Musician Portraits From the Ottoman Bureaucracy
Legist and Musicologist Hüseyin Sadeddin Arel as an Ottoman Bureaucrat
Seyit YöreHüseyin Sadeddin Arel (1880-1955) came to the fore as a musicologist, theorist, and composer in the Republic of Turkey. He conducted much research on music and published articles and journals. He did not, however, pursue his musical studies as a career because he was neither a musician nor a singer. Despite his musical and literary studies, his primary line of work was in law and bureaucracy. Arel, who completed his higher education in Mekteb-i Hukuk-ı Şâhâne (Rulership Law School) in İstanbul, graduating with the first rank in 1906, started to work as an officer in the Ottoman bureaucracy in 1895 while he was still in secondary school. Arel, a high-level bureaucrat until 1918, established the Turkish Lawyers Association during his practice as a freelance lawyer between 1928 and 1953 and ensured the Law of Land Registry and Cadastre. Arel, one of the key persons in the history of Turkish law, began his duties as a young officer in the Ottoman bureaucracy and continued them during the Turkish Republic -along with his musical and literary studies. However, his duties and studies in law and bureaucracy have not been sufficiently studied. Through his national and international law studies, it has been observed that Arel’s research and pioneering aspect in music were also prevalent in his bureaucratic duties. In this biographical book chapter, besides Arel’s musical studies, his work as a translator, clerk, director, assistant director, inspector, undersecretary, international delegate, and head of departments in the Ottoman bureaucracy, which covered another part of his life, is included.
