| The early-modern period witnessed the slow demise of the old medieval order dominated by the dual authority of emperor and pope. The Age of the Crusades was also past. Princes like Francois I began to engage in economic and military alliances with the traditional enemy, the Muslim Turk. Increased diplomacy and trade brought with it a pew freedom of movement between Christendom and the Ottoman Empire. This dissertation explores the consequences of this new interdependence on the relations between the French and the Turks during a period before the emergence of Western economic, military and cultural hegemony. It does so via a consideration of literary as well as historical documents, ranging from theatrical texts to diplomatic correspondence, travel accounts to histories. It is argued on the basis of these sources that, while a new intimacy with and curiosity about the Turks did not dispel old misgivings and fears, it did foster a new level of pragmatism on the part of French diplomats and travelers. In a contemporary development, disciplinary pressures were growing during this period of state formation in France, a phenomenon that has famously been referred as the "civilizing process". This dissertation seeks to explain the complexities and frequent paradoxes of the image of the Turk by reference to this phenomenon. |
