, the name given to the Ottoman imperial council, until the mid 11th/17th century the central organ of the government of the Empire. Evidence on the dīwān under the early Sultans is scanty. According to ʿĀs̲h̲iḳpas̲h̲azāde (ch. 31; ed. N. Atsız, Osmanlı tarihlerı , Istanbul 1949, 118; German trans. R. Kreutel, Vom Hirtenzeit zur hohen Pforte , Graz 1959, 66), the practice of wearing a twisted turban ( burma dülbend ) when attending the dīwān was introduced during the reign of Ork̲h̲ān. Probably a kind of public audience is meant. The Egyptian physician S̲h̲ams al-Dīn b. Ṣag̲h̲īr, sent by …