Even friendly diplomatic ties with the Ottomans failed to soften European demonization of Turks.

Evidence

Political alliances with the Ottomans did little to temper European attitudes. France had extended periods of positive relations with the Ottomans, but this did not result in a change in French attitudes toward Turkish people. French Renaissance philosophers writing about the grotesque named it the “arabesque,” thus linking Islam with disgust. … Michel Baudier charged, “18 out of 20 Ottoman sultans abandoned themselves to the love of boys and used them as women.” Pope Pius II accused Turks of being “wallowed in lust” and “addicted to prostitution and rape.” Early Protestants harbored similar views. Luther famously referred to the pope and Muhammad as the “bloodhound and the devil,” and accused Muslims of “dog-marriage,” a charge reflecting earlier characterizations of Muslims as dogs. He and other Protestants also referred to Catholicism as “Turkopapalism.” — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 235

Categorization

• XREF: Fits the reader’s ‘fear without an object’ thesis: direct political engagement and even alliance did not correct the manufactured image — the image is autonomous from any actual contact.
• QUESTION: The France case is a sharp anomaly — how did Baudier and Pius II’s claims coexist with a Franco-Ottoman alliance? Worth digging into why diplomatic rationality and cultural demonization ran on separate tracks.