Celali rebellions
The Celali rebellions (Turkish: Celalî ayaklanmaları), were a series of rebellions in Anatolia of irregular troops led by provincial administrations known as celalî, against the authority of the Ottoman Empire in the late 16th and early to mid-17th centuries. The first revolt termed as such occurred in 1519, during sultan Selim I's reign, near Tokat under the leadership of Celâl, an Alevi preacher. Celâl's name was later used by Ottoman histories as a general term for rebellious groups in Anatolia, most of whom bore no particular connection to the original Celâl. As it is used by historians, the "Celali Rebellions" refer primarily to the activity of bandits and warlords in Anatolia from c. 1590 to 1610, with a second wave of Celali activity, this time led by rebellious provincial governors rather than bandit chiefs, lasting from 1622 to the suppression of the revolt of Abaza Hasan Pasha in 1659. These rebellions were the largest and longest lasting in the history of the Ottoman Empire.
The major uprisings involved the sekbans (irregular troops of musketeers) and sipahis (cavalrymen maintained by land grants). The rebellions were not attempts to overthrow the Ottoman government but were reactions to a social and economic crisis stemming from a number of factors: demographic pressure following a period of unprecedented population growth during the 16th century, climatic hardship associated with the Little Ice Age, a depreciation of the currency, and the mobilization of thousands of sekban musketeers for the Ottoman army during its wars with the Habsburgs and Safavids, who turned to banditry when demobilized.
Causes
- Oppressed peasants and declining timariot system. The Ottoman taxation system was based on agriculture and the major share was collected off from peasants toiling for the local feudal lords who were in turn taxed by the local government to pay the muqata'ah. When tax rates were raised for the local governors due to devaluation of the currency and enormous expenses of the state caused by newly conquered lands and military campaigns, the feudal agricultural lords illegally increased the amount of tax they demanded from the peasants. In the meanwhile, land evaluators started to demand bribes to refrain from assessing higher values for land value taxes. Consequently, many peasants started to quit being laborers for feudal lords, emigrating to larger provinces either to join governors' forces as sekbans or to become vagabonds (levends). These numerous peasants were required to pay even further taxes for disrupting the system, but still, the population increased in large cities and unemployment rate increased sharply.
- During wartime the sekbans served the governors and drew regular pay. In peacetime, however, they were not paid, and they resorted to banditry. The first rebellions were, in nature, merely raids by sekbans commanded by their governors and joined by levends to extort more money from the public. They were later joined by sipahis, who had lost their land grants, levends, Turkmen/Yörük and Kurdish nomads.
- Degenerate officials. With the decline of the devshirme governor system, and high taxes, the governors and local officials increased their unofficial tax rates and started to exploit the workforce of the peasants. In parallel to these developments, bribery increased.
Major revolts
Karayazıcı (1598)
Especially after the 1550s, with the increase of oppression by local governors and levying of new and high taxes, minor incidents started to occur with increasing frequency. After the beginning of the wars with Persia, especially after 1584, Janissaries began seizing the lands of the peasants to extort money, and also lent money with high interest rates, thus causing the tax revenues of the state to drop seriously.
In 1598 a sekban leader, Karayazıcı Abdülhalim united the dissatisfied groups in the Anatolia Eyalet, forcing the towns to pay tribute and assumed the role of the governor of a small district. However, he denied turn the district over to his successor; instead he rebelled and killed the new officer with the help of rebellious levends and peasants. He was offered the governorship of Çorum, but refused the post and when Ottoman forces were sent against them, he retreated with his forces to Urfa, seeking refuge in a fortified castle, which became the center of resistance for 18 months. Out of fear that his forces would mutiny against him, he left the castle, was defeated by government forces, and died some time later in 1602 from natural causes. His brother Deli Hasan then seized Kutahya, in western Anatolia, but later he and his followers were won over by grants of governorships.
Later
The Celali unrests, however, continued under the leadership of Janbuladoglu in Aleppo and Yusuf Pasha and Kalenderoğlu in western Anatolia. They were finally suppressed by the grand vizier Kuyucu Murad Pasha, who by 1610 had eliminated a large number of Jelalis.
See also
Further reading
- Barkey, Karen. Bandits and Bureaucrats: The Ottoman Route to State Centralization. Cornell University Press, 1994.
- Griswold, William J. The Great Anatolian Rebellion, 1000-1020/1591-1611 (Islamkundliche Untersuchungen), 1983. K. Schwarz Verlag. ISBN 3-922968-34-1.
- İnalcık, Halil. “Military and Fiscal Transformation in the Ottoman Empire, 1600-1700.” Archivum Ottomanicum 6 (1980): 283-337.
- Özel, Oktay. “The Reign of Violence: The Celalis c. 1550-1700.” In The Ottoman World, 184-202. Edited by Christine Woodhead. London: Routledge, 2011.
- White, Sam. The Climate of Rebellion in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
