Skip navigation

The Exalted Column, the Hejaz Railway and imperial legitimation in late Ottoman Haifa

The Exalted Column, the Hejaz Railway and imperial legitimation in late Ottoman Haifa

Talbot, Michael ORCID: 0000-0001-7198-1422 (2015) The Exalted Column, the Hejaz Railway and imperial legitimation in late Ottoman Haifa. Cambridge University Press, pp. 246-272. ISSN 0963-9268 (Print), 1469-8706 (Online) (doi:https://doi.org/10.1017/S096392681400056X)

[img] PDF (Publisher's PDF)
15483 TALBOT_Exalted_Column_Hejaz_Railway_2015.pdf - Published Version
Restricted to Registered users only

Download (1MB)

Abstract

This article examines the political and social tensions of late Ottoman Haifa through the history of the Hejaz Railway and a particular monument, the ‘Exalted Column’ (Sütūn-u ʿĀlī), a monument erected in 1903 to commemorate the beginning of Ottoman construction on the Haifa railway branch. By first establishing the use of railways and railway architecture as a means of exerting state power in a comparative and local perspective, the railway structures in Haifa are analysed in the context of that city's other monumental buildings. This then leads to a discussion of the Sütūn-u ʿĀlī as a celebration of Ottoman authority and modernity, and of the developing Ottoman–German alliance. The symbolism of the column's iconography is shown to reflect a variety of problems that the Ottoman state faced in Haifa at the turn of the twentieth century.

Item Type: Book
Uncontrolled Keywords: Ottoman Haifa; Hejaz Railway
Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group: Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences
Faculty of Liberal Arts & Sciences > School of Humanities & Social Sciences (HSS)
Last Modified: 05 Jan 2021 23:01
URI: http://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/15483

Actions (login required)

View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year

View more statistics