I study the Dutch Golden Age and its encounter with Islam through the lens of Dutch-Ottoman relations. I’m primarily interested in how trade, cosmopolitanism, and patterns of cross-cultural interaction between the Dutch and the Ottomans in the Mediterranean influenced the structure of the Dutch colonial empire.
I grew up in Thessaloniki, Greece, and I received a BA in History from Aristotle University (2014); thereafter, I received an MA in Colonial History (2016) and an MA in Middle Eastern/Turkish Studies (2017), both from Leiden University where I was an Onassis Scholar. My published work to date has focused on the ahidnâmes regulating the presence of European traders in the Ottoman Empire; Dutch converts to Islam as intermediaries in the service of the corsairs of Algiers; and the relations between the Dutch Republic and the Knights of Malta. My current research project investigates the dissemination of Mediterranean maritime news in Dutch colonial port cities between the 1640s and the 1670s.
