Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post

Zifir · 19th September 2006, 03:25 PM

When I was reading a traveler account I came across a passage, narrating the comments of an Ottoman watching the parade of the new troops after the military refom in 1826. Though nothing new, still interesting reading:

"So these are the new troops" said he, "that I have heard so much of; these are the troops that are to defend the Ottoman Empire from its enemies! And what in Allah's name can the sultan expect to do with these beardless puny boys, with their little shining muskets? Why, they have not a yatagan among them! What does this mean? It was with the yatagan the Osmanlis conquered these territories; and it is with the yatagan they ought to defend them. The yatagan is the arm of Mohammed and of his people, not that chibouque-wire (bayonet) I see stuck at the end of their guns. Mashallah! And what sort of a monkey's dress is this?

19th September 2006, 03:25 PM	#1
Zifir Member Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Istanbul Posts: 228	An interesting passage on yatagans When I was reading a traveler account I came across a passage, narrating the comments of an Ottoman watching the parade of the new troops after the military refom in 1826. Though nothing new, still interesting reading: "So these are the new troops" said he, "that I have heard so much of; these are the troops that are to defend the Ottoman Empire from its enemies! And what in Allah's name can the sultan expect to do with these beardless puny boys, with their little shining muskets? Why, they have not a yatagan among them! What does this mean? It was with the yatagan the Osmanlis conquered these territories; and it is with the yatagan they ought to defend them. The yatagan is the arm of Mohammed and of his people, not that chibouque-wire (bayonet) I see stuck at the end of their guns. Mashallah! And what sort of a monkey's dress is this?