studying the ottomans - artsrn.ualberta.ca 2012/lecture/sept 24... · the ottoman empire, sixteenth...

Part I: A Changing Empire - 17th C.:

‘Emergence of New Elites’Sept. 24 - 26

Studying the Ottomans:

Formation of the Modern State: the Ottoman Empire, Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries

Rifa’at ‘Ali Abou-El-Haj

Studying the Ottomans

Central Question:

Are changes in Ottoman Empire about:

- loss of power, incompetence of ruling class(‘Decline Theory’)

or

- (emergence of) autonomy of Modern State?


Essence of ‘Study’: - challenging historians to re-read major sources of the era (primarily 17th century)

Why?- argues their reading to date has wrongly supported the long-standing ‘decline’ theory


‘Decline Theory’:-Ottoman Empire reached its apex with the centralized rule of Suleiman the Magnificent- ‘decline’ began thereafter- measured in:

-lost territory-diminished power Sultan- ‘unraveling’ of empire (political system, morality,

economy)


According to ‘theory’:

- fate of becoming “the sick man of Europe” (19th

Century) inevitable

- defeat and dismantling of Empire (early 20th Century) also inevitable


Abou-El-Haj:

- historians have used Euro-centric view of ‘natural’emergence of Modern State as model

- have read late 16th and 17th century internal Ottoman sources through prism of this model rather than in context of Ottoman reality


Re-reading these texts with authors’ (personal) positions and audiences in mind and

Without assumptions of European Modernization –

Will lead to new appreciation of Ottoman political development:

Transformation (not decline) of the State


Original edition (1991): considerable research since then- some taken account of in second edition (2005)

- the ‘Long Decline of Empire’ theory still dominates but there have been challenges to it (eg. Carolyn FinkelOsman’s Dream)

- Quataert also questions it: from perspective of 19th C

[as we will see]

- Abou-El-Haj most fully develops argument in context of 17th C.


‘The Study’:

- bulk of book entitled ‘The Study’: pure analysis

- assumes knowledge of ‘facts’

- This week: will try first to establish changes taking place in the 17th century- then will engage with Abou-El-Haj’s arguments and the main sources he examines (Mustapha Ali, KochuBey, Mustapha Naimi)


17TH Century Issues: the Ecomony

Spain and the New World:

- 16th century sending flotillas loaded with silver back to Europe

`- Impact on Europe: inflation

- Ottomans increasingly tied into European commercial networks in 16th century [last week’s lecture]

- impact transferred into Ottoman economy

[Abou-El-Haj references this context]

-1585-6: Ottomans warring with Safavids[below]

- revenues from new conquests considerably diminished (compared to old, ‘wealthy’ ones)

- ‘cash’ needed to pay janissaries and other military

- Cut silver content of currency in half: debasement of silver asper caused major financial instability

- Many refused payment in coin


- those on fixed salaries suffered most, bureaucrats, military: many of whom were janissaries

- 16th C. saw rapid growth in janissary class:

-1527: 8000-1574: 13,500-1601: 40,000


Janissaries:

Consequences:- Growth at expense of sipahis (traditional cavalry): social, political tension

- janisssaries chronically under paid (plus problems of inflation)

- often several months with no pay (lack of cash in treasury)

17th Century Issues: The Economy

Consequences:- upon succession of Selim II (1566): janissaries threatened mutiny

- demanded ‘payment’ in return for assured support: received

- critical moment: underscored dependency of Sultan on ‘new troops’

- also economic imperative of providing regular salaries


- some preferred to seek independent means: developed links to local merchants, craft and trade guilds (eg.carpentry, metal-working; slave-trading)

- ‘elite’ status translated into urban context

- became “voice of the people”


Janissaries: class in transition

- after first generations, janissaries permitted to marry, have families

- fathers arranged for sons to move into ‘system’

- Janissaries now Muslim by birth

- self-reproduction fulfilled state needs BUT changed essential identity of corps, class


Janissaries: class in transition

- ‘evolution’ of class during 16th C.:- reduced need to recruit devshirme(effectively died out by mid-17th C.)

- acquired new economic significance: issues of ‘payment’ (and responses when not paid, eg. 1566), new role as ‘urban elite’

- role as rural ‘landlords’ (timariots) declined: after 1695 timar no longer granted as salary (below)


17TH Century Issues: the Economy

As taxes paid in ‘cash’, real value taxes paid to Sultan’s treasury decreased by half

Response?- raised taxes, so some paid more

- introduced ‘new’ taxes: on cavalry (sipahis), peasants (reaya)

- ‘borrowed’ from elite (‘notables’) and merchants

- moved away from ‘timar’: introduced ‘tax farming’:

17th Century Issues: the Economy

[from lecture Sept. 17]Timar:- Sipahis (cavalry) and janissaries:

- received rights to land - and to peasants on it

- For janissaries (paid only sporadically) replaced salary

- ‘Rights’ continued as long as participation in military campaigns continued


- Grants were both small (managed by provincial governor) and large (administered directly by Sultan)

- Sometimes held by high-placed women (eg. Sultan’s mother)

- Careful records kept

- In early years, timariots often moved so that none became too ‘rooted’ in local region


Tax Farming:- timar difficult to control, much potential ‘surplus extraction’ escaping government treasury

- ‘tax farming’ began to replace:- ‘farms’ up for auction every three years- land-lords paid ‘price’ for right to collect taxes- agents delivered both to them and to imperial treasury (according to agreement of ‘rental’)- payments increasingly in cash


Benefits:- treasury benefitted from tri-annual ‘auctions’ directly- farmers had vested interest in respecting ‘contract’- auctioning in hands of ‘new elite’ [see below] : means of ensuring their loyalty

Problems:- Facilitated local-level exploitation of reaya(peasantry) in order to maximize return to ‘farmer’- rapid turn-over of property mitigated against investment (which assumes long-term returns)

1695: establishment ‘lifetime’ tax-farms malikane

- local families bought rights to collect taxes from property in perpetuity, replacing timar and ‘short term’tax farming

- paid for in cash: had immediate (positive) impact on treasury

- longer-term aims: -improve investment in rural areas- improve agricultural standards, productivity


Results:- Holders of malikane no longer moving from region to

region: building up local ‘investment’, allies, power

- sipahis and increasingly, janissaries, marginalized from landed influence, wealth

- Ability of ‘new landlords’ to expand exploitation, over-taxing peasantry increased (no ‘controls’ on system’)


Results:

- further consolidation ‘power’ in hands of new elites

- new dynasties emerged, one of most important being Koprulu family

- Reinforced by, increasingly contributed to evolution of ‘new court’


‘Waqf’: charitable, religious endowment

- important element of Economic as well as Social change

- undergoes significant evolution between 16th and 19th centuries

- Abou-El-Haj deals with in ‘next section’: will return to in context of next week’s discussions


Era of ‘The Sedentary Sultan’:- Suleiman’s reign seen as ‘watershed’ also in terms of

Sultan’s role, behaviour

- As ‘expansion’ of empire gave way to ‘consolidation’, successors (Selim II, Murad III, Mehmet III) preferred withdrawal from direct governance, warfare

- increasingly remained in Istanbul and Topkapi Palace

17th Century Issues: the ‘New Court’

- Murad III (1575-95) -- ‘Patron of the Arts’): first commissioned portraits of sultans to illustrate historical texts

- significant: Sultan depicted ‘on his throne’, rather than on horseback

- reflected new vision of Sultan’s ‘sedentary’ role - also centered power firmly in palace:

power tied to place as much as (more than?) person!


The Palace:- even under Suleiman, changes were underway in court

life: harem

- under his successors, other new ‘court players’ evolved: pashas, viziers, royal sheikh

- Became known as ‘new elite’: influence permeated society


Entertainment in a palace courtyard(1530)

The Harem:- 15th C.: slave women obtained through war, purchase

- gradually replaced strategic, political marriages

- provided wives to: royal clan, administrators, provincial governors

- ‘harem’ [‘forbidden’]: concubines, children (boys and girls), attendants (slave servants – including eunuchs)

17th Century Issues: The Harem

Under Mehmet II: (1444-6; 1451-81)- moved to new Topkapi Palace,

- harem housed in ‘old palace’, with ‘Queen Mother (valid sultan)

Under Suleiman (1520-66):- significant part of harem moved with attendants and servants into Topkapi Palace (probably by 1534)


Marked significant changes: in power, authority of harem vis-à-vis Sultan- once in Topkapi, grew in size:

- under Suleiman, numbered 49- under Selim II (c.1575) more than 70- ‘older’ women moved back to Old Palace- Topkapi harem ‘retired’ to Old Palace on death of Sultan

- by 1600-1:- Topkapi harem housed 275 women- Old Palace harem, 298 women


Palace Harem:- extended Royal Family: ‘active’ concubines, mothers of royal children, valides sultans

- many married to janissaries, ‘suitable men of state’: manumitted, given dowry

- Valides sultans seldom married

- became influential centres of their own courts


Public Role-Profile:Suleiman’s Hurem Sultan – former slave, Roxalanna:

- from western Ukraine, captured by Crimean Tartar slave traders, sold into royal Harem, Instanbul- became Suleiman’s ‘favourite’: only concubine freed, married – become is legal ‘wife’[see ‘Roxalana’, Additional Readings]

- began tradition of more visible harem, more public ‘royal women’



Imagined ‘romantized’ Harem (left):‘Roxelana’, Hurrem Sultan (above)

- said to have advised in political affairs, both domestic and foreign [see letter below]

- active programme supporting (traditional) charities: built mosque, medersas (Qu’ranic schools), fountain, hospital

- Also built hamam (public bath) near Hagia Sophia



Letter of Hürrem Sultan to Sigismund II Augustus, congratulating him on his accession to the throne (1549).

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roxelana]


Hurrem Sultan ‘Bath’ complex, Aya Sophia Square (Istanbul)

Jerusalem 1552: imaret- built public soup kitchen: said to have fed 500 people per day (students of medersas, dervishes, poor ‘needy’)

- constructed as ‘waqf’ [see discussion below]

- complex consisted of:- mosque, - pilgrim hospice (55 rooms)- inn (khan) for travellers.


Entrance to Haseki Sultan‘imaret’, (soup-kitchen complex)Jerusalem

Selim II (1566-74):

- Nurbanu Sultan: concubine “wife”

- no agreement on origins (noble Venetian? Daughter of Spanish Jew? Greek?)

- Took active role in foreign affairs: corresponded with ‘Most Serene Republic of Venice, Queen Catherine de Medici (France)



Nurbanu Sultan and Sultan Selim II

- ordered architect Mimar Sinan [last lecture] to build Atik Valide Mosque and Kulliye (Istanbul):- complex built around mosque composed of:

-medersa- hosptial and medical centre- place for sufi retreat (mystical brotherhoods)- inn to serve travellers- hamam

- completed, put in commission end of 1583 - as valide sultan paid highest salary in empire



Atik Valide Mosque and Kulliye (Istanbul)

- Her son, Murad III, became Selim’s successor (brothers executed)

- She then took official title of ‘valide sultan’ (Queen Mother)

- With Murad’s favourite concubine dominated court/family affairs


Murad III (1774-95):- concubine: Safiye Sultan – Albanian birth

- following death of Nurbanu, as mother of Mehmet, she became ‘haseki sultan’ (mother of heir to the throne)

- after 1595, Mehmet III’s accession to throne, became valide sultan

- exercised great influence- supported Grand Vizier in court politics- ‘partial’ to the interests of Venice in foreign affairs


Valid Sultan (centre) with others of Harem [note Chief Black Eunuch at far left]

Inside the Palace:

- princes no longer did duty in provinces

- remained in, educated in palace, under influenceof harem women and royal eunuchs

[note ‘Chief Black Eunuch,bottom, left]


.


Painting of Selim II,Clearly suggestinginfluence of ‘women’ inhis reign

- with growing importance Harem, valide Sultan enhanced position “Chief Black Eunuch”

- Gained control over endowments for Holy Places, also those of previous four sultans

- Huge amounts of money involved: translated into huge amount power

- Achieved at cost of others in Palace: viziers, other Eunuchs (including Chief ‘White’ Eunuch)


Chief White Eunuch (above)Chief Black Eunuch (right)

The ‘New Elite’:

- royal military and administrative offices: new source of wealth and power

- Ghazi ‘warrior skills’, sipahis cavalry given way to:- military administrators: ‘Pashas’, ‘viziers’- powerful urban elites: ‘imperial troops’, janissaries

17th Century Issues: the New Elite

- new elites competing for positions, access to wealth (egtax-farms)

- pashas, wealthy ‘notables’: trained clients, dependents, apprentices -- ‘clientage’

- playing key roles as ‘king makers’, policy shapers

- political strategies placed them in court – jostling for ‘favours’

- by 1680-1700: some 40 ‘grandee’ families [Abou-Al-Haj’s term] controlled more than half appointments to high office


‘Sheikhuislam’: Royal ‘Sheikh’ (interpreter of Islam at court)- created by Murad III [lecture Sept. 19]

- in context of Palace politics, religious hierarchy lost distance from secular affairs:

-became part of ‘new elite’: moral authority replaced by court authority-began to be source of law

[see ‘Decrees’ of Royal Sheikh Feyzullah Effendi, Abou–El-Haj, ‘Discussion Document Oct. 5]


State religion becoming puritanical, inflexible: ‘return to tradition’

- late 16th C. customary ‘tolerance’ being challenged- (once again) tearing down coffee houses, banning

tobacco, razing taverns- attempted to prohibit alcohol trade (wine trade in hands of Jews & Christians -- but served many Muslims, including those in the Royal Household)- restricting permitted clothing apparel Jews, Christians


Jews:- prominent in commerce: expelled from main commercial

area in Istanbul

- present in Court: physicians, diplomats, advisors

- ‘lady-in-waiting’ to valide sultan under Mehmet of Jewish background - blamed for economic crisis (reflecting ongoing perceived power of harem) – poisoned


Jews:- well-represented among tax-farmers

- Latter part century, privileged positions challenged

- imposition extraordinary taxes contravening traditional exemptions


Revolts and Resistance: Tatars, Cossack

- revealed vulnerability of Ottomans in region: by 17th

century, dependent on Tatars - they played one ally off against others- new ‘option’ emerged: Moscovy

Situation of ‘strategic’ interest to Safavids as well as Ottomans

17th Century Issues: Military Issues

- Cossacks attacking in Steppe region, north of Black sea

- Raiding: taking captives (slaves), arms, livestock

- Undermined Ottoman’s claim to ‘control and protect’ local population

- Last quarter 17th century, cavalry took to boats: raided shoreline, reaching Bosporus Straights


Revolts/resistance: ‘Celali Rebellions’-named after Sheikh Celal who led eastern religious revolt early 16th C.:

“brigands, pillaging poor villages, taking young boys and virgin girls, stealing livestock, food stores, capturing and torturing men”

Rose in inverse proportion to conflict with Safavids


Religious rhetoric “Sheikh Cebali” of initial rebellions soon lost:

- Became secular revolts of students, governors, demobilized soldiers, deserters, landless peasants

- Localized to Anatolia

- Government adopted policy of co-opting most effective leaders: dangerous for future. . .


Revolts/resistance: Safavids

- Death of Persian Shah 1576: re-ignited war with Ottomans

- Factional in-fighting over succession drew on latent frustrations Kizilbash [those of Shia faith living on frontier of Sunni Ottoman empire]

- Murad II drawn into war by ‘Palace intrigue’ by pashas

- their goal: to oust Mehmed Pasha (Sultan’s favourite) for one (of their own) – proven ‘worth’ in taking of Cyprus


- War with Safavids continued (on-off) until 1639

-weakened eastern regions

- contributed significantly to empire’s economic crisis


Underscored problems (military, economic –potentially religious) of holding onto inhospitable parts of empire:

- dependency on local troops (eg.Tatars) who were not necessarily (or always) loyal

- dependency on frontiers ‘held’ by non-Sunni Muslims

- dependency on ‘provinces’ where social issues distinct from those of capital/urban areas


Decades between Treaty of Vasvar (1664) and March on Vienna (1683 )reflected evolution Ottoman-European relations

Treaty of Vasvar: - negotiated peace treaty with Hapsburgs

- Ottomans still had ‘worrying’ level of influence in ‘Europe’

17th Century Issues: Siege of Vienna

- Hungarian nobility resistant to Hapsburg rule sought support from Ottoman representatives in Transylvania

- wanted war from which they could gain autonomy

- Hapsburgs responded by granting more local power

- not enough: 1682, delegation appealed directly to Sultan


- Ottomans accepted Hungarian prince as ‘vassal’

- Refused to renew Treaty of Vasvar: not-so-subtle declaration of war

- France offered to stay neutral should Ottomans return to war ‘temporarily’


Sultan reluctant to return to war with Hapsburgs

- Grand Vizier determined: Kopruli Mehmud Pasha, (Albanian devshirme, began family dynasty from 1656)

- found support with Janissary agha

- possible Vizier solicited false reports of problems in border region to bolster argument

- sought support from Religious hierarchy: did not receive it


- nevertheless, put Hapsburg envoy under house arrest

- 1683 ‘went to war’

- Sultan not in agreement but headed out with army to Belgrade

- ‘entourage’ included harem “80 coaches with women and attendants” : settled in for season in Belgrade


Vizier took army straight to Vienna:

- plan had been to attack and control fortress that was particularly important for trade

- Vizier defied Sultan’s plan by going directly to Vienna

- Sultan ‘impotent’ to do anything about independent activity of his Vizier and army


Initial siege successful:

- Hapsburgs did not expect the immediate attack

- scrambling to find European allies among Polish commonwealth (including Austrians, Germans)

- Ottomans succeeded in breaching outer wall in one place


Next two months ‘stalemate’:

- no further victory for either side

- European support in form of 60,000 additional troops approaching

- Ottomans unable to shift forces away from siege (some 30,000 including Walachians, Moldavians and Tatars)


12 September: one-day decisive battle

- Ottomans ‘swept away’: “those who had not been cut to pieces by end of Day, fled”

- siege was lost

- Ottomans literally left behind everything: tents, armaments, ammunition, personal belongings…

[see ‘Turkish Prayer’ and ‘Secret History… Jan Sobieski, 1683’, Additional Readings]


Response of Sultan:

- when word reached Belgrade, he was “furious”

- threatened Grand Vizier responsible (Kara Mustapha Pasha) with execution

- demanded he present himself in Belgrade

- Pasha ‘declined’ on grounds of illness

- Sultan and household forced to return Edirne


Mustapha Pasha:

- in turn blamed defeat on governor who had opposed his decision to go straight to Vienna

- had him killed, sizeable estate confiscated, turned over to treasury


In Edirne:

- Vizier’s enemies ‘plotted’ to take advantage of his situation to have him overthrown

- fabricated reports about his ‘failures’

- emphasized his ‘disloyalty’

- keeper of stables referred to him as ‘Our Enemy”; supported by Chief Black Eunuch (of harem) and 3rd ranked Vizier


Plot successful:

- Grand Vizier executed

- 3rd Vizier took his place, representing interests of ‘palace coup’


Another Victim:

- prominent preacher (effendi ) of puritanical ‘faction’religious clergy who had accompanied the siege to Vienna

- sent from court to ‘estate’ in Bursa, later exiled


Failure of the Siege:

- in Europe, major psychological impact (especially Hapsburgs, but elsewhere as well)

- historians speak of failed Siege of Vienna’ as first in chain of defeats that would end in humiliating treaty of Karlowitz, 1699


Story of Siege:

- reveals how ‘new elite’ and ‘new power’ structure functioned

- clearly shows transformation of role of Sultan: although physically present at Vienna, no longer exercised military authority

- had become ‘symbol’ not ‘source’ of Empire’s power


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