Tapu (Ottoman history)

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In the Ottoman Empire, tapu was a permanent lease of state-owned arable land to a peasant family. The family head acquired the usufruct of the land and was able to transmit this right to his male descendants upon his death. In return, he pledged to cultivate the land on a continuous basis and to meet a series of fiscal requirements and obligations to fulfill specific services to the state or to the sipahis.

The term was also used to indicate the title deed that certified tapu rights.

Tapu is considered to be the basis of the Ottoman agrarian system revolving around family-scale units called çifthane.

[edit] See also

• Economic history of the Ottoman Empire
• Tax farming
• Timar

[edit] References

İNALCIK & QUATAERT, An Economic and Social History of the Ottoman Empire, 1300-1914, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994. ISBN 0-521-34315-1