The Ottoman Empire: a Historical Encyclopedia [2 Volumes]
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See also: Battles and Treaties: Sèvres, Treaty of; Empire and Administration: Atatürk, Kemal; Sultans: Mehmed VI
Further Reading
Ahmad, Feroz. The Young Turks: The Committee of Union and Progress in Turkish Politics. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969.
Finkel, Caroline. Osman’s Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire. New York: Basic Books, 2005.
Quataert, Donald. The Ottoman Empire, 1700–1922. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Shaw, Stanford J. History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey. 2 vols. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1976.
Zürcher, Erik-Jan. Turkey: A Modern History. London: I. B. Tauris, 2004.
Alemdar Mustafa Pasha (1765–1808)
Alemdar Mustafa Pasha, also known as Bayraktar Mustafa Pasha, was a powerful local notable (āyān) from Rusçuk (present-day Ruse in northeastern Bulgaria) on the right bank of the Danube. In 1808 he tried to reinstate the deposed Ottoman sultan, Selim III (r. 1789–1807), on the throne. Selim III, however, was murdered before Alemdar Mustafa Pasha could rescue him. After the death of Selim III, Alemdar Mustafa Pasha deposed the reigning sultan Mustafa IV (r. 1807–1808) and placed Mahmud (Mahmud II), a cousin of Selim III, on the Ottoman throne. Alemdar Mustafa Pasha was appointed as the grand vizier. His tenure as the grand vizier, however, proved to be short. The janissaries stationed in the capital staged a revolt against him. Unable to suppress the rebellion, Alemdar Mustafa Pasha committed suicide.
Selim III was the first Ottoman sultan to introduce a thorough modernization program for the Ottoman armed forces. His reforms threatened the traditional-minded elements within the Ottoman ruling elite, particularly the ulema and the janissaries, who feared that the sultan’s reforms would undermine their power and status. In late May 1807 the janissary corps stationed outside Istanbul staged a revolt against the sultan. Soon they were joined by the ulema and the members of the religious class. Selim hoped that he could neutralize the rebels by adopting a conciliatory approach. As the rebels arrived in front of the palace, the sultan tried to negotiate with them, promising to disband his new army, known as Nizam-i Cedid (Nizam-i Jedid). He also threw a number of his own supporters, including his grand vizier, into the crowd. The policy of appeasing his opponents only emboldened the rebels. The ulema threw their support behind the janissaries and issued a fetva declaring Selim’s reforms incompatible with the laws of Islam. Selim was deposed on May 29, 1807. Selim’s cousins, Mustafa and Mahmud, were the only male members of the Ottoman dynasty who could replace Selim. Because Mahmud was believed to be sympathetic to Selim’s reforms, the rebels brought Mustafa out of the royal harem and placed him on the throne as Mustafa IV. Weak and incompetent, the new sultan was merely a powerless tool in the hands of the rebels, who used him to reverse Selim’s military and governmental reforms.
Although many among the provincial notables (āyāns) opposed Selim’s reforms, there were also powerful notables who had recognized the need to build a modern army capable of defending the empire against the Habsburg and Russian empires. Among the provincial notables in the Balkans who supported Selim III, none was as powerful as Alemdar Mustafa Pasha, the powerful lord of Rusçuk. Alemdar Mustafa Pasha was born in Khotyn in western Ukraine in 1765. He joined the Ottoman military service as a member of the janissary corps. Alemdar Mustafa Pasha participated in the Russo-Ottoman war of 1787–1792. He then served the powerful notable (āyān) Tirsiniklioğlu Ismail Ağa, who ruled Rusçuk. When Tirsiniklioğlu Ismail Ağa died in 1806, Alemdar Mustafa Pasha emerged as the master of Rusçuk (Somel: 15).
When Selim III was deposed in May 1807, Alemdar Mustafa Pasha organized the Rusçuk Committee, which brought some of the powerful āyāns of southeast Europe under one umbrella. He then marched to Istanbul in July 1808 to reinstate Selim. The reigning sultan, Mustafa IV, responded to the arrival of Alemdar Mustafa Pasha and his army by ordering the murder of Selim and Mahmud, the only members of the Ottoman royal family who could replace him. Selim was killed, but Mahmud managed to escape through the roof of the palace and found refuge with Alemdar Mustafa Pasha. Alemdar Mustafa Pasha deposed Mustafa and installed Mahmud as the new sultan on July 28, 1808.
After placing Mahmud II on the throne, Alemdar Mustafa Pasha called for a meeting of the prominent āyāns of the empire in Istanbul. Those āyāns who participated in the gathering organized by Alemdar Mustafa Pasha produced a “document of agreement” called Sened-i İttifak, which was signed on October 7, 1808 (Shaw: 2:2–3; Zürcher: 28). In this document the provincial notables reaffirmed their loyalty to Mahmud II, promising to support the new sultan against any rebellion (Zürcher: 28). They also agreed to implement the Ottoman tax system throughout the empire without diverting any revenue that belonged to the sultan (Shaw: 2:2; Zürcher: 28). In return, the sultan made a commitment to “levy taxes justly and fairly” (Shaw: 2:2; Zürcher: 28). Recognizing the need to defend the empire against foreign aggression, the participating āyāns also made a commitment to support the central government in its efforts to recruit men for the new army (Finkel: 422). Through the Sened-i İttifak, Alemdar Mustafa Pasha and the āyāns who were allied with him tried to impose a pact on the sultan and “legitimize their privileges and autonomy in the provinces” (Finkel: 422).
Alemdar Mustafa Pasha reorganized the disbanded Nizam-i Cedid (Nizam-i Jedid), the modern army created by Selim III, under the new name Seğban-i Cedid (New Segbans, or the new Dog Keepers). He also tried to reform the janissary corps by prohibiting the sale of their positions, restoring the traditional system of seniority, and demanding that they receive modern training (Shaw: 2:4). A revolt staged by rival āyāns from Bulgaria forced Alemdar Mustafa Pasha to send a large segment of his army to Rusçuk, which had been attacked by the rebels. Believing that he had full control over the capital, Alemdar Mustafa Pasha also allowed many of the āyāns who had marched with him to Istanbul to return to the Balkans. The ulema and the janissaries, who opposed Alemdar Mustafa Pasha’s reforms, seized this opportunity and revolted. Janissary units spread the rumor that Alemdar Mustafa Pasha intended to disband their corps. Joined by an angry mob, they stormed the palace and trapped Alemdar Mustafa Pasha in a powder magazine, where he blew himself up on November 15, 1808 (Shaw: 2:5; Zürcher: 29).
See also: Empire and Administration: Janissaries; Sultans: Mahmud II; Selim III
Further Reading
Finkel, Caroline. Osman’s Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire. New York: Basic Books, 2005.
Jelavich, Barbara. History of the Balkans: Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries. Vol 1. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1983.
Jelavich, Charles, and Barbara Jelavich. The Establishment of the Balkan National States, 1804–1920. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1977.
Shaw, Stanford J. Between Old and New: The Ottoman Empire under Sultan Selim III, 1781–1807. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971.
Shaw, Stanford J. History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey. 2 vols. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1976.
Somel, Selçuk Akșin. Historical Dictionary of the Ottoman Empire. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2003.
Zürcher, Erik-Jan. Turkey: A Modern History. London: I. B. Tauris, 2004.
Āli Pasha, Mehmed Emin (1815–1871)
Ottoman statesman, diplomat, and reformer who emerged as one of the principal architects of Tanzimat (reorganization), a series of governmental reforms aimed at modernizing (i.e., Europeanizing) the Ottoman state and society. From 1848 to 1871 Āli Pasha served as the grand vizier of the Ottoman Empire five times and as the foreign minister eight times (Yurdakul: 37). He was appointed grand vizier for the first time in 1852, but he was dismissed after a few months in office. He was reinstated as the grand vizier a second time from 1855 to 1856, the third time from 1858 to 1859, the fourth time in 1861, and for the fifth time from 1867 to 1871.
Mehmed Emin (later known as Āli Pasha) was born in Istanbul on March 15, 1815. His father wa
s a shopkeeper in Istanbul’s Egyptian Market. As a young boy he received a traditional Islamic education. He also studied Arabic. Āli Pasha’s rise to power began after he joined the Translation Office (Tercüme Odasi) in 1833. At the Translation Office, Mehmed Emin studied French. The Translation Office served as the recruitment pool for the emerging Ottoman diplomatic corps. Āli Pasha’s talents as an administrator gained him the attention and patronage of Mustafa Reşid Pasha (Mustafa Reshid Pasha), the Ottoman statesman who emerged as the architect of Tanzimat. With support from Mustafa Reşid Pasha, Mehmed Emin was appointed to diplomatic positions in various European countries: “second clerk at the Vienna embassy (1835), interpreter to the Imperial Council (1837), chargé d’affaires in London (1838), undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (1840), ambassador to London (1841), and member of the Supreme Council for Judicial Ordinances (Meclis-i Vālā-yi Ahkām-i Adliye, 1844)” (Yurdakul: 36). At one point during his career as a government official and diplomat, he was given the nickname of Āli and the honorific title of Āli Effendi. In 1846, after his patron, Mustafa Reşid Pasha, became the grand vizier, Āli Effendi was appointed foreign minister. In 1848 he received the title of pasha, hence Āli Pasha. Though Mustafa Reşid Pasha and Āli Pasha were dismissed in 1848, they were reappointed to the same posts they had lost in 1852. When Mustafa Reşid Pasha was dismissed in the same year, Āli Pasha replaced his patron as the grand vizier. To consolidate his position, he appointed his close friend and one of the architects of Tanzimat, Fuad Pasha, as minister of foreign affairs. However, Āli Pasha was dismissed a short time later. In 1853 he was sent to Izmir as the provincial governor. In 1854 Āli Pasha was appointed governor of Bursa in western Anatolia. In the same year, after Mustafa Reşid Pasha became the grand vizier, Āli Pasha was appointed minister of foreign affairs.
The Crimean War began on October 4, 1853, after the sultan declared war on Russia. In March 1854 France and Great Britain declared war on Russia. The military campaigns that followed, particularly the attack on Sevastopol, which was occupied in October 1855, forced Russia to sue for peace. When the Crimean War began in 1853, Āli Pasha went to Vienna as a special envoy to gauge the Austrian government’s position vis-à-vis Russia and the Ottoman Empire. In 1855 Āli Pasha was appointed grand vizier. As the grand vizier, he led the Ottoman delegation to the Paris Peace Conference, which was convened in February 1856 after the end of the Crimean War. Before the departure of the Ottoman delegation for Paris, Sultan Abdülmecid (Abdülmejid) (r. 1839–1861), under pressure from France and Great Britain and with strong encouragement from Āli Pasha, promulgated a second major reform decree, the Hatt-i Hümayun, or the Imperial Rescript on February 18, 1856, committing the Ottoman government to the principle of equality of all Ottoman subjects. The Hatt-i Hümayun reaffirmed the stipulations of the Hatt-i Şerif Gülhane, which had been issued in 1839. As the representative of the sultan, and as the leader of the Ottoman delegation, Āli Pasha signed the Treaty of Paris on March 30, 1856. The Treaty of Paris forced Russia to withdraw from the two Romanian-populated principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia. Wallachia and Moldavia, along with Serbia, regained their autonomy under Ottoman rule. By surrendering southern Bessarabia to Moldavia, Russia’s access to the Danube River was blocked. The Danube and the Turkish Straits were declared open to ships of all countries, and the Black Sea was demilitarized. Russia also was forced to withdraw its forces from eastern Anatolia, including from the city of Kars, which it had occupied during the Crimean War. Perhaps most important, however, the Treaty of Paris resulted in the de facto inclusion of the Ottoman Empire in the “Concert of Europe,” which had tried to maintain the balance of power on the continent since the defeat of Napoleon and the convening of the Congress of Vienna in 1814 (Zürcher: 54; Shaw: 2:140–141). Thus, as the Ottoman grand vizier confronting a tumultuous international arena, Āli Pasha managed to preserve the territorial integrity of the Ottoman Empire and contain, albeit temporarily, Russia’s expansion in the Balkans. Despite his outstanding service to his royal master, Āli Pasha was dismissed from his post after the end of the Paris Peace Conference.
After Mustafa Reşid Pasha died in 1858, Āli Pasha was appointed grand vizier yet once again, but he was dismissed from his post after a year. In 1861 he was reinstated as the foreign minister for the sixth time. Upon the death of Sultan Abdülmecid on June 25, 1861, his younger brother, Abdülaziz (r. 1861–1876), ascended the throne. The new sultan appointed Āli Pasha as his grand vizier, but he was dismissed after four months in office. He was then appointed as the foreign minister for the seventh time. In 1867 Āli Pasha was reinstated as the grand vizier for the fifth time.
During his last tenure as the grand vizier from 1867 to 1871, Āli Pasha was forced to face new nationalist revolts such as the one that had erupted on the island of Crete shortly before he assumed his post. While the Muslim community on the island had remained loyal to the sultan, the Greek community that constituted the majority of the population maintained close ties to mainland Greece. Greek nationalists called for the union of the island with mainland Greece and began to recruit volunteers to join the battle against Ottoman troops. As the conflict intensified, the Russian government called on the European powers to intervene and secure the separation of Crete from the Ottoman Empire and its union with Greece. The European states, however, refused to intervene. The failure of the Greek nationalists to mobilize European support allowed the Ottoman government led by Āli Pasha to restore order by 1868 and to re-establish the authority of the central government on the island. In 1869, after his close friend and confidant, Fuad Pasha, who served as the minister of foreign affairs, died, Āli Pasha added the post of foreign minister to his portfolio.
The era of governmental reforms known as Tanzimat, which began in 1839, was dominated by government officials who had received their education and training at the Translation Office, followed by service at Ottoman embassies in European capitals. Under the leadership of Mustafa Reşid Pasha, Fuad Pasha, and Āli Pasha, the center of power shifted from the palace to the Porte and particularly the ministry of foreign affairs. With the death of Āli Pasha on September 7, 1871, the Tanzimat era came to an end.
See also: Beys and Pashas: Fuad Pasha; Mustafa Reşid Pasha; Sultans: Abdülmecid
Further Reading
Davison, Roderic H. Nineteenth Century Ottoman Diplomacy and Reforms. Istanbul: Isis Press, 1999.
Davison, Roderic H. Reform in the Ottoman Empire, 1856–1876. New York: Gordian Press, 1973.
Findley, Carter V. Bureaucratic Reform in the Ottoman Empire: The Sublime Porte, 1789–1922. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980.
Finkel, Caroline. Osman’s Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire. New York: Basic Books, 2005.
Hurewitz, J. C. Diplomacy in the Near and Middle East: A Documentary Record. 2 vols. Princeton, NJ: D. Van Nostrand Company, 1956.
Inalcik, Halil. Application of the Tanzimat and Its Social Effects. Lisse: Peter de Ridder, 1976.
Jelavich, Charles, and Barbara Jelavich. The Establishment of the Balkan National States, 1804–1920. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1977.
Lord Kinross. The Ottoman Centuries: The Rise and Fall of the Turkish Empire. New York: William Morrow, 1977.
Mardin, Şerif. The Genesis of Young Ottoman Thought: A Study in the Modernization of Turkish Political Ideas. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1963.
Pamuk, Șevket. The Ottoman Empire and European Capitalism, 1820–1913: Trade, Investment and Production. Cambridge, UK, and London: Cambridge University Press, 1987.
Quataert, Donald. The Ottoman Empire, 1700–1922. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Shaw, Stanford J. History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey. 2 vols. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1976.
Yurdakul, Ilhami. “Āli Pasha, Mehmed Emin.” In Encyclopedia of the Ottoman Empire, edited by Gábor Ágoston and Bruce Masters, 36–37. New York: Facts On File, 2009.
/> Zürcher, Erik-Jan. Turkey: A Modern History. London: I. B. Tauris, 2004.
Ali Pasha of Janina (Tepedelenli Ali Pasha)
(1744–1822)
Ali Pasha of Janina (now Ioánnina, Greece), also known as Tepedelenli Ali Pasha, or Aslan (Lion) of Janina, or the Muslim Bonaparte, was a powerful local notable (āyān) who at the height of his reign ruled a vast region that included much of present-day Greece, Macedonia, and large parts of Albania, from 1787 to 1820. He was born in 1744 in Tepelenë in southern Albania into a “prominent Albanian family” (Jelavich: 124). He lost his father, Veli Bey, at a very young age.
Ali began his career as a brigand determined to restore the political and financial fortunes of his family. As a ruthless bandit, he accumulated considerable wealth. He also offered his services to the pashas, who ruled the various regions and districts of northwestern Greece and southern Albania on behalf of the Ottoman sultan. By policing highroads he enriched himself, and by sending gifts and bribes to Istanbul he finally secured himself the governorship (pāshālik) of Trikkala in the Epirus, the coastal region of northwestern Greece. Through bribery, intrigue, and elimination of his rivals, Ali managed to be appointed governor of Janina (Yannina/Ioánnina) in 1788. Using Janina as his base of operations, Ali Pasha expanded the territory under his control, quickly emerging as a quasi-independent ruler of Epirus. He pushed south all the way to Morea (Peloponnese) in present-day southern Greece and north all the way into central Albania. To consolidate and expand the territory under his control, Ali Pasha appointed his sons to governorships of various districts in Greece and Albania. Thus his son Veli seized Trikkala in northwestern Thessaly and later Morea in southern Greece, while his son Mukhtar became the governor of Lepanto in southwestern Greece. To the north his territorial possessions incorporated Delvino (Delvinë) and Vlore (Vlorë) in southern Albania, Berat in south central Albania, and Vlore and Elbasan in central Albania. In 1799 Ali Pasha reached the zenith of his power when he was appointed “governor of Rumelia, the highest Balkan post” in the Ottoman Empire (Jelavich: 124). By the first decade of the 19th century, Ali Pasha had established his own court, and he negotiated with foreign powers, including Russia, France, and England, as a semi-independent ruler.