摘要：In the beginning of the eighteenth century, the position of continuous official historiographer ( vekâyi‘nüvîs ) was institutionalized in the Ottoman Empire. These men continued to record Ottoman history, and were consecutively appointed, until the end of the Ottoman Empire. This policy was exceptional, yet no one has speculated as to why they were institutionalized and in what way they chose to write history. The purpose of this paper is to reconsider the formation process and their ideas by examining the careers of the supposed first four official historiographers: Na‘îmâ, Șefîk, Râșid, and Küçükçelebizâde. The questions asked are: (I) Was the position of official historiographer really instituted in 1714 (a date accepted by modem scholars)? Why was this institution of offical historiographer created? (2) How and why did the early official historiographers want to write their histories? In conclusion: (I) The official historiographers might be said to have been institutionalized around the year 1717, because their continual historical writing started at that time. The Ottomans’ vision that consecutive historical writing is useful might have motivated the institutionalization. (2) Their main purpose could be regarded as praising their patron. That is why their histories were generally described as boring and uninteresting for modem scholars. We should note, however, that these characters were intentionally chosen by them. Documents and registers classfied as “the Secretariat of the Official Historiographer” in the Ottoman Archives of the Prime Ministry were examined for the appendix. They were found to be composed of various materials in no particular order, and none of them bear a direct connection to the chronicles. It follows that these documents and registers were probably not the ones given systematically to official historiographers, and this fact leads us to question even the existence ofthis secretariat.
