Archival Studies in the Municipalities of the Ottoman Period according to Celal Esad (Celal Esat Arseven): The Case of the Municipality of Istanbul
İshak Keskin, Sinan SümbülWorks on the archival profession provide information on the historical development of the profession, on its current case, and –looking from a futuristic perspective– on its possible future developments. There are few works devoted exclusively to the subject of archival studies in Turkish history and those available are still waiting to be brought to daylight. The book entitled How Should Documents Be Recorded and Classified in Municipalities by Celal Esad [Arseven] is among the few works on archival studies. It examines the subject of archival activities in the 20th Century Ottoman municipalities, focusing particularly on the Municipality of Istanbul. It focuses on the subjects of office management, registration, filing, protection, organization, and archival practices in the Ottoman municipalities by giving examples while also emphasizing their significance and defining how they should be performed. The aim of this article is to evaluate the significance of the said book with respect to the municipalities of its age and to compare it with the current developments. Celal Esad’s book reveals that many document management functions such as registering, filing and organizing were also available and practiced at the time the book was written. This article was designed as a case study while the data evaluation was carried out through the technique of content analysis.
Celal Esad’a (Celal Esat Arseven) Göre Osmanlı Dönemi Belediyelerinde Arşiv Çalışmaları: İstanbul Şehremaneti (Belediyesi) Örneği
İshak Keskin, Sinan SümbülArşivcilik mesleği hakkında kaleme alınan eserler; mesleğin tarihsel gelişme süreci, mevcut durumu ve -fütüristik bir yaklaşımla- gelecekte ne türden gelişmeler olabileceği hakkında bilgiler verir. Türk tarihinde arşivcilik konusuna hasredilmiş eserlerin sayısı oldukça az olmakla birlikte olanlar da gün yüzüne çıkarılmayı beklemektedir. Celal Esad [Arseven] tarafından kaleme alınan “Belediyelerde Evrâkın Kayıd Ve Tasnîfi Nasıl Olmalıdır” adlı eser, arşivcilik konusuna değinen nadir örnekler arasındadır. Bu eser, 20. yüzyıl Osmanlı yerel yönetimlerinde arşivcilik konusunu İstanbul Şehremaneti (İstanbul Belediyesi) özelinde değerlendirmektedir. Söz konusu eserde; Osmanlı yerel yönetimlerinde büro yönetimi, kayıt, dosyalama, koruma, düzenleme ve arşiv işlemlerinin önemi ve nasıl olması gerektiği konuları örnekleriyle birlikte incelenmiştir. Bu araştırma, adı geçen kitabın zamanın yerel yönetimleri bakımından öneminin değerlendirilmesi ve günümüz gelişmeleriyle karşılaştırılması amacıyla hazırlanmıştır. Celal Esad’ın bu eseri, kayıt, dosyalama ve düzenleme gibi birçok belge yönetimi fonksiyonunun o dönem de var olduğuna ve uygulandığına işaret etmektedir. Araştırmanın deseni durum çalışmasıdır. Verilerin değerlendirilmesi ise içerik analizi tekniği ile gerçekleştirilmiştir.
Works on the archival profession provide information on the historical development of the profession, on its current case, and –looking from a futuristic perspective– on its possible future developments. There are few works devoted exclusively to the subject of archival studies in Turkish history. The book entitled How Should Documents Be Recorded and Classified in Municipalities by Celal Esad [Arseven] is among the few works on that subject. Although this work, which was written in Ottoman Turkish by Celal Esad, a versatile intellectual figure of the Ottoman period and of the period of the Turkish Republic, dates back to a century ago, its content is still significant today. It examines the subject of the archival activities in the 20th Century Ottoman municipalities by focusing particularly on the Municipality of Istanbul. The book focuses on the subjects of office management,document registration, filing, protection, organization, and archival practices in the Ottoman municipalities by giving examples while also emphasizing their significance and defining how they should be performed. The aim of this article is to evaluate the significance of the book entitled How Should Documents Be Recorded and Classified in Municipalities with respect to the municipalities of its age and to compare the book with the current developments in the field. It provides a content analysis of the said book and presents a detailed discussion of the basic archival issues that the book informs its readers about. Another aim of the article is to investigate which sub-topics this book deals with within the framework of the basic issues such as office and record management as well as institutional archival practices and loan procedures.
The book entitled How Should Documents Be Recorded and Classified in Municipalities was written, as the writer himself said, in order to give information on the procedures of registering and protecting documents as well as archival practices and loan procedures of documents in municipalities. The main subject of the book comprises the archival activities performed in municipalities. The book focuses on the archival activities that belong to a particular type of institution. This book, which –due to its size– should rather be considered as a treatise, was written basically on the records and the archive produced in the Municipality of Istanbul as well as on the office and archival storage activities there. This book is one of the most extensive books on the archival activities in the Ottoman period. Although the file examples given in the book were prepared for the Municipality of Kadıköy in particular, they contain some basic features that can function as an example for other municipalities as well.
The introductory sections of the book focus on the procedures of registering and protecting documents and, consequently, on the significance of archives. The book, in general, provides detailed information on the procedures of registering, protecting, organizing, and filing the documents produced in the offices as well as the procedures of transfering those documents to the archive, the archival processes, and procedures of loan requests from the archive. The writer presents five basic chapters in the book about the recording, office procedures and archival procedures of documents. However, there are also some noteworthy basic sub-topics. The book consists of 29 pages in total while the emphasis is openly put on the fourth section (9 pages). The least emphasized chapter, on the other hand, is the fifth chapter (3 pages in total). The writer discusses in his book subjects like the qualities of the clerks who perform the practices; the titles, rights, responsibilities and qualities of those clerks; the professional terminology, the material used as well as how the secretarial work and the office and archival practices should be carried out. The third section of this article, where the book is analysed, follows the divisions and chapter headings made by the writer himself. However, the article divides the information given under the headings of the book into sub-sections in relation to their professional concerns. There are, in the book, sample forms for various procedures, the layout plan for the recording and archival clerks as well as the management, and the logo designed for the Municipality of Istanbul.
At the end of this article, a glossary is given in order to explain the concepts used in the book for the subjects related to the filing department, offices, archives and management. These concepts have been given in their original spelling and they have been explained based on their meanings in the book.
This book by Celal Esat Arseven analysed here in this study, shows that the profession and procedures of record management, which have generally been accepted to have started in the post-Second World War period, had actually already begun in the late Ottoman period institutions. This shows openly that the Turkish record management tradition in the modern sense started before the Turkish Republic. This book shows once more that there really are genuine treasures which will bring to the daylight an immensely remarkable state tradition and civilisation hidden among the dusty shelves of history.
This research presents a case study which focuses on the data based only on a single work by Celal Esad through the technique of content analysis. It examines what the office and archival procedures were like in an Ottoman institution (the Municipality of Istanbul) based on the data obtained from the book entitled How Should Documents Be Recorded and Classified in Municipalities. It also finds out information on the concepts used at the time when that book was written, on the authorized officials, the equipment used and the procedures carried out. It presents a comparison of the information obtained with the current archival practices. Thus, it aims to fill a significant gap by providing researchers with a comparative example about the historical development of the archival profession.
