College Saint-Beno4it cheese

Origins

The history of the College Saint-Beno4it cheese starts with the Sainte-Marie monastery of the Mercy (known as Monastère of the Cistern of Péra ), held by sisters bénédictines génoises starting from 1362 with the current site of the college, on the street Kemeralti with Galata. The construction of this monastery was made possible thanks to a concession granted by the Byzantine Emperor Jean VI Cantacuzène one decade rather to Génois. The expenses of construction were dealt with by the Republic of Genoa.

By order of the pope Martin V, the monastery was entrusted to the Italian Bénédictins Cassin Mount the May 12th 1427 under the direction of the apostolic legate Francesco Spinola and took then the name of Saint-Benoît . The October 24th 1450, the establishment passed to the hands Bénédictins French directed by Dom Nicolas Meynet and became a French institution then. In 1540, with the agreement of the Sultan Soliman the Magnificent the, François Ier granted to Saint-Benoît the statute vault of embassy and the establishment entered then under the diplomatic protection of the France. Under the terms of this right, the ambassadors of France named the treasurers and the vice-chancellors of this convent.

Following the departure of the Benedictines, the church and the Saint-Benoît monastery were entrusted to Dominican between 1555 and 1583.

Establishment under the Ottoman Empire

The mission of the Jesuits and the first school (1583)

At the 16th century, the catholic congregations took foot on the territory of the Ottoman Empire at the instigation of the Pope Gregoire XIII, which had established the Saint-Athanase College in Rome for the formation of a clergy grecophone with an aim of obtaining executives to fight against orthodoxy. In this context, in accordance with the will of the king Henri III and the agreement of the pope Gregoire XIII, an small group of Jesuits, composed of two French (Father Honore Caze of Marseilles and Frère Martin of Marseilles) and two Italians (Father Jules Mancinelli and Père Maurice Timpanizza of Raguse), settled the November 18th 1583 in the Saint-Beno4it cheese convent under the direction of the Father J. Mancinelli.

Thanks to the efforts of the ambassador of France Jean de Germigny and Baille of Venice Morosini, the first school saw there the day in 1583, just after the arrival of the Jesuits. The activity of those installed in Saint-Benoît was not limited to teaching. They ensured also a religious assistance the catholics in the hospitals and the prisons of the city. But in 1586, an cholera epidemic devastated the community.

The Pope Sixte V chooses the Capuchins under the direction of the Father Joseph de Léonisse to replace the four Jesuits died during the epidemic. But when the Léonisse Father and his companion, the Gregoire Father, had the bad idea to go to the Seraglio to ask the Sultan Murat III to convert with Christianity, they were stopped and expelled.

In 1604, the ambassador of France Savary de Brève managed to obtain from the Sultan Ahmet Ier the authorization for the arrival of a new mission of Jesuits. This time, all these Jesuits were French: Antoine Frégate, Guillaume Levesque, Charles Gobin and Claude Colomb, led by the Father of Canillac. About fifty pupils, mainly Latin, were registered at the school and the material taught were limited to Latin, the Greek, mathematics and philosophy.

In 1610, a hospital was created there under the employers of Saint Louis. The cholera epidemic of 1611 - 1612 put the mission in financial problems, and the Canillac Father went to Rome, then in Paris to collect funds. The Pope Paul V promised to pour 600 ecus per annum and the queen of France Marie de Médicis 300 ecus per annum for Saint-Benoît.

In 1686, a fire caused by a candle which the Father Clement Vialar forgot to extinguish, destroyed the library, as well as the church located at the entry of the establishment. Many manuscripts, thrown by the windows, could be saved at the last minute. Thanks to the intervention of the ambassador of Pierre France of Girardin, the church was restored quickly. Moreover, benefitting from a privilege granted hitherto only to the mosques, the new church comprised a covered lead cupola. During this restoration, the mufti of Galata offered to the Father higher Bénier, of the Byzantine marble columns which were installed at the entry of the church. One can see them still today.

The May 4th 1696 a new disaster damaged the Hospital Saint Louis, whose restoration was financed by the Chamber of commerce of Marseilles.

A printing works saw the day in 1703, but it was closed in 1724 because of the complaints of the Christians not-catholics.

The time of Lazaristes (1783)

In 1764, a royal Edict prohibited the Society of Jesus in France, then the Pope Clément XIV condemned them in 1773. The ruin of the congregation was propagated with a time lag with Raising but these missions could not be left with the abandonment because of their importance for the catholicity of the Middle East. Following the requests of the Knight of St Priest, Ambassador of France with Istanbul near his minister, the duke of Pivot, France decided to quickly give the missions of the Jésuites in the East to another congregation. At the time of the Council of State at this meeting in Versailles the December 23rd 1780, the king Louis XVI chose the Lazaristes, because the founder of this Congrégation of the mission , Vincent of Paul, had already planned to send companions to Raising without these projects not being able to succeed. The November 22nd 1782, by a decree of Crowned the Congregation for the Propaganda of the Faith, the Pope Pie VI charged officially the Lazaristes with replacing the Jésuites in the missions of the Othoman territory, in accordance with the will of Louis XVI. The decree signed by the Antonelli Cardinal stipulated that Saint-Benoît would remain under the monitoring and the protection of king de France.

Mgr. Pierre-François Viguier, Orientalist and Linguist, superior of the house of Algiers, apostolic vicar of North Africa and large expert of the ground missions of Islam, left Marseilles with 17 companions and unloaded the July 19th 1783 with Istanbul to take Saint-Benoît in load. This date is accepted today like that of the creation of current Lycée Saint-Beno4it cheese. As a superior of the mission, Mgr. Viguier named the Father Antoine Renard like the first director lazarist of the school.

Following the French revolution and the establishment of the republic in 1792, the Ambassador of France the Count de Choiseul-Gouffier, left Istanbul and the French colony of the city was organized under the name of " Committee of the friends of freedom and the égalité". The chief of this last, Antoine Fonton, required Mgr. Viguier to lend oath of fidelity to the republic. This one was opposed and was relieved to it the January 18th 1793 in favor of the Father Fox who agreed to lend oath.

The Saint-Louis Hospital took the name of the Hospital of the French Republic in 1794 and Saint-Beno4it cheese the Old people's home of Galata in 1798 before closing its doors in definitively 1825.

The countryside of Egypt of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1798 caused the interruption of the diplomatic relations between the France and the Ottoman Empire, from where the provisional Saint-Beno4it cheese closing. Following the peace treaty of Amiens, the Sultan Selim III emitted a Firman recognizing the rights of France on Saint-Beno4it cheese the October 13rd 1802. By a decree of the December 12th 1806 signed by Napoleon Bonaparte, France sent an financial aid to avoid the needs for the mission. Thanks to this money, new bells were ordered. Those were hung the September 20th 1807 with the tower of the Saint-Benoît church.

In 1812, the school counted 60 pupils. From 1821, the superiors of the Saint-Benoît mission carried the title of " Prefect apostolique" and they were chosen by the Holy See, persons in charge of the administration of the whole of the Eastern Catholic churches of the Ottoman Empire. Within this framework, the superior Mr. Bricet, played a considerable part in the years 1820 for the recognition of the catholic Armenian Church by Sublime-Carries. Before this recognition of the January 6th 1830, which authorized with the members of this community to set up their own places of worship, the catholic Armenian patriarch resided in the building of Saint-Beno4it cheese and the crypt of the church was reserved for its worship. Moreover, the first catholic Armenian church of the country (the Church Sourp Prgitch, always in activity, with the intersection of the streets Kemeralti and Alageyik) was built in 1834 just beside Saint-Benoît.

By a Decree obtained by the Ambassador of France, the Admiral Roussin, of the sultan Mahmud II in 1831, Saint-Benoît was authorized to accommodate Othoman subjects like pupils provided that the children Moslem, Greek, Armenian, French and Latin are treated equally and that teaching is in conformity with the standards in progress in the European schools. This same year, the obligation for the pupils to carry the uniform was introduced. The course at that time included/understood the teaching of French, Latin, Italian, Turkish, the Greek, arithmetic, the geography, astronomy, rhetoric, the literature, the natural science and the physique. The decree of 1831 authorized the admission of the external pupils, which increased manpower considerably.

Father Louis Leleu, director of the college between 1834 and 1848, spoke about his mission in his report/ratio sent in 1834 to the general superior of Lazaristes: " You cannot imagine the difficulties in managing a college in Constantinople. Multiple fires, the whims of the Levantines and the plague cause us torments. We succeeded in hardly gathering about fifty pupils; in these circumstances, it is already much. In spite of that, all enables us to believe that this figure will increase and that the institution will be reinforced. Everyone indicates that our work is satisfactory, or even very succeeded. The existence of the courses of physics and astronomy, as well as a laboratory, made not badly echoes. Several young men struck with my door to take part in these courses which we introduced for the first time at Constantinople". Leleu addressed a letter in November 1839 to Higher general of the Filles of Charity, by inviting it to create missions in Othoman territory. In spite of the mistrust caused because of possible difficulties for the nuns of being useful in a Moslem country, this request was accepted.

The support of the Girls of Charity (1839)

The December 8th 1839, Sœur Serviragol arrived at Istanbul, with two companions: the young ladies Bérnardine Oppermann and Louise-Amélie Albertine Tournier, lately converted Protestantism and wanting to be received with the Company of the Girls of Charity. To put them to the test, the Company had asked them to create a school of girls. Become Sister Bérnardine and Sœur Marie, they inaugurated Saint-Benoit-Our Lady of Providence within the same building. Starting from this date, the College Saint-Beno4it cheese became and remains always the center of the activities of the French sisters of charity in Turkey.

The principal court of the college was separate into two by a wall and the Saint-Benoît colleges for boys and girls cohabited during almost 150 years. At that time, the majority of the pupils were foreigners or Levantin S but during the 19th century the number of the Othoman pupils not-Moslems increased. Saint-Beno4it cheese played a leading role by its educational and cultural contribution in the formation of a new elite within the Othoman Christians. Among those, the school was more particularly selected by the members of the communities Armenian and Bulgarian.

The apogee of the Mission

An elementary school was added to the college-college in 1841. The school counts 150 pupils then. On this same date a printing works was born, financed by François Guizot, the French Minister for the Foreign affairs and the church was restored. Cupolas on the right and on the left of that gone back to 1686 were added giving to the church its current aspect to three cupolas.

The first book printed by the Saint-Beno4it cheese press was the modern French-Greek dictionary of J. Forceps.

The April 16th 1841, the king of France Louis-Philippe granted to Saint-Benoît the title " College royal" , in recognition of its merits in teaching. The College Saint-Beno4it cheese thus obtained the equivalence of its diploma with the baccaloréat.

A pharmacy was brought into service in 1844, followed in 1862 of a dispensary which always remains in function.

The efforts and the devotion of the sisters of charity during the Crimean War (1853 - 1856) in the military hospitals do not have unperceived past and Saint-Beno4it cheese benefitted from the sympathy which they attracted each other. The Minister for the Fleet ( Bahriye Nazırı ) Mehmet Ali Pasha visited Saint-Benoît, in company of the Ambassador of France Mr. Lavalette, to thank the sisters and it made a gift of 1000 francs. The first 3 Moslem pupils whose 1 intern (it is about the son of the private doctor of the Abdulmecit Sultan) were registered at that time where Saint-Benoît counted 120 pupils on the whole. In 1857, the Saint-Beno4it cheese pupils were accommodated with the Dolmabahçe Palate by the Sultan, where they gave a recital of violin.

The Saint-Benoît college played a part paramount in the formation of a catholic Bulgarian Église. The important figure of the Bulgarian uniatism, Dragan Tsankov (or Zankoff), was authorized to print its newspaper entitled Boulgaria between 1859 and 1861 in the printing works of the college on the initiative of the director of the time, celebrates it orientalist, Père Eugene Boré (higher of the mission between 1851 and 1866). In addition, the Bulgarian catholics used the vault of the college until the installation of a church specific to their community, not far from the college, dedicated to the Sveta Troitsa (Holy Trinity) and devoted on January 6th 1861. The permanence of this church is currently ensured by the French sisters who work with the college, proof of the strong bond between the two institutions. Moreover Borated Eugene said by the way: " it is in our college that this seed was sown and pushed without bruit".

In 1874, Saint-Benoît counts 130 pupils including 80 boarders, 49 school lunchers and 1 external.

During the War turco-Russian of 1877 - 1878, the sisters of Saint-Beno4it cheese were affected again with the service of the military hospitals. The sisters in charge of the care with were wounded with the Palate of Beylerbeyi transformed into hospital. 6 Saint-Beno4it cheese nuns, attack of cholera, lost their life. The March 8th 1878, the Top dog Ahmed Vefik Pasha sent a letter of thanks to the Superior of the Mission E. Borated in which he says: " (...) the courage and the devotion of those which we cry can be measured only with the depth of our affliction. They were devoted without reserve, until the sacrifice of their life, with the care of the patients and blessées. Their memories will not be erased as much as us vivrons". Following arrived massive of the refugees since Balkans, the dormitories of the school are reserved to them. The 1st February 1878, a popular kitchen was open under the direction of Mahéo Sister. These difficult conditions affected the school and manpower fell. Only 89 pupils were inscritis in 1880, including 77 catholics, 9 Armenians, 2 Protestants and 1 Jew.

Damaged by the wear of time or multiple fires, the buildings of the school were entirely demolished and rebuilt between 1875 and 1880 by giving him its actual position. Architecture was entrusted by it to Alphonse Cingria, Saint-Beno4it cheese former student and graduate as of the School of the Carmelite friars in Paris. The clock giving on the principal court was brought into service the May 19th 1880 at midday.

From 1881, the number of the pupils increased (to reach the 111) and especially that of the Moslems, following the inscription of the son Top dog Ethem Pasha and that of the doctor of Palate Nuri Bey. The Moslem pupils carried the uniform of the school to a detail near: instead of the kepi, they carried fez it. They were held to follow the courses of catechism, but did not take part in the obligatory prayers for the other pupils. No particular food mode was applied for the Moslem or Jewish pupils.

A room of theater was inaugurated the December 23rd 1895. The school counted 300 pupils in 1899 and 312 in 1901 including 14 Moslems and 4 Jews. The pupils were allowed following the file examination their by the direction. According to the payment of 1904, to be allowed " a candidate must belong to a family honourably known and provide a certificate of good behavior and études". In 1908, Saint-Benoît counts 377 pupils including 35 Moslems. In 1909, a section of the commercial and banking studies was born, applicant the program of the School of High Commercial of Paris. In 1912, the school counts 536 pupils including 134 Moslems and 29 Jews. Among these 536 pupils, 354 are Othoman, 47 have French nationality and 31 has Italian nationality.

During the First World War, where France and the Ottoman Empire were in opposed camps, the school was closed the November 18th 1914 and the French monks were expelled on December 1st 1914. The buildings of the school were used initially by a military hospital and then by a Turkish college. In September 1919, thanks to the return of the French monks, the elementary school, the college and the Saint-Benoît college again opened their doors with 594 pupils.

Under the new mode

The treaty of Ankara of 1921, signed by the government of Ankara and France, guarantees the continuity of the schools, hospital and religious managed by French congregations. This was confirmed at the time of the conference of peace to Lausanne and following an exchange of letters between the delegations Turkish and French at the time of the signature of the treaty of Lausanne, the July 24th 1923. In this letter, the chief of the Turkish delegation İsmet İnönü said: " I have the honor to declare in the name of my government which he will recognize the existence of religious, school and hospital works, as well as recognized institutions of assistance, existing in Turkey before October 30th, 1914 and arising with the France; he will examine with benevolence the case of the other French similar institutions existing in fact in Turkey at the date of the peace treaty signed today, in order to regularize to them situation".

The Turkish law of 1924 on state education showed the will of the new mode to put an order in the educational world, including the foreign establishments in activity in the country. The law ordered the suppression of the religious symbols, as well as the photographs of the Heads of State or foreign flags in the schools. The courses of catechism were removed. These changes tarnished the “French” character and “catholic” of the school, a tendency accelerated by the growing number of the Moslems who composed the majority of the pupils as from the years 1930.

The Saint-Benoît church which is located at the entry of the establishment, and which shelters the tombs of the first ambassador of France near Sublime-Carries (1535 - 1537) Jean of Forest, the Ambassador Jean de Gontaut-Biron, Baron de Salignac and of Prince François II Rákóczy, was restored in 1929.

Following a new law prohibiting the abroads to manage elementary schools, the primary section closed its doors in 1931. Saint-Beno4it cheese then started to accommodate graduates of the elementary schools for one eight years duration, including the first two years of Preparatory, three of college and three of college, the diplomas delivered by the college giving access at the same time the Turkish and French universities.

The law of 1935 on private education required the closing of the churches or vaults being inside the foreign schools throughout schooling and prohibits the port of the habit in the enclosure of the schools. The law ordered moreover that the courses of history, geography and Turkish are exempted in Turkish language and exclusively by teachers Turkish. The foreign schools had moreover the obligation to name an director-assistant of Turkish nationality which became in some kinds, the representative of the Turkish State within the establishment. Positive side, the law of 1935 authorized at the foreign schools to stop education during their respective religious days, from where Saint-Benoît became one of the rare schools in Turkey to close its doors at the time of Christmas or of Easter.

The boarding school was closed in 1974 but the most important change occurred in 1987, when the establishments for girls and boys were amalgamated. The event is symbolized by the destruction of the wall which separated formerly the principal court. Saint-Beno4it cheese counts then: 1600 pupils. This year is also remembered by the nomination of the laic French directing first, replacing the Father Yves Danjou.

Saint-Beno4it cheese privileged not only the training of the French language but also of the French literature, supported by a thorough study spread out over several years. Following a new payment and to facilitate the adaptation of its pupils to the entrance examinations in university, the matters of philosophy, psychology and sociology are given in Turkish since 1991, but the matters such as mathematics, biology, chemistry or the physique remained in French.

The graduates of the College Saint-Beno4it cheese benefit from a special quota within the Université Galatasaray, French-speaking establishment created in 1992.

In 1998, because of the incapacity to find remplaçantes for the French sisters who left to the retirement, the Italian company of the Sœurs of the Charity of the Immaculate Conception of Ivréa , which had abadonner recently the Italian Hospital of Istanbul, came to support the Girls of Charity. In 2002, the dispensary took the official name of Polyclinique Saint-Beno4it cheese and recognized like such by the Ministry for Health to be used not only for the pupils of the college but also like an health care center for the inhabitants of the district. The patients who cannot refund their expenses are dealt with by Caritas Internationalis.

The current location

The year 1997 testified the reorganization to the school to adapt to the new Turkish law carrying obligatory teaching at eight years. This one meant the gradual closing of the college. Saint-Beno4it cheese then became only one college five year old, which involved the considerable fall of the number of its pupils. The establishment currently counts 750 pupils who are allowed on contest. A restoration of the buildings is undertaken since the beginning them years 2000 in order to reinforce the anti-seismicity of the unit.

To date, it is about a private school, therefore paying (: 7700 euros), chosen per annum by the parents of pupils for his quality, his discipline and its French-speaking teaching. The Christian pupils constitute a small minority today. On the legal level, like all the schools known as “foreign” in Turkey, the Saint-Benoît college enjoys a particular status. The building pertaining to the Embassy of France; school programs established in accordance with the payments Turkish and the course of education supervised narrowly by the Turkish Minister of education main road; the laic teaching staff composed of the nationals Turkish and French directed by a French director and a Turkish director-assistant; the more or less direct control of the congregation of Lazaristes on certain fields, particularly on the nomination of the French director and the management of the real goods; the presence of the French sisters who are the physical witnesses of the catholic origins of this school, make to this establishment an institution “sui generis”. In spite of the enormous transformations which have occurred during its long story, Saint-Benoît remains one of the rare witnesses of the French-speaking presence with Raising.

External bonds

Official site
Association of Old of Saint-Beno4it cheese

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