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THE TAESCHNER COLLECTION (Or. 12.358, cont., 12.359)

The collection contains copies of various official papers concerned with, mostly, Ottoman foreign policy, dated between the years 1191 (1777) and 1222 (1807-8), which were probably gathered by a official who worked for the Porte. (See also Codices Or. 12.410 and 12.412, below, which contain similar collections written in the same hand.) A considerable part of the text consists of copies from reports on the secret negotiations between the ReTs Efendi and the French ambassador, Veminac-Saint-Maur, in 1795-6 for a defensive alliance, which, despite the support of Sultan Selim III and endless discussions, was never realized (see for details, Soysal’s study, pp. 134-45, which is based on the Tarth-i Cevdet, closely based on official Ottoman sources, among them those found in the present manuscript, and French state papers). The word ‘in?a” is found (upside down) on f. 93b. The title ‘Seyyid Nu'man Efendifle] musalaha namest' is written in pencil on f. la. The collection contains the following items: ff. lb-3b. A memorandum concerning an embassy to Poland by the hfice (bureau chief) of the Dtvün-i hümdyün, the former te$rifati (master of ceremonies) Seyyid Nu'man Beg, dated 11 Cemdtfl-ewel [1]192 (7 June 1778). Apart from details on travel (partly through Russian territory), it mostly gives an account of the