Alfio Grassi: Charte turque, ou Organisation religieuse, civile et militaire de l'Empire ottoman, Paris 1825. First edition,in 8vo,contemporary leather over boards,complete in two volumes,text clean and bright,overall in very good condition, a nice set of a rare work Alfio Grassi, was an Italian officer,a former colonel previously in the French service, who had lived in Turkey for several years. His account is arguably one of the most important intellectual contributions to the Turkish side of the debate during the height of the Greek Revolution and the vague of Philhellenism.By 1825, Paris was flooded with books supporting the Greeks. Grassi’s Charte turque was different. It was an attempt to provide a rational, objective, and sometimes even sympathetic look at the Ottoman system.He argued that the Ottoman Empire was not a lawless oriental despotism, but a state governed by a very specific Charte,the Quran and the traditions of the Sultanate.Grassi sought to correct what he saw as European prejudices, explaining that the Ottoman government was often more tolerant and less complex than European monarchies.Grassi organizes the work into a systematic analysis of the three forces that held the Empire together,he describes and explains the role of the Muslim clergy and how Islamic law acted as a kind of check on the Sultan’s power,he describes the administration of the provinces, the role of the Pashas, and the judicial system.Grassi’s work was seen even by his contemporaries as a Pro-Turkish apology in a Pro-Greek world. He dared to suggest that the Sultan was a reformer who deserved European respect and the Greeks were not the only civilized party in the conflict.Additionally he argued that the destruction of the Ottoman Empire would lead to a European power vacuum that would benefit Russia,a fear shared by many British and French diplomats.Modern research revealed that Grassi motives were not so innocent, he had personal interest at stake in the Levant,he exposed several more French local commercial interests in the Levant that feared the Greek recovery and,quite probably has been also helped by the Ottoman authorities to rise a press counter offensive. Obviously a very early specimen of pro Turkish press propaganda in a Philhellenic European public, probably without big success and consequently extremely rare