Meeting 2016 Bordeaux

Hosting in Bordeaux the annual conference of this prestigious society, CORLAS (Collegium ORL Amicitiae Sacrum), is a huge privilege for the French group, the ENT School of Bordeaux launched by Professor Georges Portmann and so brilliantly pursued by Professor Michel Portmann.

Georges Portmann was among the founders of the Collegium and organized twice the conference in his city, in 1931 and 1956. Michel Portmann exerted the function of CORLAS Treasurer for a quarter of century (1966-1990) and then passed on this responsibility to Jean-Marie Aran for eight years (1990-1999). Paul van den Broek, then General Secretary (1987-2000), was kind enough to ask me to succeed to Jean-Marie as Treasurer, thus allowing me to join the Board and start working with Pekka Karma.
The CORLAS meeting organized in Lyon by Alain Morgon in 1999, with it’s so particular French touch throughout the conference and the post-conference tour in the Beaujolais, is still in the memory of the many attendees present.
The years during which I had the immense honor to act as General Secretary (2008-2015) have considerably influenced the course of my career and I am greatly indebted to the CORLAS French, honorary and non-honorary, members who supported me during this period so fortunate for me. Without their help, in particular that of Olivier Sterkers, I would not have been able to imagine organizing this conference in Bordeaux.
For decades Bordeaux has attracted numerous tourists knowledgeable in wine. With the remarkable work undertaken by Alain Juppé, Mayor of the city since 1995, the city of Bordeaux nowadays also seduces worldwide visitors for the beauty of many stone-buildings, the delicate homogeneity of its avenues, the renovated banks of its Garonne River. Water and soil have sculpted the organization of the vineyards, Saint-Emilion and Pomerol on the right bank of the Dordogne, Medoc on the left bank of the Gironde estuary, and the trio Graves, Pessac-Léognan and Sauternes on the left bank of the Garonne, south to the city.
The President and the Vice-President of the Bordeaux conference along with the city of Bordeaux will do their best to provide our friends from all around the world with a warm and hearty welcome in August 2016.

+ Official website

+ Scientific programme

Annual Report 2014

Dear Members and Friends of the Collegium,

With his striking sense of wording, the British historian Steven Runciman describes the Fall of Constantinople, in 1453, as a tragedy for the Greek people and, at the same time, a new start for the Ottoman Empire. By hosting the 61th CORLAS meeting at the edge of the Marmora Sea, close to the Bosphorus entrance, President Metin Önerci enabled some 225 members, guests and accompanying persons to realize the dual meaning of this middle-age crucial event. Behind the long murals that had contributed to its fame, the capital of the fifteenth-century Byzantine Empire was in a weaker position than it seemed at first sight. While economical power and political influence of Byzantium had inexorably been declining over the previous decades, the Turkish army had become the strongest armada of this part of the world, both in terms of infantry, cavalry, artillery and, above all, organization of its components. This remarkable military development was made possible by the talent of rulers such as Osman, Orhan, Murad (I and II) and Mehmet II. The Ottoman sultanate’s final victory was accelerated by divisions in Christendom. The reasons for disagreement were, first, religious as a result of the long-lasting theological conflict between Western (Rome) and Eastern (Constantinople) Church, the Vatican being even more reluctant to bring military support to a community that refused its leadership. There were also other sources of limited cooperation between Western forces, such as struggle for influence between occidental monarchs and trade rivalry between Genoese and Venetian states, among others.

The Corlas Board met on Saturday 23 August 2014 at Polat Renaissance hotel, the venue of the conference. The proposals made by the Board to the General Assembly will be described in the section devoted to Business meeting. For the time being, the composition of the Board throughout the whole conference is recalled: Metin Önerci (President), Orhan Ozturan (Vice-President), René Dauman (General Secretary), Reidar Grénman (Treasurer), Ashley Wackym (President-Elect and Second Secretary), Wolfgang Arnold (Counsellor), Yasuo Hisa (Counsellor), Hamlet Suarez (Counsellor), and Matti Anniko (Editor to the Acta, the reference review for the conference-related manuscripts). The Credentials committee consisting of Allen Ryan (USA, President), René Leemans (The Netherlands) and Patrice Tran Ba Huy (at the end of his last term, France) joined the Board in its second part.

+ Corlas Annual Report 2014