The subject of the lecture will be the Ottoman “world of knowledge”, meaning the way Ottomans conceived the limitations of human knowledge; in other words, Ottoman epistemology and gnosiology. The focus, however, will be not so much in the philosophical dimensions of the subject; rather, it will seek to explore its historical development: the way the horizons of
this mental universe were delineated, in space, time or dimension, and the way they were expanding (or contracting) with time; the way this universe was seen as having limits, showing fields that could not (or should not) be known – and the way these limits were shifting to and fro in the continuum of reality.

There are horizons in time: namely, every culture in a given moment has a conception of how far can it trace back human history, but also of whether it can predict future developments somehow. There are horizons in space: every conception of the world has its well-known (or less well-known) territories, beyond which there are terrae incognitae, either to be explored or considered the place for wonders and strange phenomena par excellence. Finally, there is what can be called horizons in dimension: from the microcosm of the human body and its function to the macrocosm of the supralunary world, relations, hierarchies and correspondences influence the way we think of the universe and of what can be known about it.