village, peasant and empire

7/30/2019 Village, Peasant and Empire

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Village, Peasant and Empire

INTRODUCTIONI* to MARXIST approach, the definition of social formation generallyemphasizes the following key points as formulated by Hindess andHirst: "A distinctmodeof appropriation of surplus-product supposesa distinct sffucture of relations of production. A distinct structure ofrelations of production supposes a set of forces which correspond tothe conditions of the labor process it establishes."lIn the frame work of this model, Marxist historians and socialscientists have sought a definition for Ottoman social structure orsocial formation. In the Eastern bloc countries, the "feudal" modelwas applied until recent times, and Ottoman feudalism was describedas the appropriation of the surplus product of the peasants throughextra-economic means by a dominant military-political class. Simul-taneously, there has also been an attempt to underline characteristicswhich distinguish Ottoman feudalism from its more advancedvariant in the West.2 According to the aforementioned scholars,Ottoman feudalism was formed as a result of the conquest anddomination of an advanced agrarian community by nomadic war-riors. The conquerors established a communal ownership over arablelands, which eventually came under the rule or ownership of thesultan. In other words, these lands were forcibly acquired by a centralstate. In this manner, the appropriation of the surplus-product ac-quired the characteristic of a rent or tribute. It became the propertyof the sultan's treasury, and was thereafter distributed to the sipahitimars. In the Ottoman feudal system the sultan assumes a centralplace. The state is actually "feudalism personified".Hence these characteristics, according to the aforementionedscholars, distinguish Ottoman feudalism from feudalism in the West,whereby the latter is defined as "the socio-economic order of themanor based on seigneurial ownership of the land." Ottoman


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138 = Halil Inalc*feudalism does not fall into "the set of forces of production". It resultsfrom expropriation and forcible usurpation. According to Marxistdialectics, it does not lead to a more progressive social order, in otherwotds, to capitalism. In all the East bloc countries, namely Bulgaria,Hungary, Rumania, Yugoslavia as well as in the USSR,3 the Ottomanfeudal system has principally been defined as a regressive primitivefeudalism based on extra-economic means. Moreover, certain Marx-ist historians claim that their countries had advanced along moreprogressive lines of Western feudalism until the Ottoman conquestbrought an end to this process. (Implying, in other words, that theywould have followed a Western European model of development hadthe Ottomans not arrived). That this claim is a mere hypothesis whichhas no relationship to historical reality has been substantiated withdocuments from the Ottoman archives. It has been demonstrated thatthe pre-Ottoman feudal landlords who we e incorporated into theOttoman timar system lived on the "rent-tax" collected directly frompeasants-similar to the Ottoman timar sipahis-and hence did notin any way participate in the actual production process.

Karl Marx himself observed that the feudal model, or the theory ofusurpation of surplus product, was not a satisfactory explanation forthe social formation of empires which had lasted for several centuriesin Asia.a It was not possible to explain the state's absolute controlover the forces of production, namely, over land and peasant labour,as resulting merely form coercive tactics and fear of the sword. "Adistinct set of forces of production" which conditioned such an orderneeded to be identified. It was observed that in a number of ancientempires (Egypt, Mesopotamia, China), production forces were regu-lated by a central and absolute authority as public works. The theorywas that the large-scale hydraulic works necessary for flood controland irrigation, not to mention production, had to be organized as apublic management functions by a central and absolute state author-ity. They thereby sought to explain the state's absolute control overthe forces of production. This particular structure of relations ofproduction was termed the "Asiatic Mode of Production."The Asiatic Mode of Production (AMP) theory of Marx-Engelsfirst became popular in Western Europe in the 1950s, and then inTurkey through the writings of Sencer DivitEio$u6 as the closestMarxist approximation to explaining Ottoman social formation.Divitgiollu and his successors subsequently demonstrated that on

Village, Peasant and Empire = 139the basis of historical evidence, the theory developed by Marx ofIndian society which drew primarily on British reporrs did notprovide an adequate explanation for ottoman sociity, and thuscalled for modifications. Firstly they pointed our thar village commu-nities in the Ottoman Empire, at least those in the vicinity of big citiesand on coastal areas open to trade, were not closed, isolated, self-sufficient communities. In fact, there existed a measure of socio-economic integration between city and countryside. On the otherhand, there was "highly monetized economy with a developeddivision of labour and a system of regional and inter-regionalmarkets." The particular emphasis was made that during the disso-lution of the centralist Ottoman imperial system in the eighteenthand nineteenth centuries, there was a growing integration,"peripherarrzatton", with the capitalist world economy. As a result,ottoman rural society came under the influence of the rnarketeconomy and commodity production. Following the findings of theempirical historians, DivitEioilu, islamoflu and Keyde/ also arguedthat during the classical period, the Ottoman state's ownership ofarable land prevented servitude and the rise of a class of feudallandlords in the provinces. And, through such distributive institu-tions as the walcf (religious endowmenrs), a significanr part of thesurplus production found ways to serve social and economic pur-poses.The theory of despotic Asian empires based on great publichydraulic works was developed and subjected to detailed historicalanalysis by Karl Wittfogel. Wittfogel included the Ortoman Empireas an important example of "despotic" Asian empires. It is clear,however, that the Ottoman Empire was not a case of hyd.raulicsociety. The core lands of the Ottoman Empire, Anatolia and theBalkans, were not subject to irrigation farming, but do dry farming.It is possible however to take Wittfogel's theory in a larger sense.8For peasant communities which face a continuous challenge in theform of insecurity and feudal exploitation, the acceptance and sup-port for an absolute central regime which provides law and orderfollows inevitably. As in the case of hydraulic societies, such a statecan only fulfill its functions as aresult of a well-developed manage-rial apparatus with a central bureaucracy. Hence, the Ottoman statereprcsents a highly centralist, absolute, bureaucratic, regulatory typeof empire. This idea was further developed by N. Eisenstadt, and the

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l4O = Half.l Inalcr.kOttoman state was depicted as a typical example of a centralistbureaucratic empire. Wittfogel and Eisenstadt are following MaxWeber. According to Weber, the Ottoman Empire is the most radicalexample of a patrimonial state system. In the patrimonial system, aswith the patriarchal family, the ruler has absolute domination.Thecommunity and the economy are organizedas the ruler's household.In the ottoman regime, the ruler possesses such authority in adiscretionary and arbitrary way. No autonomous group, institution ortradition can limit his discretionary powers. Weber who considersthis state system to be particular to the Middle East, calls thispatrimonial state type "sultanism".What, in fact, is the social structure which gives birth of a centralbureaucratic empire? In other words, what is the "distinct mode ofappropriation," or the "distinct structure of relations" "determinedby a set of forces of production" which produced such aregime? Thepublic hydraulic works theory cannor be applied to the ottomanregime. The AMP does not constitute "a mode of production" sinceone sees no evidence of economic integration or articulationbetweenvillage communities and military-administrative city cente s formedas a result of military conquests. The conquerors, it is argued, usurpsurplus products from agriculturalists according toright of conquest.The village community on the other hand is described as an undevel-oped, stagnant social structure dependent on a closed, self-sufficienteconomy. In the last analysis, village and city, conquerors andvillagers have not been integrated, but constituted two distinctcommunities which live side by side. Hence, the appropriation ofsurplus-product is only realized through coercive means. In otherterms, such a society is not endowed with any mode of production orsocial formation and hence must be deemed something abnormal.Herein lies the weak point in the AMP theory. The mechanism ofchange which it posits for the evolution of societies is inapplicableto this case. These are ahistorical societies!In the following pages we atrempr ro explain the Ottoman Empire 'seconomic, social, political and ideologic characteristics as com-prised within a global and integrated system, a social formation. It isimportant to underline that the results arrived at are the outcome ofhalf a century of research in the Ottoman archives, and not the fruitof imaginative experiments based on theory models.

Village, Peasant and Empire = 741TI{E OTTOMAN 9IFI-HANE GEASANT FAMILY FAR}O SYSTEM

The formation of Turkey's basic economic and social sffucturewas determined during the Ottoman period.e In other words, we owethe socio-economic structure based on small peasant family exploi-tations to the Ottoman state-owned land regime and to the gift-hanesystem (see infra). Turkey's economy and social system preserved itscentury-old traditional Ottoman character until 1950. With the spreadof the tractor and the entry of agriculture into the market economyduring the 1950- 1960 period, Turkey has entered a profound processof change. Whiie in 1939 there were only 3200 tractors, this figurehadreached42,000 by 1959.10 Wheat and barley, which are the maincrops of subsistence in agricultural economy, ffe gradually relin-quishing their place to market crops, industrial plants, cotton, figs,grapes, tobacco, rice and corn.What are the traditional characteristics from the Ottoman past?The main points of our discussion below will attempt to explain thesecharacteristics.The principal tool of traditional agriculture is the plough pulled byapair of oxen. This represents the most effective "technological" useof animal power for the traction prior to the application of the tractor.Since the time of the ancient Mesopotamian civrlizations, the climatebelt of wheat-barley cultivation under dry farming through the use ofthe oxen-pulled plough eventually spread to other parts of the worldas the most advanced farming technique. The fact that the ploughcould be consffucted from wood, or iron, its structural versatility andother characteristics clearly brought about important changes in thecourse of time. However, agricultural economy did not witness anyfundamental innovations until machine power replaced ox power.llWe will see below that tax rates in the Byzantine and Ottomanempires were determined according to the number of oxen. Thegovernments exempted from taxation those peasants who fell intodestitute after loosing their oxen as a result of epidemics.The theoreticians of general peasant economics, such as themarginalist school, consider family labour to be a basic factor.l2They do not, however, take into account ox power which we regardas the tractor of traditional farming. And, as we will see below, itconstitutes one of the fundamental elements of the gift-hane system.The "fundamental cell" of traditional society is undoubtedly thepeasant family. It is the labour unit symbolized by the married

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142 = Halil Inalcr,kpeasant male with children. In this regime, the principal componentsof the peasant family unit consist of the husband, the wife and thechildren, and oftentimes also of married sons and grand children.This is a patriarchal and patrilinear family type. The husband is theorganizer and final arbiter of the family economy and its administra-tion. It is him that state recognizes as the taxpayer. Hence, it is easyto understand why the patriarchal family type is still the dominanrfamily type in the rural sector in Turkey today. It was a rule in theOttoman administration to take away the land of families where thehusband died without leaving a male heir and to transfer it to anothermale peasant. If the widow could manage with hired laborers untilher sons reached working age, she should be recognized as the ownerof the farm under the category blve (widow). This is why the"miizevvec" or married man occupied such an important place in thegeneral law codes.l3 In all the Ottoman survey registers, taxation isdetermined according to hane or household, i.e., by the name of thehusband who represents the family. Although in our rime landconstitutes the most important component of agricultural unit as theproperty of the peasant family, it carried a completely different statusunder the specific Ottoman land regime known as miri. The miri,state-owned, land gave the government the authority to control andorganrze the entire peasant land-holding and agricultural economy.Despite numerous publications to date, certain key concepts con-cerning the miri land regime have not yet been defined clearly whichhas led to a number of misinterpretations.laBriefly, miri land which is under the state's eminent domain doesnot comprise all agricultural land but areas used as fields and open tograin cultivation. Orchards and gardens fall outside this category.This is because the livelihood of large masses depends on subsistenceeconomy, in particular, wheat-barley cultivation. When there isscarcity in grain cultivation, shortage and famine ensue. It is evi-dently for this reason that the state has felt the need to control fieldagriculture and grain cultivation. In fact, Ottoman law codes strictlyforbid the conversion of fields into orchards or gard.ens. The uninter-rupted farming of fields was guaranteed by law. The state alwayssupervised the land andpeasant farming through the sipahis residentin the village. A family which has a pair of oxen constitutes the basicunit of exploitation. The unit of land which can be operated bypeasant family labour and a pair of oxen is considered to be the mostproductive and essential form of exploitation. This raiyyet giftlik is

Village, Peasant and Empire = 743the basic unit of agricultural economy and taxation for the state.lsStrict legal measures have been adopted to prevent its division ordisappearance. In sum, it is in order to apply a pafiicular economicand social regime that the state has felt the necessity to bring arableland under its absolute control. The miri land system is consideredan indispensable agrarian system for the sustenance of a particulareconomy and social order. We call this the Eift-hane system.The second point regarding the miri land regime which requiresclarification is the following. The miri or state lands are divided intotwo fundamental categories: The first is tapulu arazt (land undertap u), and mukat a ah ar a z i (land under mukat a a, s ee infra ) .r 6 Tap uluis the land which is given to peasant family units under a specialsystem known as the tapu regime. Land which is disposed accordingto the tapu regime are the raiyyet giftltks which are neither sold norsubject to donation (hibe) or mortmain (walcf), but transfered fromfather to son as a unit of exploitation. It is up to the peasant to cultivatethis land. He organizes the production himself. He provides themeans of production, the ox, the plough and the seeds, and cultivatesthe land as an autonomous unit of exploitation. In the followingsense, therefore, the peasantis free andindependent. He does notowesipahi any other labour service than that ordained by law. No oneexploits his labour without compensation. These are the guaranteesprovided by the state. Otherwise, raiyyer farming could not operate,nor could taxation of sipahi benefice be realized; and the wholesystem would collapse. In short, the status of the raiyyet (or depen-dent peasant) is determined by the requirements of the gift hanesystem. The state thus prevented the grandees (ekabir) from usingthe raiyyet on their own farms or walcf lands. The laws protected thelabour and freedom of the peasant. On the other hand, one should notforget that in the Ottoman Empire, peasant labour was as much undergovernment control as land. Services, corv,ies, should be evaluatedfrom this angle. In sum, the tapu system consists of an arrangementwhich enables giftlik units to be exploited in an autonomous andsystematic fashion by peasant families. The patrilineal hereditysystem, namely, the principle of inheritance without any ffansfer feesof the land from father to son, was instituted in order to guarantee thiscontinuity. This is the underlying basis of the tapu regime during theclassical period. In the succeeding periods, the raiyyet farming unit,the independence of the peasant and other factors would be subjectto various changes. But the main parameters of small peasant farming


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I44 = Halil Inalc*units survived into the twentieth century. In the Byzantine andottoman empires, the state always sought to protect the reaya (pl. ofraiyyet), namely, the peasant families combined with units of land,i.e., the farm or the unit of land ploughed by a pair of oxen, againstthe grandees. One of the principal tasks of the imperial bureaucracywas to supervise and guarantee this regime. The peasants were to beprotected against the grandees (dynatoi in the Byzantrne, ekdbir inthe ottoman Empire) as a "poor and destitute" class.l? For thisreason I do not think it would be an exaggeration to characterize theseempires as "peasant empires." The imperial bureaucracy's struggleto prevent feudal conffol over the land and the reaya constitutes one,if not the most important, chapter of imperial history. This could bea principal indicator in explaining a fundamental aspect of imperialhistory provided one avoids the pitfalls of known theories andexamines the struggle undertaken by the state in a historical context.As a fundamental imperial regime that was discovered and main-tained by imperial politics, the miri tapulu land system is the basiswhich shaped Mediterranean and Middle Eastern societies andhistory since early medieval times.The second major category of land after the miri tapulu system isthe miri mukataah system. Compared to the tapusystem, the mukataasystem signifies a completely different land regime. In the meaningused here, mukataa or kesim is the act of renting out a source ofincome by the state to a private individual. In the general sense thisis farming out, or iltizam. The mukataa system was applied in thefollowing manner to the miri lands. Land which was not under ampuregime, or as explained above, land which was not managed by apeasant under the special system known as the tapu system, wasrented or conffacted out by the state to individuals. The latter were notnecessarily peasants. City dwellers, ffadesmen, even soldiers wouldqualify as well. But peasants could also rent the land either on anindividual or group basis as mukataa.In this type of lands the rulesof the tapu regime did not apply. Because from a legal perspectivemukataa is rental policy. It was settled or "cut" (mukataa or kesim)in contractual form between the state and the individual who paid agiven sum of money as rent. The amount of rent is settled following"mutual agreement" (kesi[me). often the figure was determined inopen auction. The renter only pays the amount agreed upon. A lumpsum amount for the raiyyet giftliks (farms) undertaken under mukataa(mukatah giftlik) or larger land units such as mezraa 18 are recorded

Village, Peasant and Empire = 745in the survey registers. (For instance, "the mezraa of Pmar in thepossession of Ali : 800 akEa," the amount of money indicates here theyearly rent agreed upon.)Why does the state disrribute certain lands under mukataa?1e Be-cause the state owns a great deal of land not cultivated by the peasantsand not possessed by the reaya under the tapu system. For instance,a village community may have run away from the village for a varietyof reasons. Or a family may have abandoned its raiyyet farm whichthus remains uncultivated. We find many such records of abandonedlands (halI) in the survey registers for giftlik, mezraa or village lands.The state sought to rent such lands as mukataa as the best means toensure continued cultivation and to prevent a loss of source of incomefor the treasury. In other words, so as to provide a source of revenuefor the state treasury rather than let them go to waste, the state farmsthem out to individuals under a free rental system. The centralbureaucracy's ultimate objective is to eventually convert this type oflands into lands under tapu, i.e., possessed by the peasants. Theprincipal regime under the miri land system is the tapu regime. Ineffect, the subsequent registers show that these types of farms andmezreas gradually became lands under tapu following the settle-ment of peasant families. This process resembles the settlement ofcolons with their families on latifundia lands in late Roman history.

These are the two main land categories in the Ottoman Empire, andsince the distinction between the tapulu andthe mukataah lands havenot been identified in a clear mannerby researchers to date, it has ledto various misinterpretation s.2oIn sum, the existence of the mukataalz lands does not deny the factthat the gift-hane system which is applied under the tapu regimeforms the fundamental policy of the Ottoman state. The system,whose origins go back to ancient Iran and the late Roman Empire,appears to have been inherited from the Byzantine and Seljukempires.As briefly referred to above, the foundation of the system and themain unit is composed of the peasant family which possesse s a gtftlikfarm within the rules of the tapu regime. For the imperial bureau-cracy, this unit is also the main unit of a specific system of taxationknown as gifttax.2l Becau se gift-haners the principal unit of the entiresystem, the tax registers and law codes speak first of the gift tax.Inthe survey registers, a gift-hane unrt is identified by the letter "g"under the name of the family head responsible for taxes. In old

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L46 = Halil Inalc*registers, scribes sometimes list this unit clearly under the name of"hane-ba-gift" (peasant household with a piece of land the size of aEiftlik). Qift actually signifies "gift oktiz" (pair of oxen). And the sumof fields ploughed by a pair of oxen is known as a giftlik or farm.Actually, in the Byzantine Empire, the same unit known as zeugarion(derived form the same roor in Persian juft, and in Latin Jug)represented not the land, but a pair of oxen.zz But also zeugarionsometimes described not a pair of oxen, but the land. The Ottomanstake as a taxation basis the land or the Eiftlik operated by a pair ofoxen. Though seldom, there are also cases where the oxen areconsidered a tax unit.The hane is the peasant family. More precisely, it means that thefamily's productive labour unit is considered as the standard for taxassessment.Here it is to be emphasized that family labour, together with theland cultivated with a pair of oxen is all considered to be a single unitof production, and hence also a fiscal unit. The Eift tax collected asa result is not, as some have argued, only a form of personal tax.Rather, it is the tax obligation of the gift-hane unit. In other words,it is a combination tax over peasant-land-oxen unit. In the late Romanperiod too, jugum corresponding to Qtft, and capur to hane weretaken together as jugum-caput, and the tax imposed on it encom-passed both. Western historians have for two hundred years dis-agreed about whether this tax constituted a personal tax or a hearthtax, or whether it amounted to a land tax. The combined peasant-landtax nature of it has only been established in recent times.z3The ottoman gift-hane tax corresponds to one case of this "com-bined" tax system. In the Mediterranean countries where graincultivation prevailed, the principal system of agriculture and taxationwas the gift-hane system. From an economic viewpoint, gift-hanewas a typical production unit which provided for the subsistence ofthe peasant family and met the taxation requirements of the statethrough surplus-produce. This was also a social and fiscal unit whichthe state medculously sought to protect. In view of this principalcharacteristics, gift-hane was the fundamental cell of the ruralsociety and the basis of the imperial structure. The Marginalistschool claims that this form of organization of production based onfamily labour constitutes the most productive form of agriculturalmanagement in the pre-industrial era. According to A. V. Chayanov,rather than being a primitive type of farming, this is in fact one of the

Village, Peasant and Empire = 147principal "modes of production." Chayanov argues that this particu-lar mode of production explains the specific historical stmcture ofeconomy and society in Asia and Russia.The ideal production unit for the Asian bureaucracies is thepeasant family equipped with a pair of oxen. The single man, or"mi.icerred" as it appears in the registers, is placed at the lowest levelin the echelons of the gift-hane system due to his limited labourcapacity compared to a maried man. In fact, in rural communities,social reality does not conform with the formal regulations of thebureaucrats. In this community, in addition to those families whopossess andmanage giftlit units, there are also families who have losttheir land or who do not possess sufficient land. The state classifiesthese families according to a different status within the gift resmisystem and puts them in the surveys under separate columns. Like-wise, it determines their tax obligations not on the basis of land, butaccording to their labour capacity. Regarding tax policy therefore,the following rank gradation can be observed in the peasant taxationsystem. The gffis or those peasant families who manage gtftltks comefirst. Next follows those families who possess roughly half the landof giftlik owners, namely the "nim (or half) - gifts" (equivalent in theByzantine system to "those with one ox"). Third are farmers calledbennaks who are families in possession of a piece of land less thana giftlik; their labour force is taken as the determining factor intaxation. Last are single men who nevertheless generate a source ofincome. The latter are peasants known by the names of milcerred,kara or caba. A final category in this system is that of widow s or bfvewho manage to work their former husband's farms. This regime,which compasses the peasant community in such a schematic taxa-tion system has been meticulously described in the Ottoman taxcodes and register books.

We had established the relationship between raiyyet taxation andthe gift system in aprevious research onraiyyet taxation.2aHoweve ,we had been unable to show adequately at the time that the taxes anddues levied under this taxation system were simply part of a complexsystem related to the social structure of the rural society. We had notrealized that it was based on a socio-economic sffucture which theimperial bureaucracy took as the basis of its entire land and taxationsystem. Our later research led us to believe that this system was thebasic agrarian system of ancient empires, which was, in turn, tied tothe system of Mediterranean countries dependent on wheat-barley


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148 = Halil Inalc*cultivation using dry farming. It would appear that the colons in thelate Roman Empire, the mansus in Gal1ia, the zeugarion in theByzantine Empire, and the gift-hane Ln the Ottoman Empire were allforms of an agrarian system based on peasant family labour and theplough pulled by a pair of oxen.2s In this system, the entire ruralcommunity, whether those owning gffiliks or those who owned lessthan a giftlik of no land, were classified as poor laborers and wereregistered and identified in the imperial registers according to aspecial system. As in the Roman and Byzantine empires, the peasantin the Ottoman Empire too gained a fiscal and social status by beingregistered in special survey books. This status, which persisted untilthe new suryey, shaped the social sffucture of the wholerural society.In other words, as a result of the control it exercised over the land andthe peasant through the survey system, the imperial bureaucracyplayed a fairly large role in influencing, even crating, this socialorder. So lnstead of the spontaneous emergence of a social order, wewitness the formation of an estate society, or stratified order regu-lated by the state. Nevertheless, one should keep in mind that thestratification role of the bureaucracy did not and could not totallyeliminate the social differences spontaneously formed in rural com-munity. Rather, the fiscal system tried to conform with that. Thanksto the miri (state-owned) land and survey (tahrtr) system,26 the statemaintained tight control over land and the reaya, and sought toprevent the break up of farms, the conversion of fields into orchardsand gardens, and the emergence of big farms and plantations. As aresult, it perpetuated an extremely restrictive or conservative socialorder. The miri land regime and the gift-hane system are held pri-marily responsible for the Ottoman and other traditional empires'resistance to chatgo, improvement and the emergence of new eco-nomic systems, and underlies the way they clung on to a "stagnant"socio-economic structure. Neither should we forget, however, thatthis system constitutes the historical foundation of the present socialstructure in Turkey based on small family enterprises. Although landand the peasant fell under the domination of a small feudal group incertain areas, such as Iran, where the central authority lost its control,a similar development was to a great extent avoided in the OttomanEmpire. Even in the malikane-mukatad system of the eighteenthcentury, the state was able to protect its eminent rights over arablelands. Similarly, when property was converted to mortmain (walcf),the state did not completely relinquish its control rights over land and

Village, Peasant and Empire : L49the reaya. Those villages and large farms which came under thecontrol of the ayans or provincial notables, were eventually returnedmostly to miri system through state confiscation.2T In surn, thestruggle witnessed in each period between the central state and the"men of power" (kudretliiler or ayan) in the provinces overland andpeasant labour neverresulted in perpetual and absolute conffol of thelatter. In fact, according to Marxist analysis, the real subject of thisstruggle between the state and the "feudals" concerns the surplus-product of the direct producer, i.e., the peasant reaya and not theactual ownership of the land. The question here is seen as one ofdetermining which group among the privileged "classes" would takepossession of the surplus-product. However, because the imperialregime operated within the framework of general laws and regula-tions, it emerged as the protector of the small peasant against local,personal exploitation. Under the imperial regime, the state sought toprevent their uncontrolled exploitation by the provincial officers or"sffong men" through illegal fees and forced labour. In this manner,an imperial ideology of 'Justice" and a kind of trust and dependenceemerged between the central imperial authority and the peasant. Wehave sought elsewhere to explain in detail this ideology within theframework of the adaletnameler, or the o'rescripts of justice."28Thanks to this confidence in imperial justice, the Serbian farmeralong the Danube, or the Turkish peasant in Amasya always felt ableto seek the protection of the sultan in Carigrad or Dersaadet againstlocal injustices. The state's fiscal interests, including extraordinarylevies, were legitimated in a political system based on the ma:riageof a specific ideology of social j ustice and the requirements of th e Dinu Devler, "Islam and the Islamic state". An expert bureaucracysuccessfully applied this regime through a comprehensive system ofsurveys, registration (tahrtr), central archives (defterhane), andeffective bookkeepin g.STATE AND VILLAGE TYPES

Clearly, the system did not in reality operate as smoothly as thebureaucrats had planned. Fundamental differences have emergedbetween the ideal order laid out in imperial laws and registers andactual developments among rural communities. The imperial bu-reaucracy constantly sought to issue new regulations in order toresolve these differences. The cadi court registers, though rarely used


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150 = Halil Inalc*for this purpose, provide us with a detailed source for exploring thereal situation.2e It is to be remembered that every jurisdiction as-sembles 40-50, sometimes up to 300 villages under the authority ofthe cadi. The judaical cases which arise in the villages fall under thejurisdiction of that town or city's cadi. It appears that the cadi oftenappointed a naib or surogate to deal with village lawsuits. Amongthe shari'a court registers, p&rticular registers dealing with ruralquestions, and in estate registers which list and determine the valueof belongings in the estates of the deceased, wo find detailedinformation about the socio-economic aspects of rural life that hashitherto been unavailable in other sources. Below we shall discusscertain interesting points that we have obtained from these sources.Before we start, it should be kept in mind that because these villagesare close to cities and towns, they are subject to special conditions.This is why one should treat any generalizations related to them withcaution. For instance, by looking at the "sales" of Eiftliks andmezraas in these villages, there have been generalizations relating tothe large conversion of miri lands into freehold propefty in givenperiods. In reality, many of these sales consisted of mere transfersarising form possession rights, or ('s4195"-more correctly, leas-ing-of land under mukataa.In different regions of the Ottoman Empire there existed differentvillage types. Physical and ethnic factors, settlement conditions,cultural, political-military circumstances determined the size ofvillages, their population, type of settlement and economic activity.It is therefore not possible to speak of a particular village type on thescale of the empire. One can nevertheless identify, at least in the coreregion of the empire, namely in Anatolia and Rumilia, villagesettlements which acquired a special "Ottoman" character under theinfluence of Ottoman land andtaxation laws. The characteristics andeffects of village structure under Ottoman law can be summarized asfollows:

1. Despite the principle of his attachment to the land, the peasantcould move around and frequently abandoned his holding to becomewhat Ottoman law calls a gift-bozan, that is, "a peasant who hasabandoned his gift." In order to prevent this, Ottoman laws grantedthe sipahi the right to bring the fugitive peasant back to his registeredvillage within a period of 10 to 15 years. That such a law existedtestifies to the ease with which the peasant could displace himself.This convenience arose from the fact that the peasant did not own the

Village, Peasant and Empire = 151land himself. Either because of natural disasters, such as desertifica-tion and the land becoming uncultivable, or of being close to acaravan ormilitaryroad, or due to the imposition by the'state of extraduties or heavy taxes within the framework of the system of extraor-dinary levies (awariz), the peasant often quit his village and emi-grated elsewhere. Another important factor was the flight of peasantsto villages under walcf which were in a better position to protectpeasants. The peasant naturally sought conditions which guaranteeda better life. The number of villages registered under mezraa insurvey registers which have been abandoned by peasants are surpris-ingly numerous. In many sub-provinces, these mezraasare as numer-ous as the villages. At the same time, we also know thatthe mezraasdid not consist only of abandoned o1d villages. As a result ofpopulation growth, a village could bring under cultivation a nearbyforest or wasteland, and could lease it from the state as land undermukataa in a new survey. Hence, village satellites ,, giftliks,and- evensmall settle-ments would emerge which would be registered insurvey books under the name of mezraa. These mezre,as could eitherbecome transient settlement areas orpermanentones with only a fewpeasant households. This type of land would also be identified asmezraas in register books. During the sixteenth century, manymezrals appear to have emerged in this manner. However, for laterperiods, we find considerable evidence of peasants who abandonedtheir villages, either partially or entirely, to escape heavy taxation.The fact that the peasant only possessed land under the tapu system(supra) and did not loose much by abandoning it is considered to bea major factor in explaining the Ottoman peasant's unusual rate ofdisplacement. It we consider escapes as individual acts, we comeacros s the phenomenon of abandoned ( hall) giftliks ; the sipahi mighthave had difficulty settling new families in these giftliks under thetapu regime. We can take the increase of the number of the hallgiftliks as an indication of the economic deterioration of the village.In other words, the augmentation of hall giftliks inthe registers of anygiven region can be explained through the increase of negativefactors affecting the peasantry. Data on hatl giftliks and,mezraas mayshow how the tax policies of the government affected village exist-ence and changes within.

z. Simultaneously, the Ottoman state's etatist-patrimonial charac-ter which enabled it to bring under control not only field lands butalso field labour, led certain villages to assume a special character.


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152 = Halil InalctkThe most obvious examples are found in derbendci (peasant guardsat mountain passes), madenci (mrner), and geltukci (rice-growing)villages. Villages designated as guarding mountain passes, or sub-jected to mining or rice-growing are completely differentiated oneconomic and social grounds.

3. The Ottoman village never formed a village type based on thecommunal possession of land. Admittedly, one comes across casesof communal ownership and the periodic parcelling of lands follow-ing the settlement of nomads and immigrants. But the typical villagein the Ottoman Empire was formed by independent peasant familieswho settled on hereditary miri land of the raiyyet giftliks.In otherwords, the gift-hane system constitutes the fundamental socialstructure of the Ottoman village. There is no such factor as communalpossession which could form the basis of a village community. Thevillage community's communal possessions, such as its pastureland,forest, meadow, trashing gtound, cemetery and water, while consti-tuting a communal ownership, still does not enable us to speak of acommunal village type. We cannot consider certain collectivelyperformed social actions, i.e., the peasants' cooperation to do suchworks as harvesting of each other's produce (imece), as evidence ofa communal village type. Among the jointly owned possessions, thestruggle between different villages and/or nomads over pasturegrounds occupies an important place in village history. The stateattempted to substantially reduce conflict between neighboring vil-lages over pastureland by allocating specific meadows to specificvillages. The demarcation of borders between villages was deter-mined by the cadi who identified them by special certificates.The reference by G. Ostrogorsky and H. Stahl to communal landpossession in the Balkans prior to the Ottoman period3o has beendenied by current research. In any event, it is clear that such "villagecommunities" did not exist in the Balkans during the Ottoman period.Certain taxes entailed the village's communal responsibility. Forinstance, in the collection of extraordinary levies and the poll tax, thevillage was communally held responsible for the total amount,particularly after the sixteenth century. Similarly, under Ottomancriminal law, an entire village would be held responsible for murderand theft actions committed within the village boundaries. Whilesuch cases strengthened the communal character of villages, theywere not sufficient to fundamentally alter their social character. Insum, the Ottoman village was an administrative unit whose fields,

Village, Peasant and Empire = 153pastures and meadows were delimited, and whose territorial exist-ence was determined in the survey registers as well as in cadicertificates. It is a unit whose territory is clearly distinct in relationto the sipahis of other units, or to other administrative units such asthewaffi. In addition to the villages'common material interests anddispositions, it is necessary to stress this administrative identity andunity. But despite all these "community" characteristics, from asocio-economic structural point of view, the Ottoman village was avillage community composed of independent gffi-hanes each ofwhich practiced cultivation independently on independent raiyyetgiftliks. within the community, the independ.enc e of gifts and fami-lies was the essential char-acteristic. In sum, it is evident that theOttoman miri land regime and gift-hane system sought to perpetuatea specific socio-economic order which led in certain regions to theemergence of a specific village type with common characteristics.TIIE SIPAHI AND TFIE PEASANT

The principal responsibility of the sipahi in the village was roadminister the laws which sought to maintain the gift-hane sysremunder the sipahi's continued control. In the court registers there existdocuments which illustrate the specific nature of sipahi-peasantrelations.3lThe documents we examined comprise the years 1500-1600.Fields devoted to grain cultivation never appear in court docurnentstestifying division of inheritances (terekes).In terms of land, onlygardens and orchards were divided among the heirs. Nevertheless,Ottoman land law recognizes the ffans fer (ferag) right of a peas ant tofiled or farm. Transfer can only occur with the permission of thesipahi. An oldpeasant can, in his lifetime, transfer his land und.er mputo his adult sons or to a stranger. The fact that the transfer method isreferred to in cadi registers as a sales act (satma or bayc u sira' hasled to erroneous generalizations. In the transfer trans-action thepeasant receives a certain amount of money from the contractor inreturn for the tapu fee he originally paid for the land. And since thesipahi accords his permission, the peasant also agrees to give a fee tohim even though this is not decreed by law. In this manner we witnessmiri farms (gift-liks.) becoming the subject of a large scale tradingoperation. The cadi registers contain innumerable transactions oftransfer "sales."


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L54 = Halil Inalc*We also frequently come across the following event in the cadiregisters. Profiting from the loopholes in the law, the sipahis gener-ally tend towards taking away the lands under tapufrom the peasants.The reason is due to the fact that when they hand over land tosomeone else's possession under tapu,itprovides anew tapufee. We

have also observedin the registers cases of orphans and share holderslosing their rights as a result of sipahis' frauds and applying to cadicoufts for redress.In law codes, other subjects of conflict between the peasants andthe sipahis are figured. For instance, cases of the sipahis forcing thepeasant to carry his own tithes on grain to profitable distant markets,or that newcoming sipahis obliging the peasants to build houses andStore rooms for the sipahis' own use, and other similar services. Oneof the most widespread, and for the poasant, the most oppressivemalpractice resorted to by the sipahi was that of reviving the legallyforbidden practice of forced labour or local dues under the pretextthat it was old custom. Another widespread sipahi malpractice wasthat of extracting taxes from meadow and pasturelands not recordedin tax registers. Onty a new survey could regulate this type of sourceof income. The most serious grounds for conflict emerged from thesipahi's attempt to exploit peasant labour. One of the characteristicsof the Ottoman regime was to try to prevent this type of extendedservice or forced labour. A frequently encountered case was thesipahi's attempt to use the peasant on his reserve (hassa)Iand moreoften than decreed by law, and to impose on the latter transportationtasks on his animals and cart. All the same, under such circumstancesthe peasant had the right to appeal to the local cadi court and, in moreserious cases, to take his complaints directly to the sultan. In sum,alongside the sipahi's duty of protecting the peasant in the village,there existed several areas where the two conflicted.EPILOGIIE

The Ottomans regarded the family labour farm system as thefoundation of agricultural production and rural society, and theyscrupulously endeavored to maintain it through a complex bureau-cratic system. It was, So to speak, the constitutional underpinning ofthe whole imperial system until the nineteenth century.A. V. Chayanov,3z the noted Russian theoretician of peasant eco-nomy, argued that in a specific geographical zone this system was the

Village, Peasant and Empire = 155most efficient "mode of production." Dismissing Marx's analysis ofthe peasant economy based on the capitalistic economy, Chayanovasserts that family labour and capital are organized into a specificunit, a distinct production machine which actually represents a saigeneris mode of production.33 The peasant household is taken as asingle unit, and its annual income is considered a single labourincome. The adult male worker in the peasant family is the standardmeasure, and female and child labour are expressed in relation to it.Family composition, whether young, mature or aged, determined theconsumer-demand equilibrium. The self-exploitation of the familyintensified in conditions of limited availability of land. Thus thesystem worked better in thinly populated areas where land wasrelatively more available. In this system, family labour andland (letme add, animal power, or a pair of oxen) are articulated into oneorganic unit of production. Chayanow believed his theory applied toall traditional agrarian societies, including Russia and the OttomanEmpire. He emphasized that "this mode of production machine"signified an independent mode of production. Such an ingenious"machine" is actually the outgrowth of a long experiment in humanhistory. Chayanow's theoretical analysis is important for our under-standing of the economic basis of the gift-hane system and itscounter-part in the Roman world, the jugum-caput. What makes itparticularly relevant to our topic here is that Chayanow's theory isbased on empirical data derived from the traditional Russian peasanteconomy. What feudal or Asian Mode of Production theories failedto explain on the basis of Marxist premises finds in this mode ofproduction a clear, logical and historically documented. explanation.we have to add to Chayanov's theory that the most importantprerequisite for the continuity of such a system is a powerful andefficient centralist state conffol over land possession and familylabour. An imperial bureaucratic apparatus, as explained above, hadto struggle systematically to perpetually eliminate encroachment onthe part of local lords, while striving to prevent its own provincialagents from transforming themselves into a provincial gentry. Bymeans of its centralist regulatory power, the imperial systern wasresponsible for the functioning of this particular mode of production,and was also undoubtedly responsible for an indispensable part of theforces of production in it.

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156 = Halil Inalc*NOTES

1. Barry Hindess and Paul Q. Hirst, Precapitalist Modes of Pro-duction, London : Routledge and Kegan Paul, L975, t83.2. In particular, see Vera P. Moutafchieva, Agrarian Relations inthe Ottoman Empire in the l1th and l6th Centuries, New York:Columbia University Press, 1988; this study influenced all Marxisthistorians in the Eastern bloc countries on Ottoman social formation.3. In Bulgaria: V. Moutafchieva and St. Dimitrov; Hungary: L.Makkai, E. Francds (Byzantine period); Romania: A. Otetea, H. Stahl;Yugoslavia: B. Djurdjev, N. Filipovii; USSR: F. Oreshkova; EastGermany: E.Werner.4. K. Marx ,Precapitalist Economic Formations, ed. E. Hobsbawm,London: Lawrence and Wishart , I964;K. Wittfo gel, Oriental Despo-tism, New Haven 1964,364-412; Ferenc Tokei, Essays on the AstattcMode of Productton, Budapest: Akademiai Kiad6, 1979,9-35; alsosee Witold Kula, An Economic Theory of the Feudal System, trans. L.Garner, Bristol, I97 6,tl-27;Recherches Internattonales, vol. 57 -58,(January-April), numero special: Premidres sociti4s de classes etMode de Production Asiatique.5. Karl Wittfogel, Oriental Despotism, A Comparative Study ofTotal Power, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, FifthPrinting, t964 (originally published in 1957).6. Asya Tipi Uretim Tarzt ve Osmanh Toplumu,Isranbul: IktisatFaktiltesi Publications, 1967; among his followers, M. A. $evki,Osmanh Toplumunun Sosyal BiIimIe Agtklanmast, Istanbul: Elif,1968; in particular Huri Islamollu and Qallar Keyder, "Agenda forOttoman History," Review,I-L (1977); Q. Keyder, "The Dissolutionof the Asiatic Mode of Production," Economy and Soctety,V-2 (May1976), t78-96.

7. Art. cit.8. Op. cir., 101-t07; 16t-270.9. Number of Households, etc., in rural areas. (Source: Mine QrnarKvsal Kesim Gelir Da!iltmt ve Tuketimi Harcamalart 1973-74 ,Ankara: Institute of Statistics, 32.)

Village, Peasant and Empire : 157

Total: 2,833,905 100.00 1,7,57I,916 100.000- 1999 2t8,430 7.71 1,068,673 6.082000- 5999 596,948 2t.06 3,273,61 18.636000- 9999 704,384 24.86 4,217,772 24.0010000- 19999 837,436 29.55 5,455,780 31.0520000- 39999 379,943 t3.40 2,799,082 15.8740000- 59999 56,920 2.0L 456,071 2.6060000- 79999 14,942 0.53 106,725 0.6180000- 99999 9,960 0.35 72,573 0.41,100000-299999 13,519 0.48 124,513 0.77300000+ 1,423 0.05 7,115 0.04

6.24.95.56.06.57.38.07.L7.39.25.0

10. H. Inalcrk, "LandProblems in Turkish History," MLtslimWorld,45 (L955),221-28.11. E. Cecil Curwen, Plough and Pasture, London: Cobett Press,1946; G. Haudricourt, Mariel J. Brunhes Delamarre, I'homme et lacharrue dtravers Iemonde, Paris; Gallimard, 1955;A. Leroi-Gourhan,Evolution et techniques, vol. II, Milieu et techniques, Paris: A.Michel, 1945; Carl Sauer, Agricultural Origins andDispersals, NewYork: American Geographical Society, 1952; Andr6 Beteille, Studiesin Agrarian Social Structure,Delhi: Oxford lJniversity Press, 1974;A. Dauzat, Le village et le paysan de France, Paris: Gallimard,I94I,in particular, 8l-126.12. S ee A.V. Chayano w, T he T he o ry of P e as ant E c o nomy,Manches -ter: Manchester University Pres s, 19 66 (reprint by T. Shanin, I-Jniver-sity of Wisconsin Press, 1986), Introduction by B. Kerblay, l-24,XI-LXXV. The principle of gift-hane is expressed in the following way:"In apeasanteconomy,labour, proportionate to the size of the family,is the stable element which determines the change in the volume ofcapital and land area." D. Warriner, The Economics of PeasantFarming, New York: Barnes and Noble, 1939; D. Thorner, "PeasantEconomy as a Category in Economic Histor!", Proceedings, Inter-national Conference of Economic History, 1962, 287 -300.13. In the law code of Mehmed II (ed. F. Kraelitz, in Mitteilungenzur Osmanischen Geschicte, I (1921), 12-48, see chapter on thetaxation of "Non-Muslim Married Men" (Miizevvec-i Gebran); alsosee H. Inalcik, "Osmahlarda Raiyyet Rusumu ," Belleten,XIII ( 1959),s83.

t-.1

Income in T.L. Household Number of House-hold Members Average sizeof HouseholdIncome Grou Number go Number 7o


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158 = HaIiI Inalc*L4. In the Byzantine Empire a similar situation appears to have beenprevalent, but the Byzantinists are hesitant to recognize this basic factwhich would clarify many problems, see P. Lemerle, Esquisse,mentioned in note 30, pp. 68-70.15. See "Qiftlik" (H. Inalcik), Encyclopaedta of Islam,2nd Edition(hereafte r EI2)II,32-33; O.l. Barkan,XV.veWI. Asrlarda Osmanltimparatorlugunda Zirat Ekonomtnin Hukukt ve MaIt Esaslart, I:

Kanunlar, Istanbul, 1943, Index: Qiftlik.16. Barkan, XV. ve XVI Asrrlarda...,Index: Tapu, Tapulu; in"Osmanh Kanunndmeleri," Millt Tetebbular Mecmuast,I ( 1915), 49-IL2; 343-37, where the distinction between tapulu and mukataaltlands is clearly expressed.L7. For the peasant household with its farm (stasis) and team ofplough oxen in the Byzantine Empire, see G. Ostrogorsky, Pourl'histoire de la fdodalite Byzanttne, ffans. H. Gr6goire and P.Lemerle, Brussel s,1954,still essential; also N. Svoronos, "Recherchessur le cadastre byzantin et Ia fiscalit6 aux XIe et XIIe sibcles: lecadastre de Thebe s," Bulletin de Corrrespondance Hellenique,1959;P. Lemerle, "Esquisee . . . , " mentioned in note 30 below ,pp.279-81;A. E. Laiou-Thomadakrs, Peasant Sociee in the Late ByzantineEmpire, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977: J. Lefort,"fiscalit6 m6diaeval et informatique . . . ," Revue Historique, 5I2(I974),315-54: for the ruling elite, see G. Ostrogorsky, "Observa-tions on the Aristocracy in Byzantium," Dt,rmbartonOaks Papers,25(197 1); K.-P. Matschke, "socialschichten und Geisteshaltungen,"Akten, XVI. Internationalen Byzantinistenkongresses, 1981; I.Hauptreferate, @ien 198 1), I89-2I2.18. See "Mazra"a" (H. Inalctk), EI2, VI.19. For Mukataah lands also see, "The Emergence of Big Farms,Qtftliks: State, Landlords and Tenants", Contributions d I'histoireconomique et sociale de l'empire ottoman, Louvain: Peeters , L984,108- 12.20. Cf. G. Veinstein, "les steppes du nord de la Mer Noire au XVIesibcle," istanbul Oniversitesi iktisat FakilItesi Mecmuafl, vol. 4(1985), O. t. Barkan' a Arma|an, 177 -2I0.2I. See H. Inalcrk, "Osmanhlarda Raiyyet Rus0mu," Belleten,XXII (1959), 575-6I; Chayanov, 1966, 50.22. H. Inalcrk, "The Problem of the Relationship between Byzan-tine and Ottoman Taxation ," Akten,XI .I nternationalen Byzantinisten-

Village, Peasant and Empire = 159kongresses, Miinchen, 1958, 237-42. On state control on arable landand family farm in the Byzantine Empire, see M. Kaplan, "Remarquessur la place de I'exploitation paysanne dans 1'6conomie ruralebyzantin e," Akte n, XVI. Internal B y zantinis tenkongre s se s, J ahrbuc hder osterr. Byzantinistik, vol. XXXIT-2, 105- 14; Z.Y . Udal'cova andK.V. Chvostova, "Les structures sociales et dconimques dans LaBasse-B yzance," ibid, 131-47 .23. Th. Mommsen, "Syrisches Provinzialmass und RomischerReichskataster," Hermes,III (Berlin, 1869); G. Ostrogorsky, "Das

S teuersy s tem in by zantini s che A ltertum und Mittelal ter", B y z anti o n,6 (1931); A. H. M. Jones, "The Roman Colonate," Past and Present,Vol. 13 (1958); A. Dl6,age, La Capitation du Bas-Empire, Micon:Rotat, 1954; F. LOt, L'imp6t Foncier et la capttation personelle sousle Bas Empire et d l'4poque franque, Paris, L928; A. H. M. Jones,"Capitatio and Iugatio," The Journal of Roman Stud[es, vol. LVil(1957),88-94.24. See note 21 above.25. In addition to the literature mentioned in note 22 above, see M.Bloch, Les caracftres origtnatu de l'htstoire rurale frangaise,Znded., 2 vol. Paris: A. Colin, 1952-1956; A. H. M. Jones, The LaterRoman Empire,Il, IJniversity of Oklahoma Press: Norman ,7 67 -823;E. L. R. Ladurie and M. Morineau, Histotre 4conimique et sociale dela France, vol. I-2, Pais: PUF, 483 ff .26. On the tahrlr system, see O. L. Barkan, "les Grands r6censementsde la population et du terrritoire de I'empire Ottoman et les r6gistersimpdriaux de statistique," iktisat Fakriltest Mecmuasl, Vo1. II (1940-1941),20-6A,214-47; H. Inalcrk, Sfiret-i Defrer-i Sancak-i Arvanid,Ankara, L954,I-XX; idem, "Ottoman Methods of Conquest," StudiaIslamica, II (Paris, 1954), 107-1I2.

27 . H. Inalcrk, "Centralization and Decentralization in Ottomanadministration," Studies in Eig hteenth C entury O ttoman History, eds.T. Naff and R. Owen, London, 1977 , 27 -52.28. H. Inalcrk, "AdA1etnAme1er," Belgeler,II (Ankara, 1965),49-145; on state protection of peasants against the grandees in the pro-vinces, see P. Lemerle, art. cit.,277 -79.29. I published a selection of documents from the Bursa cadi courtcovering the period 1520-90, in Belgeler, vols. X, XIII and XIV.30. G. Ostrogorsky, "La commune rurale byzantine," Byzantion,32(1962), 139-66; H. Stahl, Les anciennes communawes villageoises


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160 = HaIiI Inalc*roumatne s, as s erv is s e me nt et p 6 nd tr ati o n c ap it ali ste, B uchares t andParis: l'Academie . . . de Roumaine, 1969; idem, "Paysage etpeuplement rural en Roumanie," Nouvelles Etudes d'Histoire,YoL.III, (Bucharest, 1905), 71-85; cf. P. Lemerle, "Esquisse pour unehistoire agraire de Byzance," Revue Historique,vol.2L9, (1958),32-94, in particular,9t-92, 139-66,255-84; Danuta M. Gorecki, "LandTenure in Byzantine Property Law: iura in re aliena," Greek, Romanand Byzantine Studies, Vol. 22 (L981), 19t-2I0.31. Cadi court records mentioned in note 29 above.32. See note 12 above.33. Op. cit., XVII-XXI.


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Indiana University Turkish Studies andTurkish Ministry of Culture Joint SeriesGeneral Editor: llhan Baqgoz

Halil InalclkThe

Middle Eastand theBalkansunder theOttoman EmpireEssays on Economy and Society

lndiana University Turkish Studies andTurkish Ministry of Culture Joint Series

Volume 9

Br-ooMrNGToN

Hillrent UnlversltyHslil inalcrk Center

village, peasant and empire

Documents