The Crescent of the Sultan

Here's another important part of this meeting, folks.

You must also know about the situation in the empire. The Jellali Rebellion more than a hundred years ago (some provincial governors wanted to fight against the central government with the support of landless peasants and urban unemployed groups) caused unbearable damage to the empire.

Today, such a situation will never be allowed to happen again.

For this reason, I hope you can hand over control of the Timar and Zamit (both basic administrative units of the Ottoman Empire) that you hold in your hands as soon as possible.

As for the supply of related armies, the empire no longer needs a large number of local armed forces, and the professional army will be the main force of the empire.

The officials talked a lot after hearing this, but most of them silenced their voices in the end.

Only a few voices were still muttering.

"It's been like this for hundreds of years."

"The laws of our ancestors are immutable."

"If you reform randomly, the empire will fall."

"No sultan would take this away without compensation."

Listening to the whispers of the group below, a trace of ridicule appeared on Selim's smiling face.

He said calmly.

"Have you forgotten who owns these lands?"

It was obvious that Sultan was still smiling, but it gave people a feeling of extreme danger.

After hearing the Sultan's words, the officials below were completely silent, because from a legal point of view, these lands were indeed not theirs.

This has to mention one of the few political achievements of the Ottoman Empire, namely the nationalization of land.

Before talking about this issue, we must first understand the social form of the Ottoman Empire.

In fact, the Ottoman Empire was mainly an agricultural society, with farmers and herders making up the majority of the population.

There are many ways to organize farmers. Some are small couple families, relying on a pair of oxen to cultivate a small piece of cultivable land, and some are large clans, which collectively cultivate adjacent land.

These farmers are sharecroppers or homesteaders, and most of them are located in the Balkans.

But this was not the case everywhere in the Ottoman Empire. In the mountains of eastern Anatolia, serfdom still existed.

This is the Ottoman Empire. Let’s not talk about it first. The diversity is indeed very diverse.

The question arises, why do a large number of farmers support the Jellali rebellion.

This is caused by population fluctuations caused by poor harvests or political instability.

Therefore, the shortage of labor and the displacement of farmers are common themes in the rural economy.

Back to the point, in order to avoid disorder caused by landless farmers wandering around.

The land system of the Ottoman Empire was consolidated in the 16th century with the consolidation of law by Ottoman jurists.

It defined most arable land as state land and strictly limited private ownership to city properties and orchards in and around cities. Properties associated with charities, known as wahefu, accounted for about 100 percent of all cultivable land. Fifteen.

According to this reform that began in the sixteenth century, farmers on state-owned land were hereditary tenants and could freely organize production and transfer the land to heirs or others.

However, in this order, it is not the country that benefits, let alone the landlords or fief owners.

Rather, it is the officials or contractors who receive the salary, who come to collect these surpluses.

Pensionary officials collected taxes in the province in the form of money, in kind, or in labor from the administrative units of varying sizes assigned to them - the timars and zamits.

At the same time, in return for military service, along with their retinues, they participated in military campaigns under the command of provincial governors, which overextended local power.

Officials or contractors who were holders of timar and zamit, who usually had administrative and taxing powers over a village and its arable lands and farms.

However, their administrative and security powers do not include judicial power, which is in the hands of qadi (judges) appointed by the ulema.

In the 16th century, the holders of Timar and Zamit maintained a large number of local cavalry units, the famous Sipaxi cavalry.

These units would be mobilized in a hierarchical manner to participate in seasonal military campaigns.

Throughout the 17th century, however, these units were marginalized from combat due to changes in military technology.

This change favored musket-armed infantry over sword-wielding horse archers.

By the 18th century, the holders of timar and zamit did not disappear, but became holders of foreign lands or leaders of reinforcements, providing logistical services to the imperial army in times of war.

They often outsource the taxation and jurisdiction of their units to middlemen.

The empire's governors were of varying ranks, served for short periods of time, and often traveled from province to province with their families and armed retinues.

Their taxes were usually collected by their agents from their stipends, the so-called haas, which were rural or urban units scattered throughout the provinces they administered.

The centrally appointed governors were one of the main pillars of administrative integration in the Ottoman Empire, while the centrally appointed qadi was the representative of the judiciary.

During the war, armed groups of peasants and city dwellers called sekbans were commanded by local military chiefs and fought to be included in the governor's retinue.

Although the local boundaries between sekban and banditry are often not very clear, sekban has become a career for many young people hoping to make a career in the military.

In the 18th century, provincial strongmen would rally around their sekbans to compete for imperial positions, first as lieutenant-governor and then gradually as governor-general.

This is also a major feature of the Ottoman Empire, local versus central.

In addition to these fiefdoms were held by provincial military elites.

Members of the Ottoman Empire's royal family and central elite were able to hold income units in name only by virtue of their status or origin, without having to provide any services.

These imperial dignitaries administered their units and communities through agents and local contractors.

Therefore, the reforms envisioned by Selim actually required the abolition of his own "imperial estate."

Similar to Timar and Zamit, Imperial Wahef has agricultural units spread throughout the empire. Wahef management agencies typically operate the units and collect taxes through local contractors and subcontractors.

In addition, within each area, some units were defined as separate urban or rural tax areas, including mines, workshops, and customs.

The state either outsources short-term taxing authority for these districts to contractors or manages them directly through salaried supervisors.

The contractor collects taxes in these enterprises, remits the contracted sum to the state or the original holder, and the rest is profit.

Like other early modern regimes, the central government of the Ottoman Empire had limited revenues.

Most of the surplus collected in the name of the state was either spent on local military or administrative needs, or was taken by officials as compensation for their military-administrative duties and by contractors as their profits.

This was one of the reasons why the Ottoman Empire was in decline.

It is clear that the land has been nationalized in the form of law, but there is no effective administrative mechanism. If the Ottoman Empire does not die, who will die?