The Ottoman 'timar' system and its transformation, 1563-1656

Modern historiography of the Ottoman Empire in the period following the death of Sultan Suleyman in 1566 is dominated by a paradigm of decline, a crucial element of which has been an assessment of the decline of the timar system. Reconstruction of the timar organization on the basis of the ruznamce registers,the daily records of the Ottoman Imperial Registry, reveals that in the mid-sixteenth century, the majority of timar-holders were cavalry sipahis, who received their grants in exchange for military service, and passed on their right to a timar to their sons. Provincial officials initiated the sipahi's application for a timar, verified his qualifications according to the law, and forwarded their recommendation to Istanbul for confirmation by the central administration. In the period 1563-1611, a clear diminution of the significance of the provincial administration is discernible. This does not, however, imply that a process of centralization took place. Rather, beginning in the 1580s, greater influence in the timar bestowal process came to excersized by the commanders of Ottoman forces in the battlefield. Data gathered from the ruznamce registers of the Anatolian district of Aydin indicate that in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, a fundamental transformation occurred in the makeup of this force. The traditional, hereditary sipahi class, which had received 63.8% of new timar bestowals in this district 1563-64, accounted for only 9.5% in 1610-11. By the latter date, over half of the new timar bestowals in the district of Aydin went to men with no military heritage, who were probably peasants. This alteration was itself the cause of, and not the result of, the administrative changes noted. Documents surrounding a major reform initiated by Sultan Murad IV in 1632 show that Ottoman policy regarding the transformation of the timar system was neither reactionary nor traditionalist in conception, and that a much more modest degree of influence should be ascribed to Ottoman writers than has previously been assumed. Ottoman officials constructed a policy which sought not to enforce an intellectual ideal, but to reorganize the system according to contemporary military exigencies.