Nasihatnameler, İcmal Defterleri, and the Timar-Holding Ottoman Elite in the Late Sixteenth Century / XVI. Yüzyılın Sonunda İcmal Defterleri, Nasihatnameler ve Timar Sahibi Osmanlı Eliti

Abstract

This article examines the changing identities of one portion of the Ot- toman elite as depicted in the icmal defterleri. The focus is on the late sixteenth century, when the advice writers say the timar system declined and elite recruitment altered significantly. They attribute the uselessness of the timar-holding cavalry to the replacement of the sons of timar-holders by outsiders (ecnebiler), Janissaries or the retainers of the powerful. The icmal defterleri, however, do not indicate a major change in elite recruitment around 1580.They show that sons of timar-holders were never the majority of recipients, and that although they did decrease somewhat from a momentary peak in the 1560s, this decrease was made up, not by Janissaries, the provincial military, or retainers of great men, but by sons of nobodies with military experience. And they did not disappear but acquired new functions, especially in siege warfare