Edmondo De Amicis (1846–1908) was an Italian writer, journalist, and traveler. His literary output includes military memoirs, travelogues, works on children’s literature, and writings reflecting socialist thought. He is particularly known for his works Il cuore (The Heart) and Constantinopoli (Constantinople).

De Amicis was born on 21 October 1846 in Oneglia. He completed his secondary education in Cuneo and Turin, then entered the Military Academy of Modena. In 1865 he became an artillery officer and served in the Battle of Custozza in 1866. He wrote articles for the journal L’Italia militare and became its publishing director in 1867. A selection of his writings from this period was published in 1868 under the title La vita militare. In 1871 he left military service to devote himself fully to literature.

During the 1870s he traveled to Spain, the Netherlands, England, Morocco, Constantinople, and Paris, turning his impressions from these journeys into books. He arrived in Constantinople in 1874 and explored the city largely accompanied by the painter Junck. In the final years of his life he lived in Turin and Bordighera, dying in Bordighera on 12 March 1908.

De Amicis’s earliest works consisted of military memoirs and short stories. Following La vita militare, he published Ricordi di Roma (1870), Ricordi del 1870–1871, and Novelle (1872). His travelogues include La Spagna (1872), Ricordi di Londra (1873), Olanda (1874), Marocco (1876), Constantinopoli (1878–1879), and Ricordi di Parigi (1879).

From the 1880s onward he focused on children’s literature and school life. Works from this period include Poesie (1880), Gli amici (1883), Il cuore (1886), Sull’oceano (1889), Il romanzo di un maestro (1890), Fra la scuola e casa (1892), La carrozza di tutti (1899), and Ricordi di infanzia e scuola (1901). In his book L’Idioma Gentile he praised the Italian language, and in Lotte civili (1901) and Le Cri du peuple (1907) he expressed his socialist ideas.

De Amicis’s work of significance to Turkish history is Constantinopoli. Based on his 1874 journey to Constantinople, the book was first published in two volumes in Milan in 1878–1879. It was quickly translated into French, English, German, and Greek. The work contains observations on the neighborhoods, streets, coffeehouses, bazaars, mosques, and daily life of the city.

De Amicis did not establish direct contact with Turkish society; he gathered most of his information from the Italian colony in Constantinople. Nevertheless, thanks to his observations and the engravings by Cesare Biseo and Junck, the book became one of the most popular travelogues about Constantinople written in Europe.

The first Turkish translation of the work was an abridged version prepared by Reşat Ekrem Koçu from the French text and published in 1936 in the newspaper Cumhuriyet. It was later published as a book in 1938 under the title 1874’de İstanbul. The complete Turkish translation was made by Beynun Akyavaş in 1981 and published as İstanbul: 1874.

De Amicis’s most famous work is Il cuore, published in 1886. Written in the form of a student’s diary, the book was quickly translated into more than thirty languages and reached a wide readership. It has been translated into Turkish under the titles Mektep Âlemi (1912), Çocuk Kalbi (1926, 1984), Annesini Kurtaran Kahraman Çocuk (1957), and Vicdan, Bir Talebenin Hâtıra Defteri (1960).

From the 1890s onward, De Amicis became interested in socialist ideas and reflected them in his writings. He gained international recognition through his literary and travel works and was among the most widely read Italian authors of his time. He died in Bordighera on 12 March 1908.