The Ottoman Imperial University was established in Stamboul, the native part of Constantinople, by the exsultan, Abdul Hamid, in 1904, with six departments — law, medicine, politics, theology, literature, and natural sciences. It was a concession to the orthodox and loyal families of the Moslem faith who were determined that their sons should have a liberal education, but were reluctant to send them to the American missionary colleges or to the European universities. Hundreds of Turkish young men have been going to the universities of Paris, Geneva, Berlin, Vienna, and Budapest, and at those institutions have acquired liberal and revolutionary doctrines which made them dangerous to the despotism. Abdul Hamid was opposed to education in every form, particularly among the middle and lower classes of his subjects, because it made them troublesome and discontented, but he threw a tub to the whale, as it were, by starting a university of his own about four years before his downfall. It did not amount to much under his reign, but since the Young Turks came into power it has branched out considerably and promises to be an institution of importance.
There are now about twenty-five hundred students in the various departments, and a faculty of two hundred professors, most of them competent men, but only a few have had experience in instruction. For the year 1910, the appropriation for the support of the university was three million piasters, which is equivalent to $150,000 in American money — a sum that is ample to meet the present demands.
The university occupies the former palace of Kiamil Pasha, near the mosque of Sultan Bayazid, on one of the highest and best positions in the city. While the building is not at all adapted to the purpose, it is a costly and highly decorated mansion, and when the Cheragan Palace, occupied by the parliament, was burned in 1909, it was proposed to turn out the university and use the Kiamil Palace as a parliament house. Fortunately the minister of public education was able to head off the plan, because he would have found it very difficult to find even so good, or so poor a place in Constantinople for the institution. Plans have been made for a new building to cost five million dollars, but it will be a long time before the Turkish treasury can afford such an expenditure.
The largest branch of the university is the law department, called the Mektebi Hookouk, where an average of more than a thousand young men are attending lectures to prepare themselves for the bar, and for employment by the government as magistrates and in other legal capacities. Many of these young men finish their courses at the Sorbonne,
Paris, and other European institutions. More attention is paid to the Shariat, the Mohammedan code, than to European law, because that prevails throughout the entire Ottoman Empire, and is based entirely upon the Koran. Several propositions have been offered for the appointment of a commission to modernize this code, that it may better apply to everyday affairs, but thus far the Mohammedan priests have been able to head them off.
The law school is open to students of all nationalities. The matriculation fee is $5.00 and there are similar fees for tuition and for each examination, which makes the total charge $15.00 for the first year. Parliament has passed a law authorizing the officials of the university to waive the fees of students who bring certificates from local magistrates that they are competent and worthy to attend the lectures, but are not able to pay the charges. During the year 1910, 40 per cent, of the students in the law department took advantage of this exemption.
There are about fifty instructors in the law school, and probably 2,500 different young men attend all or a part of the lectures during the year, coming and going according to their convenience, but the average attendance does not exceed one thousand.
The next largest school is the Mektebi Milkieh, or school of politics, where attendance is obligatory and each student is required to appear at three lectures a day, except on Friday, which is the Moslem sabbath. There are about three hundred students and nine professors, who are teaching the several languages spoken in the Turkish Empire, and other general branches for the purpose of qualifying the graduates to fill official positions in the different provinces and in the various departments of the government. It is a training school for government employes.