Source Value of Foreign Travel Books in Terms of Ottoman City Histories

During the writing an Ottoman city history, travelogues have an important place among other sources that could be consulted. These books, their authors whether local or foreign, contain valuable information worth checking out carefully in many ways. Though different discussion on travel books about their value of historical source exists, they reflect lively description of time and place, cultural structure of the period and make us possible to look at history from a different aspect. In this context, travelogues, as a source of Ottoman city histories, gained more importance in terms of Ottoman historiography. This paper aims to make, after a general review of the studies on travel accounts in Turkey, a few observations in terms of source value of travel books in city historiography.