Study Guide for Murphey and Bacque-Grammont

Study Guide for Murphey and Bacque-Grammont essays on Suleyman's Eastern Policy

Rhoads Murphey studied with the same person I studied with at Columbia University, Tibor Halasi-Kun, taught once here at Michigan State, and now is on the faculty at the University of Birmingham in England. Jean-Louis Bacque-Grammont served as direct or of the French Institute in Istanbul and now is at the Sorbonne in Paris. Their two essays were presented at a conference at Princeton University on Suleyman. Suleyman of course ruled for 46 years, a long time, and thus there is plenty of chronological room for two accounts of his eastern policy. Bacque-Grammont focuses on the early period; Murphey on the later period. But each also has a quite different view of general Ottoman policy towards Iran and vice versa.

How do their views differ?

What were the real motives behind Ottoman policy towards Iran? religious? political?