19th century cementeries of Istanbul from the Polish point of view

Bibliogr. s. 249

This work focuses on the topic of 19th century Istanbul’s cementeries, seen from the subjective point of view by Polish travellers, who decided to visit Turkey because of various reasons: as tourists, journalists, emigrants or simply because they had to change the ship on their way to Jerusalem. The following Polish travellers’ memories were chosen as the subject of the work: Edward Raczynski (arrived in Istanbul in 1814), Manswet Aulich (1831), Ignacy Holowinski (1839), Maurycy Mann (1853), Stanislaw Tarnowski (1858), Henryk Bartsch (1861), Wladyslaw Jablonowski (1866), Adam Sierakowski (1883), Antoni Zaleski (1886), Stanislaw Kozmian (1890), Stanislaw Belza (1890) and Karol Niedzialkowski (1894). "Old Istanbul shows its soul not only with innumerable mosques, but also with the graveyards". This remark of Stanislaw Belza explaines why cementeries were thought as one of the places to be seen in Istanbul. Poles, visiting Muslim, Catholic, Protestant, Armenian, Greek and English cementeries in Istanbul and describing their location, external view, atmosphere or visitors, left a permanent mark of Turkish culture in Polish literature. Bringing the observations of Polish writers out into the open was the main aim of this work.