Ismail (bin Mustafa bin Mahmûd) Gelenbevi (1730 – 1790 or 1791) was anOttoman Turkish mathematician,HanafiMaturiditheologian, logician, philosopher and Professor of Geometry at the Naval College inIstanbul,Turkey.
His life and work are well documented in several scholarly works in English and Turkishsuch as the thesis by Alaettin Avci "Turkiyede Askeri Okullar Tarihcesi" (History of the Military Schools in Turkey), 1963, published by the Research and Development Office of the Turkish General Staff,[1] and Mehmet Karabela's "The development of dialectic and argumentation theory in post-classical Islamic intellectual history",[2][3]
Born in 1730 in the town of Gelenbe,[4] nearManisa, at that time in the province ofAydin in WesternAnatolia, he is known under the name "Gelenbevi" (English:"from Gelenbe"), which means "de Gelenbe" in French, and "von Gelenbe" in German. He studied inIstanbul where he rose through theOttoman examination system to the rank of "Müderris" or professor, at the age of 33.
At the request of the Sadrazam orGrand VizierHalil Hamit Pasha ("Paşa" in modern Turkish) (1782–1785), and of the Fleet AdmiralCezayirli Hasan Pasha, he was appointed to a professorship in mathematics at the new Naval College inKasımpaşa, on theGolden Horn, in Istanbul where he worked with other Ottoman reformers such as the Franco-Hungarian military engineer and aristocratFrançois Baron de Tott. Gelenbevi received an award from the Emperor SultanSelim III for his very accurateballistic computations.
Gelenbevi Ismail published some thirty five scientific treatises, including a monograph on the game of chess[5] written inTurkish andArabic. He is credited with the introduction oflogarithms in Turkey. The late Ottoman era Cabinet MinisterMehmet Cemaleddin Efendi (1848–1917) (Turkish: Mehmet Cemâlüddin Efendi), senior judge of the Ottoman Empire and Şeyhülislam or Cabinet Minister in charge of religious and legal matters, the Ottoman period Minister of Education and Director of the Imperial School of Commerce, Gelenbevizade Mehmet Said (1863–1937), the Turkish cinema pioneer and photographerBaha Gelenbevi (1907–1984), and ProfessorErol Gelenbe are direct descendants of Gelenbevi Ismail. A selective public high school in theFatih district of Istanbulbears the family name.[6]
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