Authors

Silvana Rachieru¹;  ¹ University of Bucharest, Romania

Discussion

Adakale used to be an island on the Danube, at the border between the Ottoman Empire, Habsburg Empire and Romanian Principalities, which was sunk in 1970 once the Dam of the Iron Gates was built by Romania and Serbia. As a result of its protection that has varied over time, Adakale was a political, military and cultural border and a meeting point of different cultures. Due to its unique character, as the only inhabited island on the Danube, and strategic location between different poles of power, Adakale determined the creation of an important archival collection, both produced on the island or in the main political centers from the neighbourhood. The island has also represented an inexhaustible and continuous source of inspiration for academic research and cultural projects. The paper will focus on the last decades of Ottoman administration of the island, which also correspond to a disconnection of Adakale from the chore territories of the Empire. After the treaty of Berlin of 1878, the island was surrounded by foreign territories, due to the recognition of independence of Romania and Serbia and the creation of the autonomous Principality of Bulgaria. Traditional historiography had the tendency to consider the island as “forgotten” by the Ottoman authorities, while recent research emphasizes a permanent interest of the imperial authority towards a peripherical territory. From protection of the Ottoman subjects to uniforms of the guards, the paper will investigate different forms of the image of imperial authority which could be identified in this small island. Main sources are various reports between the governments and Ottoman Embassy in Vienna as well as the neighbouring consulates, in an attempt to emphasize once more an imperial image which coincided with the ideology and legitimation of power of sultan Abdulhamid II.