Luigi Mongeri: A reformist and expert on "Oriental Insanity" in the Nineteenth-Century Ottoman Empire

Year 2022, , 418 - 437, 31.08.2022

Cihangir Gündoğdu

https://doi.org/10.26791/sarkiat.1112764

Abstract

This article focuses on the early career of Luigi Mongeri, who was appointed as the chief physician to the Süleymaniye Mental Asylum in 1856 to treat mental illness and improve the living conditions of mentally ill patients in the nineteenth-century Ottoman Empire. It focuses on Mongeri's early career in Italy, investigates his involvement in Ottoman imperial patronage networks and their subsequent effects on his career, and finally explores the reform program he implemented at Süleymaniye. While in the Ottoman Empire, Mongeri appeared as a reformist who claimed to improve the living conditions and treatment of patients by the use medical statistics, abolishing the use of shackles, etc. At the same time in Europe—and especially in France, which was one of the important centers of alienist medicine at the time— he presented himself as an expert on "oriental insanity,” a claim which gained him access to international medical circles and organizations.

Keywords

History of medicine, Ottoman Empire, History of insanity, History of modernization, Oriental insanity, Luigi Mongeri, Medical statistics

Thanks

I want to thank my thesis advisor Holly Shissler and committee members Orit Bashkin and Hakan Karateke for their comments and guidance. I would also like to thank Zülfiye Koçak, Vural Genç, and Yaşar Tolga Cora for their support in the preparation of the current article. My thanks also go to the anonymous reviewers of the journal.

Luigi Mongeri: On dokuzuncu Yüzyıl Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nda Bir Islahatçı ve “Şark Deliliği” Uzmanı

Abstract

Bu makale on dokuzuncu yüzyıl Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nda akıl hastalığının tedavisi ve hastaların yaşam koşullarını ıslah etmek üzere 1856 yılında Süleymaniye Bimarhanesi’ne başhekim olarak tayin olunan Luigi Mongeri’nin kariyerinin ilk dönemlerine odaklanmaktadır. Bunu yaparken bir taraftan Mongeri’nin Osmanlı İmparatorluğu öncesindeki kariyerini incelemekte diğer taraftan imparatorluk patronaj ağlarına dahlini; bunun kariyeri üzerindeki etkilerini ve Süleymaniye’de uygulamaya çalıştığı reform programı üzerinde durmaktadır. Mongeri içeride prangaları kaldırarak ve tıbbi istatistik uygulamaları vasıtasıyla hastaların yaşam ve tedavi koşullarını iyileştirme iddiasında olan bir ıslahatçı olarak karşımıza çıkarken Avrupa’da özellikle de o dönem aliyenist tıbbın önemli merkezlerinden biri olan Fransa’da ise kendisini “şark deliliği”nin (oriental insanity) bir uzmanı olarak sunmakta ve böylece uluslararası profesyonel çevre ve cemiyetlerde de varlığını kabul ettirmekteydi.

Keywords

Tıp tarihi, Osmanlı tarihi, Akıl hastalığının tarihi, Modernleşme, Şark deliliği, Luigi Mongeri, Tıbbi istatistikler

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