Booty Turks

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Ludwig Maximilian Mehmet von Königstreu , the so-called “booty Turk”, whose family was raised to imperial nobility in 1716 ;
Oil painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller in Barsinghausen Monastery

Looted Turks were Ottoman prisoners of war during the so-called Turkish Wars , which were deported to Germany in the 17th and 18th centuries and completely assimilated .

Turkish Wars

Ever since the fall of the Byzantine Empire and the conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Sultan Mehmet II , but at the latest with the first siege of Vienna in 1529 by Sultan Suleyman I , the Islamic Ottoman Empire was considered a serious threat to the West . At the height of its expansion phase in the middle of the 17th century, the Ottoman Empire tried to destroy the Habsburgs and besieged Vienna again. The liberation of Vienna on September 12, 1683 by a coalition army of Venetians, Saxony, Bavaria and Poland-Lithuania as well as Imperial Habsburgs marked a turning point in the military-political relations between the Habsburgs and the Ottomans. The salvation of Vienna was interpreted as a triumph of Christianity over Islam. In the years that followed, the Habsburgs succeeded in further reconquests: Neuhäusel fortress fell in 1685, Budapest in 1686 , Mohács in 1687 and finally Belgrade in 1688 .

During the Turkish wars , both sides were in no way inferior in terms of brutality and violence. The “ Türkenlouis ”, Margrave Ludwig Wilhelm von Baden , reported to his emperor that the decisive battle at Novi Slankamen on August 19, 1691 had “cost a lot of blood…” and “so I don't think that this seculo was a bit more severe and bloody The Ottomans had already abducted the children of the conquered territories and re-educated them to the Janissaries , the higher ranks of the militaries of the victorious powers now deported the strongest “booty Turks” and the most beautiful “booty Turks” as prisoners of war to the individual residences, especially in Southern Germany. Hundreds of Ottoman prisoners of war were found as court shops in Stuttgart , Heidelberg and Munich . You can also find traces of them in Hanover and Berlin . With the returning " Turkish warriors " it was customary to enslave people as living booty and trophies in addition to other items of booty ; often for the purpose of giving or selling them to a boss or gentleman after their return in order to gain a social advantage. In the circles of the princes and the higher nobility it was an important prestige feature at that time to adorn one's own court with exotic clad young Turks. These led a relatively comfortable life as lackeys and maids . The time of the Baroque preferred the exotic to the chinoiserie and Hofmohren at the courts now joined the Turquerien . A literary example of this is the appointment of Monsieur Jourdain as "Mamamouchi" at the end of the ballet comedy Der Bürger als Edelmann by Molière and Jean-Baptiste Lully .

assimilation

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Tomb slab erected on the outer wall of St. Petri Church in Hanover-Döhren (rebuilt in 1949) for Johann Ludewig Mehmet von Königstreu (1709–1775)

The initial status as a slave quickly transformed into patronage relationships of a quasi-familial character. The release into freedom and naturalization of the abducted Turks was preceded by an integration concept, which, after learning the “German language and main parts of Christian teaching”, resulted in the conversion from Muslim to Christian. Most of the time, Catholicization took place in the first four years, sometimes for decades. Thus converted an eighty-year-old Turkish officer named Hussein in a Friedrich Karl Wilhelm Benedict .

According to the principle of " Cuius regio, eius religio " , the country father decreed the religious affiliation of his serf subjects , so that many of them were baptized. After the baptism, most of the former Muslims hired themselves out as staff at the former owner. Already in the first generation, captured Turks achieved positions of trust such as tax collector, city governor or governor.

Most of them married into the German middle class and had children; some made the leap into higher circles. Fatima baptized Maria Aurora was mistress of Augustus the Strong and his wife of his valet Johann Georg mirror. Augusta Marianna Cölestine Fatme became Countess Castell through marriage (see below). The elector of Hanover , George I , persuaded the emperor to raise his valet as Mehmet von Königstreu to the rank of nobility, thus giving him an inheritable title of nobility.

Cultural influences

The cultural exchange in connection with booty Turks and booty from Turks was particularly evident in the arts and crafts in the sense of " alla turca ": The charming jewelery of the " Turqueria ", the new world of figures in porcelain art and goldsmithing, testify to an enrichment. The same goes for the “ Turkish Garden ” in Schwetzingen Castle and the expensive construction of the “ Turkish Mosque ” that followed. Former military musicians were accepted into the princely military bands and enriched Western music with the previously unknown instruments of Janissary music . Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart brought the new dimensions of the sound world of the " Turkish Opera " in 1781, which was highly regarded at the time, to the highest artistic maturity with " The Abduction from the Seraglio ". The pleasure in decorative surface fillings in the sense of horror vacui in painting also testifies to the new influences. The ornament technique of Islamic art was also formative . Flowers such as rose , carnation , hyacinth and tulip are imported from Turkey. As the “flower field of paradise”, these flowers symbolically adorned the equipment of war to illustrate the entrance of the fallen warrior of Islam in the holy war ( jihad ) as a martyr (shahid). The typical Ottoman dragon and cloud ornamentation also found its way into German art. Nikolaus Strauss opened the first coffee house in Würzburg in 1697 .

Well-known booty Turks

The research is so far incomplete; it includes several hundred names that have been passed down from tombstones and church chronicles. Well-known names of former booty Turks are among others

See also

literature

  • Hans-Joachim Böttcher : The Turkish Wars in the Mirror of Saxon Biographies, Gabriele Schäfer Verlag Herne 2019, ISBN 978-3-944487-63-2 , pp. 229–244 (XIII. Turks at historical times in Saxony).
  • Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall : History of the Ottoman Empire. Volume 3: From the accession of Murad the Fourth to the Peace of Carlowicz. 1623-1699 . 2. improved edition. Hartleben, Pesth 1835, p. 725ff.
  • Hartmut Heller: Around 1700. Strange fellow villagers from Turkey. Minority observations in Franconia, spa Bavaria and Swabia. In: Hermann Heidrich et al. (Ed.): Strangers in the country . Verlag Fränkisches Freilandmuseum, Bad Windsheim 2000, ISBN 3-926834-43-9 , ( Writings Süddeutscher Freilichtmuseen 1), pp. 13–44.
  • Hartmut Heller: The Nuremberg restaurant "Alla Turca" - and what preceded it: "Looted Turks" of the 16th and 17th centuries. Century. In: Hartmut Heller: New Home Germany. Aspects of immigration, acculturation and emotional attachment. Erlangen 2002, pp. 265-274.
  • Philipp Roeder von Diersburg : The margrave Ludwig Wilhelm von Baden's campaigns against the Turks, mostly based on manuscripts that have not been used until now. Volume 2. Müller, Karlsruhe 1842, p. 385.
  • Faruk Şen , Hayrettin Aydın: Islam in Germany. Beck, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-406-47606-6 , pp. 10-12.
  • Eva Verma: Booty Turks. In: "... wherever you come from". Binational couples through the millennia. Dipa, Frankfurt 1993, ISBN 3-7638-0196-0 , pp. 47–56, (also some in: Hofmohren ibid. Pp. 73 ff.)
  • Zdisław Zygulski jr .: Turkish Trophies in Poland and the Imperial Ottoman Style. In: Armi antiche. Numero speciale per il 6th congresso dell associazione internazionale dei musei d'armi e di storia militare. Accademia di S. Marciano, Turin 1972, pp. 26-66.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ernst Petrasch: The Karlsruhe Turks' Booty ( Memento of the original from June 21, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.tuerkenbeute.de archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Website of the Virtual Museum Karlsruher Türkenbeute (PDF, p. 2).
  2. ↑ Hartmut Heller: Baptism of the Turks around 1700 - a forgotten chapter in Franconian population history. In: Hartmut Heller, Gerhard Schröttel: Refugees and non-believers in Franconia. Würzburg 1987, pp. 255-272.
  3. ↑ The country's memory: Freiherr Leopold von Zungaberg (Pascha Mehmed Csonkabeg) . Niederösterreichische Museum BetriebsgesmbH., Accessed on October 9, 2017.
  4. ↑ Muhammad Salim Abdullah : History of Islam in Germany . Verlag Styria, Graz-Vienna-Cologne 1981, p. 19, ISBN 3-222-11352-1 .
  5. ^ Arthur Kleinschmidt :  Hermann, Margrave of Baden . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 12, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1880, pp. 120-122.
  6. ^ Prosper Graf zu Castell-Castell:  Castell-Remlingen, Friedrich Magnus Graf zu. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 3, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1957, ISBN 3-428-00184-2 , p. 171 f. ( Digitized version ).
  7. ↑ August Sperl : Castell. Pictures from the past of a German dynasty. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart and Leipzig, 1908, pp. 416–422.
  8. ^ Walter von Bötticher: History of the Upper Lusatian nobility and their estates 1635-1815. Self-published by the Upper Lusatian Society of Sciences, Görlitz, 1912, p. 899/900, digital version (PDF, 0.55 MB).
  9. ^ Friedrich August Freiherr ô Byrn: On the life story of Count Friedrich August Rutowski. in: Karl von Weber (Ed.): Archives for the Saxon history. New episode - second volume. Bernhard Tauchnitz publisher, Leipzig, 1876, pp. 317-350, digitized from slub.dresden.
  10. ↑ The Turkish prisoners in Würzburg also brought the Germans the coffee (PDF) .
  11. ↑ Viviane Deak, Yvonne Grimm, Christiane Köglmaier-Horn, Frank-Michael Schäfer, Wolfgang Protzner: The first coffee houses in Würzburg, Nuremberg and Erlangen. In: Wolfgang Protzner, Christiane Köglmaier-Horn (Ed.): Culina Franconia. (= Contributions to economic and social history. 109). Franz Steiner, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-515-09001-8 , pp. 245–264, here: pp. 245 and 253–256 ( The first coffee house in Würzburg ).