Rapid-Fire Artillery in the Ottoman Empire I (1773-1788): Casting Technology, Bureaucracy and Deployment

Abstract

The cash subsidies sent to the people of Haramayn and Quds which are generally known as ŝurre have been studied from different perspectives. In these studies, it has been assumed that after the establishment of the Ottoman rule in Egypt two big ŝurres were maintained by the Ottomans, i.e. the old ŝurre of the Mamluks and the ŝurre of Ottomans from Istanbul. The reason for this assumption was that the Ottomans made formally no change concerning the ŝurre of the Mamluks, that there were many endowments for the benefit of the people of Haramayn founded in Anatolia before and after the Ottoman conquest of the Egypt and that the Ottomans began to send regularly subsidies to Haramayn before this time. The document MAD 1806 which was prepared by the newly appointed superintendent for the endowments of Haremayn contains the total numbers of the revenues of the Haramayn Endowments in the Ottoman Empire except Egypt from 997/1589 to 998/1590 and a report attached to the document which contains a summary of a discussion triggered by sending a new ŝurre to Haramayn. In this article, I will examine the report of Habeşî Mehmed Ağa by taking into account its judicial aspects and checking the sums of the revenues of the Haremayn Endowments given by Mehmed Ağa. I will show that there was not a big ŝurre from Istanbul before that time.