About the project

Lives behind an institution.

Ottoman Bureaucracy brings the people of the Post and Telegraph service into view: where they came from, what they learned, where they worked and how their recorded careers changed.

Creator

Fatih Kansoy · Oxford

This website was created by Fatih Kansoy as an interactive collective biography of the Ottoman Post and Telegraph service.

The underlying dataset

The project is based on the dataset developed by Hacı Ömer Akyıldız for his doctoral thesis at Marmara University.

Modernleşme döneminde Osmanlı memurları: Posta ve telgraf çalışanları üzerine ampirik bir analiz (2024).

Read the university's thesis record →

From personnel records to collective biography

Akyıldız's research draws on the Ottoman Sicill-i Ahvâl personnel registers to study the social backgrounds and careers of postal and telegraph officials. This website connects the coded records through their preserved archival identifiers. Names, schools, language terms and locality wording remain linked to their recorded evidence.

Start with an individual life, follow a place and its officials, or use Explore to ask a question across the collection.

Additional details from linked sources

A separate enrichment edition connects older EDA records, the September 2025 personnel extract and selected workbook fields using preserved archival identifiers. It adds recorded occupation categories for 4,932 officials, older occupation wording for 5,141 and workbook rank or decoration fields for 717 matched officials. The annual chronology remains in its original edition.

Readable wording is displayed with its source scope. Numeric rank, decoration and merit fields retain their original codes because their labels have not been verified. A zero is a stored code; it is not translated into an absence of an award. The printable CVs identify the original annual edition and do not include this separate enrichment.

Additional source edition and checksums

ottoman-bureaucracy-enrichment-7835c3ebd1dd0913

thismemur.csv (eda-thismemur): 69,620 source rows
8460d71c4126862214b0f70ef441da80f09eecadad743c9c3025d187fc09b699
thismemur_updated.csv (eda-thismemur-updated): 69,620 source rows
be5d29bc07a23c93ae0630e5b47d8eac22eb0fdec99ced6e3d763a4dd9177478
memur.csv (eda-memur): 69,620 source rows
f56d39ab6c0cab96f09ad3315749bd68de22013a571669e3e7962ba339707b38
memureski.csv (eda-memureski): 69,620 source rows
00a5ec4869707b4bf68ef1b487f842c444c3bc6a99c6358ba0fb6ad8d99eefc9
September 2025 detailed personnel edition (september-occupation): 67,206 source rows
6fdceb3fe1194c2a327358a28a0aabccd1dc805ef01230bebea3e3b7797b82a6
Original personnel workbook: selected rank and award assertions (supplemental-workbook): 7,532 source rows
5d62e80233900f904a72ff9729b6a210a2c182fbb275c1742236e2f254a2f607

Download the enrichment index and source manifest (JSON)

Exports without an archival identifier were compared against the identified CSV records. An ambiguous numeric-ID group was quarantined; numeric IDs are not used as a universal person key.

The collection in this edition

5,146 archival identities4,968 named officials178 names not recorded

Data edition: ottoman-bureaucracy-2026-10-11-v1-84d4f7f2230a.

The full inventory reconciles several inherited extracts. Annual biographies use the recovered extract where available; officials found only in the older edition retain their own recorded rows. An annual gap is left open. The recovered extract and the saved paper sample are narrower source populations, available as explicit Explore filters.

Edition sources and checksums

Source row numbers and workbook cells are shown in individual dossiers. These checksums identify the inherited files; the original datasets are not public downloads.

October 2024 detailed personnel edition: 69,611 source rows
05eaf61ca8b88183bf954efa84806195d7e37c8e87485b48d27a4ad9bcc4df9c
September 2025 detailed personnel edition: 67,206 source rows
6fdceb3fe1194c2a327358a28a0aabccd1dc805ef01230bebea3e3b7797b82a6
Recovered merged personnel extract: 63,953 source rows
01524b844fa47cddac266a8818e5846a7cc9dd0b5c96fc3475f143453e98b331
Saved main annual estimation sample: 56,395 source rows
27f3630fae876687c2e26e1d5486a54d31c6ec718c6a89fd23969c0255c57a6c
Inherited undated point and hierarchy roster: 1,305 source rows
b7e471b90cee55396cdbd56c80aaaf2d9268a858765295f384dac5afea64a259
Author-coded undated locality tiers: 1,443 source rows
662ae78919325b24fa77572c94876d8a9965e3cd312905bb927b373b2c768b19
Original personnel workbook: selected background assertions: 7,532 source rows
5d62e80233900f904a72ff9729b6a210a2c182fbb275c1742236e2f254a2f607

Reading a recorded life

Each dossier distinguishes the selected display values from other source assertions. A disagreement remains visible; the selected value does not establish which source is historically correct. Blank fields mean not recorded.

Time and chronology

Source Hijri years (AH) order the annual observations. Gregorian years are inherited dataset labels, not exact calendar conversions. A recorded birth year or first-work year is a separate source field. Changes between annual rows show observed differences; they do not precisely date a promotion, transfer or appointment.

Salary

Amounts are nominal assigned monthly salaries in kuruş. They do not establish cash disbursement or purchasing power. The separate first-salary field is not placed on the annual salary curve, and a first-work date does not establish when payment began.

Places

Maps show recorded locality associations against modern coastline context. They do not reconstruct journeys or historical administrative boundaries. Birthplace, first-work place and annual posting are distinct relationships. Candidate positions and unresolved geography remain explicitly marked.

Preparation and languages

Schools and training durations are recorded attributes, not inferred completion dates. Language entries retain original competency terms, including Kitabet (writing) and Tekellum (speaking). The biography displays recorded entries; omitted language fields remain available in the source evidence and supply no conclusion about ability.

Following a group

Explore separates distinct people from annual observations. Selecting a birthplace, school or chart pattern carries its contributing people into other questions. Period bounds and observation filters apply to the displayed annual rows; exports identify the chosen population, scope and edition.