Reading this book about the Islamization and centralization of regions in the eastern Balkans under Ottoman rule, specifically Deliorman and Gerlovo. It’s always history books about seemingly obscure topics that turn out to be the most interesting. 
What's interesting about early Muslim settlement in Deliorman and Gerlovo is the high proportion of people treated with suspicion by the Ottoman state. That is, perceived sympathizers of the Shi‘i Safavids.
Many were "heterodox" and semi-nomadic Turcomans forcibly deported to the Balkans or fleeing persecution in Anatolia, especially during the reign of Selim I (r. 1512–20). The Ottoman state would make a sustained effort to transform these heretical itinerants into settled Sunnis.
Deliorman was also the location of the revolt against the Ottomans incited by the heretical Sheykh Bedreddin in 1416.
Apparently Bulgarian nationalists explained the Islamization of these regions as a result of forced conversions but these claims were based on fabricated accounts.
Wow, I can’t believe someone would do something like that.
Wow, I can’t believe someone would do something like that.
There are parallels between the Islamization of Deliorman and Gerlovo and the Islamization of Bengal. The spread of the institutions of an Islamic state, the expansion of lands under cultivation, and population growth went hand in hand with Islamization.
Bulgarian scholars were the most prominent advocates of the idea that the Ottomans forcibly converted Balkan communities to Islam. They used “domestic Slavic sources” that are “now known to be nineteenth- and early twentieth-century fabrications.”
Turkish nationalist historiography tried to emphasize “Turcoman colonization as the major explanation of the formation of Balkan Muslim communities.”
The reality is that Islamization in the Balkans was not uniform. Muslim populations appeared in different regions for different reasons. The Islamization of Bosnia took place in the late 15th and 16th centuries, while Albanians became mostly Muslim in the 17th and 18th centuries.
Conversion of natives to Islam was the dominant factor in Islamization in the western Balkans, hence why Bosniaks and Albanians don't speak Turkish.
The (initial) formation of Muslim communities in the eastern Balkans was due to Turcoman colonization, a product of geography.
The (initial) formation of Muslim communities in the eastern Balkans was due to Turcoman colonization, a product of geography.
Furthermore, the current demographic map is different than the situation present in, say, the 18th century Ottoman Empire. The population of the Balkans had a greater proportion of Muslims, just as Anatolia at the time had a greater proportion of Christians.
Regions that nowadays have minority or almost nonexistent Muslim populations historically had significant or even overwhelming majority Muslim populations, such as Crimea, northeastern Bulgaria, the Black Sea coast, the Rhodope Mountains, and so on.
The Ottoman Empire into the early modern period was particularly centralized for its time. “[I]n comparison to late medieval and early modern Europe, the state did play a leading role in most aspects of socio-economic change in Ottoman society.”
Warrior-dervishes (gazi-dervişler, alp-erenler) would take part in early Ottoman conquests in the Balkans, and afterwords search for empty or underpopulated areas to be “opened” to Islam. They would build convents that formed the “nuclei of new villages.”
The convents would be engaged in “agriculture, animal husbandry, the repair of roads, and the construction of watermills” and the dervishes would serve as mountain-pass guards and relay-station (menzilhane) personnel.”
“Colonizing dervishes” who facilitated Islamization were a feature of other frontiers of the Islamic world, including late medieval Bengal.
The Greek-Italian Theodore Spandounes (an early 16th century descendent of a Byzantine noble family) saw Osman as simply the first among equals and just one of four “lords of the Turks.” The others were “Michauli,” “Turachan,” and “Evrenes.”
This is a reference to the legendary marcher lords Köse Mihal, Turahan, and Evrenos who played a paramount role in early Ottoman expansion in the Balkans. These men were known as marcher lords (uc beyleri) and had titles like king of the ghazis (malik al-ghuzat).
These marcher lords, members of their dynasties, and lesser similar dynasties (e.g. Timurtaşoğulları and the Malkoçoğulları), were responsible for much of the early Ottoman conquests in the Balkans, often on their own accord and without direction from the House of Osman.
Basically, during the century and half of the Ottomans, these marcher lords played a leading role in conquering and consolidating parts of the Balkans for the Ottomans. They effectively ruled small frontier principalities while playing a huge role in early Ottoman politics.
"It was only during Mehmed II’s reign that the leading members of these families were effectively assimilated into the mainstream Ottoman military and administrative structures..."
Some antinomian Sufis would practice the “four blows” (chahar darb), where they would shave off their head, moustache, beard, and eyebrows. Other forms of self-mutilation or socially unacceptable behavior were also practiced.
The Babai Revolt (1239-40) in the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum was an “uprising of mostly non-sedentary, non-conformist, and non-Sharia-minded Turcoman groups against a centralizing state pursuing the consolidation of a Sharia-regulated, sedentary regime.”
The tension between the heterodox rural culture of nomads and semi-nomads and the orthodox urban culture of the centralizing state and city-dwellers would continue from Seljuk Anatolia into the Ottoman period.
The Babai Revolt was led by by two Vefa‘i shaykhs, Baba İlyas Horasani and Baba İshak. “Baba İlyas claimed to be a prophet and promised his followers deliverance from all the ills caused by the despotism of the Seljuk elites.”
Heterodox dervishes, nomadic and semi-nomadic Turcoman warriors, and frontier lord (uc beyleri) dynasties formed an (informal) coalition of centrifugal forces opposing centralizing drive of the Ottoman state.
Seyyid Ali used earthquake and it was super effective.
In mentioning an earthquake, the hagiography of Seyyid Ali Sultan (Kızıl Deli) resembles the contemporary Byzantine sources which present an earthquake as the main reason for the Ottoman conquest of Gallipoli in 1354.
On the different uses of the title of "sulṭān" by monarchs and Sufis.
The tension between different sources of authority, between sultans and Sufis, was also present in late medieval Bengal.
In 1492, there was an assassination attempt on Sultan Bayezid II when he was returning from a military campaign in Albania. It was an example of the tension between the state and heterodox dervishes becoming violent.
The Balkans were subject to several invasions by Turkic peoples before the Ottoman conquest, including by the Bulgars, Pechenegs, Uzes, and Cumans (Qipchaqs, Kipchaks, Polovtsians).
The Bulgars become assimilated by the Slavic majority, while the Cumans assimilated the earlier Pechenegs and Uzes. Cumans later became known by the ethnonym "Tatar."
Due to invasions in the late medieval period by Turkic groups, the Mongols, conflict between different Bulgarian states, crusaders, invasions of Ottoman Bulgaria by the Wallachians, the revolt of Sheykh Bedreddin, and so on, Bulgaria was underpopulated in the 15th century.
The historicity of the migration of Anatolian Turks to Dobrudja under the leadership of Sarı Saltık in the 1260s is controversial. (I’m guessing because it suggests an Oghuz Turkish presence in the Balkans before the Ottoman period.)
The evidence that the migration actually occurred seems particularly strong, especially considering that multiple independent late medieval Arabic accounts suggest or affirm a Turkish Muslim presence in Dobrudja.
One theory is that the ancestors of the modern Gagauz (Christian Turks living mostly in Moldova) were Anatolian Turks who followed Sarı Saltık to Dobrudja. According to this theory, the ethnonym "Gagauz" is derived from the name of the Seljuk Sultan Kaykawus (= Gagauz).
“[T]the Crusade of Varna’s impact on the demographic history of the northeastern Ottoman Balkans cannot be underestimated.”
Ironically, the loss of the Battle of Varna (1444) by the crusaders sealed the fate of Byzantium and the Balkans for the next four centuries.
Ironically, the loss of the Battle of Varna (1444) by the crusaders sealed the fate of Byzantium and the Balkans for the next four centuries.
Between the 1480s and the 1570s (when the Ottomans didn’t face anymore crusades and had vassalized Wallachia), the rural population of Deliorman, Gerlovo, and adjacent areas increased tenfold and the Muslim population increased twentyfold.
Conversion to Islam in the Balkans was normally associated with city-dwellers. Even cities far from the capital like Belgrade became majority-Muslim.
This wasn't the case with Deliorman and Gerlovo, where Muslim settlement and concurrent conversion occurred in the countryside.
This wasn't the case with Deliorman and Gerlovo, where Muslim settlement and concurrent conversion occurred in the countryside.
Where were the Muslim migrants to Deliorman and Gerlovo coming from? The two main sources were the southeastern Balkans (e.g. Thrace) and Anatolia. In the latter case, it was due of mass flight or (related) state-organized deportations (sürgün) of perceived Safavid sympathizers.
As was the case with the Shi'i revolts of the early Islamic period, supporters of a heterodox movement (e.g. followers of Sheykh Bedreddin) would sometimes jump ship to a more successful, but ideologically overlapping, movement (e.g. the Safavids).
“The dragon is the most commonly represented mythical beast in Islamic culture, and especially in Islamic architecture.”
The pic of a dragon below is from Istanbul (c. 1540-50).
The pic of a dragon below is from Istanbul (c. 1540-50).
In the hagiography of Demir Baba, the Sufi saint defeats a dragon in Bucak using a German sword, a specially designed rifle, and a Düldül-like horse. Later he defeats a dragon in Muscovy, after which the Muscovite king expresses his gratitude by freeing 40,000 Muslim captives.
The Orthodox church in the Balkans developed various methods to prevent conversion to Islam:
- anti-Islamic rhetoric and propaganda
- punitive measures on those who socialized with Muslim
neighbors (including excommunication)
- nurturing the images of neo-martyrs
- anti-Islamic rhetoric and propaganda
- punitive measures on those who socialized with Muslim
neighbors (including excommunication)
- nurturing the images of neo-martyrs
By the mid-16th century, most cities in the Ottoman Empire had Muslim majorities. In contemporary Mughal India, Muslims were similarly more urbanized than Hindus.
The “Wild West” in the title is fitting because the early Ottoman northeastern Balkans shared features with the American Wild West, such as underpopulation and underinstitutionalization. It was where the Ottomans deported troublesome groups, namely Safavid sympathizers.
Also, contrary to stereotypes, the Ottomans did build a significant amount of infrastructure and increased the population (both Christian and Muslim) of the region.
Finished. 😌
I would only recommend this book to people already familiar with Ottoman history.
I would only recommend this book to people already familiar with Ottoman history.
