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The Zennanname (, ) is a by Enderûnlu Fâzıl, completed in 1793. It categorizes and describes the positive and negative attributes of women from across the and the world according to their places of origin, in a form long poem in the Dîvân tradition. The Zenanname is a sequel to the (1792-3), an equivalent work on young men by the same author. Both works are in the şehrengiz () style of the masnavi, a typology of poems describing the beauties of a city.

The work was translated into various European languages in the late 19th century, beginning with Jean-Adolphe Decourdemanche's 1879 translation as the . E. J. W. Gibb, among the first and most notable translators of into , included verses from the Zennanname in his extensive six-volume survey, A History of Ottoman Poetry. One such translation is as follows:


Reception

Scholarly discussion
İrvin Cemil Schick identifies a common strain among şehrengiz poems in that an overwhelming number of them describe male beauties, and highlights the Zenanname as a rare example of the description of beautiful women. He partially attributes this imbalance to the gendered division of Ottoman society. Indeed, the work is characterized by Michael Erdman as "exceptionally misogynist at times," and Fâzıl's own preface to the Zenanname delineates the work as having been written on commission to his male lover, reluctantly and "without conviction." In this preface, Fâzıl further identifies himself as having "".


19th Century reception
E. J. W. Gibb, who characterized the Zenanname as the "ultimate outcome of the Shehr-engiz," despite his characterization of Fâzıl as "no true poet" writes of his marked success in the individuality and originality of his work.

Jean-Adolphe Decourdemanche, in his introduction to the 1879 French translation, writes that the Zenanname was considered Fâzıl's masterpiece and the best-known of his works. He also emphasizes that his motivation to translate the Zenanname above numerous other and occasionally more significant works of Ottoman poetry arose from the interest in women and harems in the Ottoman realm.

Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall, a prominent orientalist and historian of the Ottoman Empire, compared the work to Ovid's in his History of Ottoman Poetry.

Murat Bardakçı writes that the book, when first printed in book form in 1837, was in the Ottoman Empire, purportedly due to its opposition to the institution of marriage.


Manuscripts
Extant illuminated manuscripts of the Zenanname, featuring miniatures of women, are housed in the Köprülü Library (34 Ma 422/4), Istanbul Millet Library (34 Ae Manzum 1061/3 and 1062/2), (Or 7094; formerly in the collection of E. J. W. Gibb), and Princeton University Library (Islamic Manuscripts, Third Series no. 277).


See also
  • Women in the Ottoman Empire
  • Gender and sexual minorities in the Ottoman Empire


Bibliography
  • Öztürk, Nebiye (2002). Zenannâme: Enderûnlu Fâzıl. Istanbul University, Faculty of Social Science, Turkish Language and Literature graduate thesis.


External links

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