Abstract
AbstractThe Ottoman Empire, which expanded its borders with a decisive momentum in the period from its establishment to the 16th century, felt the need to go to a reorganization in its own structure, when it started to lose this stability in its military relations with Europe in the following years, by questioning and determining the processes in which Europe was gaining strength. The pioneers of this innovation movement were Sultan Selim III (1761-1808) and then Sultan Mahmud II (1785-1839). Under the reign of these two sultans, representing the transition processes in which the foundations of modernization were laid, the Ottoman Western Music branch in the field of music was added to the existing branches of Ottoman music as an extension of the innovations brought by the Western model. In this process, one of the early representations of innovations in Ottoman music is the development of a new notation system that was initiated in the period of Sultan Selim III (1789-1808) and completed in the period of Sultan Mahmud II (1808-1839). The new music writing developed is called the Hamparsum notation system, a neumatic writing system through which the Ottoman Music literature was recorded. Therefore, in the transition processes in which the first steps of the Ottoman Western Music were taken, the Hamparsum notation system was addressed. On the other hand, the lyrics notebooks provided the verbal repertoire to be recorded with its composer name, maqamic qualifications, meter, rhytmic features, form and lyrics content. Therefore, they are a complementary source for us in terms of reading and interpreting the works conveyed by Hamparsum notation system. In this article, the pioneering processes of modernization in music will be interpreted through the detection and analysis of four manuscripts that make up our sample - one of Mahmud Raif Effendy, a statesman and composer of Sultan Selim III’s era, one of Sultan Selim III’s own and two works of Sultan Mahmud II that mark the transition of the modernization process to its active - from archival collections known as “Hamparsum Notebooks”. These four works, which we have identified in the catalogues numbered Y. 203/1, Y.210 / 8 and Y.209 / 7 in the Hamparsum Notebooks in the archive of the Rare Works Library of Istanbul University, have not been translated so far. There are uncertainties and confusions about them in the literature. In this article, it is aimed to reveal and analyze the inconsistencies that we found by analyzing the four works in question also in the light of the records in the lyrics notebooks of the period, as well as to examine the relationship between the works and the process of transition to modernization in music through the representation of Hamparsum notation. In other words, the reflections of the modernization process in music will be read through the formation of the Hamparsum tradition together with our findings in these archival works.