Military Elite and Sources of Revenues

A Case-Study of the Adriatic Hinterland in the 16th and 17th Century

Abstract

This work represents an attempt to dectect manners through which local military élites in the Adriatic hinterland ensured their sources of revenues, and to investigate how they influenced on shaping social and economic relations in the attempt to extract extra revenues. It is proved that central goverment could not bail material safety of the military-bureaucratic class (asker). Although military class for its services was receiving less or more permanent incomes in cash or through prebends, the amounts were too low for ensuring daily existence or keeping social status. Timar-sipahi system in the Adriatic hinterland never had characteristics of ”classical” Ottoman system. The economic imperatives forced the members of the military class to find alternative sources of revenues in robbery, plundering, trading, agriculture activities, smuggling, bribery, economic and financial malpractises etc. In this way individuals could obtain enormous richness while the state goverment was enforced to tolerate these practices. Because the members of the military élite became less depended on incomes from the state treasury, some of them with time gained great independance and almost dynastic position. They started to resist to central goverment’s tries to establish effective control over the hinterland. In the same time, the polarization and antagonism between ruling élite and poor military class (fortress crews) became deeper and it started to awake different social conflicts among askeri caste. Many examples of misuses and ilegal treatments of the local administrators and members of military élite show not only the abusings of their’s own subjects as sources for the material gain, but the situation of total deconstruction of the Ottoman legal system in the Adriatic hinterland. After all what has been said, it is clearlier why in these relatively poor sancaks very often started strong fights for rule, prebends and positions