Search

; from ʿaskar , soldier; in Ottoman technical usage a member of the ruling military caste, as distinct from the reʿāyā —the subject population of peasants and townspeople ( reʿāyā sometimes means…

, formerly also başbakanlik arşivi , the Archives of the Prime Minister’s office, the name now given to the central state archives of Turkey and of the Ottoman Empire. The formation of the Ottoman archives begins with the rise of the Ottoman state, but the present collection, though containing a number of individual documents and registers from earlier times, dates substantially from after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453. The archives became really full from about the middle of the 16th century, and continue to the end of the Empire. The organisation of the Ottoman …

, an Ottoman title of Greek origin, from αὐθέντης, Lord, Master, (cf. authentic), probably via a Byzantine colloquial vocative form, afendi (G. Meyer, Türkische Studien , i, in SBAk . Wien (1893), 37; K. Foy in MSOS, i/2 (1898), 44 n. 3; Psichari, 408). The term was already in use in Turkish Anatolia in the 13th and 14th centuries. Eflākī indicates that the daughter of Ḏj̲alāl al-Dīn Rūmī was known as Efendipoulo—the master’s daughter (Cl. Huart, Les saints des derviches tourneurs , Paris 1922, ii, 429; on the later Karaite family name Afendopoulo or Efendipoulo see Z. Ankori, Karaites in Byzantium , New York-Jerusalem 1959, 199-200). Ibn Baṭṭūṭa found that the bro…

(a.), “servant of the two holy places” (sc. Mecca and Medina), a title used by a number of Muslim monarchs. Adopted by the Ottoman Sultan Selīm I after the conquest of Egypt in 922/1517 and used by some of his successors, it was regarded in late Ottoman times as a Caliphal title, and was said to have been taken over by Selīm from the last ʿAbbāsid caliph in Cairo. This does not correspond with the evidence, and appears to be part of the mythology of the Ottoman caliphate. As far as can be ascert…

, i.e., holder of a berāt, a name given in the late 18th and early 19th centuries to certain non-Muslim subjects of the Ottoman Empire, who held berāts conferring upon them important commercial and fiscal privileges. These berāts were distributed by the European diplomatic missions, in abusive extension of their rights under the capitulations. Originally intended for locally recruited consular officers and agents, they were sold or granted to growing numbers of local merchants, …

, 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 Egy…

(Turkish eshām ), plural of Arabic sahm (Turkish sehim), share. In Turkey the word was used to designate certain treasury issues, variously described as bonds, assignats, and annuities. The es̲h̲ām are called annuities by Hammer ( Leibrenten ) and also in the Ottoman budget of 1862-3, where they are mentioned as …

, a name given in mediaeval times to the followers in Syria of the Nizārī branch of the Ismāʿīlī sect. The name was carried from Syria to Europe by the Crusaders, and occurs in a variety of forms in the Western literature of the Crusades, as well as in Greek and Hebrew texts. In the form ‘assassin’ it eventually found its way into French and English usage, with corresponding forms in Italian, Spanish and other languages. Af first the word seems to have been used in the sense of devotee ¶ or zealot, thus corresponding to fidāʿī [ q.v.]. As early as the 12th century Provençal poets compare the…

, Ottoman Turkish writer, was born in Istanbul in 1260/1844, the son of a poor draper called Sulaymān Ag̲h̲a and a Circassian ¶ mother. He lost his father in early childhood, and was for a while apprenticed to a shopkeeper. When he was 10 years old the family moved to Vidin, where his half-brother Ḥāfiẓ Ag̲h̲a was the …

( Banu ’l-ʿ…

, Deryā-beyi , sea-lord, a title given in the Ottoman Empire to certain officers of the fleet. In the 9th/15th century the term deryā-beyi or deñiz-beyi is sometimes used of the commandant of Gallipoli [see gelibolu ], who had the rank of Sand̲j̲aḳ-beyi, and was the naval commander-inchief until the emergence of the Kapudan Pas̲h̲a [ q.v.…

, (also s̲h̲ayk̲h̲ al-islām kapi̊si̊ , …

, S̲h̲īʿite heretic, flourished in the second century A.H. He lived in Kūfa and earned his living by selling barley ( s̲h̲aʿīr ), whence his name. According to the Minhād̲j̲ and the Muntahā , he was sometimes mistakenly referred to as al-As̲h̲ʿarī, instead of the correct al-S̲h̲aʿīrī. According to traditions related by al-Kas̲h̲s̲h̲ī, he was repudiated and disowned by the Imām D̲j̲aʿfar al-Ṣādiḳ ( Rid̲j̲āl 252-4; cf. 197, where ʿAbū Bas̲h̲s̲h̲ār al-As̲h̲ʿarīʾ is denounced as a liar, together with such notorio…

, Ottoman jurist and theologian. Born in Istanbul in 1004/1595-6, he was the son of ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Efendi, a Ḳāḍīʿasker of Rumelia, and the grandson of the historian Saʿd al-Dīn. Entering upon the cursus honorum of the religious institution, he became mudarris and molla and was appointed ḳāḍī first in Salonica and then, in 1043/1633-4, in Aleppo. A heavy smoker, he was reported by the Beylerbey Aḥmed Pas̲h̲a, with whom he was on bad ternis, and in 1044/1634-5 was dismissed and exiied to Cyprus as a punishment for w…

, known as ṣāḥib al-zand̲j̲…

, a Turkish dervish who acquired some celebrity in the time of the Il-Ḵh̲āns. He is said to have been a disciple of the famous Sarǐ Saltuk [ q.v.], and is mentioned in connexion with the Bābāʾī, Bektās̲h̲ī, and Mewlewī movements. His followers were called Baraḳīs; his Ḵh̲alīfa was Ḥayrān Emird̲j̲i. A story preserved by Yazǐd̲j̲ǐog̲h̲lu ʿAlī makes him a Sald̲j̲ūḳ prince, converted to Christianity by the Greek patriarch and then reconverted to Islam by Sarǐ Saltuk, who transmitted his supernatural powers to him and gave h…

or serʿasker kapi̊si̊ , the name of the War Department in the Ottoman Empire during the 19th century. After the destruction of the Janissaries in 1241/1826, the Ag̲h̲a of the Janissaries was replaced by a new commanding officer, the Serʿasker [ q.v.]. The title was an old one, given to army commanders in former times. As applied by Maḥmūd II, it came to connote an officer who combined the functions of commander in-chief and minister of war, with special responsibility for the new style army. In addition, he inherited from the Ag̲h̲a of the Janissaries the responsibility for public security, police, firefighting, etc. in the capital. In a period of growing …

Efendi , 19th century Turkish translator. Born in Üsküdar, he was trained in the language chamber [see terd̲j̲üme odasi̊ ] of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and subsequently held a number of official appointments. He is mentioned as having been Ottoman Consul in Tabrīz and a member of the Embassy in Tehrān, and in 1876 was elected a deputy in the first Ottoman parliament. He died in 1878 of typhus, contracted while caring for refugees from the Russo-Turkish war, and was buried at the Karacaahmet cemetery in Üsküdar. Aḥmed Ḥil…

efendi, known as Aḳs̲h̲ehirli, an Ottoman S̲h̲eyk̲h̲ al-Islām. The son of ʿOt̲h̲mān Efendi of Ilgin, he was born in 1210/1795-6, and held various appointments in the teaching branch of the ʿIlmiyye [ q.v.] profession. In 1275/1858-9, on the death of Yaḥyā Efendi [ q.v.], he was appointed to the office of Ders Wekīli , with the duty of teaching and preaching on behalf of the …

, Kamāl al-Dīn Abu ’l-Ḳāsim ʿUmar b. Aḥmad b. Hibat Allāh , historian of Aleppo, born there in 588/1192, died in Cairo in 660/1262. A wealthy and prominent family of ʿIrāḳī Arab origin, the Banu ’l-ʿAdīm acquired property in and around Aleppo, and a number of them rose to eminence or office under the successive dynasties that ruled in that city. For five generations they held the office of ḳāḍī; the historian’s father was a chief ḳāḍī under Zangid and then Ayyūbid rule. He himself, after studies in Aleppo, Damascus, Jerusalem, Bag̲h̲dād and the Ḥid̲j̲āz, served in Aleppo as a secretary, as a ḳāḍī and later as wazīr to the Ayyūbid rulers al-Malik al-ʿAẓīz and al-…