Rumelia

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Map with the status from 1801

With Rumelia ( Ottoman روم ايلى İA Rūm-ili, Rūm-ėli , Turkish Rumeli about "Land of the Rhomeans " or "Rhomean Country "), the Turks have referred to the European part of the Ottoman Empire on the Balkan Peninsula since the 15th century .

General

The geographical name Rumelia (Rūm-ėli) is composed of Rūm (from Greek Ρωμανία, Rhōmanía "land of the Romans", actually the entire Eastern Roman Empire ) and the old Turkish il (country) and is in contrast to Anatolia ( Anadolu  /اناطولى / Anaṭolı "Land in the East"), the Greek name for Asia Minor.

In contrast, Rūm retained its earlier meaning without the addition -ėli , which referred to the Anatolian territory, which had been conquered by the Rum Seljuks around 1071 . For example, the Egyptian travel writer Rifa'a at-Tahtawi (1801–1873) noted that some Ottoman translators of his time applied Rūm to Europe as well as to some landscapes in Asia under Ottoman rule.

The province of Sivas was also known as Eyâlet-i Rum , Eyâlet Rum, in Ottoman times . The name rum is also included as a component in the name of the city of Erzurum (from an earlier Arzan-i Rūm or Arzan ar-Rūm or Arz-i Rūm ).

Map from 1827

Since the Greeks had largely lost control of Anatolia since around 1350, it made sense to refer to the rest of Europe of the Eastern Roman Empire, the later Ottoman province, as the "land of the Greeks". In the European languages ​​this word was slashed to Rumelia. The term was used by the Turkish administration until 1864 for the entire European part of the empire with the exception of Bosnia , Hungary and Morea . 1864–1878 the Serbian Niš , northern Bulgaria (from Widin to Varna ) and the Romanian Dobrudscha were transformed into the Vilayet Tuna . In 1878, eastern Rumelia , southern Bulgaria, also became autonomous and united with Bulgaria after an officer coup in 1885.

See also

literature

Web links

Wiktionary: Rumelia  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Richard Franz Kreutel : Life and Deeds of the Turkish Emperors , 1971, p. 268. Karl Teply: Turkish sagas and legends about the imperial city of Vienna , 1980, p. 59; Halil İnalcık: Article Rumeli . In: Encyclopaedia of Islam: "the territory of the Rūm [qv], the geographical name given to the Balkan peninsula by the Ottomans".
  2. See the use of the same term for the eastern part of the Peloponnese by the Venetians.
  3. Halil İnalcık: Rumeli . In: Encyclopaedia of Islam: “Ottoman Turks borrowed the name Rūm-ėli from the Greek Rhomania and began to use it, in contradistinction to Anadolu, to refer to the lands they conquered from the Byzantines beyond the sea. The name Rūm by itself, retained its original meaning and remained as a geographical name designating the area under Saldjuk rule in Asia Minor. "
  4. Rifa'a at-Tahtawi: A Muslim discovers Europe. The journey of an Egyptian to Paris in the 19th century . Edited and translated by Karl Stowasser. Gustav Kiepenheuer, Leipzig / Weimar 1988 ( Oriental Library ), ISBN 3-378-00253-0 , p. 22. Later edition as: A Muslim discovers Europe. Report on his stay in Paris 1826-1831 . CH Beck, Munich 1989, ISBN 3-406-32796-6 .
  5. Suraiya Faroqhi , Article Sīwās in the Encyclopaedia of Islam
  6. Halil İnalcık: Erzurum . In: Encyclopaedia of Islam