90

THE TAESCHNER COLLECTION (Or. 12.359, cont.)

ff. 60b-61b. A note, probably a telhts by the grand vizier, concerning the permission granted to an Indian for a passage to his country. The man had appeared in the retinue of Veminac when the latter was received in the Divan. When the Indian, a HanafT Muslim of Moghul origin, was questioned by the Sultan, he told him that he was Ahmad Khan, son of the governor of Broach near Surat [Gujarat] called Mu'azzaz Khan. The latter had fought the English, had been in hiding and had died. Of his six sons (Ahmad’s brothers), four had decided to travel to Britain and plead their case, and he, together with them, had secretly boarded a European ship. They had reached Baghdad, where they had been graciously received by the vdli. Ahmad, together with one brother, Nawazish Khan, had moved on to Selanik (Salonica), had travelled from there to Marseilles on a French ship and from there on to Lyons. His brother had fallen ill there and died. Ahmad Khan had decided to inter the body in the graveyard of his family in India. After a visit to Paris and a lengthy stay in Marseilles, he had travelled to London to arrange matters with the British government, had gone back to Marseilles, had taken the body on board ship, and finally reached Istanbul by way of Leghorn and Izmir. He was lodged in the Palace of the French Republic. He had brought with him a petition asking for permission to travel to Baghdad and Basra with the body and the necessary passport (yol hükmi); he also asked for a small sum of money (‘two, three kurus’). A superscript by the Sultan (60b) instructs the [grand] vizier to give [the Indian] 5000 kurus ■ ff. 61b-64b. A report, probably a telhis by the grand vizier, on the contents of the proposed Ottoman-French alliance [1795-6, cf. above]. The ReTs Efendi and his servants (gakirlar) appeared before the Sultan and informed him about the articles of the secret treaty negotiated with the French Republic; these negotiations had already been being conducted for nine months. France had expressed its intention to make an end to the wars in which it was involved in Europe. The proposed alliance would not jeopardize Ottoman neutrality and would only bring advantages. The Re’xs Efendi was to see the French ambassador that night (7 Zf l-hicce [1210], 13 June 1796) in his own house in order to solve the final differences; the resulting articles would be presented to the Sultan and discussed one by one before their being returned to the ambassador for signing. The treaty recognized the Porte as a major European power, the Ottoman throne indeed being the seat of the former Roman Emperor (Caesar). Again Ottoman neutrality is emphasized in one of the articles, after consultations by the Ottoman ambassador in London, Agah Efendi, that England would join Austria and Russia in a possible war against the Porte (cf. Soy sal's study, p. 143). France had