Recreational culture in the Ottoman and Safevi Empires (1501-1735)

The Ottomans, who were founded in the early 14th century and continued their existence until the beginning of the 20th century, and the Safavids, who ruled from the beginning of the 16th century to the middle of the 17th century, are different civilizations in terms of their political, social and even some beliefs, although they have similar characteristics. Because of the deep political disagreements between them, they competed and sometimes fought with each other. However, the relationship between the two societies continued and they influenced each other culturally. In this study, we will try to understand the mentioned cultural interaction through entertainment culture. We aim to deal with the similarities and divergences of the entertainment culture in the two societies with a comparative method. We examined the entertainment culture in the Ottoman and Safavid societies from social, religious and political perspectives through coffee, wine and other pleasure substances. We comparatively analyzed the entry of these substances into the two societies, their use among the elite and the common people, and how this situation was perceived by the Ulama. On the other hand, we tried to determine how these substances are subject to cultural exchange between two civilizations. With this aspect, our study is a research that concerns both social and economic history. In the research, we considered how each substance is perceived and used by the public, the Ulama and the state. The limitation of the study to the years 1501 to 1735 is related to the life span of the Safavid Empire. In our study, the already written literature was examined and Persian, Turkish and Ottoman chronicles, documents, travel books, divans, miniatures and other documents written at that time were used.