An autochthonous Arabic compositional technique, which gained a foothold in the urban centers of the entire Islamic world and also found its way into the musical practice of the Jews who lived there. The most comprehensive “maqamization” of the repertoire occurred among the Sephardic Jews in the Ottoman Empire. In the 16th century, under the influence of speculative mysticism, they first associated their religious hymns (piyyutim) for paraliturgical occasions with the Ottoman Tu…