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 THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE ISTANBUL ARTISANS AND TRADERS (ESNAF) IN THE LATE OTTOMAN EMPIRE: 1839-1922

ABSTRACT THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE ISTANBUL ARTISANS AND TRADERS (ESNAF) IN THE LATE OTTOMAN EMPIRE: 1839-1922 SÜT, Pınar Ph.D., The Department of History Supervisor: Assoc. Prof. Dr. Birten ÇELİK February 2021, 309 pages This study examines the integration of artisans and traders into the new administrative structure in Istanbul through municipalities between 1839-1922, as well as the abolition of their guilds during this integration process. The study suggests that the underlying reasons in changing of the conditions of these groups and the abolition of the guilds cannot be explained only with the dynamics of economy, such as the integration of the Ottoman market into the European capitalist economic system, mechanization in production, and free-trade practices, but they were also related to the changing administrative necessities. The new administrative system, legislation, marketplace supervision, and the change in the professional organization model impacted the transformation of these groups. Furthermore, this study argues that the abolition of the guild wardenship was not only the result of their economic loss of power, but it was also the outcome of the administrative modernization in the Ottoman Empire. The conflicts emerged in the guilds upon the guild’s warden position and its responsibilities played crucial roles in the abolition of the guilds. The study is set on two essential questions: The first one is that how the artisans and traders of Istanbul adapted themselves to the administrative restructuring in the nineteenth century, and
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the second one is that what kind of an organizational transformation took place from guilds to esnaf associations. Keywords: Esnaf, Guilds, Associations, Municipality, Istanbul (19th & early 20th century).
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ÖZ GEÇ DÖNEM OSMANLI İMPARATORLUĞU’NDA İSTANBUL ESNAFININ DÖNÜŞÜMÜ: 1839-1922 SÜT, Pınar Doktora, Tarih Bölümü Tez Yöneticisi: Doç. Dr. Birten ÇELİK Şubat 2021, 309 sayfa Bu çalışma 1839-1922 yılları arasında İstanbul’daki esnafın belediyeler aracılığıyla yeni idari yapıyla bütünleşmesini ve bu bütünleşme sürecinde loncalarının lağvını incelemektedir. Çalışma, bu grupların koşullarının değişmesinin ve loncaların kaldırılmasının altında yatan sebeplerin sadece Osmanlı pazarının Avrupa kapitalist ekonomik sistemi ile bütünleşmesi, üretimde makineleşme ve serbest ticaret uygulamaları gibi ekonomik dinamiklerle açıklanamayacağını, bunların değişen idari gerekliliklerle de bağlantılı olduğunu öne sürmektedir. Yeni idari sistem, mevzuat, market denetimi ve meslek örgütü modelindeki değişim bu grupların dönüşümünde etkili olmuştur. Ayrıca bu çalışma kethüdalığın ilgasının yalnızca loncaların ekonomik güç kaybının bir sonucu olmadığını, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’ndaki idari modernleşmenin de bir neticesi olduğunu iddia etmektedir. Kethüdalık pozisyonu ve sorumlulukları üzerine ortaya çıkan ihtilaflar loncaların ilga edilmesinde önemli rol oynamıştır. Çalışma iki temel soru üzerine kuruludur: Birincisi, İstanbul esnafı on dokuzuncu yüzyılda kendisini idari yeniden yapılandırmaya nasıl adapte etti? İkincisi, loncalardan esnaf cemiyetlerine doğru nasıl bir örgütsel dönüşüm yaşandı?
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Anahtar Kelimeler: Esnaf, Loncalar, Cemiyetler, Belediye, İstanbul (19. ve erken 20. Yüzyıllar).
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am greatly indebted to Assoc. Prof. Dr. Birten Çelik for her academic contribution, criticism, encouragement, and patience all through the dissertation process. I owe my deepest gratitude to her for accepting to become my supervisor. It was a great chance for me in this difficult process. I want to express my special thanks to Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nalan Turna for her suggestions and criticism, which greatly contributed to this study. I am indebted to her both for her great academic contribution and encouragement. Her invaluable help and continuous support in this field always encouraged me. I am grateful to Assist. Prof. Dr. Selçuk Dursun for his academic contribution both in my undergraduate education and in this study. His critiques on the drafts of this study always helped me to improve my academic perspective and writing. I would like to express my appreciation to Prof. Dr. Mehmet Seyitdanlıoğlu for his invaluable comments and accepting to be a member of the dissertation examining committee. I am also greatly thankful to Prof. Dr. Onur Yıldırım for his challenging comments, feedbacks, and insightful suggestions. I am indebted to his stimulating contribution. I would like to express my thanks to The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK-BİDEB) for the PhD fellowship (2211-E), which made this study possible. I would also like to thank to the staff of the Middle East Technical University Library, İBB Atatürk Library, Beyazıt State Library, the Library of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (TBMM), and Turkish Presidency State Archives of the Republic of Turkey-Department of Ottoman Archives.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
PLAGIARISM ............................................................................................................ iii
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................ iv
ÖZ ............................................................................................................................... vi
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ........................................................................................ viii
TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................ ix
LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................... xi
LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................... xii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ................................................................................... xiv
CHAPTERS
1. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................. .1
1.1. Terminological Definitions and Framework ................................................ 5
1.2. Literature Review…………………………………………………………12
1.3. Methodology and Sources………………………………………………...20
1.4. Outline of the Study ……………………………………………………….26
2. A PORTRAIT: ARTISANS, TRADERS, AND GUILDS IN ISTANBUL………30
2.1. Artisans and Traders………………………………………………………….31
2.1.1. Ottoman Women and Marketplace……………………………………42
2.2. Guilds During the Post-Tanzimat Period…………………………………….54
2.2.1. Changing Methods for Training………………………………………63
3. ADMINISTRATIVE TRANSFORMATION AND ECONOMY IN THE
SHADE OF ECONOMIC RECESSION……………………………………………70
3.1. Outcomes of Administrative Reforms………………………………………72
3.1.1. The Municipality and Legal Regulations……………………………..78
3.1.2. Supervision Tasks: Police and Municipal Police ……………………..82
3.1.3. The Establishment of the Esnaf Office (Esnaf Kalemi)………………..89
3.2. Economic Situation………………………………………………………….93
3.2.1. Struggle for Existence in Economic Downturn……………………….95
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3.2.2. Taxes and Fees………………………………………………………101
3.2.3. Esnaf License (Esnaf Tezkeresi)……………………………………..113
4. BUSINESS LIFE, SPACE, AND PUBLIC HYGIENE IN MARKETPLACE…123
4.1. The Rules for Trade and the Professional Order …………………………..124
4.2. The Workplace Spatial Settings…………………………………………….128
4.3. Public Hygiene and Sanitation in Marketplace…………………………….139
4.3.1. Food and Food-related Sectors……………………………………....145
4.3.2. Other Sectors ………………………………………………………..155
5. TRANSFORMATION OF OTTOMAN GUILDS: THE ABOLITION
OF THE GUILD WARDENSHIP AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF
ESNAF ASSOCIATIONS (ESNAF CEMİYETLERİ)…………………………..…164
5.1. The Last Period of Guilds………………………………………………….165
5.1.1. Guild Warden: A Burden?...................................................................170
5.1.2. Sharing the Authority………………………………………………..177
5.1.3. The Guild Warden Position as a Life-Time Income Source…………181
5.1.4. The Abuses of the Guild Wardens and Disputes ……………………182
5.2. From Guilds to Esnaf Associations (1910/1912)…………………………..188
6. CONCLUSION………………………………………………………………….205
BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................... 212
APPENDICES
A. THE ORDINANCE OF THE ESNAF OFFICE………………………………..243
B. ESNAF KALEMİNİN SÛRET-İ TEŞKÎL VE VEZÂİFİNİ MÜBEYYİN
TALİMAT…………………………………………………………………………247
C. THE EXAMPLE OF A BARBER LICENSE…………………………………..248
D. THE EXAMPLE OF A COFFEEHOUSE KEEPER LICENSE………...……..249
E. THE REGULATION OF ESNAF ASSOCIATIONS (1912)…………………..250
F. ESNAF CEMİYETLERİ NİZAMNÂMESİ……………………………………254
G. TABLES……………………………………………..…………………………258
H. FIGURES…………………………………….………………………..………..261
I. CURRICULUM VITAE ....................................................................................... 292
J. TURKISH SUMMARY / TÜRKÇE ÖZET ......................................................... 293
K. THESIS PERMISSION FORM / TEZ İZİN FORMU…………………………310
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LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Taxes and Total Income of the Municipality: 1907-1908 (1325)……......111 Table 2: Marketplaces in Dersaadet……………………………………………….258 Table 3: Associations and Locations ...………………………………………...…259
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LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: “Esnaflarımızda Nezaket” ………………………………………….…..261
Figure 2: A peddler basket seller…………………………………………….…….262
Figure 3: A Grocery Store………………………………………………………....263
Figure 4: Five shoemakers and their workplace…………………………………...264
Figure 5: Itinerant liver seller……………………………………………………..265
Figure 6: The Comb-sellers’ guild warden Ali Ulvi, Hilmi and Cevdet Efendi
from the artisan group……………………………………………………………...266
Figure 7: The postcard of public water carriers……………………………………267
Figure 8: The photograph of a sahleb seller……………………………………….268
Figure 9: The photograph of an egg seller…………………………………………269
Figure 10: A Coffee Maker………………………………………………………...270
Figure 11: A Carpenter Shop………………………………………………………271
Figure 12: Six tailors with their sewing machine………………………………….272
Figure 13: “A baker and his sons”…………………………………………………273
Figure 14: “A butcher shop and a bakery”………………………………………...274
Figure 15: “Simit Sellers”…………………………………………………………275
Figure 16: “İstanbul: Yeni Valide Camii and Market at Eminönü”………………..276
Figure 17: “Turkish Coffeehouse”………………………………………………...277
Figure 18: “Peddlers in front of the New Mosque”………………………………..278
Figure 19: “Prayer beads sellers”………………………………………………….279
Figure 20: “Butchers”……………………………………………………………..280
Figure 21: “Public fountain at Şehzadebaşı”………………………………………281
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Figure 22: “Entrance to Egyptian (Spice) Bazaar”……………………….………..282 Figure 23: “Young garlic peddler”…………………………………………….......283 Figure 24: “Street barbers”……………………………………………..……….…284 Figure 25: “Street coffee vendor”………………………………………….……...285 Figure 26: “Savory pastry vendor”……………………………………………..….286 . Figure 27: “Itinerant pudding vendor”………………………………………….....287 Figure 28: “Turkish barber shaving Prof. Sterrett on corridor of Khan”……….….288 Figure 29: “Hamals Transporting a Hogshead of Wine” and “Selling Strawberries in the Stamboul Market” ………………………………..……...……289 Figure 30: “A Shop in Grand Bazaar”……………………………………………..290 Figure 31: Cigarette Paper and A Case…………………………………………….291
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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS A.} DVN. Sadaret, Divan Kalemi Evrakı A.} MKT. MHM. Sadaret, Mühimme Kalemi Evrakı A.} DVN. MKL. Sadaret, Mukavelenameler A.} MKT. NZD. Sadaret, Nezaret ve Devair Evrakı B Receb BEO. Bab-ı Ali Evrak Odası BOA Devlet Arşivleri Başkanlığı Osmanlı Arşivi C Cemâziyelâhir CA Cemâziyelevvel C.. ML.. Cevdet, Maliye DH. EUM. KADL. Dahiliye Nezareti, Emniyet-i Umumiye Müdüriyeti, Kısm-ı Adli DH. EUM. 6. Şb Dahiliye Nezareti, Emniyet-i Umumiye Müdüriyeti, Altıncı Şube DH. EUM. THR. Dahiliye Nezareti, Emniyet-i Umumiye Müdüriyeti, Tahrirat Kalemi DH. EUM. VRK. Dahiliye Nezareti, Emniyet-i Umumiye Müdüriyeti, Evrak Odası Kalemi DH. HMŞ. Dahiliye Nezareti, Hukuk Müşavirliği DH. İD. Dahiliye Nezareti, İdari Kısım DH. İ. UM. Dahiliye Nezareti, İdare-i Umumiye DH. MB.. HPS. Dahiliye Nezareti, Hapishaneler Müdiriyeti DH. MKT. Dahiliye Nezareti, Mektubi Kalemi DH. MUİ. Dahiliye Nezareti Muhaberat-ı Umumiye İdaresi DH. TMIK.M.. Dahiliye Nezareti, Muamelat DH. UMVM. Dahiliye Nezareti, Umur-ı Mahalliyye ve Vilayat Müdürlüğü Ed. Editor FTG. f.. Fotoğraflar
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HAT. Hatt-ı Hümayun HR. MKT. Hariciye Nezareti, Mektubi Kalemi HR. TH. Hariciye Nezareti, Tahrirat İ.. DH. İrade, Dahiliye İ.. DUİT.. İrade, Dosya Usulü İ.. EV. İrade, Evkaf İ.. HUS. İrade, Hususi İ.. MMS. İrade, Meclis-i Mahsus İ.. MSM. İrade, Mesail-i Mühimme İ.. MVL. İrade, Meclis-i Vala İ.. ŞD.. İrade, Şura-yı Devlet İ.. ŞE.. İrade, Şehremaneti İ. TAL. İrade, Taltifat L Şevval M Muharrem MF. MKT. Maarif Nezareti, Mektubi Kalemi MV. Meclis-i Vükela MVL. Meclis-i Vala N Ramazan R Rebîülâhir RA Rebîülevvel S Safer Ş Şaban ŞD. Şura-yı Devlet TDV Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı TS. MA. d. Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi Arşivi Defterleri TS. MA. e. Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi Arşivi Evrakı Y.. A. HUS. Yıldız, Hususi Maruzat Y.. A. RES. Yıldız, Resmi Maruzat YB..021. Yabancı Arşivler, Makedonya Arşivi Y.. MTV. Yıldız, Mütenevvi Maruzat Y.. PRK. AZJ. Yıldız, Arzuhal Jurnal
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Y.. PRK. PT. Yıldız, Posta Telgraf Nezareti Maruzatı
Y.. PRK. SH. Yıldız, Sıhhiye Nezareti Maruzatı
Y.. PRK. ŞH. Yıldız, Şehremaneti Maruzatı
Y.. PRK. ZB. Yıldız, Zabtiye Nezareti Maruzatı
Z Zilhicce
ZA Zilkade
ZB. Zabtiye Nezareti
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CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION Artisans and traders namely esnaf is the significant social layer of the Ottoman society, referring to the individuals who dealt with craft and trade.1 It denotes the group of people who conducted retail trade in shops and workplaces all over the empire.2 They worked either mobile or in a specific shop, place or district in various fields and performed their business both in urban and rural under the rules of their guilds and professions. They were active in fields related to both production and consumption, which are the main human activities. Therefore, artisans and traders were in a critical position in providing good and service needs of society and provisioning. The nature of their work was based on the subsistence economy. The work hierarchy was consolidated with professional relations and daily interactions among the masters, the journeymen, and the apprentices. The journeymen and apprentices had to follow the order of their masters, who dictated to them. In return, the masters had to teach the details of the profession preserving the work ethics. The state was in contact with these groups and monitored their conducts and problems via guilds. This study examines the integration and adaptation of Istanbul artisans and traders to the new centralized and law-based administrative order via the municipalities. It describes the process, including the years between 1839 and 1922, by considering the effects of administrative reforms and changing public administration practices on the experiences of these groups. The establishment of the Municipality (Şehremâneti) in Istanbul in 1855 marked a new period for these groups since it changed their administrative and juridical position in line with the Tanzimat order. The municipalities established in Istanbul directly interacted with artisans and
1 Hereafter, this study will use artisan and trader to refer esnaf. 2 “Esnaf”, Dersaadet Ticaret Odası Gazetesi, no: 9, 12 B 1302 [27 April 1885], p. 5.
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traders and these new urban institutions became their official authority agencies after 1855. The leitmotiv of the Ottoman municipal politics was initially composed of managing the affairs of these groups and the public works. Then, in time, the municipal service was expanded and shaped according to the new necessities of urban life. The Ottoman state sought ways to integrate these groups into its new municipal administration since they were inseparable part of economic and social life. The Municipality supervised artisans and traders under its new bureaucratic system rather than leaving them unattended under the individual initiatives. It had a leading role in the centralization and systematization of their affairs. The relational factors, including centralization and bureaucratic modernization, which shaped the administrative structure in the nineteenth century, had significant transforming impacts on the affairs of these groups. On the other side, the groups in question tried to accommodate themselves to the unsettled structure of the municipal order. They sought ways to find an answer or a solution to their demands and problems with such reactions as adaptation or resistance as active marketplace actors by consulting to the municipal administration that they were belonged. The engagement in the new administrative system enabled these groups to develop the notion of regulation and other legal arrangements as well. They emphasized the importance of the rule of law when trying to solve their problems, and they began to partially internalize the perspective of modern law. The legislative regulations, which covered the issues of the marketplace affairs, the supervision of the groups, and the institutional change of guilds, determined the path of the marketplace actors in articulating to the municipal administration. On the other hand, these groups became a propelling force, especially in the systematization of the trading activities, public health, and city planning policies during the Tanzimat (1839-1876) and the post-Tanzimat (1876-1922) periods. Therefore, this study depicts artisans and traders considering their experiences, reactions, conflicts along with the policies of the state center and the Municipality. It explains how a new official institution interacted with these social groups and how this interaction changed the state of them. The academic and non-academic sources explain the process mainly as that artisans and traders decreased in number with the effect of burgeoning capitalism. Although the issue of the integration of the Ottoman Empire into the capitalist
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economic system was controversial, it can be claimed that the integration into the capitalist system did not influence certain craft or trade professions. Some production branches were industrialized and mechanized, whereas some were hardly transformed, and some were partially mechanized. This study keeps in mind the adverse effects of the liberal market economy on certain industries. However, it contextualizes the administrative-judicial and economic experiences of artisans and traders together through the issue of new government agencies; in other words, municipalities, but not with such a grand fact as capitalism, which the literature dominantly highlighted. A new structural change in the administration apparatus began to blossom for the craft and trade groups with the new municipalization process in this period. In this respect, the transformation of these groups and their guilds has to be investigated by considering the consequences of both capitalism and the changing administrative-judicial structure of the Ottoman state. This study aims to do this by concentrating on the experiences of these groups living in Istanbul and examining the legislations prepared for them. The abolition of the guilds in 1910 is another considerable issue in this study since it signifies a fundamental change for artisans and traders. This abolition is presented as their disappearance and it generally linked to the incorporation of the Ottoman Empire into the European capitalist system. Rather than focusing only on the external reason for this repeal, this study gives weight to the internal subjects and factors that emerged in the empire’s last period. Unlike the existing literature that emphasizes the dismantling of the guilds and the disappearance of certain professions from the markets in the last period of the Empire, this study focuses on the process of the integration of these groups into the new administrative order accelerated with the Tanzimat reforms and their new organizational experiences. Contrary to the oft-repeated account, this study suggests that the reason for the abolition of guilds cannot be explained only with the economic dynamics but also with the changing administrative necessities. It also claims that even though the roles of guild wardens were so crucial in keeping the order of guilds, the attempt to eliminate them from the administrative mechanism, the conflicts emerged due to guild warden position, and tax affairs also played important roles in the abolition of the guild warden post; in other words, the guilds. This study argues that the abolition of this post was not only related
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to the economic demise, but it was also the outcome of the administrative modernization in the Ottoman Empire. Following the collapse of the guilds, esnaf associations (artisan and trader associations-esnaf cemiyetleri), which began to appear from 1910 onwards, functioned as the main organizations of artisans and traders. These associations played a role in bringing the guild tradition to an end. The artisans and traders continued to conduct their occupational affairs under the management of these associations. A set of questions will help understand the transformation of the Ottoman artisans and traders with their guilds by highlighting possible factors and conditions that played crucial roles in this process. These questions are; what were the socio-economic conditions and the legal positions of these groups in Istanbul during the mid-nineteenth century? What was the state policy towards these groups in this period? What kinds of legal arrangements were made concerning these trade groups? How did the legal regulations change the marketplace order and influence the managerial, organizational, and daily practices of these groups? How did these groups react to the legal arrangements and the economic policies? Finally, how did all these contribute to the transformation of these groups? To be able to answer these questions, it is important to know the changing conditions of these groups by following the transition from old order, which was based on individual authorities, to the new administrative-judicial and economic understanding, which was developed with the new state institutions. The following paragraphs provide information on the adaptability and resistance of artisans and traders to the new legislation to understand their circumstances. All the changes related to these groups provide an idea about the panorama of the late Ottoman urban socio-economic life as well since they took part in a significant part of public space in the Ottoman life. They were involved in this narrative as the underprivileged masses. It is an attempt of an analysis that tries to show the interactions between the economic and administrative institutions and these social groups from the perspectives of both sides.3 Beyond the creation of a counter-argument
3 Thomas Welskopp, “Social History”, in Writing History: Theory & Practice, Stefan Berger et al. (eds.), (London: Oxford University Press, 2003), pp. 217-218.
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in the literature, this study aims to propound an alternative perspective that had a role
in the considerable changes in terms of the groups mentioned here.
1.1.Terminological Definitions and Framework
Esnaf means classes in Arabic (it comes from sınıf, which means class). Ta’ifa
was also used for referring to esnaf.4 It had two particular meanings: One means
profession,5 and the other is a group of people who dealt with a certain profession.6
This term was commonly used in the late nineteenth and early twentieth-century
Ottoman documents to denote the artisan and trade groups who traded with small
capital.7 Indeed, it did not have an exact official depiction specified by a code. Esnaf
consisted of two different groups: The first group was the artisans; the second group
was the traders who belonged to a certain workplace or itinerant. Esnaf involved in the
non-agricultural production activity.
The new words entered into the bureaucratic language, which made the
concepts and terms more complex. The conceptual ambiguities concerning the
definition of esnaf continue in the literature as well. However, it has to be stated that
4 Esnaf was also used to refer to the other groups of people when researching for the artisan and trader
groups (esnaf) in the archival research. For example, esnaf was used for pickpockets as esnaf-ı
yankesiciyan even though they were not a trade or a craft group. See Osman Nuri Ergin, Mecelle-i
Umûr-ı Belediyye, v. 9, (İstanbul, İBB Kültür İşleri Daire Başkanlığı Yayınları, 1995), p. 182. The
Arabic term ta’ifa, which was used for the Egyptian guilds, also denotes denominational, national or
social non-trade based groups such as Copts, North Africans or gypsies respectively. See John Chalcraft,
“The Striking Cabbies of Cairo and Other Stories: Crafts and Guilds in Egypt,1863-1914”, Ph.D. diss.,
(New York University, 2001), p. 9. For the dissertation’s book format, see John T. Chalcraft, The
Striking Cabbies of Cairo and Other Stories: Crafts and Guilds in Egypt, 1836-1914, (Albany, New
York University Press, 2005).
5 Donald Quataert, “Labor History and the Ottoman Empire, c. 1700-1922”, International Labor and
Working Class History, no. 60 (Fall, 2001), p. 101.
6 Performing a vocation or carrying out a profession (icrâ-yı sanat etme) includes the words “vocation”
or “profession” (sanat), but it did not always involve a positive meaning in this period as it is in modern
Turkish. It encapsulates a broader meaning, which also includes illegal acts. For example, there is a
statement in article 242 of the Penal Code (11th part, “Kumar ve Piyango mücâzâtı”), which stated as
“having a profession and gaining a profit with gaming as an occupation… (kumarbazlığı kâr ve sanat
edinip)”. See Ahmet Akgündüz, İslam ve Osmanlı Hukuku Külliyatı, (İstanbul: Osmanlı Araştırmaları
Vakfı, 2011), p. 652.
7 The term “esnaf” was defined in the document. See Presidency of Republic of Turkey Directorate of
State Archives, Ottoman Archive (Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Cumhurbaşkanlığı Devlet Arşivleri Başkanlığı-
Osmanlı Arşivi-BOA), BOA, DH. HMŞ. 4/4, 19 S 1339 [2 November 1920]. Hereafter BOA.
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there was no strict differentiation in certain cases in terms of the state between the
worker and artisan/trader. For instance, individuals who worked in a bakery were
accepted as both worker/amele and esnaf. This ambiguity about the names of the
positions or professions emerged probably due to the new administrative order and a
new developing language for this order. The common uses can be detected from the
list of professions and guilds. In this study, the names of the trade and craft groups
have been detected from The Ottoman Archive, the Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye,8 1294
(1877) Ottoman Yearbook,9 Turkish Commerce Yearbook of 1340-1341,10 and
various secondary sources.
There is no single appropriate English word or term for esnaf. The terms such
as craftsman, tradesman, artisan, merchant, guild, and craft worker have been used to
refer to it in various academic works.11 This study accepts people who were
manufacturers, shopkeepers, peddlers, and people who had small businesses to denote
and encompass the term “esnaf” and “artisan and trade groups” will be used in this
study. Although the distinction of trader and esnaf was made in some official
documents on different topics, this study will use them together to prevent ambiguity.12
Artisans and traders were accepted as individuals who traded with small capital that
separated them from merchants.13 Therefore, it has to be added that there is a difference
8 Osman Nuri Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, (İstanbul, İBB Kültür İşleri Daire Başkanlığı
Yayınları, 1995). This work includes professional groups from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
as well, which might not exist in the late nineteenth-century Ottoman Istanbul. They were crosschecked
with the archival research.
9 Salnâme-i Devlet-i Aliyye-i Osmaniyye 1294/1877, (İstanbul: Dersaadet Matbaası, 1294); Necdet
Sakaoğlu & Nuri Akbayar, Osmanlı’da Zenaatten Sanata: Esnaf ve Zenaatkârlar, v. 1, (İstanbul:
Körfezbank, 1999), pp. 299-311.
10 Türk Ticaret Salnâmesi (Turkish Commerce Yearbook of 1340-1341 /1924-1925), (İstanbul: İktisadi
Tedkikat Neşriyat ve Muamelat Türk Anonim Şirketi, 1340-1341).
11 Robert W. Olson used the term “esnaf” in his works. See Robert W. Olson, “The Esnaf and the
Patrona Halil Rebellion of 1730: A Realignment in Ottoman Politics”, Journal of the Economic and
Social History of the Orient, vol. 17, no. 3, (September, 1974), pp. 329-344; Robert W. Olson, “Jews,
Janissaries, Esnaf and the Revolt of 1740 in Istanbul: Social Upheaval and Political Realignment in the
Ottoman Empire”, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. 20, no. 2, (May,
1977), pp. 185-207.
12 For the distinction between trader and esnaf in a population record of migrants, see BOA, YB..021,
28 Z 1296 [13 December 1879].
13 BOA, DH. HMŞ. 4/4, 19 S 1339 [2 November 1920]. Artisans and traders also separated themselves
from merchants even though they purchased the products wholesale. For example, the mat makers took
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between merchant and trader because the former was engaging in wholesale trade and
investing capital; on the other hand, the latter denotes the individuals or groups who
were trading with small capital but not investing it. The scholars generally have used
esnaf for artisans, but it is broader in terms of its content.14 Every artisan can be
accepted as a member of esnaf traditionally, but a trader may not be accepted as an
artisan when the professional difference is concerned.15
Guild (lonca in Turkish) denotes the craft and trade organization that regulated
the division of labor in the production process and the marketplace life in both urban
and rural areas. Trade and artisan groups produced and sold their products under the
authorization of their guilds. The term “guild” was first used for the rooms of these
groups in which they gathered to talk about their problems or current issues. These
rooms were also used for storing raw materials that would be allocated to the related
group. Second, it was also used for referring to their organization.16 The term guild
which refers to their organization has also been used to refer esnaf, but esnaf has a
broader meaning as explained above.
The guild organization aimed to regulate the affairs such as the organization of
labor and the control of price movements at the market. On the other hand, the state
used the guilds as a means of controlling urban population and city life, including
procurement of services, securing the payment of taxes, and following the dues of the
guild members.17 The state ensured to collect taxes and fees via guild headmen and to
their licenses from the Municipality, and they should be accepted as traders even if they procured mat
as wholesale. The license was the official-written proof of their professional epithets. See BOA, BEO.
1021/76548, 15 CA 1315 [12 October 1897].
14 Another frequently used term “tradesmen” refers only to men, but women artisans and traders existed
as well in the late Ottoman period. The term “tradespeople” can be preferred in studies instead of the
former.
15 Sometimes the terms trader (tüccar) and esnaf were used together for the same profession. For the
example of cattle-dealers, see BOA, DH. MKT. 897/14, 26 B 1322 [6 October 1904].
16 Şemseddin Sami mentions that “lonca” (which is now used for guild) is the mumpsimus of the word
“loca”. See Şemseddin Sami, “Loca”, Kâmûs-ı Türkî, (İstanbul: Çağrı Yayınları, 2007), pp. 1246-1247;
Mehmet Zeki Pakalın, “Lonca”, Osmanlı Deyimleri ve Terimleri Sözlüğü (2nd vol), (İstanbul: Milli
Eğitim Bakanlığı, 2004), pp. 369-370.
17 Suraiya N. Faroqhi, “Guildsmen and handicraft producers”, The Cambridge History of Turkey: The
Later Ottoman Empire, 1603-1898, Suraiya N. Faroqhi (ed.), (New York: Cambridge University Press,
2006), p. 344.
8
control of the quality, weight, price, and measures of the products. The guilds supplied
services and labor in addition to the distribution of the goods. They provided funds
and mutual help to their members. They consulted the courts and later also to the
Municipality in case of arbitration of disputes. Hence, the government implemented
measures according to these requests (that can be about transportation problems,
import-export affairs, security and public order) to prevent the bad effects and results
of famine and unemployment that craftspeople or tradespeople may be influenced and
pursued them.18
A standard description of the organizational structure of the guilds was
superficially made without considering the positional changes over time as such: They
were ruled according to a certain hierarchy, and at the top of this hierarchy, there was
a guild warden (kethüdâ) who was the main representative of the guild and was
responsible for the affairs of artisan and trade groups. The guild sheik (şeyh) was the
religious representative; nakîb was in charge of conducting the ceremonies; yiğitbaşı
was responsible for the domestic affairs of the guilds, and he was distributing raw
materials or designating the mainframe of the work;19 and finally ehl-i hibre
(experienced masters) were the specialists of the guilds. These six people constituted
the guild council, the formal economic organization in rural and urban centers.20
Apart from the people in the guild hierarchy, there was also a hierarchy in terms
of work order: First master, then journeyman, and apprentice. Journeyman and
apprentice had to obey the orders of their masters, and they were not the members of
the guilds until they became a master. Their heads (reis) handled the affairs of the
groups, and these heads (not in all professions) were responsible for dealing with the
doings and problems of the related group. Their duties included the solving of disputes
among the guild members, registering the returning to the cash box, the establishment
of charitable foundations, a close examination of the private and general conditions of
18 Mehmet Genç, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nda Devlet ve Ekonomi, (İstanbul: Ötüken Neşriyat, 2012),
pp. 303-304.
19 In general, Yiğitbaşı is known as the assistant of the guild wardens, but this description is open to
debate.
20 Halil İnalcık, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu Klasik Çağ (1300-1600), (İstanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları,
2013), p. 159.
9
employees, presidency to the guild’s administrative committee, the representing the
guild in external affairs, and the practice of the ceremonies of the journeymen and
apprentices.21 In the late nineteenth century, the small-scale trade and artisan groups
were composed of mainly master, journeyman, and apprentice.22 The issues about the
positions of the guild members and the other professional matters were solved by the
consultation to the government and the Municipality. The structure of the guilds was
suitable to build the stratum affiliation notion because it denoted the vocational stratum
affiliation.23 Nonetheless, craftspeople and tradespeople formed a social class as a
kernel, and it was not completely an Ottoman social class.24 Hence, the use of “layer”
for these groups is more plausible than “class” in the Ottoman context.
Every different production and service phase organized its artisan and trader
guilds. Organizational differences depended on various reasons such as the different
production phases, service areas, models, and colors in the same good, which could
generally be changed according to the economic or religious differences, such as in
shoes.25 But it has to be pointed out that every artisan or trade group did not have their
guilds. On the other hand, different guilds were established in the same field but in
separate districts. Without examining the guilds, there will be a gap in the history of
the Ottoman socio-economic life since they were the main organizations of the
marketplace actors, which had control of nearly all production and service processes.
Interestingly, the word lonca, which is the Turkish equivalent of guild, was less
used in the archival documents, and the entity of guilds in the last period of the Empire
21 Celâl Yerman & Samet Ağaoğlu, Türkiye İktisadî Teşkilatında Ticaret ve Sanayi Odaları Esnaf
Odaları ve Ticaret Borsaları, (Ankara: Titaş Basımevi, 1943), p. 14.
22 A booklet was found in the catalogue of Muallim Cevdet from Atatürk Library (İBB Atatürk
Kitaplığı). The printing house of the booklet is unknown. The publication date of it is also not written,
but it was written in the record of the website of the library as 1900. It includes the taxes and fees that
artisan and trade groups paid. Hademe was used as a member of certain trade groups. Moreover, it is
confusing that the members, including a master, journeyman, apprenticeship, hademe, and sales clerk,
were divided as honorable and dishonorable, and their taxes changed according to this differentiation.
See Dersaadet ve Bilâd-ı Selâse’de icra-yı sanat eden bilcümle esnâf-ı mütenevvianın mükellef
oldukları mahiye vergisiyle senevî tezkere harcları mübeyyin bir kıta tarife defteridir, İBB Atatürk
Kitaplığı, no: 413/01, (1900?).
23 Şerif Mardin, Türkiye’de Toplum ve Siyaset, (İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları, 2012), pp. 80-81.
24 Mardin, p. 100.
25 Genç, p. 294.
10
was unearthed by the use of the term guild warden (kethüdâ). However, certain trade
and artisan groups did not even have their guild wardens. Hence, the use of the
professional epithets and the terms guild warden/guild wardenship rather than guild
became more functional during the research. After the functions of the guild
organizations disrupted and they were abolished, new associations named Esnaf
Cemiyetleri replaced them. How and why this change occurred is one of the main
concerns of this study.
Another important concept in esnaf studies is gedik (slot). The guild member
artisans or traders were able to perform their work if they possessed a gedik. It was a
significant development in the history of guilds, which was officially implemented in
the eighteenth century. It initially meant the tools and equipment in a craft. Then, it
began to be used as the right to practice a particular profession at a specific location,
including means and production tools as well. The term was associated with sectorspecific
barriers to entry that limited the number of people who could enter a certain
craft or trade activity. It finally meant the full usufruct over the real property of a
holder.26 It became the vestige of protecting artisan and trade groups from the
uncontrollable economic growth, which could weaken the production potential. It also
protected them from the unfair profits of waqf (pious foundations) members from rents
or the evacuation demand of the shops.27 As the symbol of the monopolization of
production, trade, and estate market, the gedik system became prevalent after the
second half of the eighteenth century. This system led to the monopolization of
production under certain individuals who had a gedik and having equipment for
practicing their professions. It became influential long time in economic life until the
first quarter of the nineteenth century. The gedik was implemented in 1727 and
abolished on March 1, 1913.28 In fact, the internal monopolistic privileges of artisans
26 See Engin Deniz Akarlı, “Gedik: Implements, Mastership, Usufruct, and Monopoly among Istanbul
Artisans, 1750-1850”, Wissenschaftskolleg Berlin Jahrbuch, (Berlin: Siedler Verlag, 1987), pp. 223-
232; Seven Ağır and Onur Yıldırım, “Gedik: What’s in a name?”, in Bread from The Lion’s Mouth:
Artisans Struggling for a Livelihood in Ottoman Cities, Suraiya Faroqhi (ed.), (New York: Berghahn
Books, 2015), p. 219.
27 Akarlı, p. 226.
28 “Gediklerin İlgası Hakkında Kanun-ı Muvakkat”, 22 RE 1331 [1 March 1913], Düstur, II/5,
(Dersaadet, Matbaa-i Amire, 1332.), pp. 118-120. It has to be pointed out that this arrangement was the
announcement of the abolition of the gedik over the real property of a holder.
11
and traders ended with the 1838-1841 treaties.29 The regulation of 1861 was a specific
arrangement that announced the limitations on these monopolistic privileges.30 When
it comes to the second half of the nineteenth century, the gedik system lost its
importance in economic life. Therefore, this study excludes the issues related to the
gedik.
Before evaluating the current literature about the topic, the limits of the
framework of the study has to be stated as well. This study determined the time period
as between 1839-1922, but it shows the institutional and economic transformation of
the Ottoman state which was based on the Tanzimat reforms and free trade economy
rather than the activities of the artisans and traders. The period that elaborated on the
experiences of the groups began with the establishment of the municipalities in 1855
which was the outcome of the mentioned reforms and new economic policies.
In order to focus more on the integration and adaptation of artisans and traders
to the new administrative-judicial and economic order in the late Ottoman Istanbul,
this study excluded the political attempts of the groups or other political contexts
existed in the period that this study covers. The period covered in this study
encompasses the Empire’s turmoil era, which was full of with successive wars,
economic recession, and different administrative and political practices. However, this
study will not deal with the nationalist separatist movement appeared in the empire
and its impact on the artisans and traders in Istanbul, and it will only touch on their
presence in the marketplace.
Economic policies had crucial transforming effects on artisans and traders but
two issues about the framework of this study should be pointed out. One of them is
about the industrial or non-industrial character of the Ottoman Empire.
Industrialization was propounded as the reason for the disappearance of the guilds in
previous studies. But this study regards that certain professions were even not
influenced by this factor even though they had guilds. On the other side, the late
development of capitalism in the Ottomans; that is to say, the non-industrial feature of
it, cannot be considered equal with enduring the old-style service techniques, and the
29 Akarlı, p. 230.
30 Ahmet Akgündüz, “Gedik”, TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.13), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı
Yayınevi, 1996), p. 542.
12
end of the guilds is not the endpoint of this process. Therefore, this study will not put
the issue of capitalism at the center of its narrative. The other point is related to the
national economic policy, which was officially followed from 1908 until the end of
the empire. This policy remarkably influenced the artisan and trade groups. Whether
this policy was a loss or advantage for the groups in Istanbul is a matter of question
that restricts the content of this study since the economic developments influenced
professions in different ways and levels. Therefore, the study will refrain from this
kind of holistic conclusions and dualities.
The analysis of the decline of the classical Ottoman institutions, economic
growth, and administrative reorganization will help to show the changing
circumstances of artisans and traders, their guilds and their transformation.31 The
formal relations of these groups with the government institutions and the state policy
towards the esnaf affairs will be the major topics discussed in this study. The main
effort of this study is the elucidation of the artisan and trader groups living in Istanbul
within the framework of late period’s institutions, market order, administrative
reorganization, and organizational status changed in time. Many works contributed to
understanding the nature of guilds and the conditions of various artisan and trade
groups that existed over time. This study aims to fill the gap in the literature about the
experiences of these groups and positioning of them into the new administrative and
judicial order in the late Ottoman Istanbul, which remained somewhat obscure so far.
Locating these groups into the socio-economic patterns of the state apparatus entails a
remarkable effort. Understanding the late period of Ottoman economy and social order
from a broad historical perspective exceeds this study’s caliber. This work is just an
effort to be a little step in such a historical narrative.
1.2.Literature Review
Many scholars have studied the Ottoman artisans and traders so far.
Comprehensive literature flourished in Ottoman socio-economic history studies, and
the issues concerning these groups were also part of this field. The studies mainly
31 Reşat Kasaba, The Ottoman Empire, and the World Economy: The Nineteenth Century, (Albany:
State University of New York Press, 1988), p. 2.
13
cover the issues such as Ahism and Futuwwa tradition existed during the classical
period of the Ottoman Empire;32 the history of the trade and artisan groups in the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries;33 the affairs concerning the gedik system;34 the
32 See Franz Taeschner, “İslam Ortaçağı’nda Futuvva (Fütüvvet Teşkilatı)”, İstanbul Üniversitesi İktisat
Fakültesi Mecmuası, n. 15, (1953), pp. 3-32; G.G. Arnakis, “Futuwwa Traditions in the Ottoman
Empire: Akhis, Bektashi Dervishes, and Craftsmen”, Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol.12, No.4,
(Oct., 1953), pp. 232-247; Deodaat Anne Breebaart, “The Development and the Structure of the Turkish
Futuwah Guilds”, PhD. diss., (Princeton University, 1961); Ziya Kazıcı, “Ahilik”, in TDV İslâm
Ansiklopedisi (v.1), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 1988), pp. 540-542; Neşet Çağatay, Bir
Türk Kurumu Olan Ahilik, (Ankara: TTK Yayınları, 1989); Neşet Çağatay, Ahilik nedir?, (Ankara: Türk
Kültürünü Araştırma Dairesi Yayınları, 1990); Süleyman Uludağ, “Fütüvvet”, TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi
(v.13), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 1996), pp. 259-261; Ahmet Yaşar Ocak, “Fütüvvet”,
in TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.13), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 1996), pp. 261-263;
Tahsin Özcan, Fetvalar Işığında Osmanlı Esnâfı, (İstanbul, Kitabevi Yayınevi, 2003); Sabri F. Ülgener,
İktisadî Çözülmenin Ahlâk ve Zihniyet Dünyası, (İstanbul: Derin Yayınları, 2006); Abdülbaki
Gölpınarlı, İslam ve Türk İllerinde Fütüvvet Teşkilatı, (İstanbul: İstanbul Ticaret Odası Yayınları,
2011).
33 See Suraiya Faroqhi and Randi Deguilhem (eds.), Crafts and Craftsmen of the Middle East:
Fashioning the Individual in the Muslim Mediterranean, (London: I.B. Tauris, 2005); Suraiya Faroqhi,
Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the Ottomans, (NewYork: I.B. Taurus & Co. Ltd.,
2009); Suraiya N. Faroqhi, “Guildsmen and handicraft producers”, in The Cambridge History of Turkey:
The Later Ottoman Empire, 1603-1898, Suraiya N. Faroqhi (ed.), (New York: Cambridge University
Press, 2006); Suraiya Faroqhi, Bread from The Lion’s Mouth: Artisans Struggling for a Livelihood in
Ottoman Cities. New York: Berghahn Books, 2015; Onur Yıldırım, “Osmanlı Esnâfında Uyum ve
Dönüşüm, 1650-1826”, Toplum ve Bilim, Sayı. 83, pp. 146-177; Mübahat S. Kütükoğlu, “Osmanlı
İktisadî Yapısı”, in Osmanlı Devleti ve Medeniyeti Tarihi, Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu (ed), v.1, (İstanbul:
IRCICA Yayını, 1994), pp. 513-729; Ahmet Kal’a, İstanbul Esnâf Tarihi Tahlilleri: İstanbul Esnâf
Birlikleri ve Nizamları, (İstanbul: İstanbul Araştırmaları Merkezi, 1998); Ahmet Kal’a, “Esnâf”, TDV
İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.11), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 1995), pp. 423-430; Kâzım S.
Ruhani, “Osmanlı- Safevi Esnaf Teşkilatı (XVI. Ve XVII. Yüzyıllarda)”, Ph.D. diss., (İstanbul
University, 1976); Bülent Çelik, “Osmanlı Seferlerinin Lojistik Sorunlarına Kentli Esnafın Getirdiği
Çözümler: Orducu Esnâfı”, Ph.D. diss., (Ankara University, 2002); Miyase Koyuncu, “18. Yüzyılın
İkinci Yarısında Osmanlı Esnafı (İstanbul ve Bursa Örnekleri)”, Ph.D. diss., (Gazi University, 2008);
Engin Çağman, “18. Yüzyılda İstanbul’da Esnaflık-Gıda Sektörü-”, Ph.D. diss., (Marmara University,
2011).
34 See Engin Deniz Akarlı, “Gedik: Implements, Mastership, Usufruct, and Monopoly among Istanbul
Artisans, 1750-1850”, Wissenschaftskolleg Berlin Jahrbuch, (Berlin: Siedler Verlag, 1987), pp. 223-
232; Seven Ağır and Onur Yıldırım, “Gedik: What’s in a name?”, in Bread from The Lion’s Mouth:
Artisans Struggling for a Livelihood in Ottoman Cities, Suraiya Faroqhi (ed.), (New York: Berghahn
Books, 2015), pp. 217-236; Ahmet Akgündüz, “Gedik”, TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.13), (İstanbul:
Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 1996), pp. 541-543.
14
history of the guilds;35 status of these groups in the nineteenth century;36 the relation
with the Janissary Corps until 1826;37 the ethno-religious division of labor in the
marketplace and its effects on the artisanal life;38 and the history of a particular group
or a group in a certain district.39 However, the studies about the guilds and artisans
35 See Ömer Lütfi Barkan, “Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nda Esnaf Cemiyetleri”, İstanbul Üniversitesi
İktisat Fakültesi Mecmuası, v. 41, 1985, pp. 39-46; Gabriel Baer, “The Administrative, Economic and
Social Functions of Turkish Guilds”, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol 1, No. 1 (Jan.,
1970), pp. 28-50; Minna Rozen, “Boatmen’s and Fishermen’s Guilds in Nineteenth-Century Istanbul”,
Mediterranean Historical Review, v. 15: 1, 2000, pp. 72-93; Onur Yıldırım, “Ottoman Guilds (1600-
1826): A Survey”. Paper presented at the meeting of The Return of the Guilds, Utrecht University,
Utrecht, 5-7 October, 2006; Onur Yıldırım, “Ottoman Guilds in the Early Modern Era”, IRSH, n. 53,
(2008), pp. 73-93; Amnon Cohen, The Guilds of Ottoman Jerusalem (Leiden:Brill, 2001); Abdul-Karim
Rafeq, “Craft Organization, Work Ethics, and the Strains of Change in Ottoman Syria”, Journal of the
American Oriental Society, Vol. 111, No. 3 (Jul.- Sep.,1991), pp. 495-51; Ahmet Kal’a, “Lonca”, TDV
İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.27), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 2003), pp. 211-212; M. Tolga
Uslu, “Transition from Ottoman Guilds to Modern Turkish Enterprises: A Weberian Approach”, Ph.D.
diss., (Yeditepe University, 2009); Eunjeong Yi, Guild Dynamics in Seventeenth-Century Istanbul:
Fluidity and Leverage, (Leiden: Brill, 2004); John T. Chalcraft, The Striking Cabbies of Cairo and
Other Stories: Crafts and Guilds in Egypt, 1836-1914, (Albany, New York University Press, 2005).
36 See Amnon Cohen, The Guilds of Ottoman Jerusalem, (Leiden: Brill, 2001); John T Chalcraft, The
Striking Cabbies of Cairo and Other Stories: Crafts and Guilds in Egypt,1863-1914, (Albany: State
University of New York Press, 2005); Nalan Turna, “The Everyday Life of Istanbul and Its Artisans,
1808-1839”, Ph.D. diss., (Binghamton University, 2006).
37 See Donald Quataert, “Janisseries, Artisans and the Question of Ottoman Decline”, in Workers,
Peasants and Economic Change in the Ottoman Empire 1730-1914, (İstanbul: The ISIS Press, 1993),
pp. 197-203; André Raymond, “Soldiers in Trade: The Case of Ottoman Cairo”, British Society for
Middle Eastern Studies: Bulletin, vol. 18, no: 1, (1991), pp. 16-37; Robert W. Olson, “The Esnaf and
the Patrona Halil Rebellion of 1730: A Realignment in Ottoman Politics”, Journal of the Economic and
Social History of the Orient, vol. 17, no. 3, (September, 1974), pp. 329-344; Robert W. Olson, “Jews,
Janissaries, Esnaf and the Revolt of 1740 in Istanbul: Social Upheaval and Political Realignment in the
Ottoman Empire”, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. 20, no. 2, (May,
1977), pp. 185-207; Cemal Kafadar, “On the Purity and Corruption of Janissaries”, Turkish Studies
Association Bulletin, vol. 15, no. 2, (1991), pp. 273-280; Nalan Turna, “The Everyday Life of Istanbul
and Its Artisans, 1808-1839”, Ph.D. Diss., (Binghamton University, 2006); Mehmet Mert Sunar, “When
Grocers, Porters and Other Riff-Raff Become Soldiers: Janissary Artisans and Laborers in the
Nineteenth Century Istanbul and Edirne”, Kocaeli Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi (KOSBED), vol.
17, no.1, (2009), pp. 175-194.
38 See Onur Yıldırım, “Ottoman Guilds as a Setting for Ethno-Religious Conflict: The case of the Silkthread
Spinners’ Guild in Istanbul”, International Review of Social History, vol. 47, no. 3, (December
2002), pp. 407-419; Cengiz Kırlı, “A Profile of the Labor Force in Early Nineteenth-Century Istanbul”,
International Labor and Working Class History, vol. 60, (2001), pp. 125-140.
39 See Çağatay Uluçay, Manisa’da Ziraat, Ticaret ve Esnaf Teşkilatı: XVII. Asırda, (İstanbul: CHP
Manisa Halkevi Yayınları, 1942); Çağatay Uluçay, “İstanbul Saraçhanesi ve Saraçlarına Dair Bir
Araştırma”, Tarih Dergisi v. III, n: 5-6, 1951-52, pp. 147-164; Nikolay Todorov, “19. Yüzyılın İkinci
Yarısında Bulgaristan Esnaf Teşkilatında Bazı Karakter Değişmeleri”, İstanbul Üniversitesi İktisat
Fakültesi Mecmuası, v. 27, n. 1-2, 1967-68, pp. 1-36; Rifat Özdemir, “Ankara Esnaf Teşkilatı (1785-
1840)”, Ondokuz Mayıs Üniversitesi Eğitim Fakültesi Dergisi, v.1, 1986, pp. 156-181; Rifat Özdemir,
“Tokat Esnaf Teşkilatı (1785-1840)”, Ondokuz Mayıs Üniversitesi Eğitim Fakültesi Birinci Tarih
Boyunca Karadeniz Kongresi Bildirileri (13-17 Ekim 1986), 1986, pp. 397-424; İlhan Şahin and
15
existed after the second half of the nineteenth century are few, which will be detailed
below.
Besides these different themes and aspects in artisanship (esnaflık) and guild
history, there are critical debates and changes in terms of approaches to the origin,
legal position, and the role of the guilds in the marketplace as well. One of them is the
discussion on whether the guilds were the direct apparatus of the control mechanism
of the state or were autonomous institutions? For example, as one of the first scholars
who worked on the guilds, Gabriel Baer claimed that the guilds were strictly under the
state’s control, and guild warden was the official representative of the state rather than
the trade and artisan groups. He tried to legitimate his idea by asserting that the guilds
had administrative, economic, and judicial functions, which eased the control of the
state.40 Baer’s assertion became the hegemonic perspective in the literature about the
structure and the role of the guilds for a while. However, this general acceptance
changed with his student’s, Haim Gerber’s, dissertation on the sixteenth-century Bursa
guilds, which emphasized the flexibility of the guilds towards the state control,
replaced the generalization made by Baer.41 Gerber’s claim stresses the autonomy of
the Ottoman guilds because it was recognized that the guilds were open to change their
organizational structure and the relations with the state. This significant perspective
was consolidated with the work of Eunjeong Yi. She explained the relationship of the
seventeenth-century guilds with the state, and she emphasized the flexibility within
the guilds.42 On the other hand, Amnon Cohen examined the Jerusalem guilds. He
stated that guilds were not part of the state apparatus, and they did not have a close
Feridun Emecen, “XV. Asrın İkinci Yarısında Tokat Esnafı”, Osmanlı Araştırmaları, v. VII-III, 1988,
pp. 287-308; Charles Wilkins, Forging Urban Solidarities: Ottoman Aleppo, 1640-1700, (Leiden: Brill,
2010); Ömer Demirel, II. Mahmud Döneminde Sivas’ta Esnaf Teşkilatı ve Üretim-Tüketim İlişkileri,
(Ankara: Kültür Bakanlığı, 1989).
40 For his well-known article, see Gabriel Baer, “The Administrative, Economic and Social Functions
of Turkish Guilds”, International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 1, no. 1 (January, 1970), pp. 28-
50.
41 His dissertation was published. See Haim Gerber, Economy and Society in an Ottoman City: Bursa,
1600-1700, (Jerusalem: Hebrew University Press, 1988); Eunjeong Yi, Guild Dynamics in Seventeenth-
Century Istanbul: Fluidity and Leverage, (Leiden: Brill, 2004), p. 12.
42 Eunjeong Yi, Guild Dynamics in Seventeenth-Century Istanbul: Fluidity and Leverage, (Leiden:
Brill, 2004).
16
organizational structure.43 Suraiya Faroqhi also highlights the importance of the guilds
for the artisans and traders since they used the guilds as the major tool to “defend their
interests”. She also quoting from James Scott mentions of the guilds as “the weapons
of the weak” tells that the artisans could involve in the popular movements, and
became active actors in the Ottoman politics.44
Meanwhile, Özer Ergenç proposed a bilateral view. He states that the groups
of the professions (hirfet zümreleri) cannot be considered as only the part of the state
or the autonomous provincial institutions since this perspective had the risk of fading
one aspect of the reality.45 This study also considers the fluid character of the guilds,
but their official affiliation and responsibilities to the Municipality from the midnineteenth
century onward determined the borders of this fluid character. A document
dated 1891 tells the state plan to open up an Esnaf Office (Esnaf Kalemi) under the
authority of the Accountant Office of the Istanbul Municipality. This office was
opened in 1892 and the details about this office will be given soon.46 Another
discussion is about whether the Ottoman guilds are the continuation of Ahi-order
(mystical brotherhood organization) or not. This question intensively dominated the
studies that cover the classical period. The narrative about esnaf begins mostly from
the Futuwwa (fütüvvet-the rules of conduct) tradition and Ahi-order practices, which
were inherited from the period of the Anatolian Seljuk Empire, whose administration
structure was highly influential on the Ottoman dynasty, to the Ottoman Empire. On
the other side, it was claimed that the market system, which was based on the
convention of a certain trade group in a certain place, was similar to the Byzantine
market system.47 The hybrid heritage narrative nourished the discussions about the
43 For Jerusalem guilds, see Amnon Cohen, The Guilds of Ottoman Jerusalem, (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2001).
44 Faroqhi, “Guildsmen and handicraft producers”, p. 355; James Scott, Weapons of the Weak: Everyday
Forms of Peasant Resistance, (New Have and London: Yale University Press, 1985).
45 Özer Ergenç, “Osmanlı Şehir Tarihi Araştırmalarının Kuramsal Çerçevesi Nasıl Oluşturulabilir?”, in
Şehir, Toplum, Devlet: Osmanlı Tarihi Yazıları, (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 2012), p. 32.
46 BOA, İ..ŞD.. 114/6856, 10 C 1309 [11 January 1892]; “Esnaf kaleminin sûret-i teşkîl ve vezâifini
mübeyyin talimat”, 10 C 1309 [11 January 1892], Düstur, I/6, (Ankara: Devlet Matbaası, 1939), pp.
1150-1155.
47 Fuad Köprülü, Bizans Müesseselerinin Osmanlı Müesseselerine Tesiri, (İstanbul: Kaynak Yayınları,
2009), p. 149.
17
origin of the esnaf tradition and guilds.48 Nonetheless, there is still no consensus
among the researchers about the origin of these organizations and traditions.
The controversial subject in this issue is about the link of the guilds with the
Ahi-order. The Ahi-order was established by taking inspiration from Islam’s futuwwa
tradition, which idealizes a flawless society and order. According to this view, the Ahiorder
members tried to practice this idealized order in economic life via their
associations.49 The futuwwa morals entailed absolute obedience of workers (probably
apprentices) to the masters and formed the basic functioning of the guild system.50 It
was pointed out that the issues related to work ethics were generally taken from
futuwwa morals and the Ahi doctrine. This approach forms the nostalgic and idealized
aspect of discussions on trade and artisan groups in the Ottoman Empire, not included
here. Researchers have to be critical towards the prevalent idealized notion about the
guilds, which claims the existence of perfect, constant, and rigid hierarchical
organization, full of social solidarity, and always toeing the line of the moral codes
and religious obligations.
The topic of this study is directly related to the history of institutions,
particularly history of municipalities and everyday life. Osman Nuri Ergin, who was
the head clerk of the Municipality Archives in Istanbul, is a pioneer in this field and
he prepared a comprehensive work on the history of the municipalities in the Ottoman
Empire and the related topics with trade and artisan groups. His valuable work titled
Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye involves the topics such as the establishment of Istanbul
Municipality (Şehremâneti), Narh, the Ministry of Marketplace (İhtisab), gedik , taxes,
48 Yerasimos accepted both Seljuks and Byzantines as inheritors. See Stefanos Yerasimos, Az
Gelişmişlik Sürecinde Türkiye: Bizans’tan Tanzimat’a, (vol.1), (İstanbul: Gözlem Yayınları, 1977), p.
495.
49 There are many works from various perspectives about the relationship of artisan and trade groups
with the Futuwwa Tradition and Ahism in the Ottoman Empire, but this study will not unearth these
contradictive issues because it is the archeology of the issue, which exceeds the limits of this study. For
a brief explanation on the works summarizing the ahi organization and the early period guilds’ features,
see Kayoko Hayashi, “Turkey”, in Islamic Urban Studies: Historical Review and Processes, (London:
Kegan Paul International, 1994), pp.192-194. Nalan Turna explains different views, including the
nationalist and Islam-based perspectives, in the examination of the guild-mystical brotherhood
relationship. See Nalan Turna, “The Everyday Life of Istanbul and Its Artisans, 1808-1839”, Ph.D.
diss., (Binghamton University, 2006), pp. 10-13.
50 İnalcık, p. 158.
18
traditions of artisans and traders, regulations and other legal arrangements, and finally
issues related to public works and public health covering a long period of time.51 Apart
from including various ordinances, regulations, and other decisions about the
marketplace order and actors, his constructive criticisms about the affairs of the
municipalities and links with the European models are valuable contributions to
history studies. This explains why many works have been benefitted from this source,
as this study does. However, the holistic approach of his work may generate some
problems such as failing to notice the changeable structure of the guilds from period
to period and regional differentiations among guilds or changing working life
conditions over time. Although the researchers intensely use this work, they should
bear in mind these deficiencies. In addition to Ergin’s works, the prominent writers
Reşad Ekrem Koçu and Ahmed Refik (Altınay) wrote on the daily lives of the artisans
and traders in Istanbul, yet the lack of primary archival sources use and their
generalizing conclusions, which include the peril of disregarding the conditions of the
related period, make the historical conditions of these groups and their guilds blurred
to comprehend.52
Few scholars have written about the state of artisans and traders lived after the
second half of the nineteenth century until the empire’s collapse and the end of the
guilds so far, which were the main themes of this study. According to Faroqhi, the
guilds were dissolved due to the deliberate state policy, which targeted maintaining
the centralized order and the disappearance of handicrafts because of increasing import
and new economic policy compatible with it in time.53 As the other leading scholar in
this field, John Chalcraft worked on the importance of the crafts and service workers
in Egypt’s economy and society. He revealed that the guilds increased in number in
51 The work consists of eight volumes with an extra index volume (9th vol.) in its modern Turkish
version. See Osman Nuri Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, (İstanbul, İBB Kültür İşleri Daire
Başkanlığı Yayınları, 1995).
52 These two writers are significant figures of the popular history writing, and their works are worth
examining specially in the history of everyday life. See Reşat Ekrem Koçu, İstanbul Ansiklopedisi (11
vols.), (İstanbul: İstanbul Ansiklopedisi ve Neşriyat, 1958-1973); Reşat Ekrem Koçu, Tarihte İstanbul
Esnafı, (İstanbul: Doğan Kitap, 2016); Ahmet Refik Altınay, İstanbul Hayatı: Hicri Onüçüncü Asırda:
1200-1255, (İstanbul: Enderun Kitabevi, 1988); Ahmet Refik Altınay, Eski İstanbul (1553-1839),
(İstanbul: Kapı Yayınları, 2011).
53 Faroqhi, Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the Ottomans, pp. 186-207.
19
line with rapid population increase, and they were involved in the remarkable protests,
which affected Egyptian political life. These protests played an important role in the
development of nationalism in Egypt. He turned down the account that argues the the
abolition of the guilds with the collapse of the traditional economy.54 It is a valuable
work, which helps to break the classical narrative about the fate of the guilds55 that
seeing the guilds as an obstacle to the development of capitalism and its identity as a
traditional institution. Lastly, Sherry Vatter wrote an article about Damascus textile
artisans, including the issue of the end of the guilds. Vatter highlights that the artisans
in Damascus were involved in the labor movements. Their strikes increased in the
1870s, and the period ended with the destruction of the guild hierarchy due to the
profit-driven stances. She showed the relations of workers and artisans in her work,
and she claimed that workers were the continuation of the artisans.56
In addition to the works of the scholars, the last century of the guilds in
Jerusalem, Damascus, Cairo, and Thessaloniki were studied in comparison with the
guilds in other Ottoman provinces. Yet, the current literature does not cover the
circumstances of the artisans and traders and their guilds in the late period of Ottoman
Istanbul in detail. The process, including the period after the abolition of the guilds,
was superficially examined. Suraiya Faroqhi has given great importance to this topic,
but she did not examine the process covering the municipal period in artisan and trader
affairs and the abolition of the guilds in detail.57 The literature agreed with the
argument that the economic activities of these groups declined because of the increase
in import of the manufactured goods, and their guilds disappeared after the 1850s
because of this economic paradigm change. What will make this study different than
54 Chalcraft, pp. 4-6.
55 This term was borrowed from Donald Quataert. See Donald Quataert, “Labor History and the
Ottoman Empire, c. 1700-1922”, International Labor and Working Class History, no. 60 (Fall, 2001),
p. 102.
56 Sherry Vatter, “Militant Textile Weavers in Damascus: Waged Artisans and the Ottoman Labor
Movement, 1850-1914”, in Workers and Working Class in the Ottoman Empire and the Turkish
Republic, 1839-1950, Donald Quataert & Erik Jan Zürcher (eds.), (London: Tauris Academic Studies,
1995).
57 Suraiya Faroqhi. Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the Ottomans. (New York: I.B.
Taurus & Co. Ltd., 2009).
20
the other works about the artisans and guilds is its focus on the impact of municipalities
on the artisans and traders after the second half of the nineteenth-century, the last
period of the guilds, and their new associations in Istanbul, which other researches
generally exclude. It examines these issues in the context of administrative reform and
the rule of law apart from the changes in economic parameters. This study aims to fill
these gaps under the lights of the primary and secondary sources as much as possible.
1.3.Methodology and Sources
The purpose of this study is to concentrate on the broad evaluation of artisans
and traders considering certain legal arrangements, day-to-day practices, and
organizational changes that emerged after the second half of the nineteenth century. It
covers almost every trade and artisan group found as examples in the archival and
secondary sources regardless of their ethnicities or religions. The types of industries
involved in this study are food, transportation, textile and leather, service, cleaning,
valuable items (jewelry), raw material processing, entertainment and art, daily
consumer goods, and agriculture.
The trade and artisan groups who worked for the Palace and the Ottoman army
will not be included in this study since their working conditions and official status,
involving administrative affairs, were different from those of other trade and artisan
groups who had their guilds.58 Therefore, this study will cover only independent
artisans and traders (i.e., Ehl-i Hiref) involved in economic activities in the Ottoman
free market. Moreover, it does not include businesspeople (the merchants who
performed business in domestic and international markets) because they were
implementing capital and the occupation that they dealt with was more capital
intensive than labor-intensive.
58 For the independent army suppliers (orducu esnafı), see Bülent Çelik, “Osmanlı Seferlerinin Lojistik
Sorunlarına Kentli Esnafın Getirdiği Çözümler: Orducu Esnafı”, Ph.D. diss., (Ankara University, 2002);
Şenol Çelik, “Orducu”, TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.33), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi,
2007), pp. 370-373.
21
This study is not a kind of esnaf monography.59 Examining them as a whole
rather than focusing on one particular group or industry field can be seen as superficial
methodologically. However, the analysis of every professional group one by one in
detail is innately tough since even examining the working conditions, the situation of
their workplaces, customary practices (teâmül) in their professions, salaries, and taxes
that they paid required a broad and detailed research. In fact, some detailed works have
been done for particular craft groups that predominantly existed before the nineteenth
century. Although this kind of work could provide information on the exceptions or
unusual cases of a specific group, it prevents to see their circumstances in a broader
frame. Therefore, this study will not examine every profession in equal depth because
the goal is to show how artisanship was transformed in the late period’s Ottoman
capital. It will not confine itself to certain trade activities, groups or professions and
will look the breaking points in the affairs of these groups living in Istanbul between
1839-1922, which has not been studied so far.
This study is not a history of institutions. It explains the municipalization
process in Istanbul solely in the context of their relationship with the artisans and
traders. Also, it is not a narrative of the macroeconomic or statistical history of the late
Ottoman period. The study mainly aims to understand the transformative effects of the
administrative, judicial, and partially socio-economic changes on the artisans and
traders living in Istanbul in the last decades of the Ottoman Empire.60
One of the handicaps of the works about this topic is that they explained the
experiences of the artisans and traders by covering a long period, leading to a timeless
narrative. It can be overgeneralization if the examples are given from the classical or
early modern periods of the Empire since the circumstances of these groups were
different from those in the subsequent eras. Therefore, the related period and the
district has to be mentioned. Researchers should not handle them as unchanging groups
in terms of their guilds, their roles in the marketplace or their relationship with the
governments. The conclusions and inferences of this study only refer to the Tanzimat
59 Suraiya Faroqhi, “Giriş”, in İstanbul Değirmenleri ve Fırınları: Zahire Ticareti (1740-1840),
(İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 2002), p. vii.
60 The textile industry is an exception. The disappearance of certain professions is also related to social
factors such as the change in consumption habits or the structural factors such as technological
developments, but this transition took a long time.
22
period, in particular the era after the establishment of the Municipality until the end of
the Empire. It chose Istanbul as a location.
Related to this matter, apart from the debates about the guilds and their actors,
the common concepts and portrait of the Ottoman guilds in the classical period were
not taken directly in this study since they provide information about the classical and
early modern periods but not the period that this study covers. Fortunately, new works
have broken the standpoint, which includes the idea that the guilds were standardized
units, strictly under the state’s control, and closed to any economic development. The
structural features and routine economic activities are special to their time. In other
words, artisans and traders should be evaluated by considering their socio-economic
and judicial circumstances. Albeit the acceptance of the guilds as stable and strong
associations that were consolidated with work discipline and moral codes in the
literature in theory, the practice reveals a separate table from period to period. The
episode that this study handles is far from the perspective of previously mentioned
picture and rigid managerial practices.
The conditions and the legal status of the groups working in the provinces and
the ones in the capital were different. For example, the legal decisions were taken first
for the groups in Istanbul, and then they were implemented for the groups working in
the provinces. It is understandable to prioritize the center in terms of the state because
of the factors such as being the administration center, overcoming probable food (iaşe)
problems, especially in war periods, and the difficulty of nourishing the large
population of the city compared to the provinces. In other respects, the state might
only have wanted to see the running of the new regulations closely for a while since
any intervention to these groups might be easier in Istanbul than in the provinces.61
There are four reasons why this study will focus solely on Istanbul. First of all,
examining the trade and artisan groups in the whole Empire exceeds the limits of the
study. Therefore, it chose to focus on one city. Second, Istanbul was one of the major
economic centers of the Ottoman Empire with small-scale trade and production
activities and the strategic location of its ports. The observation of the changes in
production, provision, and distribution activities in this city is helpful to understand
61 The borders of Istanbul, which were specified by the Law of 1877 and 1912, were divided into several
municipal departments. It will be explained in the next chapter.
23
the economic transformation of the Empire as well. Third, the artisans and traders in
Istanbul were relatively more visible than those living in the other regions of the
Empire from the aspects of documentation about them and their close supervision by
the state authorities since their trade activities were important for the provision and
order of the capital city. Fourth, due to being the capital city, some legal arrangements;
for example, the abolition of the guilds was first implemented in 1910 only for
Istanbul. Then, it was implemented for the other provinces in 1912. The early attempt
of this abolition in the capital might have been related to the priority of the capital in
terms of the state as well. In this sense, the reason for the selection of Istanbul as a
case study is not only because of the quantity of the sources but also these factual
reasons. Nevertheless, the academic habit to research Istanbul or the other major cities
such as Izmir, Salonica, Bursa or Damascus has to change. The researchers in this field
and the other Ottoman history sub-fields incrementally have to direct themselves to
the lesser-known cities and regions because of the changeable political and economic
structures even in the same period. Every region is well worth examining to understand
the socio-economic and judicial system of the Ottoman state. Istanbul was chosen as
a case primarily due to the lack of works on the official positions of the artisans and
traders in the new administrative system and the last period of the guilds in this city.
This can be a reasonable start for this research field.62
The Ottoman archives provide many documents about the artisans and traders
in Istanbul and other Ottoman provinces. Despite the risk of a state-centered approach
arising from the use of archive resources in historical studies, the information in
official records is needed to understand the commercial activities of the artisans and
traders in Istanbul and the legal regulations concerning their affairs. For this reason,
the archival sources are important to understand the role of the constantly expanding
Ottoman bureaucracy with its administrative and social projects, which also had a huge
effect on these marketplace actors.63 In this study, official documents such as the state
62 This study concentrated on Istanbul, yet it does not present the history of the artisans and guilds in
the late period Istanbul as a model for the whole Empire. It regards the economic, social, and judicial
differences in terms of both time and region. For the analysis on the works on the Ottoman guilds, which
shows the diversity and complexity of them by using the certain works in this field and the discussion
on the factor of time and place, see Nelly Hanna, “Guilds in Recent Historical Scholarship”, in The City
in the Islamic World, Salma K. Jayyusi et al. (eds.), vol.1, (Leiden: Brill, 2008), pp. 895-921.
63 Faroqhi, Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the Ottomans, pp. xxvii.
24
records, government correspondences, implemented codes, the petitions of the
abovementioned groups, and unofficial sources such as periodicals and newspapers
were used to maintain a balance in terms of the perspective.
In this study, related documents in the Presidency of Republic of Turkey
Directorate of State Archives-Ottoman Archives (Türkiye Cumhuriyeti
Cumhurbaşkanlığı Devlet Arşivleri Başkanlığı-Osmanlı Arşivi) from various
catalogues covering the period after the second half of the nineteenth century till the
empire’s end and the Düstur (the Code of Laws) were used to provide information
about the legal responsibilities and experiences of the artisans and traders. These
sources are rich in terms of topic and number. They provide information about the
themes such as control mechanism over the groups, which especially includes the
arrangements about the work order; the spatial affairs; the measures and interventions
into the public health problems; state of the guilds and associations; relationship of
these groups with the governments and among themselves; and the legislation.
According to the archival documents, the taxes and fees that the groups paid and the
matters for a particular profession are the other remarkable topics examined in this
study. Moreover, the relations and the complaints about the guild wardens and disputes
among the same or different groups were also examined by using the state documents.
Many interesting cases were found in the archives related to these groups, yet it is
nearly impossible to gather them under a single work, and this may be a comprehensive
project. Therefore, this study used a certain set of cases in consideration of the themes
mentioned above and it specifically focused on the correspondences belonged to the
executive institutions. Lastly, this study did not use the sharia (şer’i) court records
because the cases and problems related to artisans and traders in the period that this
study covers were trialed and solved in the Ottoman secular courts named Nizamiye
Mahkemeleri. These courts looked after the lawsuits related to trade activities. These
new “secular” courts were independent of religious courts (Şer’î mahkemeler).
However, this study did not use court records because it addresses of the dimensions
of the experiences of the groups that intersect with the government agencies.
All related ordinances and regulations about the marketplace order on the
periods of Tanzimat and post-Tanzimat were used to have information about the new
legislative arrangements for the marketplace actors. The analysis of these legal
25
documents demonstrates the legal responsibilities of these groups and helps to identify
the necessities in the Istanbul marketplace. The regulations prepared for the
associations established after the guilds are other significant sources to understand the
organizational structure of the groups, which had a crucial role in the marketplace and
production relations. They also give an idea about the new marketplace order and the
responsibilities of its actors within the borders of these associations.
This narrative would be left half-finished if only the state documents were used
since they generally involve the events, regulations, and the necessary actions that the
state had to take, but they do not include opinions or judgments mostly. Thus, in
addition to official primary sources, newspapers, journals, and books were used to
understand the historical context from the eyes of the ordinary city dwellers. The
journal and newspaper articles about the artisan and trader groups and guilds, which
were published in the early twentieth-century though limited, are also important
sources of information to get an idea of how the Ottoman intellectuals and journalists
received trade groups and guilds. But the number of articles about the marketplace
actors was not much. The journalists generally gave their attention to the
macroeconomic policies and state affairs more since the new economic policy and the
place in the international economic order of the Empire were more important.
Therefore, the journalists might not have paid so much attention to the problems of the
marketplace actors. Furthermore, it is the period of the emergence of the financial
press; the journalists wrote on the Industrial Revolution and the national economic
policies rather than on small economic groups. In this study, articles published in the
newspapers and journals from different ideological trends, such as Sabah, Tanin, and
Dersaadet Ticaret Odası Gazetesi, have been used. The articles mainly concentrated
on three main topics: First one is the editorials about the economic policies and the
economic conditions of the time. The second one is about the issues directly related to
the trade and artisan groups. The third is the articles about the companies, which
gained popularity after the 1860s.
Visual sources that help to witness the conditions of the marketplace actors and
their workplaces provide the opportunity to understand their daily circumstances in the
related period. The same or similar professions were grouped in particular streets or
covered bazaars in Istanbul, but there were also different trade and manufacturing
26
locations that the documents rarely showed. Certain photographs may involve these
separated bazaars and shops. Interestingly, the photographs were generally on the
peddlers rather than the workplaces. It was probably because of the technical reasons
including low light in the shops, which led to low-quality photographs and the big size
of the cameras with wide conversion lenses.64 Certain photographs were added at the
end of the study to visualize the individuals working as an artisan or a trader.
1.4.Outline of the Study
The topic of the study, the transformation of trade and artisan groups in Istanbul
in line with the administrative reforms of the period, will be examined in six chapters,
including Introduction and Conclusion.
The second chapter will present a general picture of the artisans and traders
living in the last decades of Ottoman Istanbul. It demonstrates that the groups in
question did not experience a dramatic change in their socio-economic conditions.
Artisanship is not a frozen identity, and it was transformed with the conditions of this
period. They adapted themselves to the administrative modernization through the end
of the empire. As a new category, the aspect of gender in the marketplace and the
presence of women artisans and traders will be examined in this chapter as well. Then,
64 The photographs are from the catalogues of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Taksim Atatürk
Library (İstanbul Büyükşehir Belediyesi (İBB) Atatürk Kitaplığı), the Ottoman State Archives (BOA),
Harvard University Fine Arts Library (Digital Collections), and SALT Library (Digital Collections).
The books of the Western writers also include pictures about the groups and workplaces. For example,
see Julius R. Van Millingen, Peeps at Many Lands Turkey, (London: Adam and Charles Black, 1911);
Clarance Richard Johnson, Constantinople Today: The pathfinder survey of Constantinople: A Study in
Oriental Social Life, (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1922). There are miniatures that illustrated
the trade and artisan groups in previous periods. See Nurhan Atasoy, 1582 Surname-i Humayun: Düğün
Kitabı, (İstanbul: Koçbank, 1997); Esin Atıl, Levni ve Surname: Bir Osmanlı Şenliğinin Öyküsü,
(İstanbul: Koçbank, 1999); For the work on Edirne, including miniatures of the trade and artisan groups,
see Özdemir Nutku, IV. Mehmet’in Edirne Şenliği (1675), (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları,
1972). The European travelers and missionaries depicted the Ottoman society’s daily life from various
aspects in their memoirs. Even though these books can be accepted as good sources that help to visualize
the inner side of the shops and bazaars, the personal comments that originated from different social life
practices and cultural understanding, and the personal ideas in these works should be kept in mind.
Théophile Gautier depicts the inner side of the Istanbul coffeehouses. He points out that the
coffeehouses in this city were so plain in terms of interior decoration compared to the European
examples. For a detailed narrative on the decoration of the Turkish coffee houses, see Théophile Gautier,
Constantinople, F.C. De Sumichrast (ed. & trans.), (Cambridge, USA: The Jenson Society, John
Wilson, and Son, 1901), pp. 68-72.
27
the features of the guilds after the second half of the nineteenth century will be
elaborated to understand the process that ended with their abolition.
The third chapter will trace the administrative transformation that touches on
the life of the artisans and traders, which intersects with the changes in their economic
conditions. It will examine the economic state of the groups concerning the effects of
new economic policy, taxes and fees that these groups paid, and the role of the taxes
that changed their administrative affiliation. The responsible state agents in the affairs
of these groups changed from the Islamic law judges (kadı) to the Municipality and
law enforcers that were officially connected to the Ministry of Interior. The
administration of these groups became centralized in this way during the time period
that this study covers. The official affiliation of the groups to the Municipality, the
establishment of the esnaf office, the collection of esnaf tax and its end, and lastly,
other taxes and fees will be examined in this chapter to show the new place of these
groups in the administrative system and the close relationship between the
administrative transformation and the economic responsibilities of these groups. In
particular, the taxation policy was so determinant in changing their official position.
Petitions from various groups that were generally about the increases in taxes and fees
will display the most shared reasons of their discontents. They will show the
dimensions of the demands or resistance of these groups in the new administrative
structure.
In the fourth chapter, the work order in the marketplace and the control
mechanism of the state will be elaborated by using both the official correspondences
and the regulations. Regulations and ordinances demonstrate both the urgent
necessities in the marketplace and the scope of the sensitivity of the governments
towards its matters. This chapter seeks to offer the practical side of the administrative
order, which will be examined in the previous chapter. First, the controls for trade,
professions, and the reactions of the groups in working life will be investigated.
Second, the way of spatial distribution in the marketplace and the goals of the
governments in the reorganization of the marketplaces will be explained to show both
the locational problems that the groups faced and the partial urban planning policies
in the imperial capital, which had direct influence on the marketplace order. Then,
public health policies and its intersection with the trade and artisan groups will be
28
elaborated. This chapter aims to demonstrate that day-to-day practices and the
experiences of the marketplace actors at the commercial spaces eased their adaptation
to the new administrative system. Furthermore, the reactions of these groups to the
related matter or problem contributed to the systematization and rationalization of
Ottoman spatial and public health policies that directly shaped artisanal life.
The fifth chapter will cover the state of the guilds after the Tanzimat era. It will
explain why the guilds were abolished and what kind of organization replaced them.
Guilds were highly crucial associations for the Ottoman traditional economy. But the
change in the balances of the political and economic order influenced their legal status
in the nineteenth century. This study proposes an alternative explanation about the last
period of the guilds, and it claims that the change in the administrative system and the
intention of the state center to eliminate the guild wardens led to the dismantling of
these organizations. It will concentrate on the conditions of the Istanbul guilds after
the 1880s until their abolition in 1910. The last appointments and quarrels of the guild
wardens will be handled in detail since the number of complaints about the wardens
increased drastically in the given period, and the state center asserted that the abuses
of the guild wardens paved the way for the abolition of the guilds, which formed the
human dimension of the dismantling issue. Despite the presence of the tendency in the
literature to see the guild wardens as the mediators who were solving problems that
emerged among the mentioned groups, a set of cases showed a different picture for the
late Ottoman Istanbul. The questions such as whether there was any systematic state
policy about the abolition of the guilds or not, and whether it was the result of their
nonfunctional position in the new administrative and judicial structure or not will be
answered in this chapter.
The newly established associations will also be delineated in the fifth chapter.
The official connection of the groups with the governments and the Municipality was
transferred to these corporations instead of individual agents; that is to say, guild
wardenship. The establishment of the associations can be accepted as the outcome of
the adaptation to the new administrative structure because the old guilds and their
wardens could not accommodate themselves to this new order. As a new major
authority for the artisans and traders, the Municipality removed these intermediaries;
in other words, guild wardens, who produced problems about the taxes, their positions,
29
and the other professional matters. By this abolition, the direct supervision power of
the Municipality over the groups consolidated.
In the conclusion part, the findings and the deficiencies of this study will be
shared to contribute to the history of the artisans and traders lived in the Ottoman
Empire. It has a goal to encourage the other researchers to examine whether their
experiences in Istanbul were the same in the other parts of the Ottoman Empire or not
in the same period.
30
CHAPTER 2 A PORTRAIT: ARTISANS, TRADERS, AND GUILDS IN ISTANBUL Istanbul, the capital city of the Ottoman Empire after 1453, has been one of the important trade centers in the world from the past to the present. The artisans and traders in Istanbul as well as their guilds experienced changes in this long period. This chapter will focus on the portrait of the artisans and traders lived Istanbul in the late nineteenth century.65 Their experiences from the nineteenth century onward forced them to adapt themselves to the new legal and economic order. Unlike the ongoing discussions on the presence of the artisans and traders in the Ottoman Empire, they continued to be involved in commercial activities as a dynamic socio-economic group in this period as well. This chapter will also mention female artisans and traders who became part of the production and trade activities in Istanbul that was coherent with socio-economic dynamics of the period in question. Making a living became hard during that period for all male and female Ottomans. Ottoman women were involved more in daily economic activities as artisans and traders and became more visible as new marketplace actors. But at the same time, they had to struggle with some socio-economic, ideological, and socio-cultural constraints existing in this period. 65 Istanbul, as the imperial capital, involves both the European and the Asian sides and the districts across the Bosphorus. Although the administrative and municipal units had been changed with the municipal regulations prepared in 1868, 1877, and 1912, this study accepts 20 districts as the administrative zones of Istanbul which were determined in the Municipality Regulation of 1877: Bayezid, Sultan Ahmed, Fatih, Samatya, Eyüp, Beyoğlu, Hasköy, Beşiktaş, Arnavudköyü, Yeniköy, Tarabya, Büyükdere, Beykoz, Anadolu Hisarı, Beylerbeyi, Yeni Mahalle, Doğancılar, Kadıköyü, Adalar and Makriköy. Yeni Mahalle and Doğancılar became the districts of Üsküdar in the 1912 municipal regulation. The nine bureaus, which include Beyazıt, Fatih, Beyoğlu, Yeniköy, Anadolu Hisarı, Üsküdar, Kadıköy, Adalar, and Makriköy in the 1912 regulation, were nearly the same except for different classifications of the districts. (Only Anadolu Feneri and Rumeli Feneri were excluded from Istanbul). Istanbul consisted of these districts in general even though certain differences existed in the names of the municipal districts or bureaus. See “Dersaâdet Belediye Kanunu”, 27 N 1294 [5 October 1877], Düstur, I/4, pp. 520-524; “Dersaâdet teşkilat-ı belediyesi hakkında kanun-ı muvakkat”, 20 M 1331 [30 December 1912], Düstur, II/5, p. 37.
31
Nevertheless, the presence of women in the marketplace and its outcomes was a new experience for themselves and male artisans. The relations between the two present an interesting picture in terms of that period. In addition to artisans and traders, the guilds, their major professional organizations, will also be analyzed to investigate their features and legal position in the periods that this study covers. The Ottoman guilds downsized in terms of their inner structure, and only the guild warden was formally at the front in these units. Guilds lost their features, such as being the main professional solidarity organizations or education bodies in this period. Nonetheless, guilds and guild wardenship protected their status even in the late nineteenth century, and all these will be given in this chapter as a part of the argument of this study. 2.1. Artisans and Traders The nineteenth century was the period that the Ottoman State experienced changes in economy and finance, diplomacy, law, administrative management, public law, military, education, health, and transportation fields, and all these were bonded with and influenced each other. The Imperial Edict (Gülhane Hatt-i Hümâyûnu), declared on November 3, 1839, started a series of reforms, which brought changes in the fields mentioned above and a new period in the Ottoman history named as Tanzimat (rearrangement). It was not a piece of legislation, but it was significant in terms of showing the statement of Ottoman intentions.66 The internal factors forced the preparation of the legal arrangements with increasing cultural, economic, and diplomatic relations with Europe during this period. They also inspired and contributed the reforms in the empire. The Tanzimat period reforms played a role in the acceptance of the first constitution in 1876 and opening of the first Ottoman Parliament in 1877, which is the beginning of constitutional governmental system in the Ottoman Empire. In general, duality in administration, judicial system, and education was assessed with the concepts and institutions of this period, but their reflections on social life need to be evaluated beyond this duality. All in all, the Imperial Edict of 1839 which started
66 M. Şükrü Hanioğlu, A Brief History of the Late Ottoman Empire, (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2008), p. 72.
32
the Tanzimat Period in the Ottoman Empire, the Reform Edict (Islahat) of 1856, and the First Constitutional Monarchy regime period which also covered the reign of Abdülhamid II, as well as the 1908 Constitution periods, which the literature commonly accepts as the turning points, designated the last century of the Ottoman Empire in many aspects. The establishment of a municipality first in Istanbul in 1855 was one of the significant results of the Tanzimat reforms, which was also the beginning of the municipal movement in the Ottoman Empire.67 The municipality beside the institutionalization of the city affairs had an important impact on the administrative affairs of artisans and traders at the same time and it changed the course of small-scale trade when the liberal economic system began to shape the markets in the empire. The Post-Tanzimat era, which includes the years between 1876 and 1922, was the integration period of traders and artisans into the new administrative and economic order. This era, which included the Young Turk Revolution in 1908, witnessed to the reimplementation of the constitutional regime in the empire. The Young Turk Era involves the process of the abolition of the guilds as well. Although the Young Turk era politically finished in 1918, the policy for the marketplace actors was not changed drastically until the end of the empire. It was the period of adaptation to the new national economic policy and the struggle with the political turmoil for artisans and traders. Before explaining the profile of these groups, certain political and economic developments had to be pointed out briefly to understand the atmosphere of the nineteenth century.68 The relationship between the Janissary Corps and the artisan groups was the leading controversial topic for the first half of the nineteenth century. The abolition of the Janissary Corps in 1826 was a crucial event in terms of military reasons and their relations with the marketplace life. The common argument about this issue is that the 67 The term “Municipal Movement” was taken from the issue of International Municipal Movement in Europe. For a work on this issue, see Oscar Gaspari, “Cities against States? Hopes, Dreams and Shortcomings of the European Municipal Movement, 1900-1960”, Contemporary European History, vol. 11, no.4, (November, 2002), pp. 597-621. 68 For a comprehensive work on the economic, political, social, and intellectual history in the Tanzimat period, see Halil İnalcık and Mehmet Seyitdanlıoğlu (eds.), Tanzimat: Değişim Sürecinde Osmanlı İmparatorluğu, (İstanbul: Türkiye İş Bankası Yayınları, 2017).
33
Janissary Corps were the protectors of artisans and traders. According to this view, the
guilds lost a supporter to defend their interests with the abolition of the janissaries.
There was no organized remaining group to maintain the privilege of the guilds in the
Ottoman society, and the state began to abandon the regulatory policies over the
guilds.69 But instead of being the protectors, they were involved in trading activities.70
Moreover, the Janissaries and the artisan and trade groups cooperated and reacted to
the economic policies of the state because of their economic obstacles in this period.71
The condition of the Ottoman economy was not independent from the political
developments emerged in the nineteenth century. The Question of Egypt (1839-1841),
The Straits Question (1840-1841), the Crimean War (1853-1856), the nationalist
movements such as Serbian and Greek revolts, and the Ottoman-Russian wars (1877-
1878) were the major political and diplomatic crises of this period. The reign of
Mahmud II (1808-1839) hosted various military, judicial, educational, and
administrative reforms, which continued in the later process. The administrative
centralization became as the main state policy of this century. In the meantime, the
Ottoman economy was liberalized. The 1838 Anglo-Turkish Convention was the
watershed in the political and economic developments of the Ottoman Empire. It
marked only the continuation of a phase in European-Middle East economic and
political relations because the Ottoman state was already the raw material provider for
the expanding European economy, and it was already importing goods from the
European states before this convention. The convention served to promote, and it
enhanced these two sets of trends.72 This was the period that the Ottomans increased
their commercial relations with the European capitalist states. Both the change in the
economic policy and the wave of nationalism brought fundamental changes to the
Ottoman system. The Tanzimat (1839-1876) and the Post-Tanzimat (1876-1922)
69 Donald Quataert and Çağlar Keyder, “Introduction”, New Perspectives on Turkey, v. 7, Spring 1992,
p. 5.
70 For this analysis, see Mehmet Mert Sunar, “When Grocers, Porters and Other Riff-Raff Become
Soldiers: Janissary Artisans and Laborers in the Nineteenth Century Istanbul and Edirne”, Kocaeli
Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi (KOSBED), vol. 17, no.1, (2009), pp. 175-194.
71 Mardin, p. 95.
72 Quataert and Keyder, p. 3.
34
policies were reconciled with liberalism. The new economic policy based on free trade and the new public administration practices with the modern legislation changed the Ottoman manner of rule and social life. Yet, artisans and traders did not experience dramatic changes in terms of their economic or social conditions, and only tried to protect their current economic power. Meanwhile, the state considered their extant or future problems as far as possible. For example, the Industrial Reform Commission (Islah-ı Sanayi Encümeni/ Komisyonu) established in 1866 offered the guilds to be organized as companies to survive. But it remained only as an attempt, and many decisions such as an increase in custom duties could not be implemented.73 However, the period of Committee of Union and Progress (CUP, and then Party) between 1908-1918 started a new economic policy with nationalist motives and an emphasis on a national economy increased especially after 1913. The centralization in the administration, specifically in the Arab provinces of the empire, was strengthened and the economy became more nationalized, and these two facts formed the nationalist policy of the Unionists.74 New companies, banks, and small scale enterprises were founded. The Unionists advocated the state monopoly and state control over the economy.75 For example, the Temporal law for Encouragement of Industry (Teşvik-i Sanayi Kanunu) (1913) was promulgated to increase the industrial investments, but World War I interrupted the process.76 Indeed, an economic revival began but it was interrupted with the successive wars. Nevertheless, this temporal law succeeded more. The traditional manufacturing did not change, so the organization in the production and service sector did not change drastically.77 In this economic climate, artisans and traders tried to survive during the process of paradigm change in 73 Vedat Eldem, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun İktisadi Şartları Hakkında Bir Tetkik, (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu, 1994), pp. 58-59. 74 François Georgeon, Osmanlı-Türk Modernleşmesi, 1900-1930, (İstanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 2016), p. 19. Hereafter CUP. 75 Feroz Ahmad, “Vanguard of a Nascent Bourgeoisie: The Social and Economic Policy of the Young Turks, 1908-1918”, in Türkiye’nin Sosyal ve Ekonomik Tarihi, 1071-1920, Osman Okyar and Halil İnalcık (eds.), (Ankara: Meteksan Limited Şirketi, 1980), p. 333. 76 Eldem, p. 61. 77 Musa Çadırcı, Tanzimat Döneminde Anadolu Kentlerinin Sosyal ve Ekonomik Yapısı, (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu, 2013), p. 123.
35
economic policy. Indeed, their economic problems existed over the whole century.
The goal of the last Ottoman cadres was to create a national bourgeoisie with the new
economic policy and the support of national capital, in other words; there was an effort
to create a national economy reconciled with capitalism. This policy was inherited to
the Republican period.
Tanzimat, as the period of the foundation of the new government agencies that
shaped the main framework of the new public administration policies, also comprised
the process of municipalization of urban governance in the Ottoman Empire. The
Istanbul Municipality (Şehremâneti) was established in 1855, and then the other
municipalities were established with the implementation of the related legal
arrangements during the second half of the nineteenth century. The structural and
institutional changes in all established municipalities lasted until the end of the Empire.
A new understanding of urban administration burgeoned in this way, which was
regulated by the governments. The marketplace affairs, problems or demands of the
marketplace actors, and the matters about public order in commercial hubs were under
the Istanbul Municipality’s supervision and the other established municipalities.
Because of being an inseparable part of economic life, the state sought ways to make
these groups integrated into its new municipal administration. On the other side, these
economic groups tried to accommodate themselves to the unsettled municipal policies.
For example, the necessary legal arrangements were not enough to improve the trading
rules or precautions related to the public health. Municipalization marked a new period
for them that brought significant changes in their administrative and judicial matters,
which was parallel to the institutional transformation of the state apparatus.
The centralization policy of the state, the obligation to be coherent with the
new public administration policies, the needs of the marketplace and urban, and the
new economic policies including free trade and the new tariff agreements consolidated
the establishment of municipalities. Blossoming of the Ottoman municipal movement
influenced the conditions of the traders and artisans, and this process came into
prominence as the indicator of modernization, bureaucratization, and centralization
period in the affairs of these groups. Municipalities established in Istanbul served as a
model for the other provinces of the empire as well.
36
The general population of Istanbul (including the Asian part) at the end of the
nineteenth century was around one million, and it gradually decreased with the
successive wars, especially until World War I.78 It is hard to estimate the total of
Istanbul artisans and traders , their guilds, and the existent occupations for a specific
time period. It can be said that their number was low compared to the whole
population. But it is necessary to highlight that their importance in the empire’s
economy was more qualitative than their quantity.79
It is hard to give an exact total number of the artisan and trader groups in
Istanbul due to the lack of official data. Yet, certain numerical data gives ides about
the scope of the quantity. For example, the tariff record dated to the years between
1886-1887 involves 276 groups.80 But the other archival sources provide a number
more than this tariff included. In addition, when it comes to the sectors in commercial
life, sectors such as food, transportation, textile and leather, cleaning, service,
78 For detailed population statistics, see Cem Behar, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun ve Türkiye’nin Nüfusu,
1500-1927 (The Population of the Ottoman Empire and Turkey), Tarihi İstatistikler Serisi Cilt 2
(Historical Statistics Series Volume 2), (Ankara: T.C. Başbakanlık Devlet İstatistik Enstitüsü, 1996),
p.71. Certain works state that the overall population of Istanbul was around 900 thousand people, but
the amount reaches one million people when the Asian part of Istanbul and the districts across the
Bosporus were involved.
79 The Ottoman Yearbook of 1294 (1877) includes 239 different occupations in Dersaadet and the Three
Boroughs. See Salnâme-i Devlet-i Aliyye-i Osmaniyye, (İstanbul: Dersaadet Matbaası, 1294); Sakaoğlu
& Akbayar, pp. 299-311; 1329 (1911) Istanbul Statistics Journal (İstanbul Beldesi İhsâiyat Mecmuâsı)
involves 32 different vocational categories and 31,195 people. More than 90 different categories are
included in the total. (Indeed, the total was found 30,095 with recalculation). 1330 (1912) Statistics
Journal involves 63 different profession categories in total, and 33 of them involve 31,121 people in
number. (The total was found 30,521 with recalculation). 1335 Journal includes 35 different vocation
categories and 37,931 people for the years of 1916-1917. These journals include categories such as
Bedesten and Grand Bazaar artisans and traders as well. See respectively 1329 Senesi İstanbul Beldesi
İhsâiyat Mecmuâsı, (Dersaadet: Matbaa-yı Arşak Garoyan, 1330), pp. 275-276; 1330 Senesi İstanbul
Beldesi İhsâiyat Mecmuâsı, (Dersaadet: Matbaa-yı Arşak Garoyan, 1331), pp. 250-251; 1335 Senesi
İstanbul Beldesi İhsâiyat Mecmuâsı, (Dersaadet: Matbaa-yı Osmaniye, 1337), p. 164. It should be
pointed out that these numbers were deduced from the number of the associations’ members established
in Istanbul. They do not give the total amount of artisans and traders who lived in Istanbul. One of the
private yearbooks in the Ottoman rule, Salık Veren Muhibbân Salnâmesi involves more than 180
different vocation categories, including their sub-categories existent in 1921. See Hacı Beyzâde Ahmet
Muhtar, Salık Veren Muhibbân, (İstanbul: Basın İlan Kurumu Yayınları, 2017), pp. 193-377. Stanford
Shaw indicates that the total population of Istanbul residents from all ethnic and religious groups who
were affiliated with occupation was as 133,297 in 1885. But this total included merchants and
individuals who worked in industry as well. See Stanford J. Shaw, “The Population of Istanbul in the
Nineteenth Century”, International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol.10, no.2, (May, 1979), p. 271.
80 BOA, ŞD. 790/10, 26 S 1315 [27 July 1897]. The tariff involves the data about the artisans and traders
only in Dersaâdet and Bilad-ı Selâse. For the transliteration of the list, see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı
Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1924-1952.
37
construction, valuable items, raw material processing, entertainment and art, daily
consumer goods, and agriculture formed the main production and commercial
activities in the late period of Ottoman Istanbul.
Being artisan generally compared with being a civil servant with the
development of bureaucratization in the empire, and this led to the governmental
expansion, which paved the way for the Ottoman elite formation. Artisanship is
generally compared with being a civil servant from two angles. First, being a civil
servant seemed prestigious more than being an artisan, and second, it seemed like a
money-winning occupation. Therefore, the Ottomans, in particular Muslim people,
encouraged their children to be civil servant in the nineteenth century and the later
periods. Being an artisan and trader seemed disadvantageous compared to the civil
servants in this period.81 Artisanship began to lose its prestige in the nineteenth century
when being civil servant came into prominence.
The economic difficulties that continued in the second half of the nineteenth
century badly affected artisans and traders. In the meantime, the perception of honest
artisan began to break down in the eyes of society in this economic shrinkage period.
They faced serious economic difficulties at the beginning and they became as the
resistant actors against the free trade policy. But when they began to adapt to the new
economic system and market conditions in time, this adaptation brought a new identity
to them. They became more pragmatic and they were prone to opportunism in trading
activities.
News about defrauding people in the marketplace, which made them notorious,
partially increased in this period. The impoverishment directed them to make more
money, so commercial morality receded into the background. Being an artisan or a
trader was presented in some newspapers published in the nineteenth century as an
insulting activity since being a civil servant was a more prestigious and better-paid
81 These disadvantageous groups sometimes complained about the civil servants who drove personal
benefit by demanding money under cover of custom (teâmül) in official affairs. See “Serbestî-i Sayʽu
Amel”, Tanin, no: 922, 15 March 1327 [28 March 1911], pp. 4-5. The hierarchy existed even among
the occupations in the eyes of society. Some of them seemed as the ones who possessed slight value of
labor, such as bootblacks, porters, messengers, sweet, and ice sellers (dondurmacı). See Sir Edwin
Pears, Turkey and Its People, (London: Methuen & Co. Ltd., 1911), p. 50.
38
job.82 Artisans and traders were presented as disrepute individuals in the press
especially in the issue of their attitude towards customers.83 It was stated in some
newspaper articles that many artisans and traders deceived their customers. For
example, it was alleged that the bagel sellers and pita makers deceived people by
selling stale and low-quality products, especially in the period of month Ramadan. It
was added that they wangled to make more money in a short span of time, yet the
customers did probably not come to their shops again.84 The impropriety in trading
activities was mentioned in this article. There had probably been many fraud stories in
the marketplace at that time.
Moreover, the economic recession brought social corruption, and this reflected
itself in crime statistics as well. Groups from various sectors were added to the
statistics of the central agencies and the Municipality with their professional epithets.
These official records illustrate that the abovementioned groups were in high number
as perpetrators.85 Crimes (whether they were directly related to their professions or
not) such as opening printing houses without a permit, drunkenness or vagabondism
were added to the statistics, and the groups in question were classified as separate
social groups in these official records. The governments were meticulous about the
daily actions of the marketplace actors because they were continuously in public space
and influenced the daily life of the society. Hence, they were always the focal point of
public order policies of the state as well. When the crime statistics of the Police
Directorate of Beyoğlu between 1907-1910 were examined, the opposition to or
violation of the rules of the Municipality and the municipal police (zâbıta) was the
82 An untitled article published in Sabah, no. 281, 24 M 1294 [8 February 1877], pp. 1-3; “Şuûnat”,
Sabah, no: 285, 29 M 1294 [13 February 1877], pp. 1-3. In the Ottoman Empire, the newspapers
published articles without giving a title and without giving the names of the authors. For this reason,
the newspaper and journal articles used in this study will be given with titles and author names if they
had. The ones without author names and titles will be referred only with the name of the newspaper or
journal.
83 In the caricature, discourtesy and the infelicitous statement of a cherry-seller was criticized. See
Figure 1, “Esnaflarımızda Nezaket”, Türk Sözü, n. 11, 19 June 1330 [2 July 1914], p. 84.
84 “Esnaf Hilekârlığı”, Sabah, no. 3651, 14 N 1317 [15 January 1900], p. 1.
85 They were the second group after farmers who committed an offense throughout the Empire between
June of 1895 and 1896 (1313). See İstatistik-i Umûmî İdaresi, Devlet-i Âliye-i Osmaniye’nin 1313
Senesine Mahsûs İstatistik-i Umûmîsidir, (İstanbul: Alem Matbaası, 1316), p. 39.
39
most common crimes after actual bodily harm, battery, and petty larceny.86 It indicates
that the incidents at the marketplace were so prevalent, and the marketplace actors
tended to violate its rules more than estimated.
Artisans and traders, on the other hand, were not completely notorious, and
they were dynamic subjects, especially in terms of their wartime functionality. In order
to keep patriotism alive during the wars, specifically during the Balkan Wars (1912-
1913), which endangered nationalist enthusiasm, it was reminded that traders and
artisans had to be supported. They had common goals with society, and they had to
work and progress to overcome their enemies.87
Among other things, the Ottoman society experienced a shift in work
discourses and practices in the nineteenth century. The importance of productivity and
work became as the hegemonic discourse.88 The change of the perception of working,
including work ethic and work discipline, is related to the integration to the free market
economy and de-monopolization.89 The moral sentiment related to the “work
phenomenon” changed, and it was not similar to the classical portrait of artisans and
traders. The ethos of work and productivity were aggrandized and moralized the
accumulation of capital instead of sufficiency in production in the last period of the
Ottoman daily economy.
Artisans and traders in the Ottoman Empire were traditionally classified with
their distinctive social identity, basically including Muslim/non-Muslim
categorization. The main emphasis on this classification was the high number of non-
86 BOA, DH. EUM.KADL. 13/47, 10 R 1329 [10 April 1911].
87 Erol Köroğlu, Ottoman Propaganda and Turkish Identity: Literature in Turkey During World War I,
(London, New York: Tauris, 2007), p. 120. The poem called Esnâf Destanı (Epic of Artisans and
Traders) was one of the significant literate examples, which mentioned many craft and trade groups.
Ziya Gökalp portrayed many groups in solidarity and piousness in his poem. For the poem in question
and the other poems and epics about these groups, see Doğan Kaya, “Âşık Edebiyatında Esnaf ve İş
Destanları”, Halk Kültüründe İktisat ve Ticaret Uluslararası Sempozyumu, Şanlıurfa, (27-29 Nisan,
2012), pp. 106-128.
88 For the work on the change in the concepts of work, idleness, and productivity in the Ottoman Empire,
see Melis Hafez, “The Lazy, the Idle, the Industrious: Discourse and Practice of Work and Productivity
in Late Ottoman Society”, Ph.D. diss., (University of California, 2012), pp. ii, 4.
89 For a classical work on the change in time and work-discipline towards the age of capitalism in
Europe, see E. P. Thompson, “Time, Work-Discipline, and Industrial Capitalism”, Past & Present, no:
38, (Dec., 1967), pp. 56-97.
40
Muslim artisans and traders compared to the Muslims in the Ottoman markets. Indeed,
the intensity of certain ethnic or religious groups in one craft or profession generally
existed.90 But beyond giving numerical or categorical data for these classifications,
cases about these groups give more concrete inferences to see the circumstance of their
social identities in consideration of the historical context. In the last quarter of the
nineteenth century, Muslim and non-Muslim artisans and traders from different
ethnicities had nearly the same rights in the marketplace except for some different
rules or constraints stemmed from the religious practices since the regulations prepared
for the market order and fiscal arrangements encompassed the Muslims and non-
Muslims together more.91
Organizing of some non-Muslim artisans within certain guilds strengthened the
relations and solidarity among themselves. They collected and allocated money,
especially at the Eastertide. However, the political conjuncture of the nineteenth
century forced the government to intervene more in the activities and practices of the
non-Muslim artisan groups because it was the era of nationalism, which was one of
the main threats against the political unity of the empire. From the state’s perspective,
the non-Muslim artisans could use the commercial activities as a shield to hide their
separatist aims. Thus, the governments surveyed non-Muslim groups also by
considering the groups’ political motives and were careful about their inner issues even
when they made suchlike endowments. For example, when the non-Muslim artisans
and traders decided to collect and rise funds, they had to inform the Municipality and
the other municipalities.
Surveillance over the non-Muslims was influential in shaping the
government’s policies on the marketplace and bazaars. The Police pursued the
surveillance. For example, in the case of Grand Bazaar in 1905, it was stated that the
jewelers, the respected members among themselves, gathered 1000 kuruş (piasters)
inter se at their guild room to endow. The allocation operation was made under Police
90 For example, tobacco dealers were mostly Greeks and Armenian at the beginning of the twentieth
century in Istanbul. See Théophile Gautier, Constantinople, F.C. De Sumichrast (ed. & translated),
(Cambridge, USA: The Jenson Society, John Wilson and Son, 1901), p. 76.
91 None of Christian artisan or trade group under the Eastern Orthodox Patriarchate had authority in
economic, administrative or cultural spheres. See İlber Ortaylı, Tanzimat Devrinde Osmanlı Mahallî
İdareleri (1840-1880), (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları, 2018), p. 124.
41
supervision as it was conducted in the previous year.92 In another case dated 1891, the
masters of barbers in Istanbul including Mığırdiç, Artin, Haçik, Arslanyan, and Hacı
Menol(?) obtained permission from the government to collect money from the other
artisans once a year to help the orphan patients at Yedikule Armenian Hospital and to
pray for the souls of their predecessors.93 They demanded this permission again a year
later since there was no inconvenience in terms of the Police. Therefore, the
government permitted the barbers who were praying in İstepalya church to collect the
subsidy under the officers’ control.94 But the government, in some cases, did not
permit if it disapproved of the group’s intention in question. In the case of the
cheesemongers who were from Karaman located at Balıkpazarı in Taşçılar in 1895, it
was stated that they established a lodge (cemiyet-i hafiye) headed by Nikola and
gathered 40 para for a per sack and 20 para for per tin via this association to send this
amount to the Greek school at Nevşehir district.95 They demanded a permission license
from the government for the amount of money that they collected. After the inspection
of the members and their lodge, it was found that this association gathered money
without a permission eight years ago too, and they collected 25.000 kuruş for this
Greek school. Moreover, this association bought such properties as houses, inns, and
shops in the district of Fener. Whether this donation was made with the intention of
contributing to education or not or whether it was related to the moral values or not
were queried in the inspection. At the end, the Police stated that it was forbidden to
establish such associations, yet the association was abolished. It was decided to retake
the collected money and give back this money to the related state institution. However,
the association did not have cash, so the Police decided to handle the issue by
considering the mentioned properties, which cost 240.000 kuruş, yet there was nothing
to do with these properties as they were bought previously. The collection of money
for endowments for this case was banned in the end.96 The state nearly had an objective
92 BOA, ZB. 381/45, 21 RA 1323 [26 May 1905].
93 BOA, DH. MKT. 1838/10, 23 L 1308 [1 June 1891].
94 BOA, DH. MKT. 2005/91, 4 RA 1310 [24 September 1892].
95 A para was one-fortieth of a kuruş. Cemiyet-i hafiye means a hidden organization.
96 BOA, ŞD. 1291/27, 12 S 1313 [28 October 1895].
42
stance in economic affairs in the marketplace and bazaars towards the people from all
kinds of ethnic and religious groups. It regulated the other inner issues of the non-
Muslim artisan and trade groups by considering written law and intelligence in
addition to their socio-religious values and practices. However, the control of these
groups gained political motive because of the ongoing political developments. The
ideological biases got sharpened in this period and it led to a more fragmented artisan
identity.
2.1.1 Ottoman Women and Marketplace
The term esnaf connotes to a group of professions belong to men’s domain
even though it has not been put into words. The classical narrative of artisanship
immensely identified with a genderless character, but in fact, the implied is men in this
narrative, specific to a location and connected to this location, not open to change, full
of nostalgic elements inherited from Ahi order which was mentioned with honest trade
activity (taken-for-granted). Actually, women in the Ottoman Empire took part in
production both in rural and urban.97 The most known examples are as such: women
were active in silk production in Bursa, mohair manufacturing in Ankara, and carpet
making in Uşak, along with the agricultural production all over the empire. In addition,
97 In contrast to the Ottoman case, female guilds or the guilds where women were also involved in
existed in the European countries. For example, see Martha C. Howell, Women, Production, and
Patriarchy in Late Medieval Cities, (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1986);
Elizabeth C. Goldsmith and Dena Goodman, Going Public: Women and Publishing in early Modern
France, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995); Maryanne Kowaleski and Judith M. Bennett, “Crafts,
Gilds, and Women in Middle Ages: Fifty Years After Marian K. Dale”, Signs, vol.14, no. 2, Working
Together in the Middle Ages: Perspectives on Women’s Communities, (Winter, 1989), pp. 474-501;
Judith Coffin, “Gender and the Guild Order: The Garment Trades in Eighteenth Century Paris”, The
Journal of Economic History, vol. 54, no. 4, (December, 1994), pp. 768-793; Hilda L. Smith, All Men
and Both Sexes: Gender, Politics, and the False Universal in England, 1640-1832, (Pennsylvania:
Pennsylvania University Press, 2002); Geoffrey Crossick (ed.), The Artisan and The European Town,
1500-1900, (England: Scolar Press, 1997); Dora Dumont, “Women and Guilds in Bologna: The
Ambiguities of “Marginality”, Radical History Review, no: 70, (Winter, 1998), pp. 5-25; S.D. Smith,
“Women’s Admission to Guilds in Early Modern England: The Case of the York Merchant Tailors’
Company, 1693-1776”, Gender and History, vol. 17, no. 1, (April, 2005), pp. 99-126; A classical book,
which was published in 1919 first and was about this issue, was discussed a long time in the literature.
See Alice Clark, Working Life of Women in the Seventeenth Century France, (London: Routledge,
1992). For a comprehensive summary of the academic works on this issue, see the review of Crowston,
Clare Crowston “Women, Gender, and Guilds in Early Modern Europe: An Overview of Recent
Research”, International Review of Social History, vol. 53, Supplement 16: The Return of the Guilds,
(2008), pp. 19-44.
43
women partially influenced the bazaar culture as consumers and as vendors and
producers in the nineteenth century. However, the works about craftspeople and
tradespeople in Ottoman studies have been prevalently gender blind. But it does not
indicate that women were totally absent. Gender and work were identified by the
economic and gender systems in general. Economic forces influenced the nature of
women’s employment.98 In addition to the economic dynamics, gender conflict existed
both socially and institutionally in the Ottoman case. Social and judicial factors
influenced the nature of the gender-based division of labor as well. The number of
women was low, especially in commercial activities due to some social and ideological
obstacles compared to men. The absence of women within the guilds proves this
invisibility as well.99 Women who were involved in commercial activities must have
been mostly outside of the guilds.100 This continued in the last century of the empire
too.
Artisanship formed a male-dominant space where the commercial activities
were carried out in the Ottoman case, and women’s labor in manufacturing and retail
sale was not so visible in proportion to the general population. The artisans and traders
mentioned in the archival documents were composed of men in high quantity.
Occupations that were open to women were highly restricted in number, especially
those being carried out at “visible” public spaces. Women were mostly excluded from
being artisan, shopkeeper or vendor from male-dominated business space. Therefore,
being an artisan and trader implies masculine connotations, and it was the result of the
historical process dominated by male stream. Along with referring to an individual and
a group, the term esnâf still culturally evokes a male or a group of male artisans and
98 Honeyman and Goodman, pp, 613, 624. For the analysis on the relationship between patriarchy and
capitalism, see Heidi Hartmann, “Capitalism, Patriarchy, and Job Segregation by Sex”, Signs, vol. 1,
no. 3, (Spring, 1976), pp. 137-169.
99 The hostility of the guilds towards women in the European countries was investigated in the Western
literature, yet the exclusion of women from the guilds seemed like an innate fact in the Ottoman society
because of these social and judicial premises. For the guilds’ hostility in Europe, see Katrina Honeyman
and Jordan Goodman, “Women’s work, gender conflict, and labour markets in Europe, 1500-1900”,
Economic History Review, XLIV, 4, (1991), pp. 608-628.
100 They were mainly described as shop owners, but they also worked as slave-dealers or silk-dyers. See
Yi, p. 54.
44
sellers in modern Turkish. This indicator gives an idea of to what extent women were
present or absent in small trade activities and artisanship.
They were only less visible and their nonappearance is determinative in the
formation of general artisan narration even for the late Ottoman period. But it is
imperative to examine women artisans and traders who worked in the late Ottoman
Istanbul to understand the social structure of the artisanship or being a trader and here
women artisans and traders of Istanbul will be introduced as a new classification. To
be able to highlight the women’s presence in the forming of artisanal culture and work
area by considering the socio-cultural and judicial constraints of female visibility in
the marketplace and bazaar in Istanbul, the relation between gender and work will be
analyzed to handle the artisan and trader identity in Istanbul.
It is also possible to see women active in trading, property sales, and production
activities before the nineteenth century, especially in household production for
exchange. Women dominantly participated in the textile industry of Bursa, Istanbul,
and Ankara as dyers, embroiderers, and weavers, but they were not the member of the
guilds and only remained as producers marginal in number in considering total
workforce. They were the backbone of the putting-out system; on the other hand, those
who had good economic status were moneylenders, managers of public endowments
(vakıf), shop owners, and owner and co-owners of public baths in the urban economy
as well.101 They inherited the shops of their fathers and rented out bakeries, shops, and
mills to the producers.102 In general, women were involved in the workforce by
working at small industrial enterprises such as textile, carpet weaving, and tobacco
manufacturing.103 All these work branches were accepted as “woman’s work”, but
labor women were paid a lower salary than labor men.104
101 Fariba Zarinebaf-Shahr, “The Role of Women in the Urban Economy Istanbul, 1700-1850”,
International Labor and Working-Class History, no: 60 (Fall, 2001), pp. 141-142.
102 Zarinebaf-Shahr, p. 145.
103 It should be kept in mind that there is an ambiguity between being an artisan or trader and a worker.
Artisans more often resembled independent business people than workers. See Katrina Honeyman and
Jordan Goodman, “Women’s work, gender conflict, and labour markets in Europe, 1500-1900”,
Economic History Review, XLIV, 4, (1991), p. 609.
104 Feroz Ahmad, The Making of Modern Turkey, (London: Routledge, 1993), p. 84.
45
Needless to say, women were not allowed to be a guild member. But, the less
involvement of women in commercial activities was not merely related to the official
constraints of the guilds, at least in the last decades of the Empire. This fact was based
upon economic, ideological, and social factors and constraints in the Ottoman society.
Three major reasons can be propounded for the lack of the number of women
in manufacturing and retail sale areas in the late Ottoman period. The first one is the
socio-economic reason, which involves working life and its relation with family life.
Traditionally women were affiliated to housework with family life, including
housekeeping tasks and caring for and educating children. On the other side, men in
artisanal practice were affiliated with productive labor in all Ottoman state periods.105
However, women also worked in household production, which was called a puttingout
system.106 Women continued to be constrained in family life, household work, and
marriage in the later nineteenth century too. Women’s position in family life and
marriage ossified the patriarchal structure, which resembled the working life.107
Therefore, male-dominant work areas maintained the invisibility of women.
Nonetheless, the physical presence of women at bazaars and shops particularly
may not give a meaningful inference though the employment ratio of women was
increasing in this century because women were seen generally as customers. But
women artisans and traders were trying to earn money at bazaar and marketplace, and
the income distribution differed according to their professions or market where they
worked. Moreover, economic conditions, in particular in wartimes, brought more
women to the public via the working life from the late nineteenth century onward.108
105 Jean H. Quataert, “The Shaping of Women’s Work in Manufacturing: Guilds, Households, and the
State in Central Europe, 1648-1870”, The American Historical Review, vol. 90, no:5, (December, 1985),
p. 1133.
106 The difference between work for household “use” and “exchange” should be pointed out. For the
analysis and a discussion on this topic, see Louise A. Tilly and Joan W. Scott, Women, Work, and
Family, (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1978).
107 The official status of women, such as being unmarried, married or widowed, was accepted as
distinctive factors both in terms of state and society, which also should be kept in mind in this kind of
long-termed analyses.
108 For a comprehensive work on the urgent need of the state for women labor, especially during the
wars, see Elif Mahir Metinsoy, Ottoman Women During World War I: Everyday Experiences, Politics,
and Conflict, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017).
46
Women were also employed in different branches with the requirements as in the
example of women guards employed in the custom houses.109
The second reason is the state policy, particularly the ideology of the state
apparatus that limits bringing women into working life, especially to the marketplaces
and bazaars, which was unexceptional for this period’s mentality. The most
remarkable period in terms of women’s presence in social, economic, political, and
intellectual spheres began in the post-Tanzimat period. The equal citizenship notion
was accepted officially and developed in the second half of the nineteenth century, yet
it was not strong enough to change the state’s traditional policy towards women’s
presence in public space. In line with this, the state authorities were careful about
women’s participation in working life since women seemed like a security problem in
male-dominated marketplace and bazaars. The state traditionally and structurally
prioritized and legitimized men’s domain in public space. The reactions and the
policies of the ruling elites in the affairs of these areas continued to amplify this notion.
For example, in a case dated 1914, it was stated that the women garments and
handkerchief sellers damaged the order in Grand Bazaar. The police reported that
about 15 to 20 women were selling their goods at desolated parts of Grand Bazaar.
They endangered the discipline of the bazaar since they were in contact with bargemen
and porters. The police asserted that these women caused the spread of contagious
diseases among these men. Therefore, they were not allowed to continue to sell their
goods in this district unless they could have licenses. When they did not have a license,
they were expelled from this area.110 The state blamed only women for this serious
social problem.111
The social and cultural constraints can be counted as the third reason why
women were less visible in bazaars and shops as vendors, producers, and even
109 As a new work of branch for women in this period, women custom guards were employed to detect
and catch women smugglers. See Birten Çelik, “Osmanlı Gümrüklerinde Kadın İstihdamı (1901-
1908)”, Belleten, v. LXXIX, n. 286, (Aralık, 2015), pp. 1003-1037.
110 BOA, DH. İD. 65/48, 22 C 1332 [18 May 1914].
111 This stance was true of all the European counterparts as well. Women, specifically women workers,
were blamed for causing disease and damaging public hygiene. The British Parliament enacted the
contagious acts of 1864, 1866, and 1869, which were only applied to women and “common women”.
See Clara H. Greed, Women and Planning: Creating Gendered Realities, (London: Routledge, 1994),
pp. 87-88.
47
consumers. In general, the women’s presence in public space was not preferred by men
in Ottoman society. This was related to both religious and cultural reasons.112 The
visibility of women led to a pestering factor for men, and social life could not become
quite heterogeneous long time because of this reason and the less involvement of
women in working life.
These socio-cultural constraints led to the exclusion of women from the
permeable social spaces. Because of all these constraints, the male-dominated
artisanship space shaped the façade of the socio-spatial circumstance of the Istanbul
marketplace and bazaars in terms of gender division.113 Men legitimized physical
assaults at public spaces against women. For example, the cases of harassment were
both the reason and the outcome of these social constraints. Women were exposed to
molestation of men in marketplaces and bazaars. Thus, women’s security problem
caused their exclusion from the shops and bazaars both as producers, vendors, and
consumers. The number of women’s complaints was egregiously high in number, and
they appealed to the state for help.114 But no collective reaction from women existed,
and the police’s official control and the unofficial control of ordinary men continued
to restrict the elbowroom of women. The issue of veiling was the other important
reason for the social exclusion of women. The Municipality controlled Muslim
women’s attires and veiling at shops and bazaars, which restricted their physical
112 Théophile Gautier states that women were absent in the shops in Istanbul since Muslim men jealously
did not allow commercial relations with women. He adds that the smaller household duties were being
carried by men in Turkey rather than women, which appears ridiculous to themselves (to the
Europeans). See Théophile Gautier, Constantinople, F.C. De Sumichrast (ed. & translated),
(Cambridge, USA: The Jenson Society, John Wilson and Son, 1901), pp. 80-81. Even though it is
Gautier’s subjective comment, it is clear that men did not desire the visibility of women in public spaces.
113 The socio-spatial analysis in terms of gender is necessary to prevent biological determinism. For a
comprehensive investigation in this issue, see the article of Ayten Alkan. Ayten Alkan, “Şehircilik
Çalışmalarının Zayıf Halkası: Cinsiyet”, Prof. Dr. Nermin Abadan Unat’a Armağan-Birkaç Arpa Boyu:
21. Yüzyıla Girerken Türkiye’de Feminist Çalışmalar, (ed.) Serpil Sancar, (İstanbul: Koç Üniversitesi
Yayınları, 2012), p. 347.
114 Two women complained that they were attacked by in Gedikpaşa even though a police stood nearby
them. This news was first published in Şura-yı Ümmet. See “Şikayet”, Kadın, n.1, (13 TE 1324/26
October 1908), pp. 15-16. For in Latin alphabet, see Fatma Kılıç Denman, Yeni Harflerle Kadın (1908-
1909): II. Meşrutiyet döneminde bir Jön Türk Dergisi, (İstanbul: Kadın Eserleri Kütüphanesi Bilgi
Merkezi Vakfı, 2010), pp. 51-52.
48
behaviors.115 Not only women themselves but also their families were investigated
during the veiling controls.
Interestingly, while women had difficulties in Istanbul and other big provinces,
those involved in trade activities in rural areas were freer. This is probably related to
the people’s close social relations, the high rate of knowing each other, and interwoven
daily life practices and communication in rural. The scope of social relations in urban
areas was broader, and the potential of getting out of control was higher compared to
the rural ones. Paradoxically, urban has brought an increase in communication, the
expansion of housing, gathering of various ethnic and religious groups, and being open
to the outsider at least in the nineteenth century, but public spaces in urban areas hosted
few women even though the reverse of it was thought.116 Women were predominantly
forced to live in seclusion in urban.117
Women were also less visible in the photographs of the bazaars or shops
belonging to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as if they did not exist.118
They began to appear in the photographs after the establishment of private photograph
studios at the end of the nineteenth century. The invisibility in these visuals can be
115 BOA, DH. MKT. 1827/7, 29 Ş 1308 [9 April 1891].
116 The problem of the dichotomy of public-private bases needs to be questioned. The public is
characterized by men and private denotes women traditionally. The family life and the dynamics of
social life in the Ottoman Empire intensively overlapped with this dichotomy, but the possible flexible
nature of this restrictive binary dichotomy should be kept in mind. For the feminist criticism on the
dichotomy of public-private spaces and its relation with gender, see Carole Pateman, The Disorder of
Women: Democracy, Feminism and Political Theory, (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1989);
For further reading on this subject, see Martha A. Ackelsberg and Mary Lyndon Shanley, “Privacy,
Publicity and Power: A Feminist Rethinking of the Public-Private Distinction”, in Revisioning the
Political-Feminist Reconstructions of Traditional Concepts in Western Political Theory, Nancy J.
Hirschmann & Christine di Stefano (eds.), (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996). For the analysis on
the dichotomy of public-private spheres in the case of Middle Eastern women’s history, see Elizabeth
Thompson, “Public and Private in Middle Eastern women’s history”, Journal of Women’s History, vol.
15, no.1, (March, 2003), pp. 52-69. The concept “restrictive binary dichotomy” was taken from the
work of Ambros et al. See Edith Gülçin Ambros, Ebru Boyar, Palmira Brummet, Kate Fleet, and Svetla
Ianeva, “Ottoman Women in Public Space: An Introduction”, in Ottoman Women in Public Space, Ebru
Boyar and Kate Flett (eds.), (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2016), p.2.
117 Şefika Kurnaz, Osmanlı Kadınının Yükselişi (1908-1918), (İstanbul, Ötüken Neşriyat, 2013), p. 182.
118 The article on the women workers at Cibali Régie Factory was a good example of showing the
visibility of the women workforce via the photographs. See Gülhan Balsoy, “Gendering Ottoman Labor
History: The Cibali Régie Factory in the Early Twentieth Century”, International Review Social
History, vol. 54, Supplement 17: Ottoman and Republican Turkish Labour History, (2009), pp. 45-68.
Many photographs about artisans and traders were found, but they involved men rather than women.
For the photographs, see the part of the Figures.
49
accepted as the evidence and the outcome of these social constraints. But this
invisibility was also a fact in the marketplace that proves the limited number of women
there.
Due to the facts given above, women remained in the background at bazaar
and shops in general. But they participated in economic activities more through the
end of the nineteenth century. They worked as flower, sock or bread seller.119 Many
women and kids sold cotton and yarn at bazaar places.120 Women were probably
selling their handicrafts at certain places that they thought they were safe. They also
seemed in such sectors as patisserie business,121 photography,122 tailoring, and
cooking, so the number of working women increased in the twentieth century. Women
tailors were the most distinctive artisan group in the Ottoman Empire.123 The schools
that were opened for the education of women and girls were the main result for the
increase in the number of tailors. It became as the entrepreneurship space for women.
The vocational education in these schools made them involved in working life
partially.
In the last decades of the Ottoman Empire, many women-run associations and
organizations were established after the proclamation of the 1908 Constitution to
119 For example, the document mentions the flower seller Mademoiselle Marie in Beyoğlu, who was
honored with a medal in 1899. See BOA, İ. TAL. 194/23, 4 B 1317 [8 November 1899]; The sock seller
Havva Hanım at the district of New Mosque (Yeni Camii) was honored in 1904 by the government since
she helped the students in Darülhayr-i Âli. See BOA, MF. MKT. 762/79, 26 ZA 1321 [13 February
1904]; BOA, DH. MKT. 953/4, 28 S 1323 [4 May 1905]; Darülhayr-i Âli was a boarding school at the
elementary level that aimed to provide education to the orphans. Another record mentions a woman
bread seller Eniştase Hanım in Galata. She was fined because of losing a record book, including the
information of number of bread and their amount. She demanded the cancellation of this fine and the
record book from the guild warden. This woman vendor’s relation with the guild is interesting since
women did not have any official affiliation with the guilds. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2192/29, 8 Z 1326
[19 April 1899].
120 BOA, C.ML..433/17556, 29 Z 1300 [30 April 1900].
121 Madam Vallaury opened a new patisserie at the corner of Hristaki Passage on the Pera Street in
February 1881. See Nur Akın, 19. Yüzyılın İkinci Yarısında Galata ve Pera, (İstanbul: Literatür
Yayıncılık, 1998), p. 263.
122 Naciye Hanım and Muzaffer Hanım were the most popular women photographers. Muzaffer Hanım
was the mobile photographer who took photos of women in their homes. See Yavuz Selim Karakışla,
“Osmanlı’da Kadın Fotoğrafçılar”, Toplumsal Tarih, vol.13, no.75, (March, 2000), pp. 18-20.
123 Yavuz Selim Karakışla, Osmanlı Hanımları ve Kadın Terzileri (1869-1923), (İstanbul: Akıl Fikir
Yayınları, 2014), p. 19.
50
defend the rights of women and make them involved in commercial activities. For
example, the employment of women was encouraged by the society called the
Association for Defense of Ottoman Women’s Rights (Osmanlı Müdafaa-i Hukuk-i
Nisvan Cemiyeti), founded by Nuriye Ulviye Mevlan in 1913.124 Other associations
were also established to provide job opportunities for women, and the Society for the
Employment of Ottoman Muslim Women (Kadınları Çalıştırma Cemiyet-i İslâmiyesi)
was one of them established in 1916.125 Besides, the Ottoman Women’s Company was
established in Istanbul as well.126
Newspaper articles published in this period give ideas about the circumstance
of women as artisan or trader and there were female idealist journalists asserted that it
was men who prevented the employment of women believing that it was against
traditions which in fact is contradicted with the Islamic doctrine.127 It was claimed that
working of women was not prohibited in Islam, and women always participated in
economic activities from the early years of Islam. The involvement of Muslim women
in trade and small industry activities were encouraged in Islam.128 However, the
necessity of women’s invisibility in ordinary life was accepted as a premise for
women, which was consolidated by the traditional social rules. For example, in a
journal, it was written that women had to shop only with women shopkeepers or
artisans, yet it was added that the society also needed women who were dealing with
these trade activities in that case.129
124 For the article on this society, see Serpil Çakır, “Osmanlı Kadınının Yeni Bir Kimlik Kazanma Aracı:
Osmanlı Müdâfaa-ı Hukuk-u Nisvan Cemiyeti”, Tarih ve Toplum, v. 11, n. 66, (June, 1989), pp. 16-21.
125 For a detailed information on this society, see Yavuz Selim Karakışla, Women, War and Work in the
Ottoman Empire: Society for the Employment of Ottoman Muslim Women, 1916-1923, (İstanbul:
Ottoman Bank Archives and Research Centre, 2005).
126 “Birkaç Misal”, Kadınlar Dünyası, y.1, n. 28, 1 May 1329 [14 May 1913], pp. 1-2. Quoted in Kurnaz,
p. 224.
127 Ulviye Mevlan, “Kadınlar İş Bekliyor”, Kadınlar Dünyası, no: 157, 20 KE 1330 [2 January 1915],
p. 2. Quoted in Akagündüz, p. 314.
128 Elif Sabri, “Ticaret, Sanayi ve İslâm Hanımları,”, İrtika, no: 118, 17 RA 1319 [4 July 1901], p. 135.
129 Emine Semiye, “Bir Hediye-i Fikriyye-Selanikli Hürriyetperver Vatandaşlarıma-3”, Bahçe, no: 24
(30 KE 1324/ 12 January 1909), pp. 11-12. Quoted in Zafer Toprak, Türkiye’de Kadın Özgürlüğü ve
Feminizm (1908-1935), (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 2015), p. 33. Despite the fact that Emine
Semiye proposed such a solution to emphasize the importance of the communication of women at shops
and bazaars only with women artisans and traders, which was a negative point of view for all women,
51
Furthermore, the rights given to women in European countries sometimes
shaped the content of the arguments published in the Ottoman press.130 For example,
a woman, F.N., who sent a letter to İslâm Mecmûası emphasized her wish of women’s
presence in bazaar life. She stated that women, in particular widow ones, were in
difficult situations due to the consequences of war or to the other reasons, and women
living in the Ottoman Empire should have a chance to work as women do in the
European countries. She also added that a solution which was convenient to moral and
national values had to be found for this deficiency and offered that a grand bazaar had
to be built only for the girls, boys, and women in which these groups carried out
production and manufacturing .131 The division of market areas as separate zones for
women and men was also proposed as a solution for involving women in trading
activities, but it meant maintaining male dominance in these public realms as well.132
Although women’s role in every sphere of life, including their home
conditions, was questioned and debated in journal and newspaper articles, the entrance
into the public commercial activities occurred gradually.133 Prominent women
journalists advocated women’s visibility in the public realm and every field of life with
men. For example, Müfide Ferit Tek stated that women had to be visible and active in
it was still significant to advocate for presence of women as producers in these public spaces in that
period.
130 Men journalists and intellectuals such as Namık Kemal, Ahmed Midhat Efendi, Abdullah Cevdet,
Ahmed Rıza, Ziya Gökalp, and Hüseyin Cahid Bey supported women’s participation in working life
and the strengthening the status of women in social life and their visibility in public spaces in general.
However, there is an implicit problem in here that the issues related with women were questioned
dominantly by the male writers. See Fatma Kılıç, “Maskeli Erkekler; Gölgelenen Kaynaklar; II.
Meşrutiyet Dönemi Kadın Dergilerinde Jön Türkler’in Ağzından Feminist Söylevler”, in Kadın
Belleğini Oluşturmada Kaynak Sorunu, D. Fatma Türe and Birsen Talay Keşoğlu (eds.), (İstanbul:
Women’s Library and Information Center Foundation in collaboration with Kadir Has University,
2009), pp. 432-454.
131 F.N., “Müracaat Ediyorum”, İslâm Mecmûası, vol.1, n. 2, pp. 58-63. Quoted in Kurnaz, pp. 80-81.
132 With the development of female consumption, a women-for-women market emerged via female
entrepreneurs. See Edith Gülçin Ambros, Ebru Boyar, Palmira Brummet, Kate Fleet, and Svetla Ianeva,
“Ottoman Women in Public Space: An Introduction”, p. 14. It can be said that female consumption,
which emerged as the new consumption culture in the late nineteenth century, contributed to the
involvement of women in artisanal and trade activities.
133 Hamdullah Suphi Tanrıöver pointed out that the society, in fact, men, had to invite women to all free
professions. See Hamdullah Suphi Tanrıöver, “Zavallı Kadınlarımız”, İfhâm, edebî ilâve, no:1, 18
August 1919, pp.6-7.
52
daily life then the progress would only be possible with the equality of men and
women. She also added that women had to do their affairs if they would like to achieve
their goals.134 Halide Edip, a well-known intellectual, also pointed out that it is time
for women and men to work together.135 The journal titled Bilgi Yurdu Işığı
encouraged women to find their business and to work in government agencies. In an
article, it was stated that toy manufacturing would provide income to the families. This
journal became a pioneer in creating new ideas and perspectives by opening new
working fields for women beyond the necessities.136 The Association for Defense of
Ottoman Women’s Rights published a journal titled Kadınlar Dünyası (Women’s
World), which was owned by Nuriye Ulviye Mevlan (Civelek). The journal advocated
women’s presence in social life and Mevlan pointed out that women’s place had to be
changed from consumer to producer.137 Still, in the 1900s, women were not deemed
worthy of trading in shops.138 But this journal often mentioned women entrepreneurs
to raise awareness among other women. It congratulated women who were selling their
handiworks in Grand Bazaar and the ones generated income for themselves.139
Meanwhile, the masculine connotations continued to be used, but the
masculine meanings ascribed to the terms and words and the problems they posed
134 Müfide Ferit Tek, “Kadınlarımızda Fikr-i Teşebbüs, Tanin, no. 31, 18 August 1324 [31 August
1908], p. 2.
135 Halide Salih, “Bazı Endişelerim”, Tanin, no: 42, 29 August 1324 [11 September 1908], pp. 2-3. Ziya
Gökalp emphasizes the cooperation of men and women as of artisan clique in his poem. The lines of
poetry in Turkish are as such: “Biz esnaf takımı severiz işi, çalışır yaşarız erkek ve dişi”. Quoted in Sadi
Yaver Ataman, Türk İstanbul, (İstanbul: İstanbul Büyükşehir Belediyesi Yayınları, 1997), p. 153.
136 Güzide, “Oyuncak Ticareti”, Bilgi Yurdu Işığı, y. 1, n. 2, 15 June 1333 [15 June 1917], pp. 42-45.
Quoted in Kurnaz, p. 261; Mâcit Şevket, “Kadınlarımızın Çalıştırılması”, Bilgi Yurdu Işığı, y.1, n.2, 15
May 1333 [15 May 1917], pp. 22-25.
137 Ulviye Mevlan, “Düşünüyorum”, Kadınlar Dünyası, no: 163, 2 March 1334 [2 March 1918], p. 2.
Quoted in Serpil Çakır, Osmanlı Kadın Hareketi, (İstanbul: Metis Yayınları, 1994), p. 87.
138 Ulviye Mevlan, “Kadınlar İş Bekliyor”, Kadınlar Dünyası, no: 157, 20 KE 1330 [2 January 1915],
p. 2. Quoted in Tiğinçe Oktar, Osmanlı Toplumunda Kadının Çalışma Yaşamı: Osmanlı Kadınları
Çalıştırma Cemiyet-i İslâmiyesi, (İstanbul: Bilim Teknik Yayınevi, 1998), p. 55.
139 For example, the openings of new companies of women were reported in the journal. A women
named Seyyide Kemal Hanım opened a patisserie shop only for women called Patisserie for Ladies
(Hanımlar Pastahânesi) at around Sultan Ahmed and also a shop of lavender. See Kadınlar Dünyası,
“Birinci Sene-yi Devriye Münasebetiyle”, Kadınlar Dünyası, y. 2, n. 138, 4 April 1330 [17 April 1914],
pp. 6-7. Quoted in Kurnaz, pp. 319, 321.
53
began to be criticized in the press as well. For example, it was stated that the use of
“being as a woman” is such a wrong usage, and it should not be used. It becomes
impossible to change mentality if we continue to use this term, which implies
weakness.140 This example is important to see awareness about the interaction among
mentality, language, and practice in real life. Nevertheless, these attempts were not
enough for any fundamental change, at least in women’s economic circumstances.
They had to correspond in daily life since the social and judicial order would not
change if any subject in the process would be passive.
Many significant and influential women journals and societies were founded
during this period. The elimination of the idea that asserts the identification of women
with private and domestic spheres gained momentum with their contribution. It is clear
that advocating women in the journals and newspapers could not change the mentality
by itself, yet it was crucial to gain ground to root in the future. Although the presence
of women artisans and traders was low in number,141 the dynamism developed at
private and commercial districts in favor of women, and the discussions made in
intellectual life mutually supported themselves.142
While this was the case, the masculine character of the shopping districts
shaped the market culture, which continued in the Republican period. The
reproduction of men’s domination over space caused the less familiarity of women to
the capital formation and its operation, which can be accepted as both the reason and
the result of female invisibility in the marketplace. As mentioned above, the traditional
gendered bias structure of the marketplace continued with socio-economic,
ideological, and socio-cultural restrictions. The low number of women artisans and
140 Selahaddin Asım, “Kadın Gibi I”, İçtihad, n. 125, (1 KS 1330/14 January 1914), p. 437; Selahaddin
Asım, “Kadın Gibi I”, İçtihad, n. 126, (10 KS 1330/23 January 1914), p. 456. Quoted in Ümüt
Akagündüz, II. Meşrutiyet Döneminde Kadın Olmak, (İstanbul: Yeni İnsan Yayınevi, 2015), p. 327.
141 In fact, quantity may not always produce meaningful results in humanities in general, but the number
of women is significant in terms of gender issue.
142 The need to revive Turkish women’s social and economic position was highlighted in the newspaper
articles with the effect of the national liberation movement. The importance of possessing various
occupations of women was mentioned by analyzing the state with socio-economic dynamics frequently.
This emphasis on women then became one of the significant parts of the discourse in producing nation
and citizenship in Republican Turkey. For example, see Hamdullah Suphi Tanrıöver, “Zavallı
Kadınlarımız”, İfham (Edebi İlâve), no: 1, (18 August 1919), pp. 6-7.
54
traders is the outcome of man-biased socio-political and economic dynamics. The
women’s exclusion from the membership of guilds was the indicator of this fact as
well. The main organization of artisans and traders, guilds, will be mentioned in the
following paragraphs.
2.2. Guilds During the Post-Tanzimat Period
As it was mentioned in the introductory chapter, the term guild was used in
two different meanings in the documents: First, it denotes the common meeting room
that artisans and trade groups gathered in to solve their problems or discuss issues
related to their jobs. In the last period of the Ottoman daily life, guild continued to be
used for defining as the meeting room where the groups were discussing their affairs
under the chairmanship of their guild wardens. Second, guild means both the organized
crafts and the unions of the artisans and traders. It continued to imply the union of the
mentioned groups as well. In the nineteenth century, guilds were mainly divided as
craft guilds and trade guilds in the marketplace, which was coherent with the
conceptual separation of artisan and trader.143 The type of guild differs according to
the profession, whether it was a craft or trade. This study uses only the term guild to
prevent conceptual redundancy.
Though they are still full of questions regarding their origin, the Ottoman
guilds were once treated as the official representative of the Ottoman artisans and
traders for more than three hundred years.144 Faroqhi states that the guilds were formed
by a group of senior masters who were able to explain the rules and traditions of their
143 Nalan Turna, “The Shoemakers Guilds of Istanbul in the Early Nineteenth Century”, in Bread from
The Lion’s Mouth: Artisans Struggling for a Livelihood in Ottoman Cities, Suraiya Faroqhi (ed.), (New
York: Berghahn Books, 2015), p. 158.
144 The organizational emergence of the guilds and the first usage of the term “guild” are two separate
topics, and both of them still wait for more research. Yet, the first guilds date back to the sixteenth
century. Genç points out that the term guild was used for the first time in the eighteenth century. See
Mehmet Genç, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nda Devlet ve Ekonomi, (İstanbul: Ötüken Neşriyat, 2012), p.
307. However, Haim Gerber found a document about a trade group in Bursa dated April of 1633, which
is about a “guild”. See Haim Gerber, Economy and Society in an Ottoman City: Bursa, 1600-1700,
(Jerusalem, The Hebrew University, 1988), p. 49; Kal’a, on the other hand, states that this term was
used in 1697 in Istanbul. See Kal’a, p. 211; For the earlier examples of the guilds in Istanbul, see
Kaynak, “XVI. Yüzyılın İkinci Yarısında Üsküdar’da Sosyal ve Ekonomik Hayat”, pp. 267-270.
55
crafts to Ottoman officeholders and also defend the interest of their fellow artisans in
court that emerged in the later fifteenth century. They became a formal organization
throughout the sixteenth century.145 These organizations were inseparable institutions
of artisan and trader groups.
Contrary to the Ahi Associations, the purpose of the guild organization was to
regulate the commercial affairs, and there was no religious reference in the latest guilds
in most cases except for the ceremonies and few references in the regulations of the
professions. The mainstream notion asserts religion as the cement of the co-existence
of the artisans and traders. But guilds existed in the late nineteenth century period of
Ottoman Istanbul involved both Muslim and non-Muslim members. Moreover, the
arrangements prepared for these groups were designed according to the recent judicial
practices but not to the traditional or religious doctrines of the craftspeople. Thus, the
religious themes were supportive rather than a guiding role.146 In practice, the daily
needs and benefits came into prominence instead of religious motives in the last period
of the guilds. On the other hand, the work ethics was generally based on the tradition
of Ahism, which was roughly framed with moral values, solidarity, honesty, and
discipline stemming from the rules of conduct (fütüvvet) also in the last period of the
guilds, but they were not written.
In the traditional narrative, it is stated that the artisans and traders obeyed the
rules written in the rules of conduct (fütüvvetnames) gathered around the sentiments
of solidarity, collaboration, mutual understanding and control, honesty, full of
competent, discipline at work, maintenance of quality in goods and service, not being
greedy. All these imply a stable market order. However, the examples from the last
period did not show this kind of a perfect picture mentioned in the narrative of the
classical period’s trade life.
Myriad professions existed, and more than three hundred were present in the
late Ottoman period, mainly covering the period from the 1850s to the end of the
Empire. It can be misleading to give an exact total for the number of craft and trade
145 Faroqhi, Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the Ottomans, pp. 103-104.
146 Timur Kuran, “Islamic Influences on the Ottoman Guilds”, in The Great Ottoman-Turkish
Civilisation: Economy and Society, vol.2, Kemal Çiçek (ed.), (Ankara: Yeni Türkiye Yayınları, 2000),
p. 46.
56
groups, but the high number of occupations displays their importance in economy and
daily life in every century that the guilds survived. Related to this fact, the number of
guilds is not certain in the late nineteenth century. Nevertheless, the archival sources
provide information on the number of these groups and their guilds even though these
sources are not enough to have certain information about this issue since the traderelated
occupations vary in number even in the same period. For example, 239 trade
groups were noted in the Ottoman yearbook (Salnâme) of 1877 in Dersaadet and Bilâdı
Selâse.147 In another example, 287 different guilds were registered in Istanbul in a
tax roll of 1887.148 More examples of craft and trade groups can be found in official
records, periodicals, and books. Therefore, it is very perplexing to give an exact total
because more artisan and trade groups survived than written in the yearbook of 1877
and Osman Nuri Ergin’s work, which includes examples also from the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries that might not be existed in the late nineteenth-century
Ottoman Istanbul.
In theory, guilds as professional organizations were responsible for the
maintenance of production and the trading activities in rural and urban areas, the
administration of the judicial affairs of their members, dealing with the individual
problems and wrongdoings of their members, the collection of taxes, the control of the
quality of the manufactured goods and services, the membership affairs, the planning
of workplace locations, the promotion of financial assistance as well as the
conservation of solidarity and faith among their members. They played a key role in
trade relations in terms of controllability and protecting the interests of their members.
They were the main means of supervising the small-scale trading activities both for
the state and the craft and trade groups. The official status of these guilds enabled to
regulate the affairs of the members from various groups.149 In brief, guilds
147 Sakaoğlu & Akbayar, pp. 299-311.
148 Donald Quataert, “Sanayi”, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun Ekonomik ve Sosyal Tarihi, Halil İnalcık &
Donald Quataert (eds.), v.2, (İstanbul: Eren Yayıncılık, 2004), p. 1007. Roughly 450 different artisan
and trade groups were found in the archival research with sub-occupations, including the years 1870
and 1925. All groups were checked one by one in the general catalogue to verify whether they existed
in Istanbul or not. These groups were involved in the sectors such as food, transportation, textile,
construction, cleaning, valuable items, raw material processing, entertainment and art, and daily
consumer goods.
149 The arrangements that belonged to the guilds were also carried out in trans-province commercial
activities. For example, Osman from the cattle-dealers of Kalkandelen reported that the butchers at the
57
systematized the affairs of artisans and traders, and they officially dealt with the
matters of these groups, which were vital for a sustainable economic life.
A distinctive characteristic of the Ottoman guild system was the specialized
nature of every branch of production or sale. Therefore, guilds were
compartmentalized into various related artisan or trade groups. Shops were generally
not selling a variety of goods except for certain professions such as grocers.
Occupations such as butchers or bakers were divided into different groups, and goods
or services were determined according to these groupings. They were composed of
different sub-groups under the administration of one guild warden. These
specializations existed in the later periods of the guilds as well, which reflected to the
spatial distribution in the marketplaces.
Two separate hierarchical structures existed in the Ottoman guilds: The first
one was based on the labor force qualification and the division of labor, and the second
one was based on the administrative structure of the guilds.150 According to the
classical narrative, two layers of hierarchy existed within the guilds: The guild
committee in the first layer composed of individuals including the guild warden
(kethüdâ), şeyh, nakib, duacı, yiğitbaşı, ehl-i hiref. The second layer is mainly
composed of master (usta), the journeyman (kalfa), and the apprentice (çırak)
according to the order of hierarchy. However, this rigid classification did not appear
in all cases and every period. This was partially the discursive heritage of the classical
capital were taking the sheep and goats in return for a commercial paper (sened), but the cattle-dealers
stated that they were sustaining a loss by this way. They accepted informing the cattle-dealers’ guild in
Istanbul, yet they demanded to take a certificate from them. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1655/30, 13 M 1307
[9 September 1889]. The cattle-dealers were providing the transportation and sales of the sheep and
goats and the bovine animals. They had an important position because the meat was one of the staple
foods, the same today, the state could not discard it. It was an obligation to have a regulation about the
transportation of the livestock without a problem both for the state and society. They were bringing the
animals into the capital, which was toilsome. The Ministry of Interior was monitoring this process,
including transportation problems, the pace of it, and the issues of the trade groups such as the payment
of the salaries of the guild wardens. In the example of İzmid cattle-dealers, the state ordered the
administrative authority of İzmid (İzmid mutasarrıfı) to help Hacı Osman Efendi from the Hicvan? tribe
from the guild’s committee to accelerate transportation. See BOA, DH. MKT. 897/14, 26 B 1322 [6
October 1904]. For meat provisionalism in the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries,
see Çağman, “18. Yüzyılda İstanbul’da Esnaflık-Gıda Sektörü-”, pp. 132-154; For the meat trade and
specifically Jewish meat trade, see Minna Rozen, “A Pound of Flesh: The Meat Trade and Social
Struggle in Jewish Istanbul, 1700-1923”, in Crafts and Craftsmen of the Middle East: Fashioning the
Individual in the Muslim Mediterranean, (London: I.B. Tauris, 2005), pp. 195- 234.
150 Salih Aynural, “19. Yüzyıla Girerken İstanbul Esnafının Hiyerarşik Yapısı”, Sosyal Siyaset
Konferansları Dergisi, vol. 0, no. 37-38, (January, 1992), pp. 125-131.
58
narrative on the Ottoman guilds. In addition to the new occupational positions, these
two organizing structures were almost the same in the late nineteenth century.
The economic circumstances of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries had
remarkable differences. Certain professions disappeared, and the new ones began to
emerge with the effects of new technological changes and developments, the changes
in needs and habits, the trade of new goods with the international trade mobility and
diplomacy,151 and the emergence of new official or non-official institutions. Related
to these facts, giving general information about the Ottoman guilds is turbulent as they
were not unique and standardized. Their organizational structure and experiences
changed according to the periods and regions. Structure and the features of the guilds
were transformed with the experiences of their members. Guilds in Istanbul did not
reflect the entire Ottoman guild structure since the artisanship with its condition and
the profile of the labor force in other provinces was different from Istanbul. Guilds in
the provinces had their dynamics influenced by the economic activities of the district
where they existed.
Nevertheless, in the last decades’ context, remarkable differences occurred; put
in other words, the classical hierarchy and the duties of the individuals along with the
classical missions of the guilds were not the same as they were in the late nineteenth
century. As an exception, there were some references to yiğitbaşı in the archival
documents of the nineteenth century.152 The regulation of Esnaf Office, which was
established for the arrangement of esnaf affairs belonged to the Municipality in 1892,
did not refer to any committee members of the earlier period’s guild order, and only
the guild wardens and their duties were mentioned in this regulation.153
151 The influence of the Crimean War (1853-1856) and the coming years are accepted as the period of
the “daily modernization/westernization” of the Ottoman politicians and the ordinary life in the Ottoman
society. It is not a static thing, so the consumption habits of the politicians and the people accelerated
to change with the influence of these factors. For a detailed information on the Crimean War and the
social impacts of the Crimean War on daily life, see Candan Badem, The Ottoman Crimean War (1853-
1856), (Leiden: Brill, 2010); Bekir Günay, “The Crimean War and Its Effects on Ottoman Social Life”,
Güneydoğu Avrupa Araştırmaları Dergisi, vol. 0 (16), (2014), pp. 105-128.
152 For an example of a yiğitbaşı of the masons, see BOA, BEO. 521/39069, 27 CA 1312 [26 November
1894]; In the other document, it was stated that a yiğitbaşı of stonemason named Süleyman Ağa was at
this position in 1292 (1875-1876). See BOA, ŞD. 838/19, 1 S 1327 [22 February 1909].
153 This office will be elaborated further in the next chapter.
59
Merely the guild warden was the main officer of the guilds. The presence of a
guild warden was the evidence of the existence of a guild in the late period of the
Ottoman Empire as well. The positions of nakîp, duacı, şeyh and ehl-i hiref were not
existent in this period; that is to say, the municipal administration did no longer employ
these old guild members. As a matter of fact, these positions began to disappear from
the eighteenth century onward. At the end, the position of the guild warden was
abolished, and the older positions were not even mentioned in the Ordinance for Esnaf
Associations (Esnaf Cemiyetleri Hakkında Talimat) of 1910 too. A head, members of
groups (from six to twelve members), and a clerk became as the association
members.154
The hierarchy in terms of the labor force and its reflection in workplaces
slightly changed after the second half of the nineteenth century. Positions such as
journeyman and apprentice continued to be used in the Ordinance for Esnaf
Associations, yet they were not mentioned in the 1912 Ordinance and the 1925
Regulations. Master- journeyman- apprentice trio existed in these legal arrangements,
yet the new job positions also appeared such as amele (laborer), salesclerk, hademe
(servant), journeyman of servant and scribe (yazıcı) for certain professions.155
Although other specific job positions existed in this period, the trio including masterjourneyman-
apprentice was the most standardized hierarchy form, which is still in use
and is accepted as the distinguishing characteristics of artisanship in Turkey.
Membership criteria to a guild also became more salient with the newly written
ordinances since the rules were strictly stated in these arrangements. They give ideas
regarding the duties and the selection of their members, especially in the association
system. Issues including the criterion to become a head of the artisan groups,
154 BOA, İ.ŞE. 25/14, 16 S 1328 [27 February 1910]; “Esnaf Cemiyetleri Hakkında Talimat”, 16 S 1328
[27 February 1910], Düstur, II/ 2, (Dersaadet, Matbaa-i Amire, 1331), pp. 123-127.
155 In the booklet which was found in the catalogue of Muallim Cevdet in Atatürk Library, these
categorizations were stated as a whole. It includes the taxes of certain artisan and trade groups paid. As
mentioned in the introductory chapter, it is interesting that the members, including master, journeyman,
apprenticeship, hademe, and salesclerk, were divided as honorable and dishonorable, and their paid
taxes differed according to this differentiation. The meaning and the reason for this differentiation could
not be found in the dictionaries and the reference books. No archival document including this kind of a
describing and classification was found. See Dersaadet ve Bilâd-ı Selâse’de icra-yı sanat eden bilcümle
esnâf-ı mütenevvianın mükellef oldukları mahiye vergisiyle senevî tezkire harcları mübeyyin bir kıta
tarife defteridir, (1900?).
60
membership, taxes, responsibilities of masters, and the license issues were nearly the
same in practice. Many trade groups and their professions were entirely or partly
different from each other. Yet, the official procedure in conducting their affairs was
the same for all of them. It was not claimed, however, that all the decisions and
restrictions were applied perfectly, the groups obeyed all rules or they generated no
problem, but the day-to-day practices had to have some parallelisms with the legal
arrangements. In this way, the systematization of the matters of artisans and traders
became easier for both the municipal administration and the craftspeople.
The smaller craft guilds of whose member was less in number were attached
to an older guild closer to their professions and were called assistant guilds (yamak).
For example, the slipper makers guild was attached to the shoemaker guild.156 These
assistant guilds appeared within the old guilds to supply the needs of the society by
working in the course of production or service. The problems belonged to yiğitbaşı
emerged intensively due to the taxes because they wanted to be independent taxpayers.
They would become independent and independent taxpayers with the permission of
the government after they fulfilled their responsibilities.157 Assistant guilds were
generally apt to be independent of the main guilds, especially due to the taxation
issues. 158
The locations of the guilds, in other words, their meeting room, called
ictimagâh, and how often artisans and traders came together in these rooms still stay
as unanswered questions. Moreover, only certain examples give an idea about the
meeting rules within these rooms. For example, the guilds of the bakery and the saloon
keepers were gathering once a week.159 They were located in the districts according to
156 Feridun Emecen, “Yamak”, in TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.43), (Ankara: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı
Yayınevi, 2013), p. 311; Suraiya Faroqhi, Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the
Ottomans, p. 74.
157 Bülent Çelik, “Osmanlı Lonca Sistemi İçinde Yamaklık Olgusu”, Tarih Araştırmaları Dergisi, v.
23, n. 36, (2004), pp. 65-73.
158 Currently, the term “helper or assistant” became as the assistant of the cooks (aşçı yamağı), and this
term is still in use with the same meaning. See Emecen, p. 311.
159 BOA, DH. MKT. 1718/39, 24 Ş 1307 [15 April 1890].
61
the manufacturing places or area of services.160 All registrations included the name of
guild members, the operations about their licenses, and the certificates were arranged
in the guild rooms if they were present.161 Certain groups occasionally came with a
demand for a room, and it shows that it was a need for trade life.162 As the last point,
the expenses of the guild rooms were collected from the employees, and it became an
economic burden for them.163
The location of various occupations and the guilds at the marketplace was a
significant issue for these groups that entirely influenced their conditions and working
life.164 The agglomeration of various groups and their workplaces and shops in certain
districts was one of the remarkable characteristics of the Ottoman small manufacturing
and trade activities. The spatial distribution of the professions was characterized by
the concentration at certain and demarcated locations in the marketplace. For example,
if a person wanted to buy a pair of shoes, s/he had to go to the shoemaker section of
the bazaar.165 The concentration at certain spaces was inherited from the birth of the
guilds and existed until their end. But certain single shops were founded which were
far away from the major bazaar areas as well. They existed in different districts with
the break of the monopoly of commercial activities and the increase in the demand for
160 Certain examples about the districts of the guild rooms were found. For example, Rıfat Efendi wrote
a petition in 1898 about the measuring instruments of the trade groups to give to the Ottoman Customs
Administration (Rüsûmât Emaneti) in the guild (room) at Tekfurdağı Pier in Unkapanı. See BOA, Y.
PRK. ZB. 21/50, 6 S 1316 [26 June 1898.]; The other guild room was at Büyük Yeni Han (commercial
building) at Çakmakçılar on the side of Tarakçılar, which was used by the moneychangers. See BOA,
İ..EV... 21/1. 2 N 1316 [14 January 1899].
161 For the example of the guild of the butchers, see BOA, ŞD. 2932/13, 14 C 1307 [5 February 1890].
162 For example, the journeymen of the builders demanded a guild room for themselves in addition to
the appointment of Şakir Efendi as a guild warden from the Municipality. See BOA, ŞD. 685/9, 20 RA
1293 [15 April 1876].
163 BOA, DH. MKT. 1299/9, 24 Ş 1326 [21 September 1908].
164 Indeed, the location has influenced the production, labor force, and distribution issues from past to
present. New economic geography theory stresses the importance of the spatial effects on production,
costs, and labor force. Although this theory has discussed the current international labor, trade, and
production matters intersecting with the geographical effects, this argument evokes the older trade and
production location order in the Ottoman Empire. One of the prominent advocators of this theory is
Paul Krugman. See Masahisa Fujita, Paul Krugman & Anthony J. Venables, The Spatial Economy:
Cities, Regions and International Trade, (USA: MIT Press, 1999).
165 Mehrdad Kia, Daily Life in the Ottoman Empire, (USA: Greenwood Press, 2011), p. 87.
62
new shops and bazaars with the rise in population and the change of consumption
habits. The spatial condition of the marketplace or bazaar did not show fundamental
differences compared to the previous periods, yet some spatial changes and
deportations of the members from any occupation occurred in the late nineteenth
century.166
The concentration at certain districts had many advantages in terms of craft and
trade groups, the state agencies, and the consumers. The opportunity to monitor each
other and maintain quality standards in every good or service can be counted as two
of these advantages for the craft and trade groups. The state center possessed more
advantages since it eased the supervision in the marketplace, including such affairs as
the control of production process, goods and services, the distribution doings, the
prices of goods and services, the collection of the taxes, issues related to the buildings
that the workplaces were located, the exceptional circumstances such as epidemics or
big fires, and the criminal practices that were provoked by the abovementioned groups.
As advantages for consumers, people enjoyed choosing any good or service that they
needed. Consumers could freely convey their complaints to the guild officers about
the products, services or the misconducts of the members of each craft and trade group.
Furthermore, the obligation of maintaining the minimum quality of the products and
the official supervision in the marketplace were the other advantageous points in terms
of the consumers.
Among other things, whether the guilds in the Ottoman world were
autonomous or not is a contradictive issue, and the researchers have not concurred on
this matter yet. The borders of autonomy were roughly depicted according to the
stances of the guild wardens towards the state’s interventions in the interest issue of
the craftspeople.167 The artisan and craft guilds were not so independent since they
were accepted “as one of the ways and means for urban society to organize itself on
the margins of, though not totally separate from, the framework of the Ottoman
166 Numerous street, neighborhood, bazaar or location names in Istanbul, and the other regions of the
Empire, came from their earlier usages, which denote the presence of various craft and trade groups in
districts in question, and most of them are still in use. For an article about the history of the names of
neighborhood and districts in Istanbul, see Semavi Eyice, “İstanbul’un Mahalle ve Semt Adları
Hakkında Bir Deneme”, Türkiyat Mecmuası, c. 14, (İstanbul, 1965), pp. 199-216.
167 Faroqhi, Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the Ottomans, p. 107.
63
state.”168 Thus, guilds were parts of the new official order in the nineteenth century
and they had to comply with the new judicial and administrative changes. Moreover,
the central bureaucracy forced the craft guilds to adopt themselves to new regulations
which also contributed to their transformation. As the senior representatives, guild
wardens welcomed state intervention in certain conditions or minimized the
intervention at specific times, depending on the interest of the guild masters.
Sometimes, these two stances could be pursued concurrently.169
In the late nineteenth century, because of the rising bureaucratization and
systematization in official affairs, the autonomy of the craft and trade groups became
blurred. The state took them under control with the new regulations ordinances, and
other arrangements. The state center tried to strengthened the organic link to the
Municipality to maintain its supervision, which faded the autonomy of the guilds. The
control mechanism for the craftspeople belonged to the Islamic law judges, but they
had to control themselves as well. There was more power of the guilds in controlling
its members in previous centuries. In the modernization period, which refers to the
existence of new bureaucratic and institutional practices instead of traditional ones in
the nineteenth century, the authorities such as the Municipality, Health (sıhhiye), and
Police (zaptiye) inspectorships supervised the markets. Even though the authority in
the affairs of marketplace actors seemed decentralized with the task of more than one
institution, the state centralized the affairs of these groups with its new bureaucratic
tools. Nonetheless, the guilds still had an intermediary role between the state and the
marketplace actors until their abolition.
2.2.1. Changing Methods for Training
Guilds contributed not only to economic life; they also existed as one of the
significant educational institutions in the Ottoman Empire. They were a type of
informal education body that served the members of craft and trade groups. However,
they lost this feature, and new official institutions or schools for the future craft
people’s training were established. These changes came with the opening of the new
168 Faroqhi, Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the Ottomans, pp. xxvi- xxvii.
169 Faroqhi, Artisans of Empire: Crafts and Craftspeople Under the Ottomans, p. 107.
64
education institutions from the nineteenth century onward and after the burgeoning of
institutionalization of education. New training institutions and models brought new
aspects to working life. Training of the members from various trade and manufacturing
groups was relatively altered, which was parallel to the new approaches in education
policies in this period; that is, changes in educational policies reverberated to the
working life. They contributed to a decrease in the functionality of the guilds as well.
Related to this change, the profile of the artisans and traders was also shaped by the
change in the occupational training methods.
The public education policy of the Tanzimat governments aimed to train
qualified people, especially for bureaucracy, army, and medicine. The policy did not
only cover to bring up educated generations and state officials but also to bring up
educated technical personnel.170 This policy change also affected the training
circumstance of craft and trade groups. The foundation of the industrial schools
demonstrates that the old traditional training system based on the master-apprentice
relationship was replaced with the new education model. It was aimed to train students
in state schools, which was part of a mass education policy. The day and boarding
schools became prevalent, and the aforesaid groups had to keep pace with this new
education understanding. Schooling began to create a new profile of artisan. Schooling
on the members of craft and trade occupations via the state schools was a remarkable
characteristic for this period, along with the traditional training model. The knowledge
production and dissemination of it became systematized in certain occupations by this
change.171
Meanwhile, occupational training based on master-apprentice relation was
partially abandoned and changed with the new educational institutions and education
methods. It turned from learning in practice (alaylı) to training at schools (mektebli)
170 Fortna, p. 21.
171 As related to the training of journeymen and apprentices, the religious references of the guilds and
their practices were faded in the late Ottoman period, but certain traditional ceremonies that announced
promoting continued in this period. In the record dated 1890, the guild warden of the basket makers at
Galata and two employees asked for permission from the Ministry of Police (Zaptiye Nezâreti) to play
a traditional improvised theatre and to have some fun at Silahdarağa picnic area (a district located at
Eyüp) to celebrate their new master and apprentice as it was their tradition. See BOA, DH. MKT.
1759/103, 25 M 1308 [10 September 1890]. In the classical period, trade and manufacturing groups
were portrayed in the important ceremonies that can seem in Surnâmes. Unfortunately, a visual source
that shows this kind of ceremony has not been found for the late Ottoman period.
65
method, but this cannot be generalized to all professions due to such reasons as no
need for comprehensive training for some certain commercial activities like water
selling, the technical limits of hand manufacturing, the lack of importance given to
certain occupations and the dearth of vocational schools. Nevertheless, certain
professions entered into the official education borders, and many booklets/textbooks
were prepared for introducing them.172 These new booklets were the modern angle of
occupational training. Improving the quality of the occupational abilities in terms of
their techniques was aimed, and the occupational progress was encouraged with the
written regulations and the continuance of traditional training practices. The
occupational/technical information about a particular profession became standardized
with these written booklets, at least in theory.173 But it is obvious that preparing a
booklet or textbook was not solely enough to develop an occupation in terms of
professional training. Besides, it does not prove the total change in the way and aspect
of occupational training in the artisanship world.
The need for school and new education methods went back to the earlier
periods of the second half of the nineteenth century.174 Different institutions were
established for the procurement of apprentice, journeymen, and masters. Industrial
172 Certain booklets were prepared as textbooks of Darülmuallimat. Although these booklets were not
prepared for the trade groups and artisans already working in the marketplace and bazaars, they were
significant for the presentation of the technical information about any occupation and the
professionalization in occupation training. They were not the translated versions of Western textbooks.
For example, see İhsan, İpekçilik Sanatı, Kadınlara Amelî ve Sanayi-i Ziraiye Dersleri: Sütçülük,
Tereyağcılık, Peynircilik, Tavukçuluk, Arıcılık, İpekçilik, Ekmekçilik, Nişastacılık, Gülyağcılık, ve
Bahçuvanlıktan bahistir., vol.3, (İstanbul: İstanbul Matbaası, 1331); İhsan, Ekmek ve Nişastacılık
Sanatı, Kadınlara Amelî ve Sanayi-i Ziraiye Dersleri: Sütçülük, Tereyağcılık, Peynircilik, Tavukçuluk,
Arıcılık, İpekçilik, Ekmekçilik, Nişastacılık, Gülyağcılık, ve Bahçıvanlıktan bahistir., vol. 5, (İstanbul:
İstanbul Matbaası, 1331); A textbook for Darülmuallimin: İhsan, Bağçuvanlık, (İstanbul: Matbaa-ı
Âmire, 1332).
173 For certain examples of these booklets, see Osman Nuri, Nalbandlık, (İstanbul: Mahmud Bey
Matbaası, 1312); A. Ferid, Ameli Bahçıvanlık, (İstanbul: Karabet Matbaası, n.d.); Bizde Mavnalar ve
Mavnacılık: Mazisi, Hali, İstikbali, 2nd vol., (İstanbul: İkdam Matbaası, 1340).
174 The established joint-stock companies, which were the new economically elevating tools for artisans
and traders, planned to open their schools for personal development. For example, the joint-stock
company of molders, founded by both its Muslim and non-Muslim members, planned to open a school.
They demanded establishing a school in Süleymaniye to learn how to read and write, art, and
calculation. It cannot be accepted as a school for professional training, but this example shows the
artisans’ interest towards the new types of schools. See BOA, A.} MKT. MHM. 405/89, 3 M 1285 [26
April 1868]; See also Adnan Giz, “1868’de İstanbul Sanayicilerinin Şirketler Halinde Birleştirilmesi
Teşebbüsü”, İstanbul Sanayi Odası Dergisi, n. 34, (December, 1968), pp. 16-19.
66
School was opened in 1868 in Istanbul to train the boys in various occupations.175 The
state orientated the boys to this new opportunity to make them more qualified while
carrying out their professions. For example, if a student graduates with a first, he would
be exempted from the taxes that artisans paid, and the state could provide the tools and
money.176 A Regulation with 64 Articles was prepared on 17 November, 1863 by the
Council of the State (Şûrâ-yı Devlet) on the mission, program, and the instructions for
this new school. The school began education with poor and orphan boys who were
smaller than 13 years old.
The education program was divided into two classes with different branches as
internal and external. The poor and orphan boys were affiliated to the internal one; as
regards to the apprentices of craft and trade groups who were under 30 years old, they
were recorded to the external office. The lessons in the industrial schools were divided
into two as theory and practice. The theoretical lessons were taught in the morning,
and the practical ones were in the afternoon. If the students finish first class, they
become apprentices; if they finish second, third, and fourth classes, they become
journeymen; and if they finish the fifth class, they become masters. They were taking
daily wages according to their levels.177 The syllabus included such branches as
forging, shoemaking, tailoring, binder, carpentry, and architecture for the students
under the age of 13. These schools gave a chance to boys younger than 30 years old to
learn a craft.178 Nevertheless, the financial difficulties and the deficiencies in
coordination that occurred over time negatively affected education in these schools.179
175 Rifat Önsoy, Tanzimat Dönemi Osmanlı Sanayii ve Sanayileşme Politikası, (Ankara: Türkiye İş
Bankası Kültür Yayınları, 1988), pp. 115-117.
176 Önsoy, p. 119.
177 Önsoy, pp. 121-123.
178 Önsoy, p. 124. For a detailed information on the fields of work and the number of the students, see
the tables in Önsoy, p. 119; Yaşar Semiz and Recai Kuş, “Osmanlı’da Mesleki Teknik Eğitim: İstanbul
Sanayi Mektebi (1869-1930)”, Selçuk Üniversitesi Türkiyat Araştırmaları Enstitüsü Türkiyat
Araştırmaları Dergisi, n. 15, (2004), pp. 293-295.
179 The articles of the regulation for the industrial schools, the syllabus of the branches, and the
institutional heritage to Republican Turkey were examined in the articles of Semiz and Kuş. See Semiz
& Kuş, pp. 275-295. The improvement efforts were also pointed out in the article, which shows the
attention of the governments on this issue.
67
School for the Industrial Reform (Islah-ı Sanayi Mektebi), which was accepted
as the orphanage school (ıslahhane), was opened in 1868 in Istanbul. It aimed to
protect and educate the needy and destitute children. They functioned to train a welleducated
artisan class.180 Moreover, the apprenticeship schools (çıraklık mektepleri)
were established in 1913 first, but they could not succeed.181 Interestingly, one
apprenticeship school was established in Çiçekpazarı (Beyoğlu) which announced that
it could register students free of charge.182 The fledgling schooling policy and the
economic conditions may have led to these lacks, yet this period was characterized by
the mature of the new educational policies of the empire. In fact, the state inculcated
the younger generations to its loyalty and moral values by these policies, and it found
it acceptable to give modern education in various professions.183
The training of young generations was one of the significant aims of the
governments, and it became a long-termed educational policy of the Ottoman center.184
The state took measures to train especially Muslims, to have qualified people in
different sectors.185 On the other side, the state was not interested in whether the
masters were Muslim or non-Muslim in some sectors since the important thing there
was the continuation of the production. For example, bringing a master of carving to
the Industrial Schools from foreign countries via an embassy was planned to train
master carvers in 1893. It also shows that there was no qualified carver in the Ottoman
lands, at least in Dersaadet.186
180 Nazan Maksudyan, Orphans and Destitute Children in the Late Ottoman Empire, (New York:
Syracuse University Press, 2014), pp. 91-92.
181 İlhan Tekeli & Selim İlkin, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nda Eğitim ve Bilgi Üretim Sisteminin Oluşumu
ve Dönüşümü, (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları, 1999), p. 86
182 BOA, MF. MKT. 522/59, 4 CA 1318 [30 August 1900].
183 Benjamin C. Fortna, Imperial Classroom: Islam, The State and Education in the Late Ottoman
Empire, (USA: Oxford University Press, 2002), p. 245.
184 It was decided to send the orphan boys in Dârüleytam to the trade and artisan groups to train them.
See BOA, BEO. 4652/348886. 28 Z 1338 [12 September 1920].
185 For instance, in 1860, it was ordered that Salih Usta, who was an expert in shoemaking, could train
new apprentices due to the presence of a couple of Muslim shoemakers, and it was pointed out that this
craft was monopolized by the foreigners (e.g. English) who lived in the Ottoman Empire. See BOA,
A.} MKT. NZD. 330/10, 22 R 1277 [7 November 1860].
186 BOA, İ.HUS. 14/86, 26 M 1311 [19 August 1893]; For the other works on the Industrial Schools,
see Bayram Kodaman, “Tanzimattan II. Meşrutiyete Kadar Sanayi Mektebleri”, in Türkiye’nin Sosyal
68
Three main factors paved the way for the transformation in occupational
training and competence, which directly influenced the working life of the artisans and
traders. First of all, the determination of occupational competence in certain
professions was changed. The Municipality began to approve the result of an
occupational exam. It became one of the criteria to be a member of an artisan group
and the consents of the masters at least in certain professions in the last period of the
Empire. A diploma (Şehâdetnâme) with the affirmation of the Municipality was given
after passing the exam. For example, it was stated that the builders (dülger) who were
not competent in this work gave rise to the extra expenses in building construction.
Therefore, it was ordered to divide them into three classes according to their
professional levels and the diploma to be given considering this classification in 1876.
This procedure was also valid for foreigners working in the Ottoman Empire.187 As a
second factor, the Imperial administration considered the importance of education for
professional progression with the effect of changing in general education policies, and
it was perceived as the need of the state. This triggered the modernization of the
training methods in certain professions in theory and practice. Third, the number of
artisans and trade groups increased after the abolition of the monopolies (gedik), so
the government had to redesign the rights to conduct a profession in the marketplace.
The control of the marketplace became difficult to regulate, and the municipalities
needed new arrangements for it since the population ratio of artisans, producers, and
vendors increased. New artisans were expected to know the theoretical/technical and
practical information about their professions. The old perception in the training of the
future artisans was so conservative; that is to say, the craft knowledge was
monopolized by the masters. This period’s remarkable feature was that craft
knowledge became open to the public via the booklets and schools.
It was believed that the old training method felt short for the new market order.
If training is based on books rather than the guidance of the master, artisan and trade
groups would be more successful according to this view because books could be
ve Ekonomik Tarihi (1071-1920), Osman Okyar & Halil İnalcık (eds.), (Ankara: Meteksan, 1980);
Bayram Kodaman, Abdülhamid Devri Eğitim Sistemi, (İstanbul: Ötüken Neşriyat, 1980).
187 BOA, ŞD. 685/9, 20 RA 1293 [15 April 1876].
69
updated according to the needs and technology. But the Ottoman artisan and trade
world felt behind Europe due to this deficiency.188 The 8th Article of the Ordinance for
Esnaf Associations refers to the cooperation among the members of any artisan or
trade group, and the progression of their occupations was attributed to this fact.
Helping each other could not be enough to progress in any occupation, yet it depends
on professional training. Schools for artisans and trade groups (esnaf mektebleri) had
to be founded, but there was no such an article or decision in this ordinance.189
In the next chapter, the administrative transformation in marketplace life will
be elaborated by considering the legal arrangements, and the Esnaf Office, the new
sub-unit founded under the Municipality, is examined. Then, the economic state of the
groups under the topics of the struggle for existence and taxes will be handled by
showing their relations with the change in the administrative structure.
188 Sabah, no. 281, 24 M 1294 [8 February 1877], pp. 1-3
189 “Esnâf Mektebleri, Teâvün Sandıkları”, Tanin, no. 260, 11 May 1325 [24 May 1909], p. 3.
70
CHAPTER 3 ADMINISTRATIVE TRANSFORMATION AND ECONOMY IN THE SHADE OF ECONOMIC RECESSION The nineteenth century was the era of modern law for the Ottoman Empire when certain Western-style regulations and legislation were prepared and implemented. The trivet, including economy, diplomacy, and law that determined the main policies of the modern states, shaped the Ottoman governmentality as well. The Ottoman Empire went into reforms, and this brought new bureaucratic practices in the state apparatus that influenced all official processes in this period. Bureaucratization and modernization do not always mean the practice of official affairs more rationally and systematically. Nevertheless, changes with the new arrangements brought a new manner of rule for the governments and a new administrative system for artisans and traders. New ministries and state institutions were established, and the way of practice of the official affairs changed, which directly altered the practices of the marketplace actors. The Tanzimat period brought the replacement of the traditional Ottoman institutions and marketplace actors with the new ones. The new local administration approach forced artisans and traders to accommodate themselves to this modern administrative order. In this chapter, the adaptation of these groups to the new Ottoman order will be scrutinized within the framework of the legal arrangements implemented in this period. The legal regulations help understand the role of the guilds and their official status, giving ideas about the legal procedure in the marketplace in the period under study. Many details and authorized positions were stated in the ordinances and regulations prepared for the mentioned groups, and all these arrangements enabled their articulation into the new governing order. The preparation of detailed legislation indicates the requirements of the marketplace as well. The details of these official
71
arrangements display the scope of the activity of the state center. After abolishing the Ministry of Marketplace (İhtisab Nezâreti) in 1855, an ambiguity in supervision tasks in the marketplace emerged. Therefore, this chapter will assess the roles of the police and municipal police (zâbıta) who conducted the supervisions in the new administrative order. The Esnaf Office (Esnaf Kalemi), which was one of the outcomes of the bureaucratic change of the period, will be elaborated as well. This office was established to make official affiliation of the artisans and traders to the Municipality. It worked as the sub-unit of the Municipality. Then, this chapter will examine the economic state of the marketplace actors. After giving information about the challenging economic circumstances of the artisans and traders, the chapter will handle taxes and fees that these groups paid. Taxes give not only ideas about the economic conditions of these groups but also their institutional affiliation. The change in the tax payment system directly influenced the administrative position of these groups. Finally, the esnaf license (esnaf tezkeresi) and license fee will be introduced. The license was the main obligatory official document of artisans and traders to do business, which will be explained in detail. The new administrative order, which was shaped by the expansion of bureaucracy and institutionalization, was control-oriented over artisans and traders. It enabled the conduct of the official affairs of the local administration more systematically and rationally than in previous periods.190 This chapter argues that this new structure centralized the way of conducting marketplace affairs via the municipalities. Therefore, new state institutions, administrative practices, regulations, and the absence of old traditional state functionaries point to the new institutional period for the marketplace actors. All these factors enforced them to accommodate themselves to the new bureaucratic functioning. Esnaf Office was examined as an intermediary unit and it will be asserted that this office commenced and accelerated the process of the guild warden’s disengagement in the marketplace. This chapter also underlines the place of the taxes in the change of their institutional affiliation. In this period, the type of taxes changed and the tax collection practice became centralized
190 For a detailed information on the development of administrative structure in the Ottoman Empire, see İlber Ortaylı, Türkiye Teşkilât ve İdare Tarihi, (Ankara: Cedit Neşriyat, 2017); Erkan Tural, “Osmanlı İdare Hukuku ve Modern Devlet”, in I. Türk Hukuk Tarihi Kongresi Bildirileri, Fethi Gedikli (ed.), (İstanbul: On İki Levha Yayıncılık, 2014), pp. 305-315.
72
with the centralized finance policies. Furthermore, taxes show the reasons for the discomfort of the related groups that give an idea about their economic conditions. 3.1. Outcomes of Administrative Reforms The administrative management of artisans and traders changed from the Islamic law judge-oriented (kadı) system to the modern municipalities in the nineteenth century, which can be accepted as a milestone for these groups. They were under the control of the Islamic law judge (kadı) and market inspector (muhtesib) until the early years of the Tanzimat period. The emphasis on the new legal arrangements instead of the emphasis on auld (kadime) and the old traditions came into prominence with the Tanzimat reforms. The Municipality, which was established in 1855, began to supervise the artisans and traders. It was the impact of the municipal movement in the Ottoman Empire, and it turned a new page for these groups. The establishment of the Municipality and the maintenance of its authority on trade and manufacturing groups were part of the centralization and bureaucratization of the state during the Tanzimat period. Thus, the multipartite urban administration and its bureaucratic organization took a new shape with its new institutions. These modern law-oriented institutions regulated the affairs of the marketplace and bazaar. Actually, the Islamic law judge had the primary authority in the traditional Ottoman city administration. He was depicted as the judge of the city and the supervisor of pious foundations, the financial authority of the city, the mayor and he was in charge of security. The control of artisans, guilds, and the price-fixing at the marketplaces were specific duties of the judge as well.191 Every Islamic law judge was responsible for the district where he was appointed, and he did not have the right to interfere in the judicial and administrative affairs of the other provinces or rural
191 For an informative and concise work on the Islamic law judge, see İlber Ortaylı, Hukuk ve İdare Adamı Olarak Osmanlı Devleti’nde Kadı, (İstanbul: Kronik Kitap, 2017), p. 41; Gy. Kaldy Nagy, “Kâdî”, Encyclopedia of Islam, vol. IV, Second Edition, (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1978), p. 375; For a detailed work on the Islamic law judge, see İsmail Hakkı Uzunçarşılı, Osmanlı Devleti’nin İlmiye Teşkilâtı, (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları, 2014). Even though the scholars explained the tasks and the scope of the authority of the Islamic law judges as if they were stable or unchangeable, it has to be reminded that this perception is open to question.
73
areas.192 The Islamic law judge and the other state personnel were responsible for
getting services done and organizing the people involving artisans, producers, and
vendors for these services; that is, the judges were the authority in the city affairs until
the beginning of the nineteenth century. Artisans and traders were in charge of specific
affairs such as security and cleaning the market places and shops. They defrayed all
the necessary expenses. The guild wardens and the avarız trustees regulated the
expenses of the cleaning of the streets and market, the repair of the sewer system,
fountains, and waterways. They were responsible for the Islamic law judges when they
were conducting these affairs. Guilds specifically controlled market and production
belonged to themselves. But whether they followed the rules or not was controlled by
these judges.193
The first development concerning the market and its hosts was the
establishment of the Ministry of the Marketplace in 1826, and the old marketplace
supervisor (ihtisab ağası or ihtisab emini) became the Minister of the Marketplace.
The old marketplace supervisor was working as an executive officer and municipal
police.194 İhtisab Ağası/Emini was the assistant of the Islamic law judge, and he had
certain missions to maintain order in the marketplace. After the establishment of the
ministry, certain supervision tasks of the Islamic law judge were partially transferred
to this ministry. It was mainly in charge of collecting taxes, providing security,
implementing fixed price (narh), and protecting order in urban and rural districts with
coercive measures.195 In general, the issues related to city life were belonged to the
market inspector: The control of artisans and traders, giving license to open a
workplace, tax collection, the allocation of the marketplace revenues, providing travel
192 Ortaylı, Hukuk ve İdare Adamı Olarak Osmanlı Devleti’nde Kadı, pp. 34-35.
193 Ortaylı, Tanzimat Devrinde Osmanlı Mahallî İdareleri (1840-1880), pp. 127-129.
194 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 3, (İstanbul, İBB Kültür İşleri Daire Başkanlığı Yayınları,
1995), p. 1267. Ergin pointed out that the Ministry of the Marketplace was primarily established to deal
with the affairs of the artisans and traders. See Osman Nuri Ergin, Türkiyede Şehirciliğin Tarihî İnkişafı,
(İstanbul: Cumhuriyet Matbaası, 1936), p. 122.
195 For the methods of narh, see Ömer L. Barkan, “İhtisab Kanunları”, Türk Tarih Vesikaları Dergisi,
v.1- n.5, v.2-n.7, v.3-n.9, (1942), pp.5-9. For the concise explanation of narh, see Mübahat S.
Kütükoğlu, “Narh”, TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.32), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 2006),
pp. 390-391.
74
permits, attires, issues related to export prohibition, and the organization of the children’s placement to the workplaces of craft and trade groups were given to this Ministry.196 The market inspectors controlled the marketplace and fairs for irregularities in commercial activities, such as faulty scales, commodities with exceeding established fixed price system (narh), and tainted goods.197 Furthermore, some ex tax collector-janissaries (koloğlans) became market officials (ihtisab nefer) to maintain the negotiation with artisans on tax issues.198 All in all, the Ministry of the Marketplace handled surveillance and taxation tasks in the marketplace in the first half of the nineteenth century in general.199 The Ministry of the Marketplace was the institutionalization of hisbe affairs, and the market inspector achieved autonomy against the Islamic law judge with this change.200 It was argued that the transition from the Islamic law judge to the Ministry of the Marketplace was the foundation of a despotic control mechanism in city 196 See the section of the Tasks of the Inspectors, Ziya Kazıcı, Osmanlı’da Yerel Yönetim: İhtisab Müessesesi, (İstanbul: Bilge Yayınları, 2006), pp. 78-238. 197 Kristen Stilt and M. Safa Saraçoğlu, “Hisba and Muhtasib”, The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Law, Anver M. Emon and Rumee Ahmed (eds.), (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), p. 345. 198 Turna, p. 115. 199 Turna, p. 109. 200 The Ottoman Sultans appointed an old market inspector to each major city and promulgated regulations; that is, hisba. Hisba was the base of municipal order in the Eastern Islamic cities, and it referred to the prevention of illicit acts by the enforcers of public morals in the marketplace. The main duties of the old market inspectors were to prevent fraud in the bazaars and market, apply the regulations of hisba and declare pricelist. The inspectors had a major role in urban life, particularly in the economic activities of each city. See Halil İnalcık, “Istanbul: An Islamic City”, Journal of Islamic Studies, n.1, (1990), pp. 16-17; For the inquiry about the relationship between agoranomos in the Roman and Byzantine times and the market inspectors in Islamic states, see Benyamin R. Foster, “Agoranomos and Muhtesib”, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. 13, n. 2, (April, 1970), pp. 128-144. Foster explains the transition of both the terminology and the functions of this position (muhtesib) in Roman and Islamic times; Ortaylı, Tanzimat Devrinde Osmanlı Mahallî İdareleri (1840-1880), p. 124. Ziya Kazıcı provides the history of the Institution of the Marketplace (İhtisab) with its various aspects. For a detailed information on the early history of the Marketplace and its inspectors, see Ziya Kazıcı, Osmanlı’da Yerel Yönetim: İhtisab Müessesesi, (İstanbul: Bilge Yayınları, 2006); Ahmet Akgündüz also provides the collected version of the regulations on the Marketplace (ihtisab). See Ahmet Akgündüz, Osmanlı Devleti’nde Belediye Teşkilatı ve Belediye Kanunları, (İstanbul: Osmanlı Araştırmaları Vakfı, 2005); For the duties of the market inspectors, see Osman Nuri Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 1, pp. 317-324. For a comprehensive dissertation part on the Ministry of the Marketplace, see Nalan Turna, “The Everyday Life of Istanbul and Its Artisans, 1808-1839”, pp. 88-132. The different usage of the term market inspector as enforcers of public morals, which is open to discuss, was taken from Gerber’s work. See Haim Gerber, State, Society, and Law in Islam: Ottoman Law in Comparative Perspective, (New York: State University of New York Press, 1994), p. 69.
75
administration rather than the presence of an active municipalism mentality.201
Therefore, it was accepted as a despotic and interdictor institution. The Ministry of the
Marketplace was delegated to the Directorate of Police (Zaptiye Müşiriyeti) in 1846.
The assembly of Es’ar202 was established under the supervision of this Field Marshall
(müşirlik), and it also included members from artisan and trader groups in this
assembly. Although this entity was assigned to the Ministry of Trade,203 but the
Ministry of the Marketplace was reestablished in April 1852, and the Es’ar assembly
was attached to this newly established ministry. The minister abrogated this assembly
a few months later. In the end, the newly established Municipality took over this
structure in July 1855.204
All these trial and error arrangements show the need for change in the structure
of the state departments, which forced the institutional professionalization in the
nineteenth century. With the elimination of the extant old institutions, the new
bureaucracy model came into prominence. Newly established government agencies or
administrative units such as the Municipality and the Police were equipped with the
modernized administrative system that contributed to the rationalization of public
administration in the second half of the nineteenth century. After the establishment of
the Municipality in 1855, the supervision of the marketplace and bazaar was
transferred to this new government institution. The duties of the market inspectors,
including the collection of taxes, supervision of markets and bazaars, protecting public
health and public security were mainly given to the Municipality and other government
201 İlhan Tekeli, Cumhuriyet’in Belediyecilik Öyküsü (1923-1990), (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt
Yayınları, 2009), pp. 34-35. Tekeli quotes this argument from Ortaylı. See Ortaylı, Tanzimat Devrinde
Osmanlı Mahallî İdareleri (1840-1880), p. 131.
202 Es’ar is the plural form of si’r and si’r means established market price. See James Redhouse,
Redhouse Sözlüğü: Türkçe-Osmanlıca-İngilizce, (İstanbul: SEV Matbaacılık ve Yayıncılık, 2000), p.
1022.
203 The affairs of the artisans and traders were belonged to the Ministry of Trade for a while. See Ali
Sönmez, “Zaptiye Teşkilatı’nın Kuruluşu ve Gelişimi”, Ph.D. diss., (Ankara University, 2005), p. 56.
204 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 1, p. 345; Ziya Kazıcı, “Hisbe”, TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi
(v.18), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 1998), pp. 143-145. The fixed price (narh) on meat
and some products were abolished in 1856, from vegetables and some other foodstuff in 1864, and
finally from all necessaries except for bread in 1865. The system of gedik became unnecessary with
these changes. Also, rises in prices stopped, which occurred because of the monopolies in market. See
Ortaylı, Tanzimat Devrinde Osmanlı Mahallî İdareleri (1840-1880), pp. 210-211; Zafer Toprak,
“Belediye Zabıtası”, Dünden Bugüne İstanbul Ansiklopedisi, v. 2, 1994, p. 146.
76
agencies after the second half of the nineteenth century. The municipality as the main
authority was considerably transformative in terms of artisans and traders. Municipal
reforms included the most significant part of the public administration. This new
administration policy broke the ties of these groups with the old market and trade
system. The municipal institution did not fundamentally open a new period for these
groups, especially in terms of their socio-economic conditions. However, it forced
them to customize to the new administrative order, and they met with the new legal
arrangements in this way. The marketplace actors internalized the new bureaucratic
procedure via their daily official practices.
Indeed, the establishment of the municipalities in the provinces was a necessity
for all urban affairs in that period. The first modern Ottoman municipalities were
established due to the ever-changing economic, social, and administrative needs of the
state and society since the traditional city administration could not respond to these
needs. The Ottoman municipalities were charged with city planning, sanitation, public
lighting, supervision of marketplaces, and infrastructure works by collecting taxes for
their incomes in a certain local district. It resulted in the foundation of modern and
local administrative institutions. These institutions were more developed,
professionalized, and systematized versions of the older institutions.
Three main reasons for the establishment of the municipalities can be
propounded. First, the Eastern Mediterranean port cities, which increased their trade
activities with Europe had to have a transportation and service network that was
convenient to the nineteenth century’s commercial activities. Having quarantine and
accommodation systems, healthy living conditions in the city, and well-ordered
transportation became important matters for these port cities.205 For example, the
cholera epidemic can be accepted as one of the main reasons that forced the state to
take some precautions to prevent the spread of the diseases with public health policies
and treat people who were suffered. This resulted in the need for the collaboration of
the state institutions at the center and the municipal organizations both in the imperial
capital and the provinces. The second one is the social effects of the Crimean War
(1853-1856) since it led to the increase in population in Istanbul with the soldiers of
205 Ortaylı, Türkiye Teşkilat ve İdare Tarihi, pp. 503-504.
77
the belligerents of the Crimean War who took side with the Ottoman Empire in this
war. An increase in the population enforced the institutionalization process in the
imperial capital. Rosenthal highlights the importance of the foreign influence in Galata
and the Crimean War experience as the push factors that paved the way for the urban
administration development in Ottoman Istanbul.206 These foreigners and their needs
accelerated the process of the establishment of the municipalities in the capital. Third,
the increasing diplomatic integration to the European countries enabled the
observation of these countries’ municipal tradition and style. This contributed to the
development of the municipal conception of the Ottoman governments. When all of
these factors are considered, both the effects of Europe and domestic urban
requirements accelerated the development of the Ottoman municipalities.207
Administrative modernity was shaped by a complex interaction process rather than the
implementation of a pre-written codex in the Ottoman context.208
The demands and problems of artisans and traders were handled by the state
institutions such as the Municipality and the other municipal bureaus, the Police, the
Municipal Police, Gendarmerie, and the Ministry of Trade and Pious Foundations by
the second half of the nineteenth century. Articles pertaining to the matters of these
groups were added to the legislations prepared for these state institutions. They will
be examined to understand the domain of the state departments and the limits on daily
commercial activities of the artisans and traders. Especially the legal regulations
206 Steven Rosenthal, “Foreigners and Municipal Reform in Istanbul: 1855-1865”, International Journal
of Middle East Studies, vol. 11, no.2, (April, 1980), pp. 227-245.
207 İlhan Tekeli emphasizes the importance of this dual path when considering the historical
development of municipalities in Turkey. See İlhan Tekeli, Belediyecilik Yazıları (1976-1991),
(İstanbul: IULA-EMME, 1992), p. 8.
208 The Ottoman state administration was not a passive receiver of the European reforms and ideas. See
Nora Lafi, “Mediterranean Connections: The Circulation of Municipal Knowledge and Practices during
the Ottoman Reforms, c. 1830-1910”, in Another Global City: Historical Explorations into the
Transnational Municipal Movement, 1850-2000, Pierre-Yves Saunier and Shane Ewen (eds.), (New
York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), pp. 48-49. Mahmoud Yazbak also investigates the argument that the
Ottomans established their municipalities with the European presence or pressure by examining the
municipalities in Palestine. See Mahmoud Yazbak, “Comparing Ottoman Municipalities in Palestine:
The Cases of Nablus, Haifa, and Nazareth, 1864-1914”, in Ordinary Jerusalem, 1840-1940: Opening
New Archives, Revisiting a Global City, Angelos Dalachanis and Vincent Lemire (eds.), (Leiden;
Boston: Brill, 2018), pp. 240-261.
78
prepared for the Municipality and the public enforcers give an idea about the positions
of these groups in terms of the local city administration.209
3.1.1. The Municipality and Legal Regulations
The old administrative and legal procedures for the artisans and traders were
different from the practices of the new modern municipalities. In the classical guild
order, the guild members had the responsibility to control and inspect their colleagues
and the workplaces to encompass their environment and even inflict punishment on
their members in any case. The decision-makers were the Islamic law judge, guild
wardens, and masters in previous periods, but it changed with the establishment of the
ministries, the Municipality, and the new Nizamiye courts. All controls were conducted
respectively by the Ministry of the Marketplace (until 1855), the Directorate of Police
and then the Ministry of Police, and notably the Municipality with the second half of
the nineteenth century. Specifically, the Municipality and the other municipalities had
a primary role in supervising artisans and traders in Istanbul and the other provinces,
according to the legislation. Regulations had articles designed by the necessities of the
marketplace and the responsibilities of the “trusted” actor guild warden and the guild
members. They were not able to act autonomously, and the state did not give complete
initiative to them in any affair in the new system. Certain responsibilities of artisans
and traders as the heritages of the old traditional market order in the classical and early
modern periods began to disappear. The new state institutions mentioned above
minimized the responsibilities of the artisan and trade groups in the shops and bazaars,
such as maintaining security and solving emergent problems among themselves.210
209 The aim of this chapter is not to explain the history of the Ottoman municipalities. The examination
of the municipal regulations with their details is beyond the scope of this study. For certain works on
the history of modern municipalities in the Ottoman Empire, see İlber Ortaylı, Tanzimattan Sonra
Mahalli İdareler (1840-1878), (Ankara: Türkiye ve Orta Doğu Amme İdaresi Enstitüsü Yayınları,
1974); İlber Ortaylı, Tanzimat Devrinde Osmanlı Mahallî İdareleri (1840-1880), (Ankara: Türk Tarih
Kurumu Yayınları, 2018); İlber Ortaylı, Türkiye Teşkilat ve İdare Tarihi, (Ankara: Cedit Neşriyat,
2017); Tarkan Oktay, Osmanlı’da Büyükşehir Belediye Yönetimi: İstanbul Şehremaneti, (İstanbul:
Yeditepe Yayınevi, 2011); Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 3; Ahmet Akgündüz, Osmanlı
Devleti’nde Belediye Teşkilatı ve Belediye Kanunları, (İstanbul: Osmanlı Araştırmaları Vakfı, 2005).
210 According to İlber Ortaylı infrastructural problems were dealth with by the marketplace community
and neighborhood residents before the municipalities were established. He asserts that when the
infrastructural issues became duties of the municipalities, the artisans and the neighborhood residents
79
Legal arrangements prepared for the marketplace and its actors enable to see the scope
of the necessities and the responsibilities.
The draft law called lâyiha, which was issued for the Istanbul Municipality in
1855, had articles for the maintenance of order in the issues concerning the artisans
and traders. The importance of this draft law is that it was the official declaration of
making the Municipality as the main responsible agency for the affairs of these social
groups as it was stated in its second article.211 This 14-article regulation involved five
articles directly related to these groups, and it shows their critical position in terms of
the local administration. For example, the City Council (Şehir Meclisi) involved
twelve people, including the members from artisan and trade groups as well (Article
5), and these groups became a member of local public administration. According to
the article 6, this assembly had to solve the disputes that emerged among these groups.
If any violation occurred in fixed-price or the other general order rules, a report would
be prepared and sent with a misdemeanant to the Police (Article 10). The Ministry of
Trade could carry out affairs of the mentioned groups along with the Municipality
(Article 12).212 The Regulation of the Sixth Municipal District of Istanbul dated 1857,
also with its Article 53rd and the 54thArticle gave the supervision of the craft and trade
groups with their utensils, scales, wage scales of their goods and products, such places
as coffeehouses, bazaars, theaters, alehouse, and the rules about the taxes and patent
tax to the Municipality.213 The reforms for designing and empowering the
became lazy and these groups began to complain about the infrastructure problems and sent petitions to
the municipalities. See İlber Ortaylı, “Devraldığımız Miras”, Yeni Türkiye: Yönetimde Yeniden
Yapılanma Özel Sayısı, v.1, no. 4, (1995), p. 557. The popular mayor Cemil Topuzlu also pointed out
that the responsibilities of the artisans and traders increased with the new ordinances and regulations,
but the old responsibilities disappeared with them. Still, no sharp transition existed in the responsibility
issue. For example, the Municipality took the help of the ordinary people in cleaning task. See Cemil
Topuzlu, İstibdat, Meşrutiyet, Cumhuriyet Devirlerinde 80 Yıllık Hatıralarım, (İstanbul: İstanbul
Üniversitesi Cerrahpaşa Tıp Fakültesi, 1982), p. 127.
211Şehremâneti Memuriyetiyle Teferruâtına Dair Meclis-i Âli-i Tanzimât ve Nizamnâme Lâyıhası,
Atatürk Üniversitesi Kütüphanesi Seyfettin Özege Koleksiyonu, no: 12755, 15 ZA 1271 [30 July 1855];
For in Latin alphabet, see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 3, pp. 1272-1274; BOA, A.} DVN.
105/52, 12 ZA 1271 [27 July 1855]; Osman Nuri Ergin used the term préfecture de la ville, which was
used for the municipality in France, and he added that the Ottoman municipal development was similar
to the French case. See Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 3, p. 1268.
212“Şehremâneti Memuriyetiyle Teferruâtına Dair Meclis-i Âli-i Tanzimât ve Nizamnâme Lâyıhası”,
pp. 4-5.
213 The first version of the Regulation was announced in 1857. See “Altıncı daire-i belediye nizâmatı”
11 CA 1274 [28 December 1857], Düstur, I/2, pp. 460-463; BOA, İ. DUİT. 57/2, 11 CA 1274 [28
80
administrative structure and the Municipality accelerated after the successful
implementation of the Sixth Municipal District Regulation, but financial difficulties
hampered the process.
Another regulation, titled the Regulation for the Municipal Administration of
Istanbul (Dersaadet İdare-i Belediye Nizamnâmesi) and issued in 1868, included the
articles about trade and manufacturing groups as well. The 3rd Article of this regulation
ordered that the municipal police had to control the cleaning of the eating houses,
coffee houses, gambling houses, theaters, pier boats, and hackney carriages. It also
ordered for the control of street vendors. The 4th Article emphasized to obey the rules
with respect to the sanitation of products and all kinds of scales used in bazaar and
marketplaces. This article also ordered the collection of taxes from groups dealing with
small scale commercial activities and the regulation in the guild wardens’ election. All
these rules were stated as the responsibilities of the Municipality under its authority.
Besides, according to the 11th Article of this regulation, it was stated that the
Municipality would negotiate the decisions taken in the assemblies of the artisans and
traders.214
Another legal arrangement was the Law of the Municipality (Dersaâdet
Belediye Kanunu), the first code passed in the First Ottoman Parliament in 1877. It
was prepared for the managing of the municipal administration. But it could not be
operated well since the parliament was closed and the financial crisis occurred. The
3rd Article was about the responsibilities of the Municipality, which was also stated in
the 3rd and 4th articles of the 1868 regulation. In addition to the mentioned previous
rules, the rule about the prevention of street vendors at marketplaces and main streets,
market controls, and the arrangement of the bazaars were added to the 3rd Article of
this regulation. Its 8th Article ordered that the decisions of the guilds about the affairs
December 1857]; For a new detailed arrangement, see “Devâir-i belediyeden altıncı dâire itibar olunan
Beyoğlu ve Galata dâiresinin nizâm-ı umûmîsidir”, 24 L 1274 [7 June 1858], Düstur, I/2, pp. 470-471;
BOA, İ. DUİT. 57/1, 24 L 1274 [4 June 1858]; BOA, A} DVN. MKL. 74/12, 29 CA 1274 [15 January
1858].
214 “Dersaâdet idare-i belediye nizamnâmesi”, 18 C 1285 [6 October 1868], Düstur, I/2, pp. 450-459;
BOA, A.} DVN. MKL. 7/6, 18 C 1285 [6 October 1868].
81
of their members would be issued in the Assembly of the Municipality. The 63rd
Article was about the taxes, including scales and licenses.215
The 1877 Municipality Law was replaced by a new one in 1912, and it was the
Provisional Law for the Dersaâdet Municipal Organization (Dersaadet Teşkilat-ı
Belediyesi Hakkında Kanun-ı Muvakkat), which did not include a special article about
artisans and traders.216 Many previous articles were accepted in this revised code, and
new amendments about the municipal organization were made over it, which lasted
until the new municipal law prepared in 1930.217
These regulations and provisional law contributed to the articulation of the
artisans and traders to the new administrative structure. It opened a new era for them
in terms of administrative management, which was shaped by the new modern lawbased
order. Decisions and legal arrangements had to be compatible to the
centralization policy of the state center. Restructuring the artisan policy brought a new
dimension between the state and society. It meant the increase in the supervision power
in terms of the state; on the other hand, probably more oppression in terms of society.
Yet, explaining this new administrative order on the basis of this tension forces the
perspective to be gotten in a vicious circle. The check and balance requirements in
socio-economic life have to be regarded as well. The Municipality became as the prior
responsible institution in the affairs of these groups and it had a broad authority.
However, some ambiguities emerged in supervisions. The roles of the law enforcement
bodies in the marketplace supervision and the ambiguity problem in conducting the
215 “Dersaâdet Belediye Kanunu”, 27 N 1294 [5 October 1877], Düstur, I/4, pp. 520-538; BOA, A.}
DVN. MKL. 14/16, 19 Z 1293 [5 January 1877]; 1325 Senesine Mahsûs Umûr-ı Belediye Mecmuâsı,
(İstanbul: Bağdadliyan Matbaası, 1325), pp. 1-21; For in Latin alphabet, see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı
Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1627, 1638-1639.
216 “Dersaâdet teşkilat-ı belediyesi hakkında kanun-ı muvakkat”, 20 M 1331 [30 December 1912],
Düstur, II/5, pp. 37-39. 7th article of it was amended. See “Dersaâdet teşkilat-ı belediyesine mütedair 20
Muharrem 1331 tarihli kanun-ı muvakkatın 7. Maddesini muaddil kanun-ı muvakkat”, 6 CA 1331 [13
April 1913], Düstur, II/5, pp. 251-252.
217 64th article was amended in 1914. See “Dersaâdet belediye kanununun 64 ve Vilayât belediye
kanununun 40. maddelerini muaddil 2 Cumâdelâhira 1329 tarihli madde-i kanuniyeye müzeyyel fıkra
hakkında kanun-ı muvakkat”, 8 C 1332 [4 May 1914], Düstur, II/6, p. 574; 63rd article was also
amended, which was about the tax revenues of the municipalities. See “27 Ramazan 1294 tarihli
Dersaâdet belediye kanununun 63. ve aynı tarihli vilayât-ı belediye kanununun 39. maddelerine
müzeyyel fıkra hakkında kararnâme”, 17 C 1340 [15 February 1922], Düstur, II/12, pp. 566-567.
82
controls were the remarkable deficiencies in this period, which decreased the authority
power of the state institutions.
3.1.2. Supervision Tasks: Police and Municipal Police (Zâbıta)
The supervision of municipalities and the other state institutions on artisans
and marketplace became institutionalized according to their responsibility areas nearly
in the nineteenth century. The control of market activities such as weights and scales,
prices, the prevention of selling prohibited goods, the public health protection policies
related to the goods, shops and employees, the maintenance of public order in the
marketplace and bazaar, and providing appropriate location and infrastructure to the
marketplace actors were all conducted with the cooperation of the municipalities and
the law enforcers covering police and the municipal police (zâbıta) by implementing
the warning and punishment mechanism.
In theory, the municipal police were the primary authority in controlling the
marketplace, bazaar, shops, and production areas. They were responsible for
maintaining the economic activities, environmental cleaning, supervision in these
places, including the sanitary inspection within shops, security, traffic control, and the
control of peddlers. They were inspecting groups in precarious business for public
health, such as butchers, bakeries, milkmen, and controlling the products in their
shops. They were also preventing unlicensed street vending at nights, the use of
inaccurate weights, sale of unhealthy products, patrolling the theatres, cinemas, and
casinos, which were open at nights generally.218 Indeed, many arrangements were
made for the supervision of the marketplaces, but it was insufficient since the
Municipal system did not work properly due to lack of budget, experience, and the
adaptation problems of the marketplace actors and the municipal authorities to the new
order. Therefore, these controls were carried out deficiently since the municipal police
were mostly inefficient or absent in conducting marketplace affairs.
218 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 2, p. 901.
83
The municipalities remained incapable of developing their law enforcers,
which later was established as a municipal police system.219 The missions and the way
of enforcing the law of the police and the municipal police were to be different. This
difference reflected in the supervision practices of the marketplace and the police
approached occupational affairs of these groups from the public order perspective. The
involvement of the police in the supervision also enabled the state to control the
marketplace and its actors more by externalizing the economic roles of these groups.
According to the new arrangements, the Police were responsible for keeping
public order, intervening in criminal cases, and inspecting artisans and traders. The
duties of the police officers concerning the marketplace and its hosts were given in
detail in the Police Regulation of 1845. For example, the 14th Article was about the
control of the inns, eating houses, and hotels; the 15th was for the ban of gambling
houses; the 16th was about the bans about strikes and participation to any agitator
organization of the workers and amele; the 18th Article was about controlling of the
books sold in book stores and printing houses; the 20th Article was about providing
security in theaters and the other such like public spaces.220 Certain articles of this
regulation later were detailed and updated when necessary in the Police Regulation of
1907. According to the 74th Article of the 1907 regulation, it was stated that individuals
apart from the employees who were working at a coffee house, casino or bathhouse
are not allowed to stay in these places at night.221 The regulation also gave authority
to the Police to prevent the unapproved theater plays, singing the expurgatory canto
and songs in various entertainment venues, and the presence of behaviors (Article
122).222 According to another ordinance for gendarme and police issued in 1896, if a
219 İlber Ortaylı states that the government bodies regulated especially public order issue, and it led to
the inadequancy in fulfilling the policing duties of the municipalities. See İlber Ortaylı, “İmparatorluk
Döneminde Mahallî İdarelerin ve Belediyeciliğin Evrimi”, in Türkiye’de Belediyeciliğin Evrimi, Ergun
Türkcan (ed.), (Ankara: Türk İdareciler Derneği, 1978), p. 24.
220 BOA, İ.. MSM. 3/48, 7 RA 1261 [16 March 1845]. For the transliteration of the regulation, see “İlk
Polis Nizamnamesinin Hazırlanması”, in Belgelerle Türk Polis Tarihi, vol. 1, (Ankara: Emniyet Genel
Müdürlüğü Arşiv ve Dokümantasyon Dairesi Başkanlığı, 2014), pp. 3-5.
221 “Polis Nizamnâmesi”, 5 RE 1325 [18 April 1907], Düstur, I/8, (Ankara: Başvekâlet Devlet Matbaası,
1943), p. 678.
222 “Polis Nizamnâmesi”, 5 RE 1325 [18 April 1907], Düstur, I/8, p. 685.
84
person causes any disorder and violate the rules, it would be only the police who were
able to take care of the problem. If artisans and traders react to the law enforcers, they
would be arrested by the Police.223 These rules were within the boundaries of public
order, and the police supervision in terms of trading activities remained incapable.
There was a need for the foundation of a separate department, the municipal police
(zâbıta), for these issues.
The supervision in the marketplace was done by the police forces and the
municipal police, as was explained above.224 The first examples of the municipal
police were Kavas and then the municipal sergeant (belediye çavuşu). The first legal
arrangement for the establishment of municipal police was an Ordinance
(Talimatnâme) issued in 1871, and it was replaced by a new one later with changes in
the articles. Almost all articles of this ordinance were about the duties of the municipal
police forces to supervise artisans and made them obey the rules and regulations. The
municipal police had the authority to bear arms,225 and many topics concerning
sanitation and marketplace order were also involved in the ordinance.226 In the 3rd
Article of the Ordinance, it was stated that if a case emerges in the marketplace and if
sergeants (çavuş) are not able to solve the problem, they can demand support from the
nearest police station (zabtiye merkezi). But this procedure was annulled, and it was
stated that they had to inform the Municipality. The term “municipal police officer”
(zâbıta memuru) was firstly used in the Article 23rd of the Ordinance implemented in
1872.227 The 1871 Ordinance was annulled, but the articles of these two ordinances
223 “Dersaadet ve Bilâd-ı Selase’de Takrir-i Asayiş Vazifesi ile Mükellef Olan Nizamiye ve Jandarma
Asakir-i Şahane ile Polis Memurlarının Suret-i Hareketlerine Dair Talimat”, 1 B 1314 [6 December
1896], Düstur, I/7, p. 114; Ergut, pp. 142-143.
224 Gail Bossenga mentions the ability of the municipal administrators to police the workforce in the
case of Lille. See Gail Bossenga, The politics of privilege: Old regime and revolution in Lille,
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), p. 170.
225 See Article 9, “Şehremâneti behiyyesinde müstahdem komiser ve serçavuşlar ile çavuşların mükellef
oldukları vazife-i memûriyetleriyle sûret-i harekâtlarını mübeyyin talimatnâme” 9 CA 1288 [27 July
1871], Düstur, I/3, pp. 528-530. For in Latin alphabet, see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, p.
1808.
226 “Devâir-i belediye çavuşlarının vazâifine dair talimattır” 15 ZA 1287 [6 February 1871], Düstur, I/2,
pp. 539-544. For in Latin alphabet, see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1796-1800.
227 “Devâir-i belediye çavuşlarının vezâifine dair talimattır” 30 CA 1289 [5 August 1872], Düstur, I/3,
pp. 520-526. For in Latin alphabet, see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1801-1805.
85
were nearly the same except for three of them. Moreover, the ordinances for the
municipal police of the Municipality and the municipal districts were separate. The
municipal police hierarchy, which was determined as police superintendent, mastersergeant,
and sergeant respectively, was employed to protect the Municipality. But the
supervision issue of the marketplace-bazaar areas was not mentioned in the related
regulation.228 It was stated in the 1st Article of the Regulation for the sergeants of the
municipalities (1315/1899-1900) that the realm of authority of the municipal police
officers of the Municipality and the other municipalities was equal.229 The
responsibilities of the police superintendent and municipal sergeants were detailed in
this regulation.
As an earlier legal arrangement, the Regulation for the Streets (Sokaklara Dair
Nizamnâme) issued in 1859 involved many articles about the rules in the marketplace
and bazaar, especially in the issues of occupying pavements, sweeping and cleaning
of streets, pavements and of the front of shops, the detailed rules for butchers, bakers,
shops which were selling alcohol, candy makers, druggists, and bathhouse owners.230
The fines mentioned in this regulation always referred to the 254th Article of the 1858
Imperial Ottoman Penal Code (Ceza Kanunname-i Hümayunu).231 The Penal Code
stated crimes and punishment in the marketplace in detail in its 254th, 256th, 257th,
262nd, and 263rd articles, gathered under the third categorization specified as kabahat
(guilt). This third part of the code involves the articles about the punishments for the
people against matters of sanitation, cleanliness, and public order.232 For example, the
262nd Article of the Penal Code was about the weights and measures used in the shops
228 “Şehremâneti çavuşları hakkında nizamnâmedir” 30 CA 1289 [5 August 1872], Düstur, I/3, pp. 526-
528. For in Latin alphabet, see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1805-1807.
229 Düstur did not include this regulation. See Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, p. 1809.
230 “Sokaklara dair nizamnâmedir” 17 N 1275 [20 April 1859], Düstur, I/2, pp. 478-490; For in Latin
alphabet, see, Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1785-1795. Osman Nuri Ergin stated that
this regulation was important because it was the first legal arrangement of the municipal police. See
Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, p. 1785.
231 “Ceza Kanunnâme-i hümâyûnu”, 28 Z 1274 [9 August 1858], Düstur, I/1, p. 594; For the articles
related to the marketplace orders (in Latin alphabet) see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp.
1643-1647.
232 John A. Strachey Bucknill and Haig Apisoghom S. Utidjian, The Imperial Ottoman Penal Code: A
Translation from the Turkish Text, (London: Oxford University Press, 1913), pp. xix, 199-205.
86
or bazaar and the fines in case of violations.233 But it has to be pointed out that these
articles were mostly related to the violation of public order, which entered the
responsibility borders of the police.
Articles 14, 32, and 33 of the Municipality Law of 1877 give information about
the duties of the municipal polices of the Municipality and the other municipalities,
which had an emphasis on legality. The competent authority in regulating the
responsibilities of police superintendent and sergeants was the Municipality. There
was an effort to establish a separate municipal law enforcers department independent
from the central police organization, but the municipal police were completely
affiliated to the general police forces in 1914 on the basis of the provisional law
prepared in 1912.234 The police took on the responsibilities of the municipal police
which belonged to the Municipality according to the 6th Article of this law. Because
of the disobedience of the marketplace groups, the recourse to the Police became
obligatory.235 Indeed, the municipal administration was not able to operate the office
of the municipal police since it had financial and administrative inadequacies; that is,
the major reason for this failure was the financial constraints emerged with the lack of
revenues of the municipalities and the unsettled municipal system to employ municipal
police force. With a special ordinance, the collaboration between the Municipality and
the Police became official in 1913. According to this ordinance, the resistance of the
people to the municipal police officers seemed equal to the resistance to the general
law enforcers.236 The municipal police’s affiliation to the Police was delayed due to
the Balkan Wars (1912-1913) and the change of the cabinet. It proceeded to the Police
down from March/April of 1914.237 The guards were employed in the marketplace and
neighborhoods following 1914, and they had to work under the supervision of the
233 “Ceza Kanunnâme-i hümâyûnu”, Düstur, I/1, p. 596.
234 See Article 6, “Dersaâdet teşkilat-ı belediyesi hakkında kanun-ı muvakkat”, Düstur, II/5, p. 38.
235 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 3, p. 1471.
236 See “Vazâif-i zabıta-i belediyyeyi mübeyyin talimât” in Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4,
pp. 1817-1830. This ordinance was signed by the mayor Cemil and the General Director of Security
Cafer İlhâmi. Also, the responsibilities of the traffic police were detailed in this ordinance dated 1913.
237 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, p. 1817.
87
municipal police.238 As a different law enforcement agency, the municipal police
became inactive specifically during World War I period.
The connection of the municipal police with the Municipality or the Directorate
of Police remained as a problem. This ambiguous duality occupied the agenda for a
while since the authorities tried to solve the issue by putting the municipal police in
charge. They wanted to be sure that they were to do right without getting the help of
the police. Ergin even questioned how it was possible to organize the municipal police
though the Municipality system had not been settled yet.239 A committee, which was
composed of the general directors of Bayezid Office Mustafa Nizameddin, Hisar
Office Mazlum, and Kadıköy Office Radi Beys, prepared a report for this issue. It was
stated that the affiliation of the municipal police both to the Municipality and the
Police caused a dualism. Hence, a separate office had to be established affiliated to the
Municipality as it was in France.240 The salary payment of the municipal police would
be paid to the Municipality rather than the Police Directorate, and the revenues of the
Municipality could increase in this way.241 This document was written in 1921 (1336),
and it shows the long uncertainty in solving the problem of the affiliation of the
municipal police to a state department and their inefficiency in the marketplace. The
lack of personnel, the official affiliation problem of them, and many task
commonalities with the police forces were the major factors of why the
institutionalization of municipal police fall behind.242
The border between the supervision of the commercial activities in the
marketplace and the maintenance of public order became blurred when the municipal
police were affiliated to the general police force. This ambiguity in the distribution of
these tasks among law enforcers, predominantly because of the weakness of the
238 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 2149-2150.
239 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 2, p. 899.
240 It has to be highlighted that municipal police (zâbıta) in the Ottoman Empire were different than the
civilian municipal police in France. For information on the civilian municipal police, see Clive Emsley,
“A typology of nineteenth-century police”, Crime, History & Societies, vol. 3, no. 1, (1999), pp. 29-44.
241 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 2, p. 901.
242 For a detailed information on the municipal police, see Şefik Memiş, Şehremanet’inden Büyükşehir’e
Belediye Zabıtası Tarihi, (İstanbul: İstanbul Büyükşehir Belediyesi, 2008).
88
municipal police force, continued until the early Republican Period in Turkey.
Nonetheless, it should be stated that the municipal police were employed for the
supervision of a certain municipal district. The authority of the police was belonged to
the Directorate of Police until 1909 and then to the General Directorate of Security
(Emniyet-i Umûmiyye Müdüriyeti), and their authority areas were different and more
broad.243
The penalty was also another ambiguous issue because of the unsettled
judgment-penalty procedure in the marketplace affairs even though many legal
regulations were issued. The officers were fining the artisans and traders during the
inspections, just like they had done previously. For example, in the new judicial
system, if an officer detected fraud in the market (such as mixing milk with water), he
would not be able to fine the responsible person at that time, but only to report the
incident. The officers were sending this record to the court. But, the shopkeeper could
continue to hold the good after the record. This procedure was criticized since the
Ottoman courts were so busy, and the shopkeeper could continue to defraud until the
conclusion of the case. Therefore, it was proposed that the officers had to fine at that
time.244 But this system did not work well. The fines and the shop closes existed as the
most common penalties in the marketplace.
The control mechanism in the marketplace was mostly irregular even though
many detailed regulations were prepared for it. The weakness of the supervision was
intensively because of the structural reasons such as the financial difficulties in the
Municipality and the inadequacy of the necessary state agencies like the municipal
police. All in all, the municipal police force system was not systematized until the end
of the empire. In this respect, the state approached the affairs of artisans and traders
commonly within the framework of public order and security. On the other hand, this
ambiguity hampered the marketplace supervision. Therefore, fraud among the
marketplace actors was probably more prevalent than it was estimated or recorded.
It is significant to elaborate separately on the rest of the Ottoman provinces to
deepen the understanding of the local actors, conditions, and traditional continuities in
243 Hasan Refik Ertuğ, “Belediye Zabıtası”, Ankara Üniversitesi SBF Dergisi, vol.2, no.1, (1947), p. 21.
244 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 2, pp. 902-904.
89
public administration. The conditions and the interactions in Istanbul were different
than the circumstance in rural or the other cities of the Empire.245
3.1.3. The Establishment of the Esnaf Office (Esnaf Kalemi)
The legal arrangements included both supervision and managing matters of
artisans and traders. The common consensus in the literature is that the guilds lost their
power in the last decades of the Empire. But this, in fact, is related to the emergence
of a new structure to take artisans and their guilds under control in line with the
requirements of the market, free trade economy system, and the strengthening of the
state authority. Because these groups were the backbone of the daily economic
activities. Toward the end of the nineteenth century, the government established a new
department under the Municipality rule to regularize affairs of the marketplace actors.
The Esnaf Office (Esnaf Kalemi) under the authority of the Istanbul Municipality
founded in 1892, especially to assure the esnaf affairs such as their registration and
control via their guild warden. The preparation for this office was first started in 1891
as mentioned before,246 and the ordinance (Esnaf kaleminin sûret-i teşkîl ve vezâifini
mübeyyin talimât) was promulgated in 1892.247 The ordinance was prepared for the
marketplace actors, guild wardens, and the issue of guarantee. All the official
proceedings and steps were designated, and concrete solutions for future problems
were stated in the ordinance.248 The state ensured the registration of every information
and change related to the guild members and their guild wardens via this office.
245 Nora Lafi points out that the modern administrative system was shaped by the discussions made
between Istanbul and the traditional local leaders in certain regions of the Empire, such as Tripoli on
the reforms. She also reminds the failed mediation in Tunis. It shows that local dynamics display
fundamental differences, and every administrative policy did not work in every part. See Lafi, pp. 46-
47.
246 BOA, DH.MKT. 1806/103, 27 C 1308 [7 February 1891]. It was first prepared as an ordinance; then,
it was converted into a regulation. See BOA, ŞD. 2581/41, 29 R 1309 [2 December 1891].
247 BOA, İ..ŞD.. 114/6856, 10 C 1309 [11 January 1892]; “Esnaf kaleminin sûret-i teşkîl ve vezâifini
mübeyyin talimat”, 10 C 1309 [11 January 1892], Düstur, I/6, (Ankara: Devlet Matbaası, 1939), pp.
1150-1155.
248 For the whole version of the ordinance, see Appendix A and B.
90
The Municipality considered the foundation of this office necessary for trade
and artisan groups. The officers and clerks were also involved into the ordinance who
were responsible for putting and doing the affairs of these groups in a certain order. It
aimed to specify the number of the recorded members of groups, to control the esnaf
licenses (esnaf tezkeresi), to collect license fees (tezkere harcı) from the wardens in a
proper way to increase the revenues of the Municipality,249 and to prevent the
malfeasance of the incomes by the guild wardens.250 It was stated that the malfeasances
of the guild wardens could not be stopped. This reveals the functionless old order, and
the extant administrative order could not hammer out the problems and the complaints
of the marketplace actors.251
The Esnaf Office became the main official platform for the trade and artisan
groups in the last decades of Ottoman Istanbul. The guild affairs concerning vocational
records and fees of the licenses were linked to the Municipality via this office, and a
more concrete official process between the guilds and the municipal administrators
was established.252
Indeed, the main responsibility of this office was to supervise the circulation
and the use of esnaf licenses and to control the financial misuses of the guild wardens
since the license fee formed the significant portion of the budget of the Municipality.
This process paved the way for the abolition of the guild warden post due to two main
reasons; first the warden’s their abuses and the second their inability to solve the issues
concerning the artisans and traders.
The registration to the Office became more systematic with the new six
registers mentioned in the Articles 3rd and 4th of the regulation. The Esnaf Office was
responsible for these registers. The office director was also responsible for the given
licenses, and these directors had to have guarantee in case of losses stated in Article 6.
The office strictly controlled the process related to the licenses and certificates, and
249 BOA, DH.MKT. 1829/92, 12 N 1308 [21 April 1891]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1832/29, 3 L 1308 [12 May
1891]; BOA, MV. 65/11, 3 ZA 1308 [10 June 1891]; BOA, İ. MMS. 121/5219, 8 ZA 1308 [15 June
1891].
250 BOA, DH.MKT. 1824/72, 22 Ş 1308 [2 April 1891].
251 BOA, DH. MKT. 1824/72, 22 Ş 1308 [2 April 1891].
252 The office was linked to the Civil Registry Office (Nüfus İdaresi) for a while, but it was again linked
to the Municipality. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1282/43, 23 B 1326 [21 August 1908].
91
any activity would not be done without approval of the office. The regulation made
the guild warden the responsible person for guilds, and he was totally under the control
of this office. That is to say, although guild wardens were leading officers in the
matters of trade and artisan groups, it does not mean that their scope of authority was
expanded. The 2nd Article of the regulation stated that if a guild warden abuses his
position, he could be discharged. Every change concerning the affairs of artisans and
traders had to be conveyed to the office, and if a guild warden were not able to do his
duty, he could be punished. For instance, if a member from any trade group works
without a license or the guild warden does not renew his license, the main responsible
person for this deficiency shall be the guild warden himself. Also, if a guild warden
pays a fine three times, he could be dismissed from his position, and a new one could
be chosen, which was stated in Article 9. Although many cases given in the archival
sources demonstrate that a person could stay at the guild warden position lifelong, this
office ordinance indicates that he could be dismissed from his position due to the
abovementioned reasons. The Office also gave importance to untimely giving up jobs
or the change of work/working places. Members had to inform their guild wardens,
and their guild wardens had to inform the office, which was pointed out in the Articles
10, 11, 12, and 13. The statements of the guild wardens also had to be controlled by
the Office whether they were wrong or right. The guild wardens were responsible for
collecting the necessary amount of fees in return for licenses from the related artisan
or trade group. If they could not collect these fees, they would have to pay the unpaid
part. The guild wardens were also in a risky position due to this rule.
The Esnaf Office serviced from 1892 to 1909.253 It aimed to ease the collection
of the fees, which was crucial in terms of the Municipality. The administrative goals
of the municipalities and the articles of the Ordinance for the Esnaf Office relatively
fulfilled the necessities even though informational deficiencies existed about the
activities of each specific profession and the taxes, which artisans and traders were
253 Esnaf and Collection Office (Esnaf Tahsilat Kalemi or Esnaf ve Tahsilat Kalemi), formed by the
inspectors, was established to inspect artisans and traders, which was affiliated to the Municipality. See
Oktay, pp. 156, 167. There was no reference to the Esnaf and Collection Office in the regulation of the
Esnaf Office. Only the documents about the individuals who worked in this position helped to detect
this administrative unit. See BOA, İ. TAL. 252/30, 8 S 1319 [27 May 1901]; BOA, İ. TAL. 271/38, 2
L 1319 [12 January 1902]; BOA, ŞD. 1018/60, 16 CA 1321 [10 August 1903]; BOA, ŞD. 1067/48, 18
M 1327 [9 February 1909].
92
responsible for paying. The registers of the marketplace groups, their mobilization
matters, and the collection of the license fees became more systematic with this office,
at least in theory. The official abolition of this office is not certain, but it would be
probably annulled with the abolition of the guilds.254 The abolition of the wardenship
and the esnaf tax after the implementation of profit tax (temettu’ vergisi) in 1907 in
Istanbul opened a new period for these groups.255 In this period, the Municipality went
into an organizational change in the departments of itself in general as well.256
The Esnaf Office functioned as the platform that eased to register the artisans
and traders and directly to make possible to determine the registered taxpayers. GHowever,
it was annulled with the abolition of the guild wardenship in 1910. In fact,
the municipal movement effectually undermined the guild warden position. When the
taxes began to collect by the Ministry of Finance, guild wardens became unnecessary
for the state because the prominent duty of them was to control the licenses and collect
the taxes more systematically. Interestingly, the ordinance of the Esnaf Office did not
include any reference or imply to the “guild”, but it emphasized the wardenship and
its roles. New associations were established in 1910 (and then in 1912 in all parts of
the empire) to remove the problems that originated from the abuses of guild wardens,
which were propounded as reasons to dismantle the guild warden post.257
New legal arrangements are essential for understanding the position of these
groups on the legal platform. The official procedure became standardized and
centralized in this period, at least in theory. Written rules did not exist in the guild
period systematically except for the Sultanate berat, and rules predominantly were
adapted according to the customary practices (teâmül) and verbally. But it changed
after the establishment of the Municipality. Rules were recorded in detail by the new
administrative policy.258 The change in governmentality, which led to the centralized
254 The record mentions the abolition of the office. See BOA, DH. MUİ. 110/35, 27 C 1328 [6 July
1910).
255 Belediye Vergi ve Resimleri Kanûnu, Ta‘limât ve Ta‘rifeleri, (İstanbul: Şehremâneti Matbaası,
1340), p. 55.
256 BOA, DH. MKT. 2836/91, 19 CA 1327 [8 June 1909].
257 This process will be elaborated in chapter 5, which is about the last period of the guilds.
258 Kudret Emiroğlu describes this change as a transition to bourgeoisie law (burjuva hukuku), which is
also related to capitalist market system. He stated that it was replaced with customary practices with its
93
bureaucratic structure and the absence of religious or customary references in the
marketplace matters, marks the start of the new period for these groups. By considering
this new administrative order, the new system forced the groups to comply with the
new bureaucratic procedures. Their practices, in particular in bureaucratic procedures,
changed with this new governmentality manner. Institutional changes influenced the
practices of these groups in formal applications and decreased the power of responsible
individuals. For example, the newly established esnaf office paved the way for
weakening the guild warden position. All in all, the groups adapted themselves to the
new institutions and actors by the administrative restructuring of this period.
3.2. Economic Situation
The misfortune of the nineteenth century for the Ottomans was the incessant
financial difficulties. Regressive economic conditions worsened the state of living of
the people. But this century cannot be pictured only with these economic difficulties,
which were a burden for the whole society, and it was also the period that new
economic plans and programs were tested and implemented. Various political, social,
and international developments brought new economic structure, and the changes
came to light as outcomes that were innate to this structure’s conditions. The economic
transformation concretely began in the first decades of the Tanzimat period based on
free trade policy. The major axis of the economic policies in the last century of the
Ottoman Empire was liberalization, the effort to increase the revenues of the state
budget, increasing expenses resulted with borrowing, nationalization of the economic
policies, and finally, the increase in the foreign investments. Free trade practices paved
the way for an irrevocably new economic structure. The Ottoman finance in the
Tanzimat era was shaped by the central budget, new central institutions, and
centralization of tax collection practices in general. Roughly, the period which started
with the abolition of the Janissaries in 1826 and then the Treaty of Balta Limanı in
1838 opened a new economic phase for the Ottomans. The first foreign borrowing of
the Ottoman State made during the Crimean War in 1854 and continued afterwards
working conditions and moral sentiments. See Kudret Emiroğlu, Kısa Osmanlı-Türkiye Tarihi:
Padişahlık Kültürü ve Demokrasi Ülküsü, (İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları, 2015), p. 283.
94
since the Ottoman governments could not find another sources to finance expenditures.
But this indebtedness also caused financial crisis since the governments could not pay
their debts back. This resulted in a moratorium in 1875 and then the establishment of
the Ottoman Public Debt Administration (OPDA,1881).259 The economic regression
culminated in the late nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries with
successive wars, which led to society’s discomfort. The economic policies of the
Tanzimat Period and the national economic policy period between 1908-1918 did not
display drastic changes, and the economic policies of the Ottoman governments did
not bring a considerable recovery for the society.
On the other hand, the tax collection was always a complicated and
controversial sphere that the official administrators and people faced off. The state
overly emphasized the taxation issue since it was one of the important revenues of the
central budget even though international trade and big landownership became the new
accumulation revenues at the beginning of the twentieth century.260 The tax was still
substantial revenue source, especially for the newly established state institutions such
as the Municipality, which will be elaborated in the context of economic state of the
artisan and trader groups.
259 For a detailed information on the OPDA, see Donald C. Blaisdell, European Financial Control in
the Ottoman Empire: A Study of the Establishment, Activities, and Significance of the Administration
of the Ottoman Public Debt, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1929); Murat Birdal, The Political
Economy of Ottoman Public Debt: Insolvency and European Financial Control in the Late Nineteenth
Century, (London: I.B. Tauris Publishers, 2010); Haydar Kazgan, “Düyun-ı Umumiye”, Tanzimat’tan
Cumhuriyet’e Türkiye Ansiklopedisi, v. 3, (İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları, 1985), pp. 700-704; Rifat
Önsoy, Mali Tutsaklığa Giden Yol: Osmanlı Borçları, 1854-1914, (Ankara: Turhan Kitabevi, 1999);
Rifat Önsoy, “Muharrem Kararnamesi ve Düyûn-ı Umumiye İdaresi”, in Osmanlı, v.3, Güler Eren (ed.),
(Ankara: Yeni Türkiye Yayınları, 1999), pp. 403-405; Mehmet Hakan Sağlam (ed.), Osmanlı Borç
Yönetimi: Düyûn-ı Umumiyye, 1879-1891, 4 vols., (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yayınları, 2007); Vedat
Eldem, Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun İktisadi Şartları Hakkında Bir Tetkik, (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu
Yayınları, 1994); Bedri Gürsoy, “100. Yılında Düyun-ı Umumiye İdaresi Üzerinde Bir Değerlendirme”,
İstanbul Üniversitesi İktisat Fakültesi Ord. Prof. Şükrü Balaban’a Armağan, (İstanbul:1984), pp. 17-
59.
260 Pamuk points out that the collection of taxes on behalf of the state lost its importance in the new
century. See Şevket Pamuk, Osmanlı Ekonomisinde Bağımlılık ve Büyüme (1820-1913), (İstanbul:
Türkiye İş Bankası Kültür Yayınları, 2018), p. 134.
95
3.2.1. Struggle for Existence in Economic Downturn
Economic recovery was the prominent concern for both the Ottoman state and
all economic actors living in the second half of the nineteenth century. The
incorporation process began with the Industry Reform Commission in the 1860s, and
it continued with the foundation of the new companies based on group or individual
initiatives.261 Gathering individuals from the same occupation under the same roof for
the purposes of solidarity and making a profit was one of the most characterized
developments of this period’s economic life. Both Ottoman and foreign artisans and
traders established many local and foreign joint-stock companies aimed at imports and
exports in addition to small scale trade activities after the second half of the nineteenth
century to struggle with the consequences of free trade policies.262 It displays the
resistance of these groups towards the changing economic conditions since demonopolization
forced them to gather with their capital accumulation.263 The
establishment of the joint-stock companies was always encouraged by the Ottoman
governments as a result of these limited choices. Companies were capital-oriented, and
they were significant agencies of the new economic order. Nevertheless, it is nearly
impossible to argue the existence of linearly growing companies in the last period of
the Ottomans since many of them were closed after a while. Even though these
companies revived the economic life in the last decades of the Empire, artisans and
261 For an information on the Ottoman and foreign companies founded after 1908, see Zafer Toprak,
Türkiye’de Milli İktisat: 1908-1918, (İstanbul: Doğan Kitap, 2012); Ali Muhtar underlines the
importance of the companies and also the necessity of advertisement for reviving of artisan and trader,
in particular to compete with their European rivals. See Ali Muhtar, “Bir Muʽâdile-i İktisadiye: Yerli
Esnaf Avrupa Mallarıyla Nasıl Rekabet Edebilir?”, Bilgi, vol.2, n.7, Haziran 1330 (1914), pp. 744-754.
262 These groups had to take a certification (ruhsat) to establish a company. Many regulations were
prepared to announce the establishment of these companies, and they can seem in various collections
in the Ottoman archives. For the translated versions of examples, see Celali Yılmaz, Osmanlı Anonim
Şirketleri, (İstanbul: Scala Yayıncılık, 2011). For their printed and commented versions, see Ramazan
Balcı & İbrahim Sırma, Ticaret ve Ziraat Nezareti: Memalik-i Osmaniye’de Osmanlı Anonim Şirketleri,
(İstanbul: İstanbul Ticaret Odası, 2012). For “Dersaadet Peynirci Teâvün Osmanlı Anonim Şirketi
(Dersaadet Cheesemonger Ottoman Joint-stock Company)”, see Yılmaz, pp.224-226; Balcı and Sırma,
pp. 170-173 and for “Hanımlara Mahsus Eşya Pazarı Osmanlı Anonim Şirketi (The Object Bazaar
Special to Women Ottoman Joint-stock Company)”, which was founded only by women, see Yılmaz,
pp. 377-379, and Balcı and Sırma, pp. 296-299.
263 The capital network of these trade groups is worth examining to recognize specific features and
direction of the Ottomans’ and early Republican Turkey’s economic life.
96
traders could not expand their capital and companies adequately. The accumulation of
capital under a unique legal entity became the economic strategy in the free-trade
circle. However, artisans and trade groups were not benefitted from this economic
policy because of undercapitalization. The affiliation of certain trade groups to the
commerce and industry chambers in the Republican period underlay this change. The
state tried to make these groups as the new potential investment groups and gathered
them under a single roof of the chambers to maintain the revival of small-scale
economic activities via the companies.
Changes in the needs of professions and society were parts of the process of
social mobilization and led to the fundamental alteration in the behavioral and
consumption patterns in the Ottoman case.264 The issue of the emergence and
disappearance of professions in the Ottoman lands gives ideas about the economic
process in the last century of it. It also shows the scope of the state’s ability to orient
itself to the changing economic circumstances in this period. Both progressive and
regressive changes in the economy and technological developments influenced the
state of the artisans and traders.265 The scope and the direction of this change can be
understood well with ample examples. Obviously, few examples are not enough to
make generalization and raise a claim about the fate of these groups. But they show
the economic circumstance of certain groups in this transitive period.
The organization of the marketplace was the critical mission of the municipal
administration. The control of market prices and the standardization in prices and
quality became as the most significant responsibilities of the municipalities.266
Meanwhile, the expectations and the complaints of both the artisans and traders and
the consumers greatly shaped the arrangement of the Ottoman marketplace. The
arrangements were made sometimes due to daily production and sale activities or the
264 Ahmet N. Yücekök, “19. Yüzyıl Osmanlı Toplumundan Günümüz Türkiye’sine Sivil Toplum
Kuruluşları ve Siyaset Sosyolojisi İlişkileri”, in Tanzimattan Günümüze İstanbul’da STK’lar, Yücekök
et al., (İstanbul: Türkiye Ekonomik ve Toplumsal Tarih Vakfı, 1998), p.1.
265 The issue that the unemployment of certain trade groups or artisans and the process of being a worker
covered a critical place in this topic. The unemployment of these groups as a whole or the process of
becoming worker are still expected to be researched more in the Ottoman case.
266 Zafer Toprak, “Belediye Zabıtası”, Dünden Bugüne İstanbul Ansiklopedisi, v. 2, 1994, p. 146.
97
disputes among the mentioned actors.267 Numerous grievances existed in this space,
and finding a compromise was critical to maintain economic activities and public order
in terms of the Municipality and responsible Ministries.
Trade and craft was the spirit of economy,268 yet they evolved into different
features and methods in time. Some manufacturing fields (such as silk or cotton fabric
production) were on the decline because of the increasing import goods and partial
mechanization in production in the nineteenth century. Therefore, a consensus existed
about the consequences of capitalism and capitulations in terms of artisans and traders
who were adversely influenced by them in this period.269 But the disappearance of
artisanship and small-scale production did not become a general fact since every
occupation did not belong to mass and mechanic production. Certain production
branches were industrialized and mechanized, whereas some of them were hardly
transformed. The nature of being an artisan and trader continued to be as working for
the daily needs of the society and of themselves in this period. Their majority was
connected neither with industrial production nor with manufactories, and so they sold
their goods or serviced without an intermediary.270
Some occupations changed in the course of time; individuals who were
accepted as artisans were not regarded as “esnaf” anymore since some of the crafts
were not active. Certain reasons such as the change of economic policies, development
of technology, the changes or increases in needs, increase in the importation, change
in production and consumption culture, and the institutionalization led to the changes
267 For example, from an earlier period, the glassmakers/cutters (camcı) complained about the mobile
glassmakers/cutters that they continued to do their job even though the state banned it. The reason why
the mobile artisanship was banned is uncertain, but the new decision of the administration was in favor
of the shop owners. See BOA, MVL. 492/26, 24 L 1282 [12 March 1866].
268 Abdurrahman Vefik Sayın, Tekalif Kavaidi (Osmanlı Vergi Sistemi), (Ankara: Maliye Bakanlığı
Araştırma, Planlama ve Koordinasyon Kurulu Başkanlığı, 1999), p. 185.
269 Tevfik Nureddin summarizes the economic difficulties that the artisans and traders faced, and he
propounds capitalism, technological underdevelopment, and capitulations as the major reasons for this
condition. He proposed establishing companies and trade unions in addition to the government
assistance as the solution for this demise. See Tevfik Nureddin, “Türk Esnafının Hâli-1”, Türk Yurdu,
no. 2, 1 Kanun-ı Evvel 1327 [14 December 1911], pp. 42-47; Tevfik Nureddin, “Türk Esnafının Hâli-
2”, Türk Yurdu, no. 12, 19 April 1328 [2 May 1912], pp. 360-365.
270 Charles Issawi, The Fertile Crescent. 1800-1914, (New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1988), p. 398.
98
in the status the artisans and traders.271 Towards the end of the nineteenth century,
some professions faced disappearance, and the people conducting these occupations
experienced economic trouble. The market dynamics changed, and the market actors
tried to find alternative options to satisfy their needs. They applied to the authorized
institutions to protect their working rights in general, but it was challenging thereafter
for the state to continue the old economic order and protect the monopoly rights.
The increasing import also negatively impacted certain occupations, and
resistance occurred to this by craft and trade groups. They desired the continuation of
their economic status quo by demanding the protection of the state towards the
economic penetration of the Europeans.272 This became the most salient reason in the
literature for their resistance to the new economic order to protect their economic
interests. This was also propounded as the reason for the late development of
capitalism in the Ottoman Empire. It is doubtless that this lateness cannot be explained
only by the resistance or the obstruction of the artisans in the empire; this had to be
analyzed in the context of the macroeconomic policies of the state and the economic
heritage from the previous centuries, which include the international economic,
political, and judicial developments and interactions in the late nineteenth century.
Artisans and trade groups were not strong enough to hamper capitalist development.
Therefore, they continued to complain about the consequences of the importation and
the end of the de-monopolization practices rather than being an obstacle against the
development of capitalism.
271 Production and consumption are inseparable pillars of economic life, and the relationship among
them directly influenced the production and commercial activities of artisans and traders. For a
comprehensive work on the changing of consumer culture, changing marketplace, and commerce order
through new consumption habits after the second half of the nineteenth century in Istanbul, see Yavuz
Köse, Dersaadet’te Tüketim (1855-1923), (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 2016); For an eyeopening
work on the transformation of consumer culture in the Ottoman Empire, see Donald Quataert
(ed.), Consumption Studies and the History of the Ottoman Empire, 1550-1922, (New York: State
University of New York Press, 2000). For a work on changing consumption habits of women, see the
article of Frierson, Elizabeth B. Frierson, “Cheap and Easy: The Creation of Consumer Culture in Late
Ottoman Society”, in Consumption Studies and the History of the Ottoman Empire, 1550-1922, Donald
Quataert (ed.), (New York: State University of New York Press, 2000), pp. 243-260. The development
of advertising also contributed to attaining various craft products to the consumers that revitalized the
market. For the illustrated notices and advertisements, see Arif Kolay et al., İlan-ı Ticaret: Resimli
İlanlar Perspektifinde Osmanlı’dan Cumhuriyet’e İstanbul Ticari Hayatı, (İstanbul: Istanbul Ticaret
Odası, 2012).
272 Ahmad, “Vanguard of a Nascent Bourgeoisie: The Social and Economic Policy of the Young Turks,
1908-1918”, p. 330.
99
It is possible to see the resistance of these groups towards the change of the
new economic system from the nineteenth century onward via their petitions. The rise
in importing various goods alarmed, especially the groups dealing with artisanal
production or small-scale commercial activities. In an example dated 1901, the tack
producers (mıhçı) complained about blacksmiths since the latter was using the
imported tacks coming from Europe and the tack producers demanded that the
blacksmiths should stop buying the imports and continue to buy the tackles from
themselves since they were in financial difficulties and their occupation would face
with the danger of disappearance. They stated that their tackles were not harmful to
the animals and also were enduring. Their guild warden requested fulfilment of their
wish, and they demanded to carry into effect this solution by the blacksmith’s guild
warden with the order of the state authorities.273 They tried to maintain the continuity
of the old commercial order to survive, but they could not success it because of the
changing economic policy.
Production and sale became out of the hands of trade and manufacturing groups
in the new economic system, and profession-related issues became more centercontrolled
in this way. The state tried to end the disputes related to these issues in the
new centralized system. The end of monopolization over production was the symbolic
economic development of this period, which impacted on certain producers. Demonopolization
was announced and reminded by the decisions of the governments. In
1891, the salt producer and sellers (tuzcu) demanded the monopoly of salt production
and sale. However, the government pointed out that they ended (sâkıt) certain
monopolies with the Decree of Tanzimat (1839) due to free trade requirements. It was
also added that the salters only had the right to produce and sell according to the Salt
Regulation (Tuz Nizamnamesi).274 It was stated that the Regulation for Salt explains
the procedure about production and sale in detail, and the state expected salters to
conform to this regulation.275 This decision was taken after the negotiations made
273 BOA, DH. MKT. 2513/133, 8 R 1319 [25 July 1901].
274 “Tuz Nizamnamesiyle zeyli” 9 N 1278 [10 March 1862], Düstur, I/2, (İstanbul: Matbaa-i Amire,
1289), pp. 683-706.
275 BOA, DH. MKT. 1814/136, 22 B 1308 [3 March 1891].
100
amongst the Municipality, the Public Debt Commissariat, and the Ministry of Finance.
The OPDA was normally the authorized institution of this procedure because salt was
one of the tax items that it was charged with collecting. Salters consulted to the state
for their probable economic trouble or the prediction of the occurrence of this problem
soon. Since the monopoly over production and sale ended, new people and groups
gained the right to perform all kinds of professions. The state highlighted free trade in
its decisions.
In another case in 1900, ice producers stated that the Joint Stock Company of
Ice (Anonim Buz Şirketi) established factories at Feriköy and Fener, and they added
that the Company broke the rule of monopoly even though the concession did not
include this right. However, the government warned these groups and it added that
they should not hamper the production and sale of ice and snow under the factory
because this company was able to open a factory at different places under the limits of
concession.276 In a similar example, the crosscut saw dealers (bıçkıcı) stated that they
had financial difficulties after the foundation of the crosscut saw factory established
in Hatapkapısı, which disarranged their administration and sustention (in terms of
financial difficulties). They demanded the help of the government for this problem in
1892.277 These examples prove that the establishment of the new factories
considerably influenced the commercial activities of certain craft and trade groups who
did not want to abandon their traditional production methods. They experienced
financial losses since these groups were not able to sell their products as much as it
was in the past. On the other hand, it shows that the state renounced the closed
economic system and did not set production and sale limits anymore.
Meanwhile, artisans were faced with the unemployment problems, and only
some of them had a chance to continue carrying out their professions with the
appointment to the state agencies in this period. Some of them individually applied to
the state-run institutions to be employed.278 Some groups demanded to take advantage
276 BOA, BEO. 1445/108325, 21 L 1317 [22 February 1900].
277 BOA, DH. MKT. 1964/26, 26 ZA 1309 [22 June 1892].
278 For example, Salih from the tanneries applied to be a police officer in 1907. See BOA, ZB. 335/105,
26 CA 1325 [7 July 1907]; BOA, ZB. 335/105, 21 B 1327 [8 August 1909].
101
of new employment and work opportunities via the transition of their extant
workplaces, concession contracts or the companies to the different state agencies.
These groups conveyed their problems when an alternative or a rival production area
or company occurred. For example, Hasan and İsmail Hakkı Bey, the spokesmen of
silver-gilt thread makers (sırmacı) wrote a petition to the government in 1900. They
stated that they, nearly 200 families making a living via silver-gilt thread making, were
now in financial difficulties since their craft lost its importance. They demanded to be
the part of the Ottoman Chief-of-Staff (Seraskeriye) of Simkeşhane, but their demand
was not accepted.279
On the other hand, some occupations felt behind the time; they began to be
vanished due to the social and political changes but not the economic factors. For
example, slave selling began to gradually disappear in the nineteenth century, and this
profession was banned, at least in the imperial capital.280 When considering these
complaints and demands, the artisans and traders faced economic difficulties in many
aspects. But all these formed only one side of their commercial activities and
professional experiences. Taxes and fees that they paid and the change in the payment
of the taxes also changed their living conditions and their position in the administrative
management structure.
3.2.2. Taxes and Fees
Tax payment was one of the main duties of the artisans and traders in the
Ottoman Empire as elsewhere in the world. The tax payment provided these groups
the right to open shops or sell in the market places as well as to have a say in the
279 BOA, İ. HUS. 81/43, 5 ZA 1317 [7 March 1900]. Simkeşhane was the government enterprise
compared to the other examples in this study, yet it was added to show a disappearance of an occupation.
280 BOA, A.} MKT. MHM. 330/53, 29 ZA 1281 [25 April 1865]. The slave market was banned in 1846
in Istanbul, but the slave dealers continued to do their job in different districts. For a detailed information
on slavery and the slave-dealers, see Y. Hakan Erdem, Slavery in the Ottoman Empire and Its Demise,
1808-1900, (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1996). Slave trading was banned throughout the Empire in
1889. See “Üserâ-yı zenciyye ticaretinin men’ine dair kanun”, 22 R 1307 [16 December 1889], Düstur,
I/6, (Dersaadet, Matbaa-i Amire, 1289), pp. 486-488.
102
production and sale in the empire.281 Two significant points came out in the taxation
issue: First, the complaints and demands about the taxes demonstrate the existence of
economic instability and the financial problems of the mentioned groups. However, it
also contributed to adapting these groups to the new administrative system by
involving them in the formal grievance mechanism in the last period of the Empire.
Rather than presenting general inferences about the politics of taxation of the Ottoman
state, some remarks will be deduced by using the grievance petitions about taxes of
artisans and an example of tax table belonged to 1886-1887 (1304) years. The taxation
practices will be handled predominantly through the reactions of the artisans and
traders rather than only focusing on it as a technical topic related to the financial
system.282 This examination has revealed that the taxpayers were not passive subjects
of the marketplace above all. The second point in taxation issue is that the new taxes
and tax payment practice invalidated the old guild system and its leading actor guild
warden. The payment of taxes and fees to the new authority and the elimination of
intermediaries in the tax payment system led to this invalidity.
The tax collection was one of the main issues on which the state and society
came to terms. Taxes were mainly divided into two parts as direct (bilâ vâsıta) and
indirect (bi’l-vâsıta) tax in the Tanzimat period. The way of paying tax was as a
proportional tax, which was based on the incomes of each group. The fiscal
centralization that was gradually pervaded the state’s macro fiscal policies influenced
the taxation system as well.283 The tax collection was conducted by the Municipality
and then the Ministry of Finance in Istanbul. Centralized tax collection and the change
in the type of tax were two fundamental changes on the issue of the taxation system
both during and after the Tanzimat period. However, the unestablished taxing policies
of the Ottoman governments and new arrangements made it difficult to reach exact
281 It was stated that esnaf tax was accepted as a profit tax (temettuʽ vergisi), artisans and traders hereby
had the right to vote in the general election. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2628/42, 15 N 1326 [11 October
1908].
282 Nadir Özbek, İmparatorluğun Bedeli: Osmanlı’da Vergi, Siyaset ve Toplumsal Adalet (1839-1908),
(İstanbul: Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Yayınevi, 2015), p. 20.
283 For the brief summary on the taxation system in the Ottoman Empire, see M. Macit Kenanoğlu,
“Vergi”, TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, (v.43), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 2013), pp. 52-58.
103
data at least in the last period since these policies were not determined and
systematized efficiently.
The reactions of the taxpayers towards the financial policies, in particular to
the taxation policies, take an important place in the social and economic life of society.
It is hard to draw exact conclusion on the issue of tax because of their variety in terms
of the incomes of groups or individuals or the varies in types of properties. Only certain
tax tables or statistics can help see the data about the rate of the taxes belonged to a
particular occupation specific to this topic. The individualization of the tax-paying
system in time with the profit tax, differences occurred due to the wage gaps, and
possessing different technical substructure of the individuals from the same profession
obstructed to present a concrete data. Moreover, the marketplace actors paid various
taxes for different rights; that is, they paid not only the esnaf tax but also the other
related taxes such as street cleaning and garbage collection, public lightning, property,
weigh/measures, plate, stamp, transportation (vehicles and carts), rent, and specific
taxes, which were stemming from work permits that were belonged to a special
occupation, to be able to conduct their business.284 Paying an esnaf tax was also the
requirement to possess travel documents (mürur tezkeresi) and passports to travel.285
The link between these travel documents and taxes was related to societal supervision
because it enabled to prevent illegal commercial activities and the evasion of taxes.
As was mentioned above, artisans and traders paid various taxes directly or
indirectly related to their occupations. The regulations implemented for the
municipalities in Istanbul give information about the taxes of the mentioned groups as
well. In the first regulation prepared in 1868 namely Regulation for the Municipal
Administration of Istanbul (Dersaadet İdare-i Belediye Nizamnâmesi), it was stated
284 All related taxes of artisans and traders can be seen as a whole in the work of Ergin. See Ergin,
Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1920-2022. For a detailed information on the street cleaning and
garbage collection tax decree, see “Tanfizat Kararnâmesi”, 14 B 1306 [16 March 1889], Düstur, I/6,
pp. 321-322; For a tariff on street cleaning, see BOA, ŞD. 2962/15, 19 L 1311 [25 April 1894]; For the
Imperial decree about the public lightning taxes, see “Dersaadette alınacak rüsumu tenviriye hakkında
irade-i seniyye”, 20 S 1320 [28 May 1902], Düstur, I/7, (Ankara: Başvekâlet Devlet Matbaası, 1941),
pp. 860-863.
285 BOA, DH. TMIK. M.. 95/29, 18 C 1318 [13 October 1900]. For the comprehensive information on
travel documents, see Nalan Turna, 19. Yy’den 20. Yy’ye Osmanlı Topraklarında Seyahat, Göç ve
Asayiş Belgeleri Mürur Tezkereleri, (İstanbul: Kaknüs Yayınları, 2013).
104
that the Municipality would collect esnaf taxes according to the Article 4.286 After this
regulation, the Law of the Municipality of 1877, a more detailed arrangement, Article
63 mentions the esnaf tax and the other municipal taxes that these groups had to pay
as the incomes of the Municipality.287 After 1879, the issue of the Patent system came
into the taxation agenda, but it was quite a controversial system that was partially
implemented for the traders and artisans who conducted their professions only in the
shops. Patent tax involved both fixed tax and the tax taken from the rent of the shop.288
But the grievances, in particular those of the foreign merchants, prevented the practice
and the systematization of this tax.289 Despite this failure, the Municipality continued
to collect esnaf tax in this process. The patent tax was indeed discussed in the Ottoman
Assembly (Meclis-i Mebûsan) for a long time due to the unsettled structure of the
taxation system based on the incomes of the individuals. It was stated that patent tax
meant esnaf tax.290 After this ambiguous period, the Regulation of Profit (Temettu’
Nizamnâmesi) was implemented, and the esnaf tax abolished in 1907 by this
development. The tax was divided according to the group-based and workplace-based
classifications, which had to be paid annually as two installments. The profit tax was
obligatory for the craft and trade groups to conduct their jobs according to this
regulation (Articles 18 and 19).291 This regulation was implemented with some new
286 “Dersaâdet idare-i belediye nizamnâmesi”, 18 C 1285 [6 October 1868], Düstur, I/2, p. 453.
287 “Dersaâdet Belediye Kanunu”, 27 N 1294 [5 October 1877], Düstur, I/4, p. 537; For in Latin
alphabet, see Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, p. 1639.
288 “Meclis-i Mebûsan’ın ictima‘ında kanuniyeti teklif olunmak üzere patent vergisi hakkında
kararnâmedir”, 3 B 1296 [23 June 1879], Düstur, I/4, pp. 392-396; “Patente Nizamnâmesi”, 25 ZA 1324
[19 December 1906], Düstur, I/5, pp. 870-878. See Article 2, p. 871.
289 This tax was taken from the French patent tax system. It was a municipal tax, but it led to many
failures in the practice of it in certain periods in France as well. See Bossenga, The Politics of Privilege:
Old Regime and revolution in Lille, p. 171; “Kurumlar Vergisi Kanunu Tasarısı ve Geçici Komisyon
Raporu”, T.B.M.M. Tutanak Dergisi, Dönem: VIII, Cilt, 19, Toplantı:3, pp. 103-111; Oktay, pp. 224-
225.
290 Meclis-i Mebûsan 1293-1877 Zabıt Ceridesi, Hakkı Tarık Us (pre.), D.1, C.1., İc.1, (İstanbul: Vakit
Gazetesi Matbaası, 1839), p. 120.
291 “Temettü Vergisi Nizamnâmesi”, 25 S 1325 [9 April 1907], Düstur, I/8, pp. 658-664; “Temettü
Vergisi Nizamnâmesi”, 16 ZA 1325 [21 December 1907], Düstur, I/8, pp. 798-805; “Temettü vergisi
nizamnâmesinin Dersaâdet’ten maada bi‘l-umûm vilayât-ı şahânece yerli ve ecnebi bi‘l-cümle tüccar
ve sanatkârân haklarında tatbikine dair irâde-i seniyye”, 16 ZA 1325 [21 December 1907], Düstur, I/8,
pp. 805-807.
105
amendments as well after the declaration of the Republican regime.292 The practice of
the profit tax was one of the turning points from the aspects of its content and the way
of tax collection in the empire. Because this new tax broke the direct link of the
Municipality with the collection of the taxes because the Ministry of Finance became
the sole authority in collecting practice.
The demands and complaints about the taxes were conveyed both to the
administrative and judicial authorities including the Municipality and the other
municipalities, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Interior Affairs, and the
Council of State. When a problem could not be solved or a controversy emerged on
the issues of the marketplace, the Council of State was the last stop in the inquiry.
Although many uncertainties existed in the tax rates, the governments paid regard to
the legality and proportionality principles to some extent. Levying tax on income was
one of the new and main financial principles during the Tanzimat period, but the
systematization of this method happened over time. Equality in the tax system could
not be achieved for a long time.293
The demands and complaints about tax payments always remained on the
agenda of the governments and the populace, which can be collected under three major
titles: Firstly, the complaints about the rises and high rates of taxes, secondly the
requests of tax exemption, deduction or payment delays, and lastly the complaints
about additional or repetitive (mükerrer) taxes. Apart from being a significant financial
means for the state, the tax policy was always characterized by heavy taxation, which
triggered these grievances and demands.
292 An amendment was made in the regulation and a provisional law was accepted in 1914. See “Temettü
vergisi hakkında kanun-i muvakkat”, 24 M 1333 [12 December 1914], Düstur, II/7, pp. 148-168.
293 The exception in the taxation issue for this period was the foundation of OPDA because revenues of
certain tax items were directly passed to this institution. The rate of taxes caused problems both for the
related trade groups and the state since the control was under the administration of OPDA. For example,
the saloon keepers stated that they paid taxes that they were responsible for and they were not able to
pay extra tax to the OPDA. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1512/21, 29 N 1305 [9 June 1888]; In another case,
the fish salters (balık tuzlayıcı) and caviar sellers complained the OPDA because of its unlawful tax
collection. See BOA, BEO. 819/61396, 21 S 1314 [1 August 1896]; Furriers stated that the OPDA again
demanded stamp tax taking for pelts after the manufacturing of them as fur even though they paid it
before and the Administration confiscated some of their products. They demanded not to pay this tax
for the second time and the return of their seized products. See BOA, DH. MKT. 315/59, 8 CA 1312 [7
December 1894].
106
The rises in the rate of taxes caused discomfort and economic difficulties
among artisans.294 The tax exemption, deduction or delay requests were generally
made because of elderliness or disabilities.295 Additional taxes were mainly enforced
by the officers or the OPDA, which unbalanced the order in the marketplace and led
to many complaints. But the reactions of these groups were not massive yet individual
in general.296 Nonetheless, their reactions show the active stance of the groups in
taxing.297
In addition to these common grievances and demands, non-Muslim artisans
and traders sometimes conveyed their demands about the taxes. Although the
citizenship notion was relatively strengthened in this period, different practices for
separate ethnic groups went into effect because belonging to a different religious
community existed as an official categorization until the collapse of the empire. These
different practices led to a challenge, especially for the non-Muslims. Additional taxes
became an economic burden for them. For example, the Jewish butchers brought into
question the gabele tax, and they stated that they had difficulty in payment of this
294 Many cases can be found in the archive. The itinerant fez sellers in Dersaadet and Bilâd-ı Selase
stated that they paid 40 kuruş per year as tax, but this year it was raised. They pointed out that they
could not pay this amount and demanded the changes in tax payment. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1512/88, 7
L 1305 [17 June 1888]; The mat makers (hasırcı) stated that they were in economic difficulty because
of the rise in their taxes. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1526/50, 20 ZA 1305 [29 July 1888]; Water sellers in
Kadıköy complained about the rise in taxes. See BOA, ŞD. 2929/55, 26 Ş 1306 [27 April 1889].
295 Second hand dealer (eskici) Ali resident in Üsküdar Yeni Camii demanded to be exempted from tax
because of his disability. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1527/70, 23 ZA 1305 [1 August 1888], BOA, DH.
MKT. 1541/106, 5 M 1306 [11 September 1888]; Cook Mustafa Salih resident at Hocapaşa stated that
the state requested a one-year tax even though his shop was open only for two months. He added that
he could not pay it, so he was forced to close his shop. He demanded the delay of this tax payment. See
BOA, DH. MKT. 2152/26, 10 Ş 1316 [24 December 1898]; The poulterers demanded the exemption
from tax or deduction in the amount of their taxes. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2113/28, 18 CA 1316 [4
October 1898].
296 İbrahim and another ice and snow sellers complained the tax collectors of scales (kantar mültezimi)
that they collected scale and entrance taxes unlawfully, and they were suffered because of this reason.
See BOA, DH. MKT. 1524/63, 14 ZA 1305 [23 July 1888]; The flower-sellers and the gardeners in
Istanbul pointed out that the state demanded a tax in return for using motors with three horse force. See
BOA, DH. UMVM. 105/31, 4 L 1331 [6 September 1913]; The barrel makers complained about the
collection of esnaf tax and customs duty together. See BOA, İ. DH. 596/41495, 25 R 1286 [4 August
1869].
297 The gardeners in Sarıyer and Büyükdere pointed out that repetitive taxes were collected for their
vegetables. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1638/43, 16 ZA 1306 [14 July 1889].
107
tax.298 The foreign artisans and traders were also responsible for paying taxes to work
in the Ottoman territories. The administration emphasized that all foreign groups or
individuals were subjected to the same rules of law, so they had to pay the related taxes
even though many requests were made to be exempted from these taxes.299
The discourse used in the collection and payment processes by the tax
authorities helps to understand the basis of mutual sides, including the state institutions
and the tax payers. The Municipality often emphasized the maintenance of its revenues
and so itself, especially in tax payment arrangements because taxes were important in
terms of the incomes of the Municipality. It needed taxes to operate social works and
other social affair functions. But it also needed revenues, which were taken from the
state treasury. The state imposed taxes on artisans and trade groups to maintain such
policies as providing revenue and social control pertinent to the nature and reasons for
taxation.300 On the other side, these taxes were an economic burden for artisans and
trade groups, and they paid various types of taxes. Motivations of the Municipality on
taxes turned to these groups as social and economic forces. The emphasis on the
importance of maintaining the incomes can be accepted as the translation of the new
pursuit of legitimacy to the political discourse.301 Nevertheless, the marketplace actors
used this discourse for itself as well. For example, the lemon sellers complained that
the lemon carrying boatmen sold less than 500 lemons to themselves, which was
against their deal. Vangel, the lemon sellers’ spokesman, said that this matter did harm
298 Gabele tax was paid to the Jewish community (collected by the Chief Rabbi) by the Jewish people
living in the domain of the Ottomans. This tax was paid on condition that a Jewish person bought a halal
product or slaughtered. This tax caused many debates between Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jewish. For
the information on this tax, see Ali Arslan, “Yahudilerin Gabele Vergisi”, İ.Ü. Edebiyat Fakültesi Tarih
Araştırmaları Merkezi Osmanlı Öncesi ile Cumhuriyet Dönemi Esnaf ve Ekonomi Semineri (9-10
Mayıs 2002) Bildirileri, vol.2, (İstanbul: Globus Dünya Basımevi, 2003), pp. 391-403; BOA, BEO.
3736/280126, 8 R 1328 [19 April 1910].
299 It was stated that Iranian traders were subjected to the same law like the people who belonged to the
Ottoman rule. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1541/76, 4 M 1306 [10 September 1888]; The state pointed out
that the request to be exempted from taxes collecting from foreign vehicles used for transportation and
commerce was against the principle of equality. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2889/66, 15 B 1327 [2 August
1909].
300 For the assessment of tax as a social instrument, see Clarance Heer, “Taxation as an Instrument of
Social Control”, American Journal of Sociology, vol. 42, no. 4, (Jan., 1937), pp. 484-492.
301 Özbek, p.49.
108
both the taxes that they paid and their financial conditions.302 This example shows that
the trade groups sometimes set forth the issue of paying taxes to solve their problems
in favor of themselves, which was the significant revenue for the Municipality.
The other main point about the tax was its impact on the repeal of the guild
warden position. The state authorities took over the right of extracting taxes from the
guild wardens with the centralization of the budget. Carrying out more than one
profession produced extra taxes and fees for artisans and the owners of small
enterprises because paying tax for every occupation was a financial burden on them,
so they often complained about the taxes and the taxation system.303 The state decided
to the collection of taxes only for the primary profession, but the monthly tax payments
remained the same since they were taxes in return for the profits of artisans and traders;
that is to say, they were obliged to continue to pay monthly taxes, which was
appropriate to the customary practices. However, these monthly taxes that had to be
paid for the second or additional professions had to be collected by the municipalities
because the guild wardens of the additional professions could collect taxes and
intervene in the affairs of artisans and traders. It was ordered to the municipalities to
collect these taxes at the beginning of March and September.304 But an ambiguity
emerged in this issue between the guild wardens and the Municipality after the latter
was established, which led to the conflicts in the official procedure. Groups made
many grievances in this period because of the extra tax demands of the guild wardens.
For example, brokers and the bill of exchangers stated that they were forced to pay
extra 120 kuruş for the tax, especially to the guild wardens, in 1891. Therefore, they
complained about the Municipality to the Ministry of Trade and Public Works. The
Ministry of Interior ordered to put an end to this intervention to the Municipality.305
However, responding to this appeal, the Municipality stated that this tax collection
cease procedure would trigger a remarkable decline in its revenues and the other
302 BOA, DH. MKT. 1408/121, 6 B 1304 [31 March 1887].
303 For the complaints of grocers and wax producers, see BOA, Y. PRK. ŞH. 1/26, 21 RA 1297 [3 March
1880].
304 BOA, Y. PRK. ŞH. 1/26, 21 RA 1297 [3 March 1880].
305 Ali Şenyurt, Geç Dönem Osmanlı Maliyesinde Poliçe Kullanımı ve Poliçeci Esnafı, (İstanbul: Doğu
Kitapevi, 2018), pp. 196-197; BOA, DH. MKT. 1868/62, 11 S 1309 [16 September 1891].
109
municipalities.306 It was the period that the guild wardens frequently abused their
positions when extracting taxes. This administrative conflict formed the basis of the
abolition of the guild warden post. In order to prevent these abuses, the Municipality
established the Esnaf Office and tried to follow the registered taxpayers and make the
collection more systematic and take under control. But the guild wardenship became
functionless and abolished and this office also was annulled.
A tariff record dated to the years between 1886-1887 (1304) provides numeric
data about the annual esnaf taxes of 276 groups located at Dersaadet and Bilâd-ı
Selâse.307 This tariff indicates that the artisans and traders were taxed according to
their economic levels (nisbî), but it was not as apportionment (tevzii). In this way, the
rates of taxes were determined according to the profession, which led to the
modernization of taxation system. Therefore, the demands of the taxpayers altered
with the changing of the way of collecting taxes.
The tax categorizations were made according to the professions (including
vocational hierarchy composed of master, journeyman, and apprentice), small scale
factories, shops, and being peddler. The word “trader” (tüccar) was used together with
esnaf in this tariff.308 Furthermore, some new vocational categories such as typer
(yazıcı) and salesclerk309 and classifications according to the workplaces were
indicated in the tariff.310
306 The Municipality had financial difficulties, and it tried to consolidate its tax revenues. Many service
malfunctions occurred both in Istanbul and the other provinces due to this economic constriction.
Tarkan Oktay’s detailed work on the history of the Istanbul Municipality (Şehremâneti) involves the
numeric data about the institution’s revenues and expenses. In this respect, the reason for this objection
of the Municipality was understandable when considering its financial situation. See Oktay, pp. 219-
220.
307 For the whole tariff, see BOA, ŞD. 790/10, 26 S 1315 [27 July 1897]. The tariff for the other parts
of Istanbul was probably different, which was dependent on the market conditions. Ergin transcribed
this tariff and added the updates to it, including the years of 1901-1902 (1319). See Ergin, Mecelle-i
Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1924-1952.
308 For example, the salters were divided into esnaf who produced salt and trader who sold salt. See the
tariff, p. 24. Their tax ratios are the same.
309 See the tariff, p. 7.
310 For example, the vinegar factory or stove shops. See the tariff, pp. 20,23. Shops were also divided
as small and big shops, and taxes were determined according to this difference.
110
The amount of taxes in this tariff was divided as the multiples of 5 and 10.
Many artisan and traders were paying nearly the same amount of taxes when all the
list was examined. For example, a loincloth and towel seller masters who were listed
as first, second, and third classes according to their qualification paid 140, 120, and
100 kuruş respectively while an ironer master paid 80 kuruş in a year. The
categorization in the tariff was made according to the main triple division of artisans
and traders, including master, journeyman, and apprentice. 311 It was also stated that
children under 15 years old had to be accepted as apprentices, and the ones above it
had to be accepted as journeymen who had to take their journeyman licenses.
Moreover, it was pointed out that if an artisan or trader group was not involved in this
tariff record, the member of the related vocation had to pay his/her tax according to
the profession that they belonged.
Even though many amendments were made in this tariff within years, the
Municipality stated that it involved two critical problems. The first one is that it did
not include every trade or artisan group, which led to a decrease in tax incomes. The
second one is that unjust tax payment distribution existed in this tariff. For example,
porters, log splitters, and such poor groups were paying 180 kuruş tax per year, but big
emporium or stores were paying only 140 kuruş yearly. These deficiencies had to be
changed according to the Municipality.312
This tariff record gives information about annually paid esnaf tax, but such
taxes as property, public lighting, and street cleaning, which forced the ability of these
commercial groups to pay, should be reckoned in. On the other side, this burden meant
revenue in terms of the Municipality and the central budget. As it seemed from the
table below, which was recorded in the Municipality Periodical (Belediye Mecmûası),
the esnaf taxes formed a significant portion of the municipal bureau incomes when it
was compared to the total incomes of these bureaus. But it has to be pointed out that
the amount of the taxes that artisans and traders paid was probably rounded up since
they are in numbers such as 300.000 or 80.000, which would be hard to amount.
Nonetheless, the ratio in the table verified the Municipality’s argument that esnaf taxes
311 The difference in tax amount between the masters and apprendices for the ironers was from 80 to 10
kuruş, and for the loincloth and towel sellers were from 140 to 10 kuruş. See the tariff, p. 3.
312 BOA, ŞD. 834/2, 24 Z 1324 [8 February 1907].
111
were crucial incomes for itself and they directly influenced the municipal financial
situation. Taxes and total income of the Municipality in 1907-1908 (1325) years were
as such:
Table 1: Taxes and Total Income of the Municipality: 1907-1908 (1325)
Municipal Bureaus Esnaf Tax Total Income
20 Municipal Bureaus 5.746.150 45.133.867
1. Bayezid Bureau 1.300.000 5.075.350
2. Sultan Ahmed Bureau 400.000 1.641.040
3. Fatih Bureau 600.000 1.383.722
4. Samatya Bureau 400.000 1.160.200
5. Eyüb Bureau 126.150 270.854
6. Beyoğlu Bureau 1.100.000 5.355.000
7. Hasköy Bureau 300.000 798.550
8. Beşiktaş Bureau 400.000 968.200
9. Arnavudköy Bureau 65.000 289.700
10. Yeniköy Bureau 80.000 384.000
11. Tarabya Bureau 15.000 81.580
12. Büyükdere Bureau 100.000 339.900
13. Beykoz Bureau 40.000 281.100
14. Anadolu Hisarı Bureau 30.000 157.618
15. Beylerbeyi Bureau 100.000 305.970
16. Üsküdar Bureau 120.000 605.774
17. Doğancılar Bureau 150.000 765.300
18. Kadıköy Bureau 305.000 1.344.380
19.Adalar Bureau 80.000 481.150
20.Makriköy (Bakırköy)
Bureau
35.000 358.447
Source: “Yirmi daire-i belediyenin varidat ve masârifâtı icmalidir.”, 1325 Senesine
Mahsûs Umûr-ı Belediye Mecmûası, (İstanbul: Sultan Hamamında Bağdadlıyan
Matbaası, 1325), pp. 42-90.
112
The problem in this kind of numerical data is that they do not provide comprehensive
information about the economic conditions of the marketplace actors and about the
demands and complaints done for the taxes and fees. Because the costs in the
workplaces, the prices of the goods and products on sale, salaries of the journeymen
and apprentices, profit rates, the other taxes, and the expenditures had to be known to
put forward an idea about the economic circumstance of these groups. It is not enough
to explain how these groups were financially influenced only by examining the tax
collection and receiving procedure.
Nevertheless, the taxation of urban small-scale economic activities and the
requests about taxes give considerable clues about short-term economic activities, tax
regime, and the economic circumstances of the taxpayers. In the last years of the
Ottoman Empire, the lack of systematic tax collection disrupted the economic
persistence in terms of revenues of the municipalities and the central budget. But the
Municipality was meticulous about collecting the taxes because it was the main tax
collector until 1908. The municipalities serviced in return for taxation, but the amount
of the paid taxes were quite insufficient for its budget. They were inadequate to
maintain order in districts with these tax revenues. As regards to the ordinary people,
the increase in complaints on taxes and the taxation system resulted in the development
of public opposition in society. The activities of the artisans and traders became
registered with the institutional changes, but the establishment of the new institution
meant the implementation of new taxes for the working people, which was an
economic burden for them.
What the municipal administration did when these groups did not pay their
taxes? Interestingly, the center permitted the Municipality to establish a jail within its
building for individuals who would not pay their taxes or discharged their
responsibilities in earlier periods of the Municipality.313 This method was probably
related to the deficiency in the supervision and punishment systems because no such a
punishment system could bring instant solution or execution. In later periods, fines or
a ban on conducting the related profession became Municipality’s punishment ways
and methods.
313 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 3, pp. 1486-1487.
113
Two significant points can be concluded for the taxation issue. First, the
demands and complaints about these taxes display the economic woes of the traderelated
groups. Despite their activeness in individual tax problems, there was no
collective uprising or protests because of heavy taxation within the borders of Istanbul
in the late period of the Empire. Tax resistance became visible mostly with individual
applications. As being active marketplace actors, they intervened in their taxing
affairs, which enabled them to adapt to the new administrative system. The second one
is that the new taxation system invalidated the old one, and it led to a fundamental
change in the institutional affiliation of the artisans and traders. The esnaf tax was
changed as profit tax. Then, the guilds were abolished in 1910 and the esnaf
associations were established which were free from all financial responsibilities. Both
the old esnaf tax and the guild wardens disappeared with the centralization attempts.
This chapter will continue with the examining esnaf license and its fees, which was an
important document that enabled to carry out a profession in the Ottoman Empire.
3.2.3. Esnaf License (Esnaf Tezkeresi)
The license (tezkere) was the main official document to perform a business by
artisan and trade groups, and it had to be taken from the Municipality in the second
half of the nineteenth century.314 But the license system indeed existed before the
establishment of the municipalities.315 It was a kind of a permit to do a job that was
similar to the functions of gedik, but it does not mean monopolization in trading and
manufacturing activities because of free trade policy of this period.316 Not only the
314 BOA, DH. MKT. 1277/63, 12 B 1326 [10 August 1908].
315 BOA, HAT. 335/19240, 29 Z 1249 [9 May 1834]; The other document mentions the licenses printed
at Takvimhâne-i Âmire. See BOA, HR. MKT. 26/69, 12 Ş 1265 [3 July 1849]; BOA, İ. MVL. 232/8058,
21 CA 1268 [13 March 1852].
316 The functions and the usage of Gedik system transformed within the last two centuries of the Empire,
and it gained different meanings and functions in this process. It meant having tools and equipment
right to practice a certain trade early on, in the mid-eighteenth century. Then, the scope of it widened to
the right of doing a profession. Lately, it was used for the category of legal document that meant the
holder to usufruct. But in the abolition of gedik in 1861, its meaning was accepted as the right of
conducting a profession. For the details, see Akarlı, “Gedik: Implements, Mastership, Usufruct, and
Monopoly among Istanbul Artisans, 1750-1850”, pp. 223-232.
114
masters, but also journeymen and apprentices had to take these licenses and all of them
had to pay their fees separately in return for these licenses.317 Amele and işçi both mean
workers and they were required to take licenses as well.318 The state demanded license
also from foreign artisans and traders who were trading in the Ottoman domain.319
The professional epithets and the personal information of the related person
were written to these licenses. They involve information about the name of the artisan,
trader or shopkeeper, the professional epithet, craft, the birthdate of the related person,
hometown, residential address and its number, his father’s name, professional epithet,
craft and hometown, and finally a brief explanation about registration of the person.320
There was no explanation about the tools and equipment in the license documents.
One could do his/her job with their tools and equipment; that is to say, if anyone gained
the right to do his/her job with a license, s/he automatically could gain the right to use
tools and equipment.
In general, the registration system for artisans and traders at the center was
interconnected in the second half of the nineteenth century. The Esnaf Office allocated
the licenses only in case they had that an identity card (Tezkire-yi Osmâniye).321 This
card was, in fact, the obligation for all artisan and trade groups. Moreover, artisans and
traders in the provinces had to have both esnaf licenses and travel permits (mürur
tezkiresi) when they wanted to travel. If their professional epithets were not written in
their travel permits, the municipal administration did not give them an esnaf license.
The translocation of the small scale trade and manufacturing groups from the
317 BOA, DH. MKT. 2595/113, 25 ZA 1319 [5 March 1902]; BOA, ŞD. 675/22, 18 L 1288 [31
December 1871]. It was stated that the groups selling books and the other printed documents had to take
the license according to the 29th article of Printing Houses Regulation because most of the members of
them did not have any license. See BOA, DH. MKT. 348/20, 28 Ş 1312 [24 February 1895]; BOA, DH.
MKT. 2153/3, 12 Ş 1316 [26 December 1898].
318 The workers were taking licenses employed in Cibali Regie Company. See BOA, BEO.
2496/187182, 25 ZA 1322 [31 January 1905]; The Port Administration gave licenses to the amele
working in the ships. See BOA, BEO. 3309/248144, 9 R 1326 [11 May 1908].
319 BOA, DH. MKT. 1532/98, 6 Z 1305 [14 August 1888]; BOA, Y..PRK.PT..4/88, 13 C 1306 [14
January 1892].
320 For the examples of the licenses of a barber and a coffee housekeeper, see Appendix C and Appendix
D. These two licenses were given in 1869.
321 BOA, DH. MKT. 429/20, 26 RA 1313 [16 September 1895].
115
provinces to Istanbul was involved in this registration system because the locational
changes and translocation permits had to be recorded by the Record Office (Kuyudat
Kalemi). The reason for this registry was to prevent malfeasance of the individuals
who migrated to the imperial capital and take under control of the domestic
migration.322 The municipal sergeants carried out license controls323 and if an artisan
and a trader lacked a licence, this caused him to lose his job. But the penalty for it,
which involved arrestment or fines, changed throughout the nineteenth century.324
Every artisan or trader had to pay a specific fee for a particular license, which
was esnaf fee (esnaflık harcı). Fees were collected according to the incomes in theory,
but it is impossible to argue the presence of a reasonable and fair collection of these
fees. The rate of license fee was changing according to the different marketplace
groups and their professional hierarchy. The booklet involving yearly license fees and
monthly taxes of 310 trade and artisan groups shows the amount of the licenses with
specific classifications.325
If a person wanted to carry out a profession or more than one job, s/he had to
have a license which was particular to a job.326 This special document was particular
to an occupation that included the name of the person who could carry out the relevant
profession to identify artisans and traders officially. The municipal administration was
meticulous about the possession of a license of all marketplace actors. But it produced
difficulties for the groups who wanted to produce or sell more than one product in their
shops or as a peddler. The rules, including the obligation of having a particular license,
led to a showing of displeasure among artisan and trade groups. For example, in the
record from 1890, the sellers of gum, halva, nut, and chestnut were obliged to take an
322 BOA, DH. MKT. 2291/42, 27 Ş 1317 [31 December 1899].
323 BOA, ŞD. 2927/42, 11 C 1306 [12 February 1889].
324 For example, about 50 Iranian were arrested for not having a license. See BOA, HR. MKT. 244/6,
18 ZA 1274 [30 June 1858].
325 See footnote 22 in the introductory chapter. Dersaadet ve Bilâd-ı Selâse’de icra-yı sanat eden
bilcümle esnâf-ı mütenevvianın mükellef oldukları mahiye vergisiyle senevî tezkere harcları mübeyyin
bir kıta tarife defteridir, (1900?).
326 For example, it was forbidden to sell sherbet to boza makers because they did not have a licence for
sherbet selling. See BOA, ŞD. 675/22, 18 L 1288 [31 December 1871].
116
extra license to sell ice cream in summer in addition to the fees that they paid for their
current trading activities.327 The administration even demanded a license from the
groups who put counter within their shops or from the ones who used shops and
workplaces as a storehouse.328 Also, the municipal administration ordered to have a
license according to the extra employees and the shops. For instance, the yağlıkçı329
group stated that they took three different licenses, but the first municipal district in
Istanbul demanded extra separate master license from them because of the reason that
they employed one or two journeymen in the shops and workplaces which were used
as stores within inns and alleys. The groups requested the reverse of the decision in
1888.330 Moreover, if a person wanted to change his or her profession, s/he had to bring
a certificate (ilmuhaber) to the Sublime Porte taken from the responsible guild warden
and inform it by this way.331 Then, he could take his license to conduct the related
profession.
However, some groups involved in large or small-scale commercial activities
did not have to take a license. Individuals dealing with a quasi-commercial activity did
not have to take a license. In an example from 1888, the Municipality demanded
license from fodula porters (fodla/fodula küfeci) working at imarets, but the Ministry
of Interior stated that they were servants equipped with berat and they could not be
327 BOA, DH. MKT. 1735/51, 5 ZA 1307 [13 July 1890]. License for selling ice cream always became
as an issue for the Municipality and the related trade groups. For example, groups dealing with more
than one profession complained that the Municipality requested 40 kuruş for the license fee from
themselves to sell ice cream. See BOA, BEO. 450/33730, 3 S 1312 [6 August 1894]; The makers of
milk dishes complained about the extra license for selling ice cream. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1532/84, 5
Z 1305 [13 August 1888]. The license system continued after the abolition of the esnaf office for certain
professions and it functioned as a special certificate that every profession group could not take. For
example, it was ordered to the clockmakers, haberdashers or the shops of another in 1919 not to sell
gun except for gun shops, and only the individuals who had the license to be able to sell guns. See BOA,
DH. MKT. 2701/48, 14 Z 1326 [7 January 1919].
328 BOA, DH. MKT. 2172/83, 18 L 1316 [1 March 1899].
329 It was a trade group who was selling underwear, bed, and bride clothing. They were also selling
yağlık, which was a kind of handkerchief, and the name of the group comes from here. See Mehmet
Zeki Pakalın, “Yağlıkçı”, Osmanlı Deyimleri ve Terimleri Sözlüğü (3rd vol), (İstanbul: Milli Eğitim
Bakanlığı, 2004), p. 600.
330 BOA, DH. MKT. 1568/74, 22 RE 1306 [26 November 1888].
331 BOA, ŞD. 2636/44, 6 S 1312 [9 August 1894].
117
accepted as the member of a trade group.332 Moreover, the merchant community did
not have to take a license. If the merchants were registered to the Chambers of
Commerce and Industry established in 1880, they did not have to take a license.333
This demonstrates the official separation between the artisans/traders and the
merchants. Merchants were forced to take a license by the Municipality, yet they
demanded the government make it right because they stated that they were registered
to the chamber.334 This was criticized, and it was stated that the Municipality had to
put an end to the municipal police’s (çavuş) waiting in front of the shops to take a
license from merchants. The legal distinction between artisans/traders and merchants
had to be pointed out explicitly.335 Although the Municipality insisted on taking the
licenses from merchants, the Ministries prevented this act. For example, the shops of
Zade Ahmed Fevzi, Kıyakçı(?)zade Mehmed Fuad, and Mehmed Ali Efendis, who
were registered under the Chambers of Trade, Agriculture, and Industry, were locked
by the nokta officers, and it forbade them to do their jobs in 1892.336 They stated that
the decision of the municipal administration was derogatory, and it affected their
honor. They demanded the end of this act of the Municipality. The Trade and Public
Works Ministry accepted their grievance and ordered the end of the Municipality’s
332 BOA, DH. MKT. 1522/98, 9 ZA 1305 [18 July 1888].
333 BOA, DH. MKT. 1003/15, 2 B 1323 [2 September 1905]. For example, the license issue about the
bill of exchange traders and brokers was discussed a long time, but it was determined that they were
merchants and did not have to take a license. See BOA, ŞD. 1194/5, 29 B 1309 [28 February 1892];
BOA, DH. MKT. 404/45, 7 S 1313 [30 July 1895]. In the other record, the bill of exchangers and brokers
demanded the cease of the collection of 300 kuruş of the Municipality from each of them every year in
return for the license, which was an unlawful practice, but the Municipality denied this claim. The bill
of exchangers stated that they were accepted as the merchants, and so they did not have to take a license.
See Şenyurt, p. 196; BOA, DH. MKT. 1774/120, 11 RA 1308 [25 October 1890]. These groups were
forced to retake license in 1897. See BOA, BEO. 890/66722, 29 B 1314 [3 January 1897]; BOA, BEO.
988/74069, 6 RA 1315 [5 August 1897]; BOA, BEO. 3669/275152, 16 ZA 1327 [29 November 1909];
BOA, DH. MUİ. 39/58, 19 Z 1327 [1 January 19010]; Murat Koraltürk, Türkiye’de Ticaret ve Sanayi
Odaları (1880-1952), (İstanbul: Denizler Kitabevi, 2002), p. 27.
334 BOA, ŞD. 2950/35, 24 L 1309 [22 May 1892].
335 “Tüccar ve Esnaf Tezkeresi”, Dersaadet Ticaret Odası Gazetesi, no: 23, 1 S 1303 [9 November
1885], pp. 2-3.
336 Nokta officers were the police forces. See Polis Müdüriyet-i Umûmiyyesi’nden Merâkiz
Memurlarına Hitaben Nokta ve Devriye Memurlarına Mahsus Yazılan Talimatnâmedir, (İstanbul:
Matbaa-i Hayriye ve Şürekâsı, 1327).
118
control on the licenses of these merchants registered to the chambers.337 The official
affairs of the merchants were conducted by the Chambers of Commerce and Industry
in the late nineteenth century.
Although the Ottoman government established rules about the obligatory of
having a license strictly, records from the archive demonstrate that some violations
occurred as well. People from various trade and artisan groups sometimes complained
the individuals who were conducting their professions without a license. Besides
showing an irregularity, it displays the existence of unofficial surveillance among the
marketplace actors as well.338
The license type was determined according to the occupation type, and some
licenses included special conditions. Therefore, the license brought some occupational
constraints and rules to the working life as well. For example, it was forbidden to fish
after 12 a.m. in Bosphorus for security reasons. However, it was stated that the
fishmongers had their licenses, and the officers, including the municipal police and
master attendants, could not prevent them, but only control them to do their business
accordingly.339 In addition to that, a statement that mentions the permission to keep
open the shops at midnight had to be included in the licenses of the shopkeepers who
had to work at night.340
As it seemed in the articles of the Esnaf Office Ordinance, the municipal
administration gave particular importance to collecting the esnaf license fee. It aimed
to prevent the corruption of the guild wardens and protect of the revenues of the
Municipality. The guild wardens were allocating their incomes from the fees and the
collection of the taxes and they were the sole authority in collecting the license fees of
337 BOA, DH. MKT. 1967/78, 3 Z 1309 [29 June 1892]. It was also forbidden to collect a license fee
from the company employees. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2433/14, 6 Ş 1318 [29 November 1900].
338 For example, cook Mehmed, a resident in Ekmekçibaşı Neighborhood at Tophane, complained that
many individuals and bread makers were working without a license in the borders of the 6th Municipal
District. See BOA, BEO. 685/51354, 4 R 1313 [24 September 1895].
339 BOA, BEO. 2676/200639, 25 B 1323 [25 September 1905].
340 BOA, DH. EUM. THR. 4/39, 4 N 1327 [19 September 1909]; An example for the petition to work
at night for saloon keepers, see BOA, DH. MKT. 1600/41. 29 C 1306 [2 March 1889]; The fishmongers
in Dersaadet, Bosphorus, and Islands demanded to fish after the evening adhan, which was banned by
the state. They were earning their keep with fishing, and they demanded a solution for their problem.
See BOA, BEO. 2672/200340, 22 B 1323 [22 September 1905].
119
the commercial groups. It was a legal obligation for the guild wardens to pay a deposit
to cover unregistered licence fees, which were not delivered by the wardens to the
Municipality. However, the deposit system did not work efficiently. For example,
Osman Efendi, the guild warden of cooks and kebab makers had 18.377 kuruş debt
left from the license incomes in 1908, but due to the lack of the deposit, the
Municipality cleared off his debt since there was not found a property or real estate
belonged to him.341 The deposit system also covered the artisans and traders as well.
For example, Ali Bey, a certain old barber from Samatya, died, and it was decided that
for his deregistration it is necessary to sell his estate to charge his unpaid license fee
in 1902.342
Meanwhile, the obligation to pay license fee caused complaints for two main
reasons. The first one was due to the rise in the license fee, and the second one was the
obligatory payment to get a license for a particular job.343 The Municipality raised the
license fees at certain periods, and it caused problems for individuals, involving in
small-scale commercial activities.344 In this respect, different artisan and trade groups
made requests about the reduction in license fees.345 In one example from 1902, the
masters of the carmakers were paying 70 kuruş, and their apprentices were paying 20
kuruş as a license fee. However, 160 kuruş from the masters, 70 kuruş from the
journeymen, and 25 kuruş from the apprentices were requested. The groups
complained to the municipal administration about these rises and demanded the
annulment of the fee.346
341 BOA, DH. MKT. 1237/47, 1 S 1326 [5 March 1908].
342 BOA, DH. MKT. 616/63, 22 Ş 1320 [24 November 1902].
343 The rises in fees were sometimes sharp. For example, the license fee that mobile panniers and
greengrocers in Galata and Tophane increased from 26 to 84 kuruş. See BOA, İ..DH. 1087/85241, 24
L 1305 [4 July 1888]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1523/104, 12 ZA 1305 [21 July 1888]; BOA, DH. MKT.
1526/65, 20 ZA 1305 [29 July 1888].
344 A bookbinder conveyed his demand about the increase in fees to the Municipality. See BOA, DH.
MKT. 2246/66, 7 CA 1317 [13 September 1899].
345 For the ship carpenters’ request in Galata, see BOA, DH. MKT. 2354/45, 4 S 1318 [3 June 1900].
The tanners’ journeymen demanded the cancellation of rise in yearly fees from 25 kuruş to 40 kuruş
that they had to pay. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2513/87, 7 R 1319 [24 July 1901].
346 BOA, DH. MKT. 2595/113, 25 ZA 1319 [5 March 1902].
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The municipal administration also controlled the products sold within the
shops, which might change the amount of license fee. For example, Yakup, the guild
warden of the hardware dealers at Zindankapısı, conveyed the petition of the hardware
dealers, linseed oil sellers, naphtha dealers, and dyers and it was stated that the license
fees which they paid were increased. But the government pointed out that it was
determined after an investigation made within their shops that they were also selling
zinc, lead, pipe, and galvanic. Therefore, their license fees rose from 120 kuruş to 300
kuruş. The group stated that they had hard times financially because of the increase in
the amount of fees. It was decided that hardware dealers had to pay 80 kuruş, the zinc,
lead and pipe seller had to pay 120 kuruş, and finally importer of metallic and colorful
dye and also of naphtha, and of line seed oil had to pay 300 kuruş for the esnaf
license.347 This decision indicates the strict control of the products and goods on sale
within the shops. The official authorities were changing the amount of the fees when
the ingredients of the products were changed and the prices of the products were
increased.
Certain trade groups requested changes in the way of payment of these license
fees. For example, the carter men in Sirkeci Pier in 1888 demanded to pay the fees of
the license costed 120 kuruş in installments as it was done before.348 On the other hand,
in some cases, some groups requested the change of the amount of their license fees
because the disproportions existed between the incomes of the groups and the amount
of fees that they had to pay.349 Some individuals even demanded not to pay esnaf
license fee. For example, Mustafa, a barber from Lâleli in Kuruçeşme, requested the
license fee and cleaning tax exemption due to his elderliness in 1889.350 In the other
347 BOA, ŞD. 2992/40, 27 C 1317 [2 November 1899]. This document also involved the grievance about
the fee rise of the junk dealer David and his fellows.
348 BOA, DH. MKT. 1527/73, 23 ZA 1305 [1 August 1888].
349 The pickle makers requested the change of their licenses. They stated that there was a disproportion
between their incomes and the amount of fees they had to pay. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2315/11, 6 ZA
1317 [8 March 1900].
350 BOA, DH. MKT. 1670/13, 2 RA 1307 [27 October 1889]. The twig broom sellers’ former guild
warden in Ayvansaray stated that he was not able to pay his debt, including the taxes of the years of
1886-1888 and the license fee, and he demanded to delete all of them. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1280/88,
18 B 1326 [16 August 1908].
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case from 1890, Kosti, who was working 45 years as a baker, requested to be exempted
from the license because of his elderliness. He stated that he could not help financially
to his large family like in the former example.351 Disablement and illness were also the
other excuses written in the petitions to be exempted from paying this fee.352
Incomes coming from these licenses formed a significant portion of the
Municipality budget. Transferring of incomes of these licenses was discussed, and it
could not be specified for a long time even though they were transferred to the
Treasury with the new Budget Law of 1909. The Treasury stimulated about the
implementation of this decision.353 Because of the importance of the fees and taxes,
the Municipality insisted on remaining these incomes to itself. In 1912, it was decided
to allocate 10% of patent and of profit taxes paid by the artisans and traders to the
Municipality from the central budget.354 As it was mentioned when explaining the
esnaf office, the esnaf license and thereby its fee were abolished with the
implementation of the profit tax in 1907 in Istanbul. The profit license was replaced
with esnaf license.355
Besides licenses, shop permit (ruhsatnâme) was the other obligatory document
for some particular professions, especially for opening printing houses, printingrelated
sectors, and health professionals.356 Some groups did not want to take a shop
permit since they were taking license extra every year.357 In case of occupational
351 BOA, DH. MKT. 1737/61, 11 ZA 1307 [29 June 1890].
352 For example, cook Ömer demanded to be exempted from paying the fees of license because of his
illness. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2420/27, 1 B 1318 [25 October 1900]; BOA, DH. MKT. 2433/46, 6 Ş
1318 [29 November 1900].
353 BOA, DH. MUİ. 6/18, 11 L 1327 [26 October 1909]; BOA, BEO. 3721/279046, 9 RA 1328 [21
March 1910]; BOA, DH. UMVM. 108/74, 12 C 1338 [3 March 1920].
354 See Article 2, “İstanbul şehrinin rüsûm-i belediyesi hakkında kanun-i muvakkat”, 21 R 1330 [9 April
1912], Düstur, II/4, p. 442.
355 “Temettü Vergisi Nizamnâmesi”, 16 ZA 1325 [21 December 1907], Düstur, I/8, p. 805.
356 For an example for printing houses, see BOA, DH. MKT. 1157/23, 20 S 1325 [4 April 1907]; BOA,
DH. MKT. 1056/25, 15 M 1324 [11 March 1906]. In the other record, Mihran Papazyan, Karabet
Büberyan, Agob Matyosyan, Artin Asadoryan, Aleksandır Ruztemiz Maridis, Eksenefon Teodoridis,
and Ohannes Civelekyan demanded the renewal of their permits. See BOA, DH. MKT. 359/20, 9 L
1312 [5 April 1895].
357 The engravers Artin Hamamcıyan, Haçik Enfiyeciyan, and Diran Şirinyan wanted to be exempted
from the permit. See BOA, DH. MKT. 935/6, 23 Z 1322 [28 February 1905].
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violations, the municipal administration was retaking the permits.358 Or if they had a
license but not a permit, they would levy a fine.359 Shop permits became obligatory for
the professions that entailed technical or scientific information and competence. It can
be inferred from the records that it was not mandatory for every shop or profession.
In the next chapter, concrete cases in professional, spatial, and public health
affairs of artisans and traders in the period that this study covers will be analyzed and
showed the change of traditional marketplace order, especially in problem-solving
process and decisions.
358 For example, the state retook the permit of Mihran Papazyan in 1905 due to the reason of that he
was not working as a typographer but as a bookbinder. See BOA, DH. MKT. 998/26, 14 C 1323 [16
August 1905].
359 The itinerant book seller Ohannes, who was selling Bible, petitioned for that the Municipal District
of Büyükçekmece demanded one kuruş from him because he did not possess a permit. See BOA, DH.
MKT. 1056/25, 15 M 1324 [11 March 1906].
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CHAPTER 4 BUSINESS LIFE, SPACE, AND PUBLIC HYGIENE IN MARKETPLACE The expansion of a city mostly occurred according to the order and location of the shopping centers and bazaars. The marketplaces formed the most populated and lively areas of Istanbul as elsewhere in the world. They, as a public space, provided mobility and the development of a cosmopolitan society.360 Artisans and traders were the major agents of these commercial hubs. For this reason, the supervision of the marketplace and bazaar was done in the Ottoman Empire from the old times onward with the written code of laws by the state and with the self-supervision of these groups. Apart from collecting taxes, the control of the marketplaces and their actors formed another crucial side of trade life. Before the establishment of the Istanbul Municipality in 1855, the Ministry of the Marketplace was responsible for the supervision of the bazaars, certain municipal works, and providing security. The market inspectors who were the officers of this ministry acted according to the orders of the Islamic law judge. He was the competent authority in marketplace affairs. But in the new system that appeared in the second half of the nineteenth century, the municipalities or directorates became the competent authorities in the affairs of these groups. The number of institutions responsible for the supervision of the marketplace and its actors increased, bringing a new administrative order. The police and municipal police supervised the marketplaces according to the related regulations and ordinances and artisans, shopkeepers, and vendors were taken under control via these new state agencies. The experiences of the artisans and traders will be examined in this chapter with the cases concerning the problems emerged in the marketplace and the demands of them to understand the way of carrying out marketplace affairs in Istanbul. 360 Eda Ünlü Yücesoy, “Constructing the Marketplace: A Socio-Spatial Analysis of Past Marketplaces of Istanbul”, Built Environment, vol. 39, no:2, Marketplaces as an Urban Development Strategy (2013), p. 191.
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After providing information on the foundation of this new administrative system in the previous chapter, this chapter will seek to offer the cases about the problems that emerged in the marketplace and the reactions of its actors. Indeed, the ordinances and regulations give ideas about the marketplace order and the constraints for the groups in commercial life and the authority domain of the official agencies. On the other hand, the examination of day-to-day activities in the marketplace gives information about their adaptation to the new administrative order and their reactions to this new governing order that transformed their economic life. The control mechanism in the marketplaces was operated under three mainframes: Rules and restrictions for trade and for the professional order, spatial policies in the marketplace and related commerce areas, and lastly the public health precautions. The precautions and warnings for manufacturing and small-scale trading activities, the matters about the spatial distribution, and the public health policies will be examined through the examples since they changed the traditional working conditions and problem-solving practices during the period that this study covers. Artisans and traders adapted themselves to the new administrative order via their experiences in the abovementioned issues, which transformed artisanal life in the late Ottoman Istanbul. On the other side, the practice of the new legislation and the experiences of the artisans and traders enabled the rationalization and systematization of the Ottoman spatial and public health policies. The state maintained its control over the market within the framework of free-market economy system by these policies. 4.1. The Rules for Trade and the Professional Order Rules and restrictions in the marketplace became determinant and transformative in day-to-day economic activities of all these groups. The major actors of the marketplace reacted to the decisions taken on behalf of them when their works and profits were affected by all these. Controlling the goods and products on sale and non-sale, foreign or expurgatory materials within the shops361, the façade or the 361 Other sellers or ordinary people made informal supervision in the sale of goods within the shops. For example, Dürrizâde Hasan Şanî complained milk sellers, grocers, and herbalists, and he stated that they were selling the holy Koran and the other catechism within their shops. He demanded the end of this practice. See BOA, MF. MKT. 678/43, 13 L 1320 [13 January 1903].
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interior decoration of the workplaces, and lastly, constraints concerning to the working hours formed the main supervision topics related with trade and professions themselves in the late nineteenth century of Istanbul marketplaces. Controls for the products were done by preventing the ones from producing or selling the goods for which they do not have a license. For example, in a case dated 1878, the Ministry of Police closed twenty-four shops of lemon sellers since they sold alcoholic drinks in their shops for which they were not allowed. Lemon sellers were told that the ones who dissent the administration’s decision would be banished or be arrested. The masters of the lemon sellers stated that alcoholic drinks on sale were brought from Chios, and they are all from this island if the government continues to practice this ban on these drinks, this could lead to unjust suffering, and the zecriye tax (a tax taken from alcoholic drinks) could not be collected since the production of these drinks ceased. The lemon sellers demanded abolition of the ban on the shops of the lemon sellers and wanted permission to sell alcoholic beverages too.362 Actually, they gained the right to reopen their shops after the government decided to give permit them in 1881. The state let them to sell alcohol beside lemon.363 The same problem of the lemon sellers at Limon (Lemon) Pier broke out again in 1888. The lemon sellers and their guild warden stated that their nine shops were closed since they sold alcoholic drinks. Therefore, they requested the Municipality to open their shops.364 In another example, in 1911, İstavri Sorta, a cook and greengrocer who had a shop at Altımermer district located at the front of Greek Church, was arrested for selling raki several times and he paid a fine amounted 650 kuruş four times in total. However, he continued to sell alcoholic drinks, and the state decided to close his shop according to the 16th Article of the Alcoholic Beverages Regulation (Müskirat Nizamnâmesi). He was fined according to the 17th Article of the same regulation. However, he continued to sell raki in his shop, and thus, his shop was closed permanently after signing a record for this decision.365 Interestingly, the state was tolerant in the violation of the rule repeatedly, 362 BOA, ŞD. 2891/56, 26 N 1295 [23 September 1878]. 363 BOA, DH. MKT. 1334/34, 19 R 1298 [21 March 1881]. 364 BOA, ŞD. 696/26, 17 Ş 1298 [15 July 1881]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1475/58, 23 R 1305 [7 January 1888]. 365 BOA, DH. EUM. VRK. 7/78, 21 RA 1329 [22 March 1911].
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and it did not close his shop in the first violation. But later, it implemented the article
of the regulation and closed the shop. Among other goods and products, selling
alcoholic drinks was probably one of the most delicate subjects in the supervisions
because of its complex social, economic, and judicial dimensions. Therefore, the
governments paid special attention to this issue in the marketplace.
In a case from a different business dated 1896, it was banned to produce wood
bats (sopa) to the joiners and basket makers, and the manufacturing license was
disallowed in Rasimpaşa Neighborhood (Kadıköy). The producers stated that they
were producing only fork handle and pickaxe handle needed for industrial works.
Then, they were allowed to continue to manufacture the handles. The Municipality and
the municipal police sent the account involving the features and number of these
handles to the Grand Vizier’s Office (Sadâret).366 This example demonstrates that the
features of the products were carefully controlled, and if any group violated a rule,
they could face sanctions.
The sale of obscene things was not allowed as well to prevent the keeping of
imported materials within the shops and their clandestine sale.367 For example, in the
shop of Jewish Avram located in Zürafa Street at Kalekapısı in 1903, approximately
400 obscene photographs were found. He admitted that he got these photographs from
photographer Yorgi located at Fener and photographer Syanos located at Galata Pier.
The police searched Avram’s shop, and they found some obscene visuals with the
Greek armed person’s photographs and plates. Written materials and the writings on
the goods were also controlled within the shops.368 These cases show the recorded
supervisions, but it is tough to determine the scope of these controls since the verbal
366 BOA, A. MKT.MHM. 631/5, 18 CA 1314 [25 October 1896]; BOA, Y. A. HUS. 362/35, 6 C 1314
[12 November 1896]; BOA, İ..HUS. 50/95, 20 C 1314 [26 November 1896]. For the photograph of an
itinerant basket seller, see Figure 2.
367 The Police found two plates that included a French deed of protest. See BOA, DH. MKT. 652/24,
14 ZA 1320 [12 February 1903]. That type of control had political aims, which is out of the content of
this study, but it should be stated that even though the municipal administration operated the supervision
in the marketplace, the controls for this area were the responsibilities of the general police forces due
to the nature of the rule and offense. The political atmosphere, which mainly included national uprisings
and booms that erupted in the late Ottoman period, had to be considered when these controls were
examined.
368 Certain cigarette papers and cases which had writings and pieces of advice on them were banned
from being sold. See BOA, DH. MKT. 251/51, 22 Z 1311 [26 June 1894]. See Figure 31.
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warnings would have been done by the municipal police as well and the ignored control might not have been recorded. This ended up with lack of information on violation of the rule. On the other hand, the marketplace actors were more inclined to sell different goods and products without their licenses. The old sale constraints gave its way to flexibility both because of the free trade economy and the revenue concerns of the Municipality. Apart from the inspection of goods, products, and materials, the Municipality and the Police supervised the decoration of the inner and outer parts of the shops.369 The shopkeepers could not act independently in decoration matters, and they needed permission for necessary changes. In an example dated 1906, the booksellers, prayer beads, musk sellers (miskçi) and suchlike trade groups pitched tents and barracks illicitly in Sirkeci. The traditional bazaar was opening on Mondays at New Mosque and around it. The government ordered to build lean-to-roof (sundurma) instead of these tents and barracks that could be open only on the day of the bazaar. This lean-to-roof had to be compartmentalized. It was even added that they could become more beautiful by dying eaves in dull grey and renewing dye of them. In this way, it was aimed to organize the stalls.370 In another document dated 1899, Sadullah Efendi asked for permission to put the Ottoman blazon on the door of his antique and rug shops at Mahmudpaşa.371 Obviously, the state was inspecting many details of both the exterior and the interior of the shops and small bazaars. Working hours were the other constraint matter for artisans and traders because of security and public order concerns. The opening and closing hours of the shops or the time slot of mobile trading could not be determined by the artisans and traders arbitrarily. They were mostly arranged according to the daylight apart from the exceptional professions. For example, after taking the necessary permission document, 369 The outer views of the shops and the manufacturing places can seem in the photographs, but the inner view is partially unknown due to the lack of visual materials. Certain books gave information about the interior of the shops in detail and they helped to visualize them. For example, Gautier depicts the decoration of Turkish coffee houses. See Gautier, pp. 68-72. As an example for a grocery shop, see Figure 3, and for an interior of a shoemaker workplace, see Figure 4. The district of the grocery shop is unknown. The workplace of the shoemakers is also unknown. It was written down that this photograph was taken to promote the shoemakers. 370 BOA, DH. MKT. 2782/208614, 19 M 1324 [15 March 1906]. 371 BOA, DH. MKT. 2240/121, 22 R 1317 [30 August 1899].
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fishers working at sea were allowed to continue to fish in the dark under the municipal
police’s control and the port officers in 1905.372 However, certain groups faced some
difficulties in the working hours issue. For instance, the saloon keepers (meyhaneci)
were one of the salient shopkeeper groups and were always at minefield in this issue.
In the example dated 1889, they demanded their saloons be open between 02.00 am to
04.00 am.373 They demanded the opening of their saloons until three and a half a.m.
later on even though they were being closed at half-past one. They claimed that shops
and stores in Beyoğlu were open until morning.374 It shows the flexibility in the
marketplace policies of the governments depending on the location of the shops,
business field, their functions in the related area or the scope of their benefit for the
whole society.
4.2. The Workplace Spatial Settings
Istanbul presented different feature in the late period of the Ottoman Empire
from the aspects of city planning.375 It had both pre-industrial and industrial features
during the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century. Istanbul, in addition to the
372 BOA, BEO. 2676/200639, 25 B 1323 [25 September 1905].
373 BOA, DH. MKT. 1600/41, 29 C 1306 [2 March 1889].
374 BOA, ŞD. 2933/29, 26 Ş 1307 [17 April 1890].
375 The issue of Islamic/Middle Eastern or Ottoman city formed the discussions about the way of city
planning and structure in the Ottoman studies, especially for the classical and early modern periods, but
these essentialist approaches do not suffice to understand the structure of the cities both in the classical
period and the nineteenth-twentieth centuries. Cities, particularly the port cities, were always exposed
to change with the changing trade activities and being open economically to the other foreign markets.
In general, the residential and commercial areas shaped the expansion of Istanbul. The commercial zone
was the main space of the producers, artisans, and shopkeepers. According to the classical narrative on
the Ottoman urban planning, the main urban spaces, including the central market place or the compact
hall (bedestân)-bazaar existed within the waqf-ʽimâret system. Shops were rented to the merchants,
artisans, traders in the city or provinces, and farms were the sources of revenue in the waqf system in
the classical period of the Ottoman Empire. The Sultan or other high dignitaries established the bazaars,
groups of shops, market halls, and storehouses with their infrastructure to serve for religion. Hence,
their rents had been using for keeping up the mosques or the other charitable foundations. Compact
halls, bazaars, markets or the other shopping centers were the forums of the people both for trading and
socializing. For this classical narrative, see Halil İnalcık, “Istanbul: An Islamic City”, Journal of Islamic
Studies, n.1, (1990), pp. 9-12. The multifaceted character of Istanbul in such aspects as the
ethnic/religious division of residential areas and marketplaces faded the rigid interpretations about the
nature and city features. The effects of liberal economic policy in shaping city structure and culture
deserve attention as well, but such a comprehensive and broad issue is beyond this study’s scope.
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state institutions and municipal buildings, hosted marketplaces and bazaars, residential
areas, waqf complexes (philanthropic/pious foundations), the religious buildings
(mosques, churches, and synagogues), manufacturing places and small-scale factories,
and the other open public spaces like public gardens etc. All these buildings designated
the façade of the city over time.376
Istanbul had both similar and different characteristics when compared to the
other cities in the Empire. It was transformed into a modern city with new buildings
emerging from new bureaucratic and administrative needs and the increase in
population in the nineteenth century. This spatial expansion brought along the spatial
interference of the state. The prestige of the traditional markets, bazaars, and inns
concentrated in such places as Eminönü and Beyazıd relatively decreased with the rise
of the new trade centers after the emergence of this dualism.377 New commercial
buildings and inns at the districts such as Galata and Beyoğlu became places where a
new type of commercial activities was carried out intensively on the one hand, and the
traditional market order existed on the other. Then, a bi-centric city structure emerged
in Istanbul by this way.378
Commercial areas of the city were different than the residential ones. The
commercial circulation in residential areas existed only to supply daily needs but not
large scale trade activity. Many small-scale shops, workplaces, and weekly markets
existed in the residential quarters. They chiefly provided service and products to the
people living in neighborhoods far away from the above-mentioned central business
districts. Peddlers partially supplied people located in the periphery areas of Istanbul.
376 The Ottoman cities were not similar, and they did not possess the same characteristics. These
mentioned features were valid, especially for the late Ottoman Istanbul. There existed no typical
Ottoman, Islamic or Arab city that had fundamental characteristics in this respect. Cities in various
regions had different features with the effects of local dynamics. For the work on this debate, see Edhem
Eldem, “Introduction”, in The Ottoman City Between East and West: Aleppo, Izmir, and Istanbul,
Edhem Eldem, Daniel Goffman, and Bruce Masters (eds.), (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1999), p. 15. For the critical approaches to the concept of the “Islamic city”, see Michael Chamberlain,
Knowledge and Social Practice in Medieval Damascus, 1190-1350, (Cambridge and New York:
Cambridge University Press, 1995); Richard Bulliet, The Patricians of Nishabur: A Study in Medieval
Islamic Social History, (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972).
377 Ayhan Aktar, “Şark Ticaret Yıllıkları’nda ‘Sarı Sayfalar’: İstanbul’da Meslekler ve İktisadi
Faaliyetler Hakkında Bazı Gözlemler, 1868-1938”, Toplum ve Bilim, no.76, (Bahar, 1998), p. 117.
378 İlber Ortaylı, “İstanbul’un Mekansal Yapısının Tarihsel Evrimine Bir Bakış”, Amme İdaresi Dergisi,
vol.10, no.2, (Haziran, 1977), p. 95.
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There existed an interaction between the marketplaces/weekly markets and
city/neighborhood life in both ways. In other words, commercial and residential areas
were always in contact.
People involved in daily contacts that fostered the web of relationships, and
this generated both commercial and cultural interactions among people from different
ethnic and religious groups. The politics of space give significant clues about the daily
social life and interactions in trade activities among different genders as well since the
market space in terms of its social construct feature specifically helped to understand
their gendered bias character. Therefore, the marketplaces and bazaars were not mere
commercial spheres, they were also socio-cultural sites that impacted social life and
social contact. They were autarchic social spaces where various goods and products
were being produced and sold, the producers and consumers gathered together, and
small-scale economic and social relations existed. In this respect, they were the spaces
where economic and socio-cultural interactions existed with face-to-face relations.379
In the late nineteenth century, Istanbul experienced various economic,
administrative, and social changes. This transformation led to the emergence of a new
city culture and new urban planning policy. The spatial distribution of shops and the
factors in designing the marketplace were binding for the artisans, producers, and
peddlers.380 The space politics with its flexible nature and the place of the mentioned
groups in this policy shaped the commercial order in the imperial capital.
Newly developing urban planning policies and the location and relocation
needs of the artisans and traders were shaped together. The relocation practices in the
marketplace and the solutions for the location problems formed a considerable part of
urban planning in the late nineteenth century Istanbul.381 The Municipality’s
379 For an article on the marketplaces of Istanbul as a social construct, see Eda Ünlü Yücesoy,
“Constructing the Marketplace: A Socio-Spatial Analysis of Past Marketplaces of Istanbul”, Built
Environment, vol. 39, no:2, Marketplaces as an Urban Development Strategy (2013), pp. 190-202.
Individuals shape places based on activities, meanings, and definitions while they are interacting with
others in daily life, specifically in the marketplace. Yücesoy, pp. 193, 197.
380 Yücesoy, pp. 191-193. For the tables of the marketplaces in Istanbul in 1880-1881, see Table 2. For
another list of various market locations in Istanbul between 1911 and 1912, see Table 3.
381 For a summary of the regulations concerning the building and streets which shaped the urban
planning policy of the Ottoman state, see Ceylan İrem Gençer and Işıl Çokuğraş, “Regulation of Urban
Space in the Ottoman State: The Case of Istanbul (1820-1900)”, Megaron, vol. 11, no.1, (2016/1), pp.
1-14.
131
interference impacted the forming of urban fabric, which was also unplanned and
superficially focused on a crisis resolution. This culminated in the development of
unplanned urbanization.
The spatial order was designed to prevent disturbances, disorder, and incidents
in commercial hubs and other public spaces in Istanbul. Therefore, the state policy in
relocation and designing bazaar and market areas was pragmatic and functional. The
state, specifically the Municipality, managed urban spaces, particularly market areas.
All the arrangements led to the emergence of new urban spaces, which also brought
physical growth of Istanbul in the progress of time. They were designed and
redesigned according to the foregoing reasons, so it can be argued that a flexible policy
in urban planning of the Ottomans existed, and the policies were particular to the local
needs.382 The motives of the governments and municipal administration in the
organization and designing the marketplaces were to develop efficiency in trading,
eliminating probable incidents or disasters, facilitating the transportation of goods and
products, pursuit old traditions and habits in locational distribution, strengthening the
supervision of marketplaces and groups from various trade and manufacturing sectors.
The maintenance of the spatial organization of these groups according to the old order
and their demand to be all together at a certain space was crucial because the clustering
of artisan or trade groups in a certain district or bazaar was the old-fashioned (tarz-ı
kadim) in the Ottoman market as the most characteristic feature of it. The emphasis on
the continuity of the old spatial order was always one of the priorities of the groups
because it was still functioning.383 However, urgent or extraordinary necessities
occasionally led to the end of spatial tradition in certain sectors.
382 These factors had a primary role in the examination of city spaces. This study does not promise to
present a city monograph or an example of urban history. Yet, it aims to highlight the reasons for
changes in commercial quarters but not to provide a geospatial analysis. İlhan Tekeli mentions the
effects of the practical reasons in the development of Ottoman urban planning. He states that the urban
planning was based on the necessities and changes in the cities’ economic and social conditions, which
involved the necessities for a healthy city, the mitigation of the disasters such as fires, and the
organization of private and public buildings. The urban planning in the Ottoman State did not imitate
the Westerner urban planning style utterly. See İlhan Tekeli, “Bir Modernite Projesi Olarak Türkiye’de
Kent Planlaması”, Ege Mimarlık, no. 16, (1995/2), pp. 51-55. The examples given in this section verify
the argument of İlhan Tekeli.
383 The old bazaar (pazar) system has survived until today in Istanbul. Although the number of shopping
malls increased drastically today, the old markets are still the favorites of the consumers. They are the
most visited touristic places such as Grand Bazaar (Çârşû-yı Kebîr- in modern Turkish Kapalı Çarşı)
or Spice Bazaar (Mısır Çarşısı). In addition to the old bazaars, bazaar culture continues in certain
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The conglomeration of the craftspeople in certain places shows the continuity
in the traditional location distribution of the shops, but this tradition halted with the
necessities of the new urban structure and the extraordinary reasons. City planning
became one of the municipal tasks, and the Municipality organized the translocations
of the marketplaces. The rigid structure of these places became more open to change
after the de-monopolization in trade activities in the late nineteenth century as well.
The translocation of bazaars or a certain professional group to a different place broke
the rigidity in this historical heritage of traditional commercial areas. It changed the
ethnic composition of these places and led to the conglomeration of a particular
occupation in a new specific area. Therefore, the commercial areas in Istanbul were
forced to change. Their locations altered during the course of time mainly because of
three factors: First, the necessity of the protection of populous public spaces, symbolic
districts, and public order; second, disasters; and lastly, the precautions in public health
policy. These factors shaped the spatial positioning policies in the marketplace and the
structure of the commercial zones in the late nineteenth-century Ottoman Istanbul.
First of all, the protection of certain public spaces and buildings always had
importance. The state permitted the opening of new shops at different places, but it
stipulated certain constraints on the workplaces and their locations. This was organized
and determined by the Municipality and sometimes the government, and the artisan
and trade groups could not choose the places on their own where they did their job.
Therefore, they sometimes reacted to the administration’s decisions about location
plans because they had established order. They wanted to practice their job as if it was
in the past. Groups generally legitimated their demands by emphasizing the discourse
of “location tradition” in the marketplace.
districts and days in Turkey. Bazaars, weekly markets, and other trading centers are important in terms
of economy and important public spaces where people socialized. This indicates a strong tradition that
was maintained with pragmatic motives. The names of the bazaars and streets in Istanbul possess
historical value in addition to their historical locations. Many districts, streets, marketplaces, and
bazaars were defined with their professional affiliations such as Atpazarı, Keresteciler, Kovacılar,
Fermeneciler, Halıcılar, Saraçhanebaşı (Saddler), Avratpazarı, Sabuncu (soap seller) inn, Sedefçiler,
Kalafatyeri, Küçükpazar, Tarakçılar (Carder) street, Kuyumcular (goldsmith) shop, Kağıtçılar (paper
sellers) shop, Bakırcılar (coppersmiths) shop, and Balıkpazarı. The agglomeration in a single district or
building is still one of the remarkable characteristics of artisan and trade groups in Turkey. For more
examples, see Eyice, p. 214.
133
Translocation affairs in the bazaar frequently led to the perpetual official
correspondences between craft or trade groups and the Municipality (and so the
government). In the example of the second-hand dealers (eskici) in 1895, they stated
that they were sent to Çarşıkapısı from Sultan Bayezid Mosque, but there was no
suitable area there for them. They stated that the coffeehouses keeper continued to stay
around Bayezid Mosque, and only they were sent to a different location. They wanted
to return to their usual working space.384 After one year, the municipal administration
decided to transport the second-hand dealers in front of Bayezid Library (near Sultan
Bayezid Mosque) to a different district because it was stated that they were making
noise with a mallet and people studying in the library were disturbed by the noise
coming from outside.385 The hardware sellers (hırdavatçı) who were selling goods
around the library at Sultan Bayezid Mosque were also transferred to a different place
without a door by the police and the municipal officers, but they demanded to return
their old working area in 1902.386 The area covering the Sultan Bayezid Mosque and
Bayezid Library was a significant commercial center, mostly because of being one of
the known centers of the city and populous. Therefore, the Municipality and the
governments gave importance to the place management at this kind of symbolic
centers. Certain trade groups were performing their vocations in public fountains as
well at Dersaâdet and Bilâd-ı Selâse,387 but the government forbade it as a general rule
in 1907.388 In particular, peddlers tried to stay at their traditional selling spaces, but
the official authorities did not allow it.
Measures not only involved the relocations of the shops, manufacturing places
or a trading activity of a group but also comprised the controlling, designing, and
organizing extant commercial buildings and districts for maintaining social order. In
an example dated 1890, it was stated that the shops of Albanian sherbet-sellers
(şerbetçi) and the marble paving boza makers (mermerlik boza) were selling alcoholic
384 BOA, BEO. 636/47671, 9 Z 1312 [3 June 1895].
385 BOA, MF. MKT. 340/59, 15 CA 1314 [22 October 1896].
386 BOA, DH. MKT. 2591/70, 14 ZA 1319 [22 February 1902].
387 It means “three districts”, including Eyüp, Galata, and Üsküdar in Istanbul.
388 BOA, ZB. 601/141, 10 Z 1324 [25 January 1907].
134
drinks, which were close to the Muslim cemetery and the Police Office at Topkapı.
The sale of alcoholic drinks in these shops was forbidden three years ago since these
shops were close to the public spaces and the sellers did not have a license to sell
alcohol; thus, they were closed by the Municipality again. Then, the shop owners
demanded to reopen their shops.389 The type of products selling within the shops also
determined the locations of them and of the other manufacturing places.
Apart from the extant commercial buildings, the order on the streets was
controlled by the Municipality as well. The occupation of a place on the streets was
banned in the Regulation about the Streets in 1859. Putting every kind of fruit,
vegetable, and fish on the pavement was prohibited (Articles 22 and 23 of the Streets
Regulation). Also, the coffee shop owners and saloon keepers were not allowed to put
chairs and tables on the streets (Article 24).390 If artisans or shopkeepers could violate
this rule, they had to pay from 1 white beşlik to 5 white beşlik according to the 254th
Article of the Penal Code. The municipal administration was cautious about taking up
the pavements, and it warned the groups or individuals who put their chairs, seats, and
tables on the pavements in front of their shops. The occupation of the panniers and
platforms (tabla) of the gardeners (bahçıvan) and the pannier maker/sellers (küfeci) to
the streets was banned in 1874.391 The municipal police controlled these kinds of
violations, but the practice of these controls and penalties remained insufficient
because of the inadequacy of the municipal police force. Nevertheless, all these
controls constrained the spatial expansion initiative of the trade groups and artisans.
The ports and piers that were generally lively centers of trade had a critical
position for import-export mobility and the local market. Therefore, spatial problems
frequently occurred in these areas. The government and the Municipality considered
the demands of the Port Administration and trade groups to avoid interruptions in
economic life and made rearrangements to maintain the order of trade. On the other
side, the port traders had to obey the decisions of the Municipality and the center.
389 BOA, ŞD. 2934/16, 27 ZA 1307 [15 July 1890].
390 “Sokaklara dair nizamnâmedir”, 17 N 1275 [20 April 1859], Düstur, I/2, p. 481.
391 BOA, A.} MKT. MHM. 472/4, 16 ZA 1290 [5 January 1874]. In another example, Abbas, the keeper
of a coffeehouse, was warned not to put seats in front of his shop. See BOA, DH. EUM. THR. 43/44,
19 B 1328 [27 July 1910].
135
Many disputes among different trade groups occurred at piers in the issue of
keeping their locations. For example, in 1908, the caners (hasırcı) and the cerealsellers
(zahireci) complained about the high number of cars where the boatmen
transported water at Hasır Pier. They pointed out that they could not do their job and
were suffered financially because of these lots of cars. They demanded the change of
this water transportation practice to a different pier. Even though the boatmen were
going from Beykoz and Göztepe to Hasır Pier with their pontoon and boats for so long,
it was ordered to go to Unkapanı Pier, especially after the complaint of the caners and
cereal-sellers. Nonetheless, boatmen stated that they did not damage anyone or any
group at this pier. They asserted that the shops of the caners and the cereal-sellers were
so far from the pier, and there was no probability to be suffered from their commercial
activities at the pier. Boatmen added that they could fall into huge financial difficulties
if they were sent to Unkapanı. They claimed that the rights at the land of the caners
and the cereal-sellers were protected, and these groups should not be allowed to violate
their rights at sea. But the Municipality ordered the removal of the boats. Boatmen
previously mentioned this unfair practice to some officers, and they added that these
pontoon and boats could not go to Unkapanı Pier. The government pointed out that
this problem occurred because of the cars gathered at the pier but not of the boats.392
In another example dated 1894, 300 Muslim and non-Muslim bargemen of
Yağkapanı and Unkapanı piers complained that they were not allowed to enter the pier
which was being constructed, and they had financial difficulties because of this reason.
In order to convey their demands to the Sultan, they decided to gather at Beşiktaş. But
the government interpreted this gathering as an illegal act and ordered the Police to
prevent it.393 The group members tried to reach the Sultan to continue their commercial
activities at the mentioned piers thinking that they would be able to remove the ban
with the order by the Sultan. But they failed to do so.
Disasters were the second factor that forced the state to relocate the craft and
trade groups. The state had to regulate the spatial distribution by considering probable
392 The Municipality was charged to solve this problem in the end. But the related document issuing the
solution could not be found. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1285/27, 2 Ş 1326 [30 August 1908].
393 BOA, BEO. 439/32924, 17 M 1312 [21 July 1894].
136
disasters that directly had the power to change the whole settlement of the city. Thus,
the government reorganized the spatial order in case of fire or earthquake as they had
to redesign it due to debris or the existence of risks of fires, which broke out frequently.
Fires were one of the most crucial problems in that time as the fire-fighting techniques
and equipment were not so developed, and primitive techniques were being used. The
state had to consider the risks of fire and the locational suitability of these kinds of
groups who were using fire in the bazaars or shops when performing their jobs. In an
example from 1869, the guild wardens at Grand Bazaar complained about the fezproducers
(fesçi) and the restauranteurs (lokantacı). There were four shops at the
Grand Bazaar, and the fez-producers and the restauranteurs use fire in their business.
They emphasized fire risk within the Bazaar because of these groups.394 If a fire could
outbreak within the Bazaar, there was a probability of burning and the risk of damaging
all shops in there. The guild wardens also added that it was forbidden to open the
jewelers’ shops and coffeehouses in this place since these professions also use fire in
their business. They stated in the petition that the bazaar was smoky because of using
coal, and they even were not being able to walk within the Bazaar. They added that
this condition could trigger a dangerous incident. However, the fez-producers and the
restauranteurs each had four shops within the Bazaar. How these trade groups took the
permit to open the shops was a perplexing issue because it was stated for this case that
these spaces had been controlling. If a trade group applied for the opening of a shop,
the municipal administration detected the probable risks, and hereafter, they could
have a permit.395
Besides, the government had to assign a new place to the sufferer groups in
case of relocations to continue the commercial activities. For example, the Great Fire
394 Grand Bazaar (Çârşû-yı Kebîr) was a significant market area, which is still one of the most popular
touristic places in Istanbul and Turkey. For the works on this symbolic bazaar, see Semavi Eyice,
“Büyük Çarşı”, TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, (v.6), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 1992), pp.
509-513; Kenan Mortan and Önder Küçükerman, Çarşı, Pazar, Ticaret ve Kapalıçarşı, (İstanbul:
Türkiye İş Bankası Kültür Yayınları, 2010); Ayşen Şatıroğlu and Oya Okan, Çarşı-Esnaf Kapalıçarşı,
(İstanbul: İstanbul Ticaret Odası, 2011); Orhan Erdenen, İstanbul Çarşıları ve Kapalıçarşı, (İstanbul:
Yenilik Basımevi, 1965); Yaşar Baş, “İstanbul Kapalıçarşısı (XV.-XVII. Yüzyıl)”, Ph.D. Diss.,
(Atatürk University, 2008); For the description of the interior of this bazaar at the beginning of the
twentieth century, see Théophile Gautier, Constantinople, F.C. De Sumichrast (ed. & translated),
(Cambridge, USA: The Jenson Society, John Wilson and Son, 1901), pp. 83-91.
395 BOA, A.} MKT. MHM. 433/81, 21 N 1286 [25 December 1869].
137
of Keresteciler (timber dealers), which erupted in 1899, caused a lot of work for a long
time because of its big damage. Their shops were burnt, and they demanded the
rebuilding of their manufacturing places. The government planned to build their new
places at the upper part of the Sultaniye meadow, but the timber dealers did not accept
this decision because this region was far from the city center. In contrast with this
reaction, the government decided to locate their shops in separate districts far from the
other residential and commercial areas.396 The state was cautious towards the probable
fire risks that were dangerous both for the related business group and society. In
another example, the scriveners (arzuhalci) and engravers (hakkak) were prevented
from performing their business around New Mosque (Yeni Camii, in Sirkeci) and Fatih
Mosque, which were always favorite districts and places especially for peddlers
because the tents and barracks in the yards of the mosques had the potential for the
spread of fire. Therefore, the rental contract of these trade groups for this area, which
was made so far apart from the makers of prayer beads, the booksellers, and the
scriveners in these courtyards, was abrogated. However, it was stated that certain trade
groups continued to build sheds and barracks in the courtyards of New Mosque and
Fatih Mosque, and the government ordered the removal of these barracks and sheds.
The ones in the courtyard of Fatih Mosque were done, and the rental contracts of the
makers of the prayer beads and scriveners were ordered to be cancelled in 1919.397
Apart from fires, earthquakes also forced the state to relocate shops and
manufacture sites to different areas. The official authorities had to find an alternative
place for traders and manufacturers in case of destruction. The number of demands
increased in big earthquake periods such as 1894. For example, in the case of slipper
sellers, their 15 to 16 shops were destroyed after the Istanbul earthquake in 1894, and
they demanded to do their job in the places such as the courtyard of the Blue Mosque,
the district of Kapalıfırın or the courtyard of Nuruosmaniye Mosque like the
396 BOA, İ.DH. 1187/92915, 28 B 1307 [20 March 1890]; BOA, DH. MKT. 2469/49, 17 Z 1318 [7
April 1901]; BOA, MV. 68/9, 28 RE 1309 [1 November 1891]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1892/128, 24 R 1309
[27 November 1891]. The workplace of timber dealers was asked to move to another area due to fires.
However, the timber dealers did not want to move as their business would be affected by being distant
from the city center of the determined place. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1932/108, 15 Ş 1309 [15 March
1892].
397 BOA, DH. MKT. 2732/85, 16 M 1327 [7 February 1919].
138
upholsterers. The Blue Mosque was chosen as the selling space.398 Another example
for the same year, the second-hand booksellers stated that they suffered from the
earthquake and requested the cupboards that would be placed around Bayezid Mosque.
They referred the permission and the license given to the upholsterers to profess closed
by New Mosque and Blue Mosque. Their demand was accepted as well.399 It seems
that the governments were more moderate after the big earthquakes, and their spatial
rules in the marketplace order became flexible in these periods both because of the
need for urgent solutions and minimizing the losses of the related groups.400
Third, the state replaced the groups or shops that could generate hazard to
public health because of unhygienic and unsafety working conditions, caused smoke
around the marketplace and residential areas or the proximity to the cemeteries. The
removal of hazardous conditions was vital for the order in daily commerce activities.
The public health policies directly forced the locations of the marketplaces to change
in time because the municipal administration and the other responsible state agencies
had to remove the hazardous working conditions that emerged due to the products,
goods or waste that the related field of work left. These precautions resulted in the
relocation of certain industries, groups or shops to different areas, leading to the
fundamental changes in the older spatial order of the marketplace.
One occupational group dominated a certain place, street or bazaar, which can
also be seemed as the centers where the trading groups coming into contact with the
other city dwellers in the classical market order, but the hubs of the commerce
augmented and changed in the course of time which directly determined the local
urban planning of the city. For example, new commerce spaces such as cafes or
theaters emerged with the change in consumption habits. However, the emergence of
new commerce spaces and the translocation of worksites and shops because of the
aforesaid reasons influenced the economic circumstance of the groups and the
398 BOA, BEO. 443/33214, 21 M 1312 [25 July 1894]; BOA, Y. A. HUS. 304/11, 22 M 1312 [26 July
1894].
399 BOA, BEO. 446/33393, 27 M 1312 [31 July 1894].
400 Again in 1894, the other trade groups in Grand Bazaar who were suffered from the earthquake
demanded to establish a new bazaar in Fincancılar descent on the land of Rızapaşa mansion because
their workplaces were damaged physically. Hence, they stated that they were living in misery as they
were not able to work. They aimed to name this new bazaar as the name of the Sultan, Abdülhamid II.
See BOA, BEO. 445/33311, 25 M 1312 [29 July 1894].
139
settlement plans to where the worksites were translocated. This contributed to the
continuity of the unplanned city planning in the imperial capital, and the pragmatic
and requirement-oriented locational interventions shaped the urban fabric. This
chapter will continue with the examination of the public health policies implemented
in the marketplace in detail, which also impacted the spatial distribution of the small
scale trading sectors or groups.
4.3.Public Hygiene in Marketplace
The Ottoman State did not have a systematic, conscious, and planned health
service policy before the nineteenth century as it was in the rest of the world.401 In fact,
some temporary precautions had been taken for the health problems by the state. Yet,
the institutionalization in public health policies began after the second half of the
nineteenth century. The factors that forced the Ottoman government to implement
policies concerning cleaning and public health services were the population density
and movements, the epidemics, the accumulation of knowledge about medicine, the
expansion of the municipal services, the development of supervision practices, the
increase in financial means.402 The Ottoman public health services included protective,
remedial, and rehabilitative stages403 against epidemics and various health problems
with their symptoms, controlling the infrastructure services, especially water supply
networks, and controlling shopping districts which had potential risks to the people’s
health.
In this respect, the space of the marketplace actors became a laboratory to see
the validity and reliability of the Ottoman public health policies since these policies
interested the overwhelming majority of the population, forcing the state to take
precautions and solutions. The governments expanded their efforts to prevent potential
401 Erdem Aydın, “19. Yüzyılda Osmanlı Sağlık Teşkilatlanması”, OTAM, no. XV, (Ankara, 2004), p.
187.
402 Hüseyin Özgür, “Tanzimat’tan Cumhuriyet’e Temizlik ve Halk Sağlığı Hizmetleri”, in Osmanlı, v.5,
(Ankara: Yeni Türkiye Yayınları, 1999), p. 116.
403 Özgür, p. 119.
140
threats to public health like its contemporary states in Europe. Both the public health
protection and the maintenance of production and commerce order were the binary
goal of the Ottoman administration, which also implicitly eased social control.
Therefore, the governments were meticulous concerning the topics, including the
preventive, protective, and solution-oriented attempts in health matters. The
investments, inspections, and measures became unavoidable in public health issues
and city hygiene.404 It had to implement a decision mechanism urgently like in other
calamities, yet it also needed sufficient expert and technical teams.
Public health protection and its official practices in the marketplace directly
influenced the working conditions of the artisans and traders. The Penal Code and
various ordinances and regulations prepared for several craft and trade groups involved
decisions and detailed provisions about the sanitation supervision in the marketplace.
They were collected under two main categories: Sanitation measures for food and
food-related sectors and the others.405 The food and beverages industry included
mainly meat, fish, bread, beverages, dairy, and other products such as fresh fruits,
vegetables, cooked dishes, etc. Other sectors involved barbering, tailoring, bathhouses,
transportation, pharmaceutical and herbalist trade, and the sectors regarding
environmental health included leather trade and tannery, and finally cleaning the
streets and bazaar areas.
The health institutions often were changed in terms of their administrative
structures or names during the nineteenth century because of the unsettled bureaucratic
system in the Ottoman Empire. Nonetheless, their missions and duties did not change
in general. They were charged with the supervision of the marketplace actors, solving
health problems, and taking precautions against society’s probable health problems.
For example, the General Directorate of Health (Sıhhiye Müdüriyet-i Umûmiyesi),
which was established in 1913, was controlling the working areas, following up
practices, and regulating the functions that they carried out. They were checking
404 İsmail Yaşayanlar, “Osmanlı Devleti’nde Kamu Sağlığının Kurumsallaşmasında Koleranın Etkisi”,
in Osmanlı’dan Cumhuriyet’e Salgın Hastalıklar ve Kamu Sağlığı, (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt
Yayınları, 2017), p. 23.
405 It was preferred to use “others” to refer to other professions from a wide range of except for foodrelated
sectors.
141
whether food and drink were hygienic or not by inspections; they were also inspecting
the abattoirs and tanneries whether they were implementing health codes or not; they
were controlling the health conditions of the laborers who were employed in industrial
or agricultural public works institutes as well in mines; they were inspecting whether
the drinking water or other used waters hygienic or not; and whether the hygienic rules
were applying in public areas or not.406
The Ottoman governments’ public health concern was originated from the fact
that epidemic cholera was observed among numerous bargemen, coal dealers, cooks,
butchers, sherbet makers, cabinet makers, muralists, boatmen, blacksmith,
greengrocers, grocers, and so forth between 1893-1894 in Istanbul.407 Thus, it had to
monitor and control the working life of these various groups carefully. The cholera
epidemic accelerated the new arrangements for health affairs in Istanbul. After the
406 Nuran Yıldırım, A History of Healthcare in Istanbul: Health Organizations, Epidemics, Infections
and Disease Control, Preventive Health Institutions, Hospitals, Medical Education, (İstanbul: Avrupa
Kültür Başkenti Ajansı, 2010), pp. 35-37. The Ottoman public health policy covers details but in this
study only its intersection with the trade and manufacturing groups will be examined. Many cases
demonstrate that the municipal administrations warned the responsible artisans and traders frequently
in case of violating the rules. For a detailed information on the Ottoman public health policies, see
Nusret H. Fişek, Halk Sağlığına Giriş, (Ankara: Hacettepe Üniversitesi Dünya Sağlık Örgütü Hizmet
Araştırma ve Araştırıcı Yetiştirme Merkezi Yayını, 1983); Orhan Demirhindi, “Halk Sağlığı-I”, in
Dünya’da ve Türkiye’de 1850 Yılından Sonra Tıp Dallarındaki İlerlemenin Tarihi, Ekrem Kadri Unat
(ed.), (İstanbul: Cerrahpaşa Tıp Fakültesi Vakfı Yayını, 1988); Erdem Aydın, “19. Yüzyılda Osmanlı’da
Sağlık Teşkilatlanması”, OTAM, n. 15, 2004, pp. 185-207; Nuran Yıldırım, A History of Healthcare in
Istanbul: Health Organizations, Epidemics, Infections and Disease Control, Preventive Health
Institutions, Hospitals, Medical Education, (İstanbul: Avrupa Kültür Başkenti Ajansı, 2010); Nuran
Yıldırım, 14. Yüzyıldan Cumhuriyet’e Hastalıklar, Hastaneler, Kurumlar: Sağlık Tarihi Yazıları 1,
(İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 2014); Burcu Kurt & İsmail Yaşayanlar, Osmanlı’dan
Cumhuriyet’e Salgın Hastalıklar ve Kamu Sağlığı, (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 2017). For a
literature work on the Ottoman Health Organization in the nineteenth century, see Necati Çavdar and
Erol Karcı, “XIX. Yüzyıl Osmanlı Sağlık Teşkilatlanması’na Dair Bibliyografik Bir Deneme”, Turkish
Studies, v. 9/4 Spring, 2014, pp. 255-286. The modernization and professionalization of the Ottoman
medicine and the issues related to the public health policies should be examined by considering the
history of medicine and the public health history in the world, directly related to this study’s topic. The
public health issue has an international aspect as well. For the public health history and policies for
public health in the world, see C. Fraser Brockington, “The History of Public Health”, in The Theory
and Practice of Public Health, W. Hobson (ed.), (London: Oxford University Press, 1975); Ann F. La
Berge, Mission and Method: The Early nineteenth-century French public health movement,
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992); Dorothy Porter, Health, Civilization and the State,
(London: Routledge, 1999); Alison Bashford, Imperial Hygiene: A Critical History of Colonialism,
Nationalism and Public Health, (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004); Alfred Jay Bollet, Plauges &
Poxes: The Impact of Human History on Epidemic Disease, (New York: Demos Medical Publishing,
2004); Michele L. Clouse, Medicine, Government and Public Health in Philip II’s Spain, (Great Britain:
Ashgate, 2011).
407 Mesut Ayar, Osmanlı Devleti’nde Kolera: İstanbul Örneği (1892-1895), (İstanbul: Kitabevi, 2007),
p. 209.
142
broke out of this epidemic in 1893, the Municipal Public Hygiene Commission
(Şehremâneti Hıfzısıhha-i Umûmiye Komisyonu) was established in 1894.408 The
Municipal Public Hygiene Commission and the General Inspectorship of the Health
Commissions (Heyet-i Sıhhiye Müfettiş-i Umûmiliği) were to work under the direction
of the mayor, and every municipal department had to have one health commission.
The Public Hygiene Commission was the nucleus of the Municipality health
organization, and the Health Commissions (Heyet-i Sıhhiye) were established in the
municipal districts (belediye dairesi).409 In the 3rd Article of the duties of the Health
Commission, which was employed in Dersaâdet, Üsküdar, Beyoğlu, and Beşiktaş
promulgated in 1893, it was stated that the Municipality’s physicians were in charge
of carrying out the operations about the epidemic spreading risk and the removal of
bad and healthy working conditions in coffee houses, tavern, butchers, grocers,
greengrocers, inns and rooms for singles, and casino, which office were they belonged.
If they could detect an unhealthy situation, they had to convey the case to the
Directorate and take some measures such as the suspension of production and arraying
the physical conditions of the manufacturing places or shops.410 With an edict after the
epidemic, the municipal physicians became the official municipal officers in 1895. All
health care professionals were appointed to the Municipality, and the municipal
administration carried out what the ministry considered appropriate and necessary.411
However, the Municipal Public Health Commission was abolished after the
declaration of the Constitution in 1908 because the number of its members and their
salaries were higher than necessary. Then, the Municipal Health Administration
(Şehremâneti İdare-i Sıhhiye Şubesi) was established in place of the previous
commission in March 1909.412 It was responsible for all health matters as well as
408 Yıldırım, A History of Healthcare in Istanbul, p. 85.
409 Oktay, p. 182.
410 This ordinance was valid until 1909. See Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 6, p. 3157.
411 Osman Nuri Ergin, Cumhuriyet ve İstanbul Mahalli İdaresi, (İstanbul: Matbaacılık ve Neşriyat Türk
Anonim Şirketi, 1933), p. 56.
412 The Ottoman Sultan Abdülhamid II ordered to establish a permanent commission to control and
inspect the public health in Istanbul. Thus, the Central Commission of Public Hygiene (Hıfzısıhha-i
Umûmi Merkez Komisyonu) was established to inspect the public health in the capital and surrounding
143
public health in Istanbul. The municipal physicians were inspecting markets, shops,
and the goods on sale, food and beverages on sale, bakeries, restaurants, coffee shops,
cook shops, butchers and diaries, grocers, bars, casinos, tripe, and lamb-trotter shops.
In addition to these places, the municipal physicians were also in charge of inspecting
the wool-producing shops, carders, leather dealers, upholsterers, and also quilt-makers
to know whether they were infected or not. The municipal physicians had a pivotal
role in controlling public places such as brothels, baths, inns, and hotels as well. Many
ordinances and regulations issued the public health policies prioritized the marketplace
supervision in various occupations.413 The controls in the marketplace covered the
issues of the opening of the shops, production, and service processes. If there was a
complaint from the city-dwellers or any problem and favorableness were realized, the
responsible individuals were ordered to correct the bad situation. After a few warnings,
the workplaces could be closed. Producers, artisans, and peddlers were examined by
the medical staff of the Municipality as well.
The Ordinance of the General Public Hygiene Commission (Hıfz-ı Sıhhat-i
Umûmiyye Komisyonu Talimâtı) of 1885 was revised in 1910, and a new one was
prepared for the physicians employed in the Municipality. Medical doctors in every
department had to inspect the bazaar every morning or evening to control food and
beverages; detect the spoilt or rotten products, which were dangerous to the public
health, and annihilate or throw them to the sea. They had to resort to the related
department with a report, including a to-do list, to implement them (Article 31st). The
physicians had to send the samples taken from the products to the laboratory if they
thought that a product in question was unhealthy. The health officers had to halt the
areas and take measurements in case of epidemics and other public health problems. See Yıldırım, A
History of Healthcare in Istanbul, pp. 43-44.
413 For example, in the Ordinance of the General Public Hygiene Commission (Hıfz-ı Sıhhat-i Umûmiyye
Komisyonu Talimâtı) in 1885, it was stated in the first article that the commission was established to
inspect food, beverages, and pharmaceuticals and to prevent the sale of hazardous things. According to
the 6th Article, the shops of attar and root dispensers had to be inspected by the inspectors whether they
have harmful herbals or drugs. The 7th Article was stated that the shops where food and beverages,
including such oils as olive oils, butter, plain butter or tallow, were produced had to be inspected. The
sanitation rules for slaughterhouse (selhhâne) and butchers were added to the 8th Article, and it was
ordered that these shops had to be clean and free of fly and dust; the control of these shops had to be
made if they include spoilt and rotten meat and dry salted fish; and the products such as pastrami,
soudjouk and jambon made of this rotten meat had to be confiscated by the Municipal officers after the
inspection of the Hygiene Commission. See Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 6, pp. 3090-3091.
144
sale of the products until the results of the report could come. The shop owner or
vendors had to pay the test fee (Article 32nd).414
For example, the health committee inspected the shops in Beşiktaş and around
it in 1907. They prepared a report that included the wrongdoings as a precaution
against the unsanitary conditions. It was stated that the saloon keeper Yamandi in
Köyiçi and the other saloon keeper Koço were warned about the dirty cases in their
saloons to replace them with the clean ones; the tripe restaurant of Yani in Tramway
street and the other tripe restaurant at Büyükdere Street in Şişli were warned to clean
their shops; the grocer Yuan in Nişantaşı and the other grocer Nikoli in Kağıthane
street were warned to clean the inner of their shops and counters; the grocer Vasil in
Ihlamurdere street at Beşiktaş and the grocer Vangel in Haseki field were warned to
clean the spilt coffees and the inner side of their shops, and the disposing of spilt
coffee; groups of people including a child were treated due to the communicable
disease, and it was stated that their treatment was taken under control; and finally the
tramway and the passenger cars, boats, sandals, and bathhouses had to be inspected
for sanitation.415 The sanitary supervision in the marketplace and bazaar was so
detailed and versatile. They were conducted by both the health officers and law
enforcers, including police and the municipal police. It was the last period that the
professional health officers made inspections in commercial areas. They left them to
the law enforcers, and they withdrew to the laboratories and analysis centers after that
time.
However, although this system relatively worked well, the Municipal Health
Administration was abolished by the order of Cemil Topuzlu, who was the mayor in
that period, in October 1912 due to the financial difficulties. Then, the Municipal
Health Directorate (Şehremâneti Sıhhiye Müdüriyeti) was established as a part of
Article 4 of the “Law on Istanbul Municipality Health Organization” (Dersaâdet
Teşkilat-ı Belediye Kanunu).416 The protective health services were detailed in 1916,
and the duties of the health officers were pointed out as the controlling food and their
414 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 6, pp. 3163-3164.
415 BOA, Y. PRK. SH. 7/38, 9 RE 1325 [22 April 1907].
416 Yıldırım, A History of Healthcare in Istanbul, pp. 45-47.
145
inspections with the necessary tests417; the inspections of the milk-giving animals; the
control of the animals that provide meat and its sale conditions; the vaccination; the
control of public spaces such as hotels, inns, restaurants; the control of workplaces and
factories, and the elimination of the harmful factors within them, as well as the
inspection of water channels, and water-related professions.418 The Municipal Health
Directorate structure remained the same until the end of the empire that included the
departments such as veterinary, laboratories, disinfection stationaries, and public
hygiene department.419
The institutional transformation of the health department of the Municipality
shows the unsettled structure in the practice of public health policies, but indicates that
the artisans and traders lost their initiatives in health supervision affairs as it was in
previous periods. The controls became more professionalized and centralized, which
were far away from traditional supervision practices. This changed the reactions and
the problem-solving practices of artisans and traders as well.
4.3.1. Food and Food-related Sectors
Food spoilage or the potentiality of having germs and harmful bacteria in food
products were the major factors that always threatened public health. For this reason,
the supervision of the production, storage, and sale of foodstuff had a vital importance
for the producers, vendors, and the whole society. Due to the incognizance of germs
and the other microorganisms, the state’s inspection method was only the controlling
producers or sellers whether they sold fraudulent food products or not. Yet after the
development in germ research, which proved that they were the reasons for the
contagious diseases, the test of foodstuff and the inspection of the employees were
417 The Administrative Office of Laboratory carried out these tests. See Oktay, p. 191.
418 Oktay, p. 185. For further information on the affiliated councils, commissions, and institutions of the
Municipal Health Directorate and the specific duties, the municipal district’s duties and health
commissions, salaries, duties, meetings, and decisions that the Directorate operated, see Tarkan Oktay’s
work.
419 Yıldırım, A History of Healthcare in Istanbul, p. 45.
146
gained importance. The prevention of contagious diseases that could infect via food
was only possible by controlling all kinds of food.420
The state kept a tight grip on the food and beverages sector and tried to strictly
protect the hygiene of the foodstuffs. Vegetables and fruits, bread, milk and milk
products along with meat and meat products, which were potential hatchery for
microbes and harmful bacteria, cooked dishes, and the other perishable products such
as coffee or candies had to be under the municipal administration’s control, and the
unhealthy conditions had to be removed because these sectors directly had potential to
influence people’s health; in other words, contagious diseases and epidemics were
spreading with them most. Therefore, the municipal administration tried to systematize
the controls, bans, and warnings at shopping districts to maintain healthy conditions.
The Municipal Police Ordinance (Zâbıta-i Belediye Talimatnâmesi), which
was prepared in 1913, included the articles about artisans, producers, and peddlers,
specifically the sanitation of the manufacturing places and shops.421 All members of
artisans and traders were obliged to obey the rules containing the cleaning of the
interiors of the shops, cleaning of the apparatus used, the products on sale, and the
cleaning of the attires of the employees working in the shops.422 The use of a sneeze
guard (camekan) to protect food and beverages from contamination was intensively
emphasized in all ordinances. For example, in the 5th Article of the 1913 ordinance, it
was stated that the grocers, tripe restaurants, greengrocers, bakeries, sherbet sellers,
halva, and milk sellers had to possess sneeze guard within their shops and the dishes
such as kebab, fish or meatballs had to be cooked in these sneeze guards. Meat
products had to be kept within the shops. This rule was valid for the peddlers as well.
420 Nuran Yıldırım, “Osmanlı Devleti’nde Gıda Kontrolüne Bakış”, in 14. Yüzyıldan Cumhuriyet’e
Hastalıklar, Hastaneler, Kurumlar: Sağlık Tarihi Yazıları 1, (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları,
2014), pp. 54-55.
421 Osman Nuri Ergin reminds to the readers that this ordinance was not applied until 1917 by the Police
Directorate. After the abolition of the Ottoman Sultanate, the police and the municipal police were again
separated. See Osman Nuri Ergin, Muhtasar Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediye, (İstanbul: İBB Kültür A.Ş.
Yayınları, 2017), p. 212.
422 For example, it was ordered to the milk sellers, the sellers of milk dishes (muhallebici), sherbet
(şerbet) makers, and water sellers to keep clean all kinds of cases, glasses, benchtop, swabs, spoon, and
fork. The interior and exterior of their shops had to be clean and tidy. These rules were not included in
the 1913 Ordinance. See Ergin, Muhtasar Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediye, pp. 238-239.
147
The sale of spoilt and rotten food and beverages on the streets and in the workplaces
was forbidden, and the responsible municipalities had to be informed (Article 15th).423
This ordinance was the prominent one that stated the detailed rules about sanitation in
food manufacturing and sale.424 All rules, measurements, and prohibitions were
naturally the obligations for maintaining individual and public health. But such new
practices as health testimonials or the prohibition of coloring-adulteration practices
came into the agenda of the municipal administrations and the marketplace actors in
this period. It shows the changing practices in food-related sectors and the necessity
to follow up potential harmful acts to the people’s health. Artisan and trader groups
faced new practices that had a transforming impact on their working conditions and
their relationship with the administration centers.
An ordinance named Esnafın Riayete Mecbur Olduğu Evamir-i Belediye
Hakkında Talimat was also prepared for the food and beverage producers and sellers
in Istanbul in 1919, which can be regarded as an amended or epitomized version of the
previous ordinance implemented in 1913. The ordinance contains various production
and retail groups, namely bakers,425 grocers, fruit sellers, cow breeders (inekçi),
milkman, the umûm şeridçi and water sellers,426 keeper of coffee houses, restauranteur,
423 The Municipality banned the sale of raw and bad fruit and vegetables, which were hazardous to the
people’s health, and it overemphasized obeying the sanitation rules. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1847/107,
29 ZA 1308 [6 July 1891]; Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1817-1830.
424 The ordinance about the keeper of coffeehouses, pastry sellers, the candle makers, çörek makers (a
kind of sweet or salty pastry), and halva makers was composed of the articles issuing the cleaning
conditions of the inner shops, specifically the place where the customers were hosted and the hygiene
of the cuisine including the kitchen utensils (clean or sturdy cups, clean swabs, clean cases with faucets);
and employees (wearing an apron); the chairs or seat within the shops; and lastly the fines (1 to 3 liras
and also prison sentence) which had to be paid. See Ergin, Muhtasar Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediye, pp.
239-240. Articles from 7 to 13 were assigned to the hygiene of the pickle makers working in the shops
and the itinerant ones. See Ergin, Muhtasar Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediye, pp. 231-232.
425 The bakers had a vital position in the marketplace because they provided one of the basic
consumption products, bread, to society. The physical conditions of the bakeries were detailed in the
ordinance. See Ergin, Muhtasar Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediye, pp. 192-199. The structure rules and the
interior and exterior of bakeries, and the utensil cleaning were repeated in the 1919 Ordinance. See
Esnafın Riayete Mecbur Olduğu Evamir-i Belediye Hakkında Talimat, (İstanbul: Matbaa-i Osmaniye,
1335 [1919]), pp. 3-4.
426 The umûm şeridçi and water sellers had to use clean and single use unbroken glasses, wear aprons
neatly, and their shops with their sneeze guards had to be clean. See Esnafın Riayete Mecbur Olduğu
Evamir-i Belediye Hakkında Talimat, p. 7.
148
kebab-makers, cooks, tripery,427 pasta makers, candy makers, çörek makers, halva
makers, butchers, the sellers of milk dishes, vegetable and meat sellers, and
fishmongers.428 The requirements for licenses, the transportation of the products, the
rules in working life, and fines in case of rule violations were added to this copy as
well. It touches on the orders of the Municipality about cleanliness (nezafet and
taharet) that people who produce and sell food-beverages had to obey.429 The
emphasis on the hygienic exhibition of the products within the shops was also valid
for all professional groups in the food and beverages industry.430
Food and beverage shops were under the Municipality’s control, particularly
those in the most populous areas.431 Others, which were closer to the government
427 The musts of the restauranteurs, kebab-makers, cooks, and tripe restaurants were similar to the musts
of the other trade groups, and they included the use of sneeze guards, blanching of the used cases,
cleaning of the kitchen utensils, wearing aprons, the ban of cooking kebab or the other dishes out of
shops, places of the chairs, seats, water closet, and the fines when not obeying the rules. See Ergin,
Muhtasar Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediye, pp. 234-235. The tripe shops had high risks for unhygienic
conditions. For example, the tripe and trotter soup makers around Unkapanı at Halilattar neighborhood
were found dangerous against public health. See BOA, DH. MKT. 138/7, 13 RE 1311 [24 September
1893].
428 A list of articles was prepared for the butchers, vegetable sellers, and fishmongers, and they were
gathered under the same part. See Ergin, Muhtasar Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediye, pp. 235-236. In the list
of 1919, the rules for the butchers, vegetable sellers, and meat sellers were the same. A rule added for
the fishmongers ordered that they were not able to use foul seawater for fish. See Esnafın Riayete
Mecbur Olduğu Evamir-i Belediye Hakkında Talimat, pp. 9, 11.
429 See Esnafın Riayete Mecbur Olduğu Evamir-i Belediye Hakkında Talimat, (İstanbul: Matbaa-i
Osmaniye, 1335 [1919]). Osman Nuri Ergin states that an ordinance (1335) was prepared for the groups
in the food and beverages industry who behaved arbitrarily during the war period. He referred most
probably to this ordinance because the articles for all professions were nearly the same as those
promulgated in 1913 as part of The Municipal Police Ordinance (Zâbıta-i Belediye Talimatnâmesi), and
this was also about the controls of the municipal police in the aforesaid production and sale fields. See
Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 2, p. 899. Certain small changes existed in this revision. The
list of orders was tantamount to the arrangement of 1919. The articles were overlapped with the other
arrangements. The detailing in the ordinances indicates the increasing need in sanitary controls.
430 The butchers were significant seller groups since they provided one of the basic consumption food
too. In addition to the previous arrangement, the administration prepared a separate part for the butchers
working in the shops, booths, and itinerant ones. The part related to the butchers was in detail since it
had high risks in terms of public health, both causing by the animals and the shops’ unhygienic
conditions. The rules for itinerant butchers were nearly the same as the butcher shops. They had to be
careful about cleaning the countertops, and the billet of the wood and the cabinet they used had to be
clean. The butcher shops in booths had to obey the ordinance of the Municipality like the other butcher
groups. They had to be master to do this job, and they could not work outside. See Ergin, Muhtasar
Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediye, pp. 227-230.
431 The coffeehouses located between Postahâne-i Âmire and Şişhâne and the shops of sherbet and
kebab makers at the squares of Köprübaşı and Bayezid were closed because of being anomalous to the
principles of the Municipality which had been renting to these groups every year. See BOA, A.}
MKT.MHM. 453/43, 2 RA 1290 [30 April 1873].
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buildings, were exposed to a higher level of supervision as well. Supervision was
carried out according to the prepared ordinances and the arrangements, but practice
failures were probable. All specific and detailed rules were added into the ordinances
because the high risk of contagious diseases and the producers and employees were
probably violating the cleaning rules in the workplaces. Contagious diseases entailed
strict and urgent precautions in the marketplace. Certain workplaces had risks
regarding their physical conditions; on the other hand, certain professions had
sanitation risks in terms of goods and products. The state prepared the ordinances
according to both reasons. Bakery, for example, was critical in terms of both ways. A
bakery shop had a risk of the outbreak of fire due to the production process, including
fire. Also, hygiene was crucial in bread production as it had the risk of selling spoilt
dough or the epidemics spread via bakery employees.
The municipalities were also responsible for being in contact with the
embassies for the foreign artisans or sellers trading in the Ottoman Empire. The
problems concerning them and their shops were solved through the Embassy’s
medium. It had a critical role in solving hygiene problems that occurred in the
marketplace. In an example dated 1890, it was notified that there were stinky bacon
and salted intestine in a special part at the shop of a French butcher close by Beyoğlu
Tunnel. They stank, and it adversely influenced public health and also discomforted
the other trade groups. This problem was reported to the French Embassy, and these
food products were immediately removed.432
The public health policies included the control measures and the disallowance.
In the case of water carriers (saka) in 1911, İbrahim as the spokesman of Erenköy,
Göztepe, and Kadıköy water carriers petitioned to the Grand Vizier office, and he
demanded the exemption from the stamp tax. They added that the government did not
permit them to practice their profession. However, the official certificate taken from
the 18th municipality of Istanbul reveals the lowdown of the issue. It was stated that
the water carriers jeopardized public health by selling foul water as if it was Kayın
mountain water to get rid of the stamp tax. Therefore, the sale of non-stamp water and
the disallowance decision was reported to the Police. The 17th municipality prepared
432 BOA, HR.TH. 104/19, 9 R 1308 [22 November 1890].
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a dictum about the spring water protection and providing unused water to the people
in the borderlines of its administrative zone, which aimed to prevent the abuses of the
water carriers. The practice of the procedure was obligatory for the municipalities
because it was a critical step in protecting public health.433
The closure was also carried out as the other policy for preventing the
unhygienic conditions of the shops and manufacturing places. In the case of starchproducers
at Silivrikapı in 1890, the inspectors of the Health Commission closed Raşid
Ağa’s shop due to the poor conditions, but he demanded the opening of the shop
again.434 The government permitted to reopen the shop only if the inspection of it
would be carried out again. On the other hand, he wanted to continue working in
another shop in the Hacı Kadın neighborhood, but it was not accepted. The government
stated that the shop at Hacı Kadın was harmful to people’s health.435 In general, Tavuk
Pazarı, as a lively trading area, came into prominence with closures in this period.436
In a case in 1891, Zeliha Hanım, who was the tenant of the liver seller shop in Emin
Bey neighborhood at Bayezid, complained that her shop was closed due to its
unsanitary conditions, but she claimed that the similar shops at Tavuk Pazarı and
Aksaray were open, and she demanded a permit of the opening of her shop too. The
health inspectors again controlled her shop, and it was stated that this shop did not
possess necessary sanitary conditions, so the permit could not be given.437 In the case
again in 1891, ten slaughter houses (selhhâne), a trotter shop in Tavuk Pazarı, and a
butcher at the opposite side of Valide Mosque at Aksaray were inspected, and the
report stressed the unsanitary conditions of the shops and the obligation of closing of
these shops. This report was sent to the Municipality. It was stated that the shops in
the most crowded districts of the city, such as Tavuk Pazarı and Aksaray, would not
be open even one day. The reason for omission in this issue was questioned. This could
433 BOA, DH. İD. 41/10, 23 M 1329 [24 January 1911].
434 Silivrikapı is a neighborhood at Fatih.
435 BOA, DH. MKT. 1795/52, 13 CA 1308 [25 December 1890].
436 Tavuk Pazarı is a street at Fatih.
437 BOA, DH. MKT. 1813/18, 17 B 1308 [26 February 1891]. The liver seller’s shop of the butcher
Süleyman Ağa in Tahtakale was closed due to its damage to the environment that arose from the
ventilation deficiency. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2138/48, 9 B 1316 [23 November 1898]; BOA, DH. MKT.
2161/41, 6 N 1316 [18 January 1899]; For a liver seller photograph, see Figure 5.
151
endanger the public health and lead to abuses like in the complaint of Zeliha Hanım.
The Municipality ordered the close of these shops following the report of the health
inspectors, and it questioned the delay of the practice of the decision.438 In another
case, the trotter soup maker shop in Haznedar Inn (Haznedar Han) at Tavuk Pazarı
was also closed in 1892 because of effluvia.439
Adulteration (tağşiş) and coloring (telvin) were the other two significant issues
in food manufacturing and sale. The use of halal ingredients within food and beverages
was one of the prominent concerns in the supervision procedure. Ingredients had to be
coherent according to the Islamic law and riskless to public health. The Municipality
and the municipal police were making controls in consideration of these criteria
mostly. In the case of candy makers who were located at Balıkpazarı, Eminönü, and
the old Police station in 1901, they used harmful materials within their candies.
Inspectorship of Public Hygiene gave a report about the dyes and harmful yellow dyes
used for candies, which were hazardous to the people’s health. It was stated that a nonbotanical
material was found within them. The Municipality banned selling these
candies, and it initiated a legal proceeding against this rule violation.440 In the other
case of pasta (makarna) makers in 1907, it was stated that dyes used for coloring
(telvin) pasta were not allowed, so a notification had to be sent from the embassies to
the traders and pasta makers in Dersaâdet that they belonged and their citizenship had
to be detected.441 The control of the foreign and hazardous substances in certain
products was the duty of the health officers. For example, the pickle makers (turşucu)
complained the vinegar producers (sirkeci) in 1890 that vinegar was made of spirit,
which was seriously hazardous to the people’s health. It was stated that if they
continued to produce vinegar containing this dangerous material, they would not be
allowed to produce and sell them. The test which would be carried out by the Medical
School (Tıbbiye) determined whether they could produce and sell or not.442 It is
438 BOA, DH. MKT. 1813/18, 17 B 1308 [26 February 1891].
439 BOA, DH. MKT. 1987/14, 20 M 1310 [14 August 1892].
440 BOA, DH. MKT. 2559/121, 10 Ş 1319 [22 November 1901].
441 BOA, BEO. 3028/227028, 24 S 1325 [8 April 1907]; BOA, BEO. 3080/230951, 7 CA 1325 [18 June
1907].
442 BOA, DH. MKT. 1781/69, 1 R 1308 [15 November 1890].
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unknown that why this problem lasted two years, but the vinegar producers wrote a
petition to the Imperial Military Schools (Mekatib-i Askeriye-i Şahane) and stated that
the state banned to produce and sell vinegar as they included harmful materials.
Therefore, they were aggrieved for this reason. They demanded the allowance for
selling vinegar from the government after the necessary test.443 The vinegar producers
were not allowed to produce and sell for two years. It was forbidden to sell vinegar
before the test, yet it is uncertain whether they could send all samples to the Medical
Ministry or not. Obviously, the rules regarding the people’s health were sine qua non
for everyone in the marketplace.444 This example also shows that supervision was
conducted with more scientific ways and methods.
The number of new producers and sellers increased in number after the
abolition of the gedik system in the Ottoman bazaar, and this forced the governments
to take more measures in food production. In the record of tahini halva (tahin helvası)
makers in 1918, individuals who were not masters produced halva, which was not
similar to common halva in terms of taste and color. Pieces of halva were brought to
the Municipality’s chemistry laboratory, and 198 were determined as healthy and
ordinary, 31 of them included soil, and 60 of them contained white lead and zinc.
These individuals took halva, not from masters belonged to Kastamonu, but from the
individuals who newly began to produce. The candy makers İsak at Tahmis street,
Nomiko at Galata Mumhane street, Avram at candy factory, and his partners did this
way. Halva, including soil, had been whitened by them. However, white lead was
poison, so it endangered public health. Therefore, they would be sentenced to penal
servitude on the galleys from three to ten years, individuals who only added soil into
halva would receive imprisonment with three months to three years, and the producers
who could incline to violate the rule, they would be divulged in the newspapers and
443 BOA, DH. MKT. 2012/10, 27 RA 1310 [19 October 1892].
444 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 8, pp. 4482-4483. In another example for the vinegar
producers in 1899, vinegar that Haci Yorgi in Çukurtürbe street and Lambo in Boyacı street around
Eğrikapı produced, was seized after the examination. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2197/98, 25 Z 1316 [6 May
1899].
153
the state would hang a plate that they broke the law henceforth accordingly to the 194th
Article of Penal Code.445
The health reports (tabip şehâdetnâmesi/sıhhat şehâdetnâmesi) were
compulsory documents for proving the wellness of the employees, and a memoranda
(layiha) was prepared for the taking procedure of the testimonial. This 7-Article report
included details about the health testimonials. The workers working at public and
private spaces, the makers of cake, candy, milk dishes, boza, halva, pancake, pickle,
and the grocers, butchers, water sellers, and the other food and beverage sellers,
greengrocers, journeyman, apprentices, and servants working in barbers, bakery,
bathhouses, hotels, tavern, casino, beerhouses, eating house and coffeehouses, the
women servants and childminders had to bring the health testimonials semi-annually
to the municipalities that they belonged. The Municipality’s physicians or any
physician could examine them and give a report to these employees. The testimonials
had to include the names of the employees, their occupations, their fathers’ names,
their hometowns, the health reports for information about the patients and their
diseases with the name of the physicians and dates of the reports. The testimonials and
documents had to be approved by the General Directorate of Health. The portrayals of
the employees also had to be included in these testimonials. The diseased individuals
had to give up their occupations, and the guild wardens had to inform the
municipalities about them. After the treatment, they had to send their new reports to
the municipalities. The foreigners had to be recorded in the consulates. The
Municipality had to prepare two different record books that contained these reports
and documents. The Esnaf Office and the Office of Passport had to arrange their
records. If the members of the trade and artisan groups did not bring these reports, they
would be fined with one Ottoman gold; if they used the others’ testimonials, they
would be fined with a huge amount of liras; and if a physician did not act according
to the code, he would be fined with five Ottoman gold, and all these abuses would be
divulged in newspapers. These groups had to pay 15 kuruş one-off and 5 kuruş for
every physician examination. If a suspicion could occur about the health condition of
445 “Ceza kanunnâme-i hümâyûnu”, 28 Z 1274 [8 August 1858]; Düstur, I/1, pp. 578-579; Ergin,
Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 8, pp. 4491-4492.
154
any employee, they had to be re-examined by the Municipality’s physicians, and the
inspection would be carried out about this issue.446
Although the health certificate system was not systemized in working life, the
Municipality controlled the groups, especially those working in the risky production
and service fields. For example, with an offer from İbrahim Romano, well-experienced
pharmacist of Dârülaceze (Almshouse), it was ordered that the cooks, the pastry cooks,
the candle makers, the lemonade makers, and the suchlike groups who serviced in the
food-beverage sector and their apprentices with journeymen in Istanbul and Beyoğlu
had to have the health testimonial (şehadetnâme) to take precautions against
contagious diseases such as with pox or tuberculosis. The health committee and the
health inspectors had to examine the employees whether they were infected with pox
or tuberculous or not. If they were not ill, the Municipality could certify them and
allow them to work. They had to pay one mecidi in return for this certificate. If the
masters employed sufferer journeyman or apprentices, they had to be imposed a fine.
On the other hand, if it was revealed that they were ill, the municipal administration
could not let them work. However, this rule caused the loss of jobs and income for the
infected employees. But the infected people had a chance to be treated in the poor
hospitals (fukara hastanesi) of Istanbul free of charge till they could get better.
Meanwhile, there appeared another problem since the capacity and condition of the
hospital were not enough for the treatment of sick people, and the hospitals could not
accept them.447
These cases demonstrate that the municipal administrations gave importance
to the protection of public health. They implemented necessary decisions to prevent
probable misconducts in food manufacturing and trading. Obviously, the frauds and
omissions happened more than the ones reflected in the official records. These
responsibilities generally belonged to the guilds themselves and the Ministry of the
Marketplace until the second half of the nineteenth century. Then, the Municipality
took responsibility in marketplace supervision. Moreover, the supervision methods
446 BOA, ŞD. 808/14, 7 C 1319 [21 September 1901].
447 BOA, DH. MKT. 2370/66, 10 RA 1318 [8 July 1900]; Yıldırım, “Osmanlı Devleti’nde Gıda
Kontrolüne Bakış”, pp. 62-63.
155
became more scientific with the establishment of new laboratories for tests. The
change of authority in controls and supervision methods forced the groups to adapt
themselves to this new administrative order that prioritized public health. On the other
hand, their responsibility in the supervision of the commercial activities and hubs
tailed off in this period.
4.3.2. Other Sectors
Such professionals as pharmacist, bathhouse dealer (Turkish bath), barber,
tailor, porter, leather dealers, and the ones in the transportation sector including
boatmen, oarsmen (kayıkçı), lightermen, passenger car, and carters faced the
precautions and supervision for public health as well. Among other professions, the
governments prepared ordinances and regulations mostly for the herbalists and the
pharmacists since the goods they sold directly influenced people’s health. They were
the representatives of the health services in the marketplace and bazaars. Therefore,
the Ottoman administration prepared new arrangements for pharmacy, drug
production, and its sale, which were coherent with the developing medical science in
that period. The first ordinance of pharmaceutics448 goes back to June 1852 prepared
by the Council of Health (Meclis-i Tıbbiye) called Regulations Concerning
Pharmacists in the Ottoman State (Nizamnâme-i Eczacıyan Der Memâlik-i Osmaniye).
According to this regulation, it was ordered the individuals not to sell any drug,
ointment or cataplasm instead of pharmacies. It was banned to sell drugs to the physics,
surgeons, and certain pure water sellers (Article 17th). The prohibition of selling drugs
was a crucial attempt in protecting public health. Before this regulation, many
professional groups such as barber, halva makers, soap makers, coffee shop owners,
and furrier were selling drugs to the people. Individuals were hazardously damaged by
448 Pharmacy was the new profession, which developed in this period. The detailed information about
the history of Turkish pharmacy, see A. Süheyl Ünver, Osmanlı Türklerinde Hekimlik ve Eczacılık
Tarihi Hakkında, (İstanbul: İstanbul Hüsnütabiat Basımevi, 1952); Naşid Baylav, Eczacılık Tarihi,
(İstanbul: Yörük Matbaası, 1968); Bedi N. Şehsuvaroğlu, Eczacılık Tarihi Dersleri, (İstanbul: İstanbul
Üniversitesi Eczacılık Fakültesi Yayınları, 1970); Turhan Baytop, Türk Eczacılık Tarihi, (İstanbul:
İstanbul Üniversitesi Yayınları, 1985); Turhan Baytop, Eczahaneden Eczaneye: Türkiye’de Eczaneler
ve Eczacılar (1800-1923), (Bayer Türk Sağlık Ürünleri, 1995); İzzet Kumbaracılar, Eczacılık tarihi ve
İstanbul Eczahaneleri, (İstanbul: Çelik Gülersoy Vakfı, 1988).
156
these drugs or were killed.449 An ordinance was required for pharmacists because they
could kill people at short notice to whom they provided drugs. Therefore, the state had
to prevent the unfavorable conditions of the detrimental drugs in sale with the
necessary inspections. However, it was not so efficient in practice, and a new
regulation was implemented in 1861.450 The professionals were distinguished from the
shopkeepers as the latter did not have a diploma to do this job. In the Regulation for
Attar and Herbals, there were given a list of 68 hazardous substances which were
forbidden to sell.451 However, certain foreign perfumers and herbalists (attar) in
Dersaadet and Bilâd-ı Selâse fought with the inspectors of the Health Ministry, and
they continued to sell unhealthy medical products. Meanwhile, the problems
concerning the foreigner trade groups were solved via the Embassies, so the related
embassies were warned about this issue. The inspectors demanded help from the police
to complete their duty without a problem. The members of the trade groups had to take
a permit from the Municipality and local governments in the provinces; a register book
had to be kept, which included their licenses, and this book had to be sent to the
Ministry of Health. But they were not sent to the Ministry in this case.452 Because of
449 Nuran Yıldırım, “Osmanlı Eczacılığının Gelişme Sürecinde İlaç Hazırlayıp Satan Esnaf ve
Sağlıkçılar”, Osmanlı Bilimi Araştırmaları, v. 11, n.1-2, (Ocak, 2010), pp. 275-277.
450 Yıldırım, “Osmanlı Eczacılığının Gelişme Sürecinde İlaç Hazırlayıp Satan Esnaf ve Sağlıkçılar”, pp.
276-277; The Regulation for Civilian Pharmacists (Beledî İspençiyarlık Sanatının İcrâsına Dair
Nizamnâme) regulated and professionalized the pharmacy. This regulation clarified the principles of
pharmacy and included information about pharmacists, their duties and responsibilities, the importance
of diploma approved by the Imperial School of Medicine (Mekteb-i Tıbbiye-i Şahane), the apprentices
of pharmacists, and the terms of sale of drugs. They would not be allowed to open a pharmacy without
the school’s permission (Article 5). The drug-selling operation had to be recorded in a notebook. See
Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 6, pp. 3056-3061. Two regulations were additionally
promulgated in 1885 called The Regulation for Drug Traders (Ecza Tüccarı Hakkında Nizamnâme) and
The Regulation for Attar and Root Dispensers (Attarlar ve Kökçüler Nizamnâmesi). Attars and
herbalists could only sell the necessary drugs to the pharmacists or sell only herbal drugs. See Ergin,
Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 6, pp. 3069-3070. For a brief information of all the regulations about
the pharmacists, see Nuran Yıldırım and Gürkan Sert, “Eczacılık Mevzuatımızın Tarihsel Sürecinde
Eczane Açma/Eczacı Olma Koşulları ve Hekim-Eczacı İlişkisi (1852-1953)”, Osmanlı Bilimi
Araştırmaları, vol. 11, n.1, (2010), pp. 291-303. For an example of an ordinance about the herbalists,
see “Bâ-irâde-i seniyye-i cenâb-ı Padişâhî Meclis-i tıbbiye-i mülkiye ve sıhhiye-i umûmiyeden attâr
yani ecza tüccarları ve Mısır Çarşısı hakkında kaleme alınan talimat”, 10 C 1301 [7 April 1884], Düstur,
I/5, (İstanbul: Başvekalet Matbaası, 1937), pp. 34-37.
451 Ergin, “Beyʽ ve Füruhtu Attârlar için Külliyen Memnû Olan ve Eczâ Tüccârı Tarafından Satılmasına
Meşrûtan Mezuniyet Verilen Eczâ-yı Muzırra-i Sâmiyye”, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 6, pp.
3071-3073.
452 BOA, DH. MKT. 1806/80 27 C 1308 [7 February 1891]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1813/123, 19 B 1308 [28
February 1891].
157
cures or other herbal medicines, which could be highly dangerous for public health,
the municipalities necessitated license for the herbalists to practice their profession
and sell herbal drugs. This rule was valid for both Istanbul and the other provinces.
The free sale of the toxicants was forbidden as well.453 The Municipality got the help
of the Medical School (Tıbbiye) to control these herbal drugs, and the arrangement
standardized the control of the herbalists.454 Examples show that the investigations of
the Municipality became more bureaucratic. Artisans and traders had to struggle with
these new official practices and procedures in their affairs.
The other critical groups were the barbers and hairdressers. For example, the
inspectors revealed with the reports that the barbers and hairdressers did not obey the
cleaning and hygiene rules in their saloons and the groups who were itinerant in these
professions. This was a critical issue due to the risk of the spread of dermatological
and other diseases.455 The cleaning procedure was explained in detail, and it was stated
that the kit, which includes a comb, brush, and razor, had to be kept clean, and they
had to be cleaned up every day. The guild warden of the barbers of Üsküdar and
Kadıköy was in charge of informing the inspector office consistently.456 The keepers
of coffeehouses and hairdressers worked at the same place in general. In one example,
the coffee makers and hairdressers located in Beyoğlu were operating tooth and
cupping (hacamat), which was not their profession. It was too dangerous for the
people’s health. The government warned them and their guarantors who were bound
to them in 1907.457
453 BOA, DH. MKT. 2594/137, 23 ZA 1319 [3 March 1902].
454 BOA, DH. MKT. 898/10, 30 B 1322 [10 October 1904].
455 The ordinance was prepared in 1894 for the contagious diseases. See “İlel-i sâriyeye karşı ittihaz
kılınacak tedâbir ve tebhîrhâne memurlarının vezâifine dair talimattır”, 11 CA 1312 [10 November
1894], Düstur, I/6, (Ankara: Başvekalet Devlet Matbaası, 1939), pp. 1518-1522; “İlel-i sâriyeye karşı
ittihaz olunacak tedâbire ve tebhîrhâne memurlarının vezâifine dair olan talimata tezyîl edilmek üzere
kaleme alınan fıkra-i mahsusa”, 3 Z 1312 [28 May 1895], Düstur, I/7, (İstanbul: Başvekalet Devlet
Matbaası, 1941), p. 3.
456 Rules that barbers and hairdressers had to obey were listed in detail by considering the report of the
health inspectors. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1231/91, 6 M 1326 [9 February 1908].
457 BOA, ZB. 347/64, 27 R 1325 [9 June 1907]. For the other example in cleaning issue, the carders
(hallaç) were warned to keep cotton and fleece wool clean in their shops and bat bazaars (flea market).
Their shops were also under strict control. See BOA, DH. MKT. 981/45, 24 M 1326 [27 February 1908].
158
In some sectors, the Municipality was making regular controls to prevent
hygiene negligence. Snow and ice were significant consumer goods used to keep cold
beverages and then in sanitary fields.458 Snow and ice sellers generally came to the
fore because of cleaning matters since it had the risk of breaking out and spreading
various diseases. Wells had to be always clean, which were under the management of
both the state and private snow businesses. They belonged to Karhâne, and it was
affiliated to the Municipality. Thanks to the vital need for maintaining sanitation, the
state never left Karhâne utterly to the hands of snow sellers.459 The Municipality
prepared an ordinance for the snow sellers (karcı) in 1887 to prevent these risks.460
But the snow sellers complained about the constraints frequently. In one case, the
Municipality forbade the snow sellers to use the snow wells since these wells were
close to such areas as Kasımpaşa, Tatavla (later Kurtuluş), cemetery, and dumping,
which was dangerous to the people’s health. However, the snow sellers stated that they
were gathering snow from the high regions and the wells, which were remote to the
cemeteries and dirt. Therefore, it was not hazardous to health, according to their
statement. They demanded the use of the wells, but the state did not allow to it.461 The
Municipality did not permit the use of the wells apart from Katırlı mountains or
mountains around Dersaâdet. Yet, the snow sellers defended themselves with a
458 For a detailed article on the procurement of snow and ice in the Ottoman Empire, see Burcu Kurt,
“Kar ve Buz Temininde Modernleşme ve XIX. Yüzyıl İstanbul’unda Karcı Esnafı”, Trakya Üniversitesi
Edebiyat Fakültesi Dergisi, v. 5. n. 9, (January, 2015), pp. 145-167; Kurt, pp. 149-150.
459 İbrahim Başağaoğlu, Mebrure Değer & Bayhan Çubukçu, “İstanbul’da Kar Kuyuları ve İşletmeleri
Hakkında Bir Araştırma”, Türkiye Klinikleri: Tıp Etiği-Hukuku-Tarihi, v. 11, n.4, (2003), p. 247.
460 The ordinance consisted of seven articles: First, it was forbidden to open wells in the inner-city, plots
among the quarters, cemeteries, and curtilages. Second, the municipalities would carry out an inspection
about the wells, which were located far away from the inner city and the houses, and they could give a
license to the relevant individuals free of charge. Third, snow that was put into the wells would be
controlled by the municipality of the region, and they again could give a license to the related trade
group free of charge. Fourth, hay, which would be put over the wells, had to be clean, and they had to
be changed every year. Hay that was used in the previous year would not be reused. Fifth, snow in the
wells had to be clean, and their surface had to be completely closed to prevent the falling of any foreign
material or object. Sixth, the license would not be given unless the individuals would obey these rules,
and they would pay a fine from 6 to 10 beşlik according to the 257th Article of the Penal Code. Seventh,
the snow sellers had to obey this ordinance, and the control of the application of it would be handled by
the related municipality and the administration of Karhâne-i Âmire (snow and ice seller company). See
BOA, ŞD. 729/14. 25 RA 1305 [11 December 1887]; Kurt, pp. 158-159.
461 BOA, BEO. 1043/78200, 29 C 1315 [25 November 1897].
159
petition, and argued that the Municipality approved the cleaning of the wells last year.
It was probably a decision in favor of public health. Their protective measurements
did not change from last year to the current time, and they asked for why the
Municipality implemented this ban. The building of stone walls was ordered, but the
snow sellers stated that seasonal conditions were not appropriate to build a wall in the
wells. Thus, the state postponed the building of walls to the next year.462 This example
shows that trader and artisan groups sometimes resisted the decisions of the
government, which indicates their active role in problem-solving processes.
The supervision in food and other areas intersected with the protection of
environmental health as well. Environmental health is the inseparable part of public
health that aims to remove extant land, air, and water pollution in general related to
the policy of decreasing the detrimental effects of contagious diseases or the other ones
and preventing the spread of them. Indeed, the Ottoman policymakers partially had
this cleaning consciousness.463 The environmental health politics became more
systematized with the new ordinances and regulations.464 It involved the rules about
the shops, streets, ways, and the issues about drayage.465 The remarkable point in this
issue is that it intersects with the urban planning policies of the government.
462 Kurt, pp. 160-162; Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 7, pp. 4129-4130.
463 This consciousness was not the output of the development of Western institutions in the Ottoman
Empire. The Code of Obligations enacted in 1539 (the reign of Süleyman the Magnificient) in Edirne
that includes provisions about environmental cleaning is a good example of the state’s perspective in
the earlier centuries. The superintendent (subaşı) was responsible for implementing the rules of this
code. According to this, Article 1 and Article 2 order the populace keeping the shops clean from all
kinds of surrounding garbage and rubbish. Article 7 states that dyers, cooks, pack saddlers, and butchers
(or sheep head sellers) had not to dispose their grass, garbage, and dung on the streets, and they had to
dispose them to the desolated and empty locations where people did not live in. See Ahmet Akgündüz,
İslam ve Osmanlı Çevre Hukuku, (İstanbul: Osmanlı Araştırmaları Vakfı, 2009), p. 60; Eray Yurtseven
et al., “Environmental Health During the Ottoman Era in Sixteenth Century”, Türkiye Klinikleri: Tıp
Etiği-Hukuku-Tarihi, v. 18, n.1, (2010), p. 50.
464 In general, the prevention of fires was one of the major motives of the state in environmental order
policies. The expansion of chairs, tables or the products from the front of the shops to the streets was
the other problem that the Municipality dealt with because the regulations mainly mentioned these kinds
of prohibitions. The other regulation was the Regulation for the Streets, which was accepted as the first
arrangement of the municipal police. According to the Articles of 7 to 9, the owners or renters of shops
and workplaces had to sweep their places, and they had to wait for mule cars or cars to throw them out
since it was forbidden to pollute the environment with their garbage. See Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı
Belediyye, vol. 4, p. 1786.
465 An ordinance was enacted in 1913 for debris, lumber, stone, brick, and wood transportation. It was
divided into two parts. In the first part, Article 4 states that drayage was forbidden for the transportation
of flour, lime, plaster, and the other substances that raising dust. The barbers, cooks, and tripe shops
160
The articles issued the environmental cleaning protection were added to the
various regulations. Fines for any violation were determined in the Penal Code of
1858. Article 254 of the Penal Code emphasized the environmental cleaning of inns
and eating houses and the lights around these places.466 The 255th Article ordered that
the groups who were doing their jobs with fire had to clean the ovens and flues in
certain time periods. Unless they did this, they would be fined from 1 beşlik to 5 beşlik
or be imprisoned from 24 hours to 3 days.467
Environmental cleaning involved measures such as garbage collection,
watering the streets, and the prevention of bad smells in general. Various groups
handled the cleaning of the streets before the establishment of the Municipality.
Artisans and traders were responsible for cleaning the bazaars that they were working
in and around them, and the guild members controlled it. The cleaning of the streets
and alleys was carried out by arayıcı, and imams made the control of it. Çöplük subaşı
who belonged to the Islamic law judges contracted out the street cleaning duty to
arayıcı on the official level. The cleaning of big squares and main roads was made by
acemioğlan, and the Janissaries inspected them.468 After the Auspicious Incident
(Vaka-i Hayriye-abolition of the Janissaries), the duty of acemioğlans was transferred
to the Ministry of the Marketplace. The marketplace actors were still responsible for
had to keep cases to throw dishwater and sweepings out (Article 13), and the butchers had to keep meat
into wedge-wire but not hanging on a hook (Article 14). The employees also had to bring health reports
semi-annually, as a rule in the other occupations (Article 15). There were articles considering
environmental cleaning in the second part of the code as well. The transportation of debris and lumber
on horses and donkeys was also banned, but the implementation of the drayage ban was postponed to
the following year by regarding the unjust treatment (1st Article of the 2nd part). All drayage matters
should not pollute the streets, derange the health, and it was forbidden to transport stones, bricks or iron
as if insulting pack animals. The drayage only had to be made on another auxiliary animal by putting
necessary materials into the large baskets on these animals, and this rule would be implemented next
year (Article 2). It was forbidden to sell tripe, heads, and other animal products with a pole (Articles 3
and 4). See Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, pp. 1814-1817. In the ordinance of the Duties of
the Municipal Police in 1913, putting or cumulating animal head, skin, and horn was forbidden on the
streets and in the shops (Article 19). See Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, p. 1830.
466 Provisions related to various artisans and trade groups existed in the last section of the Penal Code
of 1858. See “Umur-ı Tahaffuziye ve Tanzifiye ve Zabıtaya Muhâlif Hareket Eden Ashâb-ı Kabâhiyin
Cezaları Beyanındadır”, Akgündüz, İslam ve Osmanlı Hukuku Külliyatı, p. 653.
467 Akgündüz, İslam ve Osmanlı Hukuku Külliyatı, p. 654.
468 Ayşe Pul, “Osmanlı Sosyal Hayatı Figüranlarından Arayıcı Esnafı”, Tarih İncelemeleri Dergisi, vol.
23, n.1, (July, 2008), p. 219.
161
cleaning their surroundings, including shops and bazaars. Then, the Municipality
became the primary responsible state institution for cleaning the streets and alleys after
the second half of the nineteenth century, and arayıcıs became history. Individual or
in-group initiatives did not have a prior responsibility in the supervision of the cleaning
of the marketplace and shops anymore. The Municipality took on the marketplace
inspection and cleaning of the capital city as a task.469
As the major local authority, the Municipality also made certain arrangements
for the changes in the locations of the producers that could potentially generate risks
for environmental health. Leather production was one of the sectors which had full of
environmental health risks because of the production process and the materials used.
In the 9th Article of the Ordinance for the Tasks of Board of Audit (Heyet-i Teftîşiyye
Vezâifine Dâir Tâlimatnâme), it was pointed out that the tanneries had to be controlled
whether they were clean or not and whether they were translocated to the outside of
the city or town or not.470 Therefore, the Municipality tried to control these producers
and their workplaces vigilantly.
For instance, in the record dated 1890, it was decided to translocate the
workplaces of the tanners and leather dealers from Üsküdar to Fenerbahçe district.
Their workplaces at Üsküdar were closed till the new ones were built in Fenerbahçe.
The tanners and the leather dealers demanded the opening of their workplaces and
continuing to work in the same place. However, the Office of the Public Hygiene (Hıfzı
Sıhha-yı Umûmiye) revealed with its report that these workplaces were unsanitary,
and it was not allowable to open a shop in there. The tanners and leather dealers stated
that they were aggrieved in return for this report, and they demanded the reopening of
their workplaces.471 The tanners of Üsküdar pointed out that the places including
Fenerbahçe or Cadıbostanı shore, which the Municipality suggested to them to
relocate, did not have a fresh water source and it made impossible to work there
469 See the Article 7 of Şehremâneti Memuriyetiyle Teferruâtına Dair Meclis-i Âli-i Tanzimât ve
Nizamnâme Lâyıhası, Atatürk Üniversitesi Kütüphanesi Seyfettin Özege Koleksiyonu, no: 12755, 15
ZA 1271 [30 July 1855], p. 4. For in Latin alphabet, see Seyitdanlıoğlu, p. 27.
470 Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 6, p. 3097.
471 Appears in BOA, DH. MKT. 1790/128, 27 R 1308 [10 December 1890]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1794/105,
11 CA 1308 [23 December 1890]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1809/77, 6 B 1308 [15 February 1891].
162
according to them. Thereupon, the tanneries demanded to set a place for them in Kavak
pier, but the government did not find it suitable, and it directed the group to
Fenerbahçe. The governing center ordered to the Municipality to prepare a map for
building these tanner workplaces in Fenerbahçe. It was added that the wells in there
had freshwater, and it was sanitary and convenient even if they would sink a new well.
It was also ordered to the municipal administration to help to get rid of the difficult
situation of the tanneries quickly.472
In another example, the shops of rags and bones, leather dealers, starch sellers,
the manufacturing shops of the lime and glue located at Arasta in Istanbul and Bilâd-ı
Selâse were relocated to the district of Küçükçekmece that was slightly far away from
the city center. These groups stated that they had financial difficulties, and they
demanded the Municipality’s help for their probable expenses. The Municipality
decided to establish a commission, and an officer from the Ministry of Health was also
charged for this issue. But in the end, they were sent to Küçükçekmece in 1892.473 In
the other sector in 1890, the fleece wool producers stated that their workplaces at At
Meydanı were closed because the government banned them from working there. They
were translocated to the outer of Istanbul walls. However, the report of the
Inspectorship of Health Issues (Sıhhiye Müfettişliği) revealed that their workplaces
were opened with shortcomings by the group in question, and they continued to work
in them. The government warned them because they acted against the rules.474 This
example shows the resistance of the producers when they were suffered from
economic difficulties or were obliged to give up their professional traditions that come
from old times.
These examples show that traditional manufacturing or trading centers would
easily be changed with the new public and environmental health policies regardless of
having historical and traditional importance or the demands of the marketplace actors.
Cases display that tension emerged between the artisan and trade groups and the
governments because the producers did not want to leave their long-established and
472 BOA, DH. MKT. 1814/140, 22 B 1308 [3 March 1891].
473 BOA, ŞD. 2605/12, 6 CA 1310 [26 November 1892]; BOA, DH.MKT. 2011/52, 26 CA 1310 [17
December 1892].
474 BOA, DH. MKT. 1787/112, 19 R 1308 [2 December 1890].
163
old production centers; on the other hand, the governments and municipal
administrations had to protect the environmental health conditions in city life. With
the precautions and the new decisions for the locations of the shops, the traditional
workplaces or work sites were forced to change in time.
The controls and investigations in the marketplace show the flexible but
controlled feature of the urban planning and the public health policies in late
nineteenth-century Istanbul. The imperial capital can be accepted as the test room for
implementing these policies. Therefore, the capital city provided to see the
consequences of the new arrangements and the reactions of the society as well. The
municipalities’ public health policy formed the significant part of the general health
policies. The protective public health policies became more systematized with the
market controls via its new methods and units. The new administrative manner also
shaped the urban planning policies. All the decisions taken in the framework of needs
and the effort to adapt to the new order were beyond just being a copy of the practices
of the Western countries. The obligatory state pragmatism and rationalism in urban
planning and public health policies were the foremost features of this period. Artisans,
shopkeepers, and peddlers tried to adapt themselves to this new administrative order,
contributing to the change of their traditional reactions in the marketplace. In the next
chapter, the story of the abolition of the guilds and the roles of their wardens in this
process will be examined. Then, the establishment of the esnaf associations will be
handled.
164
CHAPTER 5 TOWARDS A NEW ORGANIZATION: THE ABOLITION OF GUILD WARDENSHIP AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF ESNAF ASSOCIATIONS (ESNAF CEMİYETLERİ) The Ottoman Empire was in the administrative transformation from the nineteenth century onward which impacted on the organizations of artisans and traders as well. Many craft and trade groups existed, but their guilds were abolished before the collapse of the empire. They already transformed into a new structure called esnaf associations (artisans’ associations-esnaf cemiyetleri) established in 1910. The common view about the Ottoman guilds is that they disappeared almost wholly from economic life from the 1850s onwards. This did not occur, but new associations were replaced them; that is to say, they evolved into a new organization form which was under the control of the Municipality including the provincial municipalities in the last period of the empire. This new practice formed a significant part of the transformation process in the affairs of the artisans and traders. The traditional professional missions of the guilds continued to exist when the new organization model in the form of association was implemented. This chapter will examine the abolition process of the Ottoman guilds, specifically Istanbul guilds, and then the establishment of esnaf associations. The chapter will explore the last days of the guilds and the process that ended with of the foundation of associations. It reveals the reasons for the abolition of the guilds with an alternative explanation that focused first on the institutional transformation of the state apparatus. The chapter will also highlight that the guild warden as the sole official representative of the guilds became another reason for the abolition. By considering these two factors, this chapter will show that the abolition of the guilds can be explained by considering the administrative transformation, including the expansion
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of bureaucracy and new institutionalization in the local government, rather than focusing only on the economic transformation. Concomitantly, the chapter will show the human dimension, the role of the guild wardens, in the abolition of the guilds from the market life. This chapter will then elaborate on the newly established associations that marked the beginning of a new organizational period in terms of artisans and traders. The structural change in the organizations of these groups presents the changing administrative patterns that directly impacted on the daily and organizational experiences of the mentioned groups. 5.1. The Last Period of Guilds The literature agreed on certain reasons for the abolition of the guilds, which is still open to the new evaluations. First of all, it was argued that the Janissary corps caused deteriorations in the traditional guild structure. But it was not the direct reason for this collapse because approximately one century lapsed ever since their abolition. Therefore, the abolition of these organizations was not directly related to the effect of the Janissary corps. Second, as the most mentioned one, it was stated that some handicrafts and small scale trade activities in the Ottoman lands started to disappear with mass production developed in certain European countries and its outcome on the Ottoman economy with the increase in the importation of manufactured goods resulted with the abolition of the guilds. All manufacturing activities did not disappear, but they remained incapable of industrial production; that is to say, the traditional production techniques could not compete with mass production methods. Moreover, it was put forth that the increase in the imported manufacturing goods and products from abroad led to the emergence of the new consumer culture, and the demand for new imported manufacturing goods of the society increased dramatically. This crucially changed the socio-economic atmosphere in the nineteenth century, which paved the way for the disappearance of traditional manufacturing methods and traditional guilds in the Ottoman Empire. Nonetheless, every trade, service or craft group such as water carriers, servants, peddlers, broom makers/sellers etc., was not influenced by the negative effects of the mass production process. Third, it was claimed that the abolition
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of gedik, as another reason, disarranged the marketplace order in terms of trading affairs and the traditional modus operandi. Therefore, it triggered the abolition of the guilds. Commercial privileges ended in 1861, and the emphasis on free trade came into prominence with the second half of the nineteenth century. But this issue was related to the break of the monopolization in commercial activities but not to the organizations of the artisans and traders. The abolition of the guilds cannot be explained solely by the change in economic policies that were previously based on protective and monopoly economic strategies. In addition, gedik was the right of trading, but the guilds were the organizations of artisans and traders. The guilds were generally mentioned with the manufacturing sectors, yet they existed in the area of the small-scale trading activities as well. Donald Quataert points out that guilds became decreasingly common in the craft sectors and increasingly in transportation over time.475 Therefore, the abolition of the guilds should be examined by taking into consideration the binary aspect of it. The abovementioned factors and arguments explain one aspect of the decline and the collapse of the guilds, but they cannot entirely enlighten the motives of the state and the process. Two arguments about the abolition of the guilds will be added and asserted at this point. First, the process that began with the Tanzimat can be accepted as a trial and error period in terms of bureaucracy and administration. This was also valid for the issues related to the groups dealing with small-scale trade and manufacturing. One of the major motives in the abolition of the guilds was the accommodation to the new bureaucratic and judicial order. It was a period of bureaucratic modernization, and many departments and offices of the state changed. The guilds, as the old administration model representative, were adapted into a new administrative structure. They were primarily and officially linked to the Municipality after 1855. Their affairs were affiliated to the Esnaf Office in 1892, which was a sub-department in the Municipality. The tasks of the guild wardens continued in the 1890s with this office. The establishment of a new guild in the last period gives an idea about the organizing procedure and the points to consider in terms of the governments. For example, an 11-articles Ordinance for the Servants (Hizmetkârân sınıfı hakkında
475 Donald Quataert, “Labor History and the Ottoman Empire, c. 1700-1922”, p. 106.
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talimat) in Istanbul was implemented.476 They did not belong to a trade group, but they
were accepted as a separate group. A guild warden was appointed for them to take
under the control of their formal matters and give them licenses. He was responsible
for the matters and problems of the servants. They could give licenses in return for
fees. This fee was divided into four categorizations, including 10, 20, 40, and 60 kuruş
in addition that servants were taking a wallet valuing 75 para for once (Article 3).
However, the criterion of this classification was uncertain. The information about the
maids had to be registered to a registry book at his disposal in return for 5 kuruş and
they did not have to take any additional fee for this recording (Article 4). One guild
warden, one guild warden assistant, and one collector (tahsildar) had to be chosen for
operating matters related to the group. Besides these officers, a guild committee had
to be formed by two Muslims, one Armenian and one Greek, and this guild committee
had to be the same as the other guilds existing in the Ottoman Empire. Having both an
Armenian and a Greek member in this committee indicates that the number of non-
Muslim servants was remarkably high, and the state was sensitive about the ethnic
differentiation among the servants. The seals of the guild wardens were impressed by
the Municipality, and the seals would be left to them as it had been done for the other
guilds. The guild warden and his assistant had to send the book records and accounts
to the Municipality Accountant Office. Moreover, they had to send the list of the
servants to the Civil Registry Office (Nüfus İdaresi). All new changes had to be
reported to these mentioned departments.477 The guild warden assistant and the debt
collectors would not be allowed to record, especially maids to be employed in
mansions, inns or the other residences.478 The number of the servants would be
increased due to the rise in the number of the mansions and waterfront residences with
the changing lifestyle of the Ottoman Istanbul, particularly the Ottoman bureaucratic
elites, onwards the second half of the nineteenth century. Therefore, the government
476 BOA, İ..MMS. 96/4078, 28 C 1305 [12 March 1888].
477 The Servant Finding Administration (Umûm Hizmetkârân İdârehânesi) was established for creating
a job for unemployed servants in 1911. For a detailed information on this office, see Yavuz Selim
Karakışla, “II. Meşrutiyet Döneminde Kurulmuş Bir Hizmetçi Bulma Ofisi: Umûm Hizmetkârân
İdârehânesi (1911)”, Tarih ve Toplum, (Ekim, 2002), n. 226, pp. 45-54.
478 BOA, Y. A. RES. 26/8. 10 M 1302 [30 October 1884]. The ordinance was implemented in 1888.
See BOA, İ..MMS. 96/4078, 28 C 1305 [12 March 1888].
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aimed to control this group under a guild and record it as a separate service group with the new administrative mentality. This ordinance was implemented only for the servants at Dersaâdet and Bilâd-ı Selâse where the change of social life habits was more visible and recorded. The governments sometimes did not allow to establish a separate guild for certain newly emerged professions in this period. For example, the bill of exchangers was accepted as “esnaf” by the Chambers of Commerce and Industry. Then, they were linked to the chambers even though the management of the guild wardens continued. After this institutional change, they were called merchants rather than esnaf. Due to the fact that they had a guild warden, they can be accepted as esnaf. However, the bill of exchangers did not have a special and individual guild in Istanbul, and this issue came to the fore. They would have a chance to carry on the businesses via this guild. Their guild warden conveyed the matter to the Ministry of Trade that the complaints about the bill of exchangers, brokers, and tellâls increased in this period due to the rise in their number and commercial activities. The guild warden wrote the need for the establishment of a separate guild for solving this problem in his petition.479 However, the Council of the State did not permit exchange traders and other mentioned professions to establish a distinctive guild since they were connected to the Chamber of Trade, and it was stated that there was no need for such a guild for this reason.480 Nevertheless, the guild wardens continued to collect the permit fees from these trade groups even after the two-year above-mentioned complaints were delivered.481 Notwithstanding the demands of the guild wardens and the bill of exchange traders, a separate guild was not established. The free trade policy began in the period of the Tanzimat reforms, and it shaped the economic order in the last decades of the Empire. People who were dealing with commercial activities had to accord themselves to the new economic policies. On the other hand, the governments had to make a smooth transition in terms of economic, political, and social aspects. For example, the Committee of Union and Progress (and
479 Şenyurt, p. 201; BOA, ŞD. 1206/13, 29 ZA 1313 [13 April 1896]. 480 BOA, BEO. 780/58465, 1 Z 1313 [14 May 1896]. 481 Şenyurt, pp. 201-202; BOA, ŞD. 1212/15, 22 M 1316 [12 June 1898].
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then Party) administration was confronted with certain problems to make these trade
groups adapted to the new economic order and discipline their official representatives.
The CUP gave importance the artisan and trader groups because they were the social
basis of the party and party politics, and they were one of the major groups that the
CUP could use in their nation-building project.482
The Ottoman governments tried to take the guilds under control via the
Municipalities. The official supervision and correspondences continued under the
administration of a new administrative unit. Esnaf Office, as the sub-unit of the
Municipality, had an intermediary role in the affairs of the guilds with the state center.
The abolition of the guilds was intrinsic not only to the economic reasons but also to
the new administrative factors. Bureaucratic modernization led to a change in the
administrative and judicial form of the guilds. Furthermore, the abolition of the guilds
was interconnected with the guild wardens. Interestingly, the leading motive of the
state authorities in changing the structure of the guilds was to remove the guild
wardens as intermediaries. The presence of a guild warden was the sign of the presence
of a guild, yet the increasing complaints about the guild wardens and their abuses
paved the way for the abolition of this traditional and historical institution in which
they were the sole responsible officers. They were apt to use the guild wardenship as
the income source and extend its limits regarding regional and sectoral aspects.
Therefore, their misconduct contributed to the abolition of the guilds.
Then, the guilds were transformed into new esnaf associations that were
different than the traditional organizational structure in 1910. It was just beyond a
change in the name, and the changes occurred in the roles and responsibilities of the
heads of the groups as well. The way of tax-paying even changed before the
establishment of associations. The common feature of the last guilds and new
associations was that every official procedure was written in detail in the regulations,
which had to be coherent with the new “modern” law and administration system.483
482 Ferdan Ergut mentions also the policing function of craftspeople in his work. He states that the CUP
used them as the assistant actor of the social control over the society. See Ferdan Ergut, Modern Devlet
ve Polis: Osmanlı’dan Cumhuriyet’e Toplumsal Denetimin Diyalektiği, (İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları,
2004), p. 171.
483 The term “modern” refers to the western style legal regulations prepared during and after the
Tanzimat period, but this study uses this concept cautiously.
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Change in the operation of the affairs of artisans and traders was the anticipated result
of this period of change.
5.1.1. Guild Warden: A Burden?
Padişahım Çok Yaşa
Ba-kemal-i afiyet tahtında kılsın müstedâm
Hakk seni ey şehriyar-ı adil ve kişver-güşâ
Ruz-ı firuz-ı cülûsun ıyd-ı ekberdir bize
Devletinle şevketinle padişahım bin yaşa484
The position of the guild warden is one of the controversial topics of the
Ottoman esnaf narrative, especially for the classical Ottoman period. The term guild
warden (kethüda) had two different meanings: The first one was used for the
individuals responsible for the public affairs of the districts and were elected by the
neighborhood (mahalle). The imam and the guild warden mediated between
community and government in security and tax collection.485 Another meaning was
used for referring to the official representative of the artisans and traders. A guild
warden was perceived as the basis of a guild, and he was the indicator of a guild’s
presence in any sector. As the representative of the artisan groups between the state
and themselves, both the terms of kethüda (Ankara, Bursa, Konya, Kayseri) and şeyh
(in Sivas) were used for guild warden. Yet, guild wardens in certain occupations had
their special terms. For example, pazarbaşı (warden of a market) was used for the
guild warden of the grocers, kasapbaşı (butcher’s warden) was used for the guild
warden of the butchers, Ahi Baba was used for the guild warden of tanners, and
484 This poem was written by the guild warden of the comb-sellers (tarakçılar) and spoon-makers
(kaşıkçılar) by name Ali Ulvi to the Sultan to praise him. See BOA, Y. PRK. AZJ. 46/42, 29 Z 1320
[29 March 1903]. In this poem, he praised the Sultan and he stated that may God keep his sovereign
perpetuated with a full and complete health. The accession to the throne of the Sultan was a festival for
them (for the people). He finishes his poem with the sentence that “Long live my Sultan with your state
and majesty”. For the photograph of Ali Ulvi and with the employees Hilmi and Cevdet Efendi (the boy
at the back side of the photograph could be an apprentice), see Figure 6.
485 İnalcık, “Istanbul: An Islamic City”, Journal of Islamic Studies, n.1, (1990), pp. 14-15.
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çarıkçıbaşı was used for the guild warden of the rawhide sandal makers in the
Tanzimat era.486
The terms used for referring to the occupational posts help to understand guildrelated
issues and the unstandardized nature of the guilds. The post kâhya was accepted
as esnaf kethüdası (guild warden of esnaf) as well and kethüda was defined as the head
or director of a trade group.487 The guild warden (kethüda) and kâhya were the two
concepts used for this position.488 In the official documents, kethüda was the most used
epithet for the guilds’ head; on the other hand, kâhya was less used in the last period’s
official records. For example, kâhya was used for the responsible person for the
second-hand booksellers (sahaf) instead of the guild warden in the last period.489 As it
was mentioned above, the guild warden position meant the presence of the guild in the
last period’s bureaucratic language and procedure. Using the guild wardenship term
rather than “guild” can be accepted as the outcome of the new bureaucratic structure
in the Ottoman center.
It was stated in the narrative on the guild wardenship that the guild warden was
the officer who protected the rights of the artisan or trader group that he was affiliated
with, dealt with their problems, and conveyed these problems to the center and
municipal administration, and collected the taxes. This post was accepted as the
cement of the guilds. This classical narrative propounds that the guild wardens did not
enter an action against the above-mentioned groups he was responsible for and their
486 Musa Çadırcı, Tanzimat Döneminde Anadolu Kentlerinin Sosyal ve Ekonomik Yapısı, (Ankara: Türk
Tarih Kurumu Yayınları, 2013), p. 123.
487 Sami, “Kethüdâ”, p. 1145.
488 There was a division between the guild warden and head-guild warden (serkethüda) positions, and
the latter was probably prior in terms of hierarchy. The head-guild warden did exist in the guild
organization of boatmen, porters, and binders. For example, the guild warden of Bağçekapısı porters
who worked more than fifty years stated that he recently became disabled to work. Therefore, he
demanded to be the head-guild warden of the porters or any other guilds. It can be deduced from this
example that this post can be accepted as an honorary but salaried one. However, the official and nonofficial
sources do not give enough information about this position. See Ahmet Saim Arıtan, “Ciltçilik”,
TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (v.7), (İstanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Yayınevi, 1993), p. 553; BOA,
DH.MKT. 2431/101, 3 Ş 1318 [26 November 1900]; Bağçekapısı is a district located between Eminönü
and Sirkeci, which was one of the crucial trade centers in Istanbul. See Mahmut Çetin, Dersaadet
Sözlüğü, (İstanbul: İstanbul Ticaret Odası Yayınları, 2012), p. 31.
489 İsmail E. Erünsal, Osmanlılarda Sahaflık ve Sahaflar, (İstanbul: Timaş Yayınları, 2013), p. 230. In
the other examples, Abdülcebbar was referred as kâhya of the porters of Kadıköy Pier. See BOA, DH.
UMVM. 88/26, 3 CA 1340 [2 January 1922]; İmdad Efendi, the guild warden of the boatmen, was noted
as kâhya, which shows that kâhya and kethüda were the same posts. See BOA, ZB. 486/125, 4 CE 1324
[26 June 1906], BOA, DH. MKT. 1095/73, 8 CE 1324 [30 June 1906].
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guilds in general. It was mentioned that they worked for the self-interest of these
groups. But the examples from late-nineteenth-century Istanbul show that all guild
wardens did not operate the guilds free of problems. The grievances of these traderelated
groups showed a different side of this issue. Yet, the guild warden was still the
most authoritative officer in conducting the affairs of the marketplace actors in the last
period of Ottoman Istanbul. The state center did only place particular emphasis on its
formal responsibilities towards the state authorities and the guilds. Guild wardens
became the extensions of the sultan’s administration in the last period of the Ottoman
Empire.490 On the other side, they continued to earn income from the payments of
artisan and trade groups.491
There was no special written arrangement about the criteria to be selected as a
guild warden in the nineteenth century. An appointment to a guild warden position
was made in two ways in the last period as it was in previous periods: First, the former
palace servants and employees were appointed; second, the masters of the related
profession were appointed or elected by the guild members.492 Most of these Palace
490 Faroqhi, pp. 121-122.
491 Genç, p. 301.
492 Many examples can be found in the archives for the appointments of the former palace servants or
people from the related professions as guild wardens. For example; Hacı Emin Ağa, who was a retired
janitor was appointed a guild wardenship of a guild. See BOA, İ.DH. 720/50242, 9 RE 1293 [4 April
1876]; The guild wardenship of the general tobacco producers was given to Ahmed Ağa, the second
warden of Mabeyn-i Hümayun Organization, after the guild warden Hacı Mehmed Efendi passed away.
See BOA, İ.DH. 892/71030, 8 L 1300 [12 August 1883]; The guild wardenship of bottle-producers,
gasolier, cup makers, toymakers, and the birdcage makers was given to Şamdani Ömer Ağa. See BOA,
DH. MKT. 1908/65, 5 C 1309 [6 January 1892]; The guild wardenship of the porters in Tophane Pier
was given the butler (kilari) Hafız Hüsnü Efendi. See BOA, İ.ŞE. 12/32, 11 L 1317 [12 February 1900];
Hüseyin Efendi, the second butler (kilari) replaced Hacı Mahmud Efendi (the former general director
of the Department of Protocol- Teşrifat-ı Hümayun) as the guild warden of the greengrocers. See BOA,
İ. ŞE. 14/11, 15 ZA 1318 [6 March 1901]; The guild wardenship of the general grocers (by including
Makriköy) was given to the head butler (serkilari) Osman Bey. See BOA, İ. ŞE. 8/43, 7 Ş 1313 [23
January 1896]; The guild wardenship of tailors was given to Osman Ağa who serviced 35 years in the
drug store of Mabeyn-i Hümayun. It was added the guild wardenship of Galata barbers was vacant. See
BOA, İ. DH. 766/62400, 7 R 1295 [10 April 1878]; The guild wardenship of Üsküdar barbers was given
to one of the barbers of Mabeyn-i Hümayun Organization Kadri Efendi with the request of him. See
BOA, Y. PRK. ŞH. 5/78, 26 B 1312 [23 January 1895]; The guild wardenship of Istanbul barbers was
given from the deceased Mustafa Ağa to one of the barbers of Mabeyn-i Hümayun Organization Osman
Efendi. See BOA, İ. ŞE. 16/20, 26 ZA 1320 [24 February 1903]; The guild wardenship of the jewelers
was given to the general director of Harem Hacı Ali Efendi. See BOA, İ. ŞE. 8/44, 19 Ş 1313 [4 February
1896]; The guild wardenship of çörek and simit makers in Galata, Hasköy, Fındıklı, Üsküdar and
Bosphorus quarter was given from the deceased Mehmed Ağa to the head warden of Daire-i Hümayun
Hacı Osman Ağa. See BOA, İ. HUS. 127/36, 15 M 1323 [22 March 1905]; The guild wardenship of
loincloth, cheesecloth, and tile (çini) was given to the Mabeyn servant Ahmed Nuri. See BOA, Y..MTV.
231/27, 5 RE 1320 [12 June 1902]. On the other hand, the trade and artisan groups chose their guild
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servants and employees were retired and not affiliated to a profession and their salaries
were paid by the guilds. Thus, the governments instead of paying their salaries from
the State budget appointed them to a guild warden position and made the guilds to pay
their salaries.493 Most guild wardens had the title of “ağa” and “efendi” as they seemed
in the examples. During the last century of the Empire, civil servants who were
appointed as guild wardens used the guilds as an income source.494
A guild warden had to have an official seal to be able to do his duty. Guild
wardenship took place as the most critical position in the affairs of artisans and traders.
It functioned as a bridge between the state and the mentioned groups in the last period
as well. There was no autonomous space of guild wardens in economic and societal
affairs, and they could not act independently in most cases. If it occurred, the state
controlled them or the related trade group resisted the guild wardens’ arbitrariness. It
is conceivably that the contrary situations might have occurred.495 This was the period
of adaptation to a new administration structure. Nevertheless, it is suspicious that all
the developments or issues were under the state’s total control or the state completely
directed these groups and their working order according to the decisions of the ruling
elites. The marketplace actors were active in conducting or shaping their affairs too.
An appointment of a guild warden was indispensable for an artisan or trade
group to engage in trade activity in the late Ottoman period. The Ministry of Interior
ordered to create a guild warden position for the newly emerged professions with the
increase in the number of artisan and traders. Certain guild warden positions were
offered for sale both in Istanbul and in the other provinces. For example, the guild
warden position was opened for the transporters of the city, towns, and ports, and it
was planned to allocate this post via auction if anyone desired it in 1892.496 The guild
wardens. For example, the dough makers and the cookers in bakeries chose their guild warden among
themselves. See BOA, DH. MKT. 1768/73, 23 S 1308 [8 October 1890].
493 Genç, p. 301.
494 Turna, p. 134.
495 The approach of the arguments in this study may seem as state-based, yet it was the result of the
critiques of the state documents. This study considers the risk of using state documents and their
problem-generated nature when examining a group in society. However, the state records show the
limits of guild wardenship in the bureaucratic system.
496 BOA, DH. MKT. 1997/70, 12 S 1310 [5 September 1892].
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wardenship was not solely predetermined and allocated by the municipal
administration to specific individuals. Certain new emerging professions requested an
esnaf license and an appointment of a guild warden to carry out their professions in an
official way too. For example, the theater players demanded a license and the
appointment of a guild warden from the Municipality in 1899. However, the Ministry
of Interior did not accept them as a member of an occupation group since they were
dealing with other trade activities as well. The municipal administration expected them
to deal with only one job. The licenses for their extant professions had already been
given to them, and there was no need for an extra license and a guild warden. The trade
groups were taking a permit from the Municipality and the provincial municipals.
Therefore, a permit was enough to conduct a profession but not to establish a separate
guild since the state did not see them as a separate professional group.497 In another
example, the lumberman (bıçkıcı) in Dersaadet, Bilâd-ı Selâse, and Çatalca sanjaks
appointed a guild warden for themselves in 1889, which was illegal and the detriment
for the group in question. This arbitrary decision was not accepted, and the government
decided to appoint a new different guild warden to them.498
The guild wardenship was given only to the Ottoman citizens.499 For example,
the Iranian bargemen exported and selected a guild warden for themselves, and they
even impressed a seal for this warden of the barge guild. But the state did not recognize
it and added that a separate guild would not be established for a particular community.
Individuals from a particular occupation had to join the registered and extant guild for
this profession.500 Indeed, both Ottoman citizens and the foreign artisans and traders
were not able to act independently in carrying out the guild affairs. Furthermore, the
common requirement for being a guild warden was having a guarantor. If a person did
not have a guarantor, the Municipality did not accept his position.501
497 BOA, ŞD. 798/14, 19 L 1316 [2 March 1899]; BOA, BEO. 1277/95735, 25 L 1316 [8 March 1899].
498 BOA. DH. MKT. 1650/156, 27 Z 1306 [24 August 1889].
499 For example, it was not allowed the citizens of Greece to be a guild warden. See, BOA, A.} DVN.
104/20, 10 N 1271 [27 May 1855].
500 BOA, DH. MKT. 596/28, 13 B 1320 [16 October 1902].
501 For example, Mahmud, who was appointed as the guild warden assistant of barbers in the capital,
showed 59.000-kuruş real estate at his hometown in return for this position, but it was not accepted
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A trend gathering of different kinds of professions under the same guild warden
management augmented towards the end of the century. It was an important indicator
that shows the changing and disrupted nature of the guild warden position in the last
years of the guilds. Technically unrelated professions were sometimes gathered under
a single roof by this way. For example, the guild warden position of salt-dealers
(tuzcu), arbor-makers (çardak yapıcı), dried fruits sellers, rush mat-makers (hasırcı),
onion sellers, fair employees, Bağhane employees along with the integration of the
piers of Hattapkapısı, wood-dealers (keresteciler), Balık pazarı, and the pit coals was
given to Seribrikdar Kamil Efendi in 1904.502 The guild warden position was given to
a person who was not an authority in any mentioned profession. Obviously, being
master of a profession or competence in a profession was not a criterion to be
appointed as a guild warden anymore.
Conflicts inevitably occurred in the appointment of a unique guild warden to
various professions at the same time. Clashes appeared between artisan or trader
groups and guild wardens because of the clash of interests. The governments
considered the old traditions, the administrative circumstance in addition to the
demands of the related groups when they tried to solve the appointment problems. For
example, a person named Edhem Ağa who was known as the guild warden of bazaar
cook, kebab-makers, soup makers, compote makers, and sherbet-makers petitioned to
the Municipality in 1894, and he demanded the guild wardenship of boza and salep
makers (including halva makers [sakız helvacı], nut and chestnut sellers). But the latter
groups emphasized their independent guild wardenship that came from older times,
and they reacted to this demand which was contrary to the old traditions. The
benchmarks for the governments were mostly the old customs as well as the reactions
of the groups who were exposed to this kind of managerial change.503
In addition, guild wardenship became more competitive when guild wardens
tried to be appointed as the guild warden of the same profession but existed in another
because he had to show a guarantor to the Municipality. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2356/114, 9 S 1318 [8
June 1900].
502 BOA, DH. MKT. 911/32, 16 N 1322 [24 November 1904].
503 BOA, Y. MTV. 101/65, 27 M 1312 [31 July 1894].
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neighborhood to earn more money. For example, a person submitted a petition to the
Ministry of Finance as the guild warden of cooks and kebab makers in 1889, but he
was registered as the guild warden of kebab and sherbet makers in the Municipality.
He claimed that the guild warden position of the cooks504 and kebab-makers of the
Istanbul side had to be assigned to him.505 In the other example, the operator Bayram
Efendi, who was the guild warden of Galata barbers and the saloons in the Istanbul
district, resorted to Galata court to take the position of the guild wardenship of Istanbul
barbers in 1893. But the members of this artisan group complained about this situation
and stated that he already had two positions and it was not compatible with their
customary practices.506 These demands indicate that the guild wardens tried to expand
their guild wardenship limits to the full extent of their power in the last period of the
guilds.
Certain guild wardens sometimes intervened in the affairs of the other
profession groups which had their own wardens. In one case dated 1887, the
upholsterer and seat-makers (oturakçı ve koltukçu esnâfı)507 of Batpazarı (The Flea
Market) complained about the guild warden of the tailors of Grand Bazaar (Çarşı-yı
Kebir) telling that he meddled in their affairs. The seat-makers were responsible for
selling used and old attires at Batpazarı; on the other hand, the tailors were in charge
of sewing attires with needles and spools. Therefore, their guild wardens were
different: The guild warden of the upholsterer and seat-makers was Mehmed Ağa, and
the guild warden of Grand Bazaar tailors was Mustafa Ağa. The seat-makers told that
the guild warden of the tailors intervened in their business, which led to some
discomforts. It was stated that the guild warden of the tailors would not be able to be
involved in the affairs of the seat-makers because their administration is going to be
separated officially. Their complaint was accepted, and they were justified because of
504 It was stated as workers (işçiler) in the document, but it probably implies the cooks. It was estimated
with the help of Eunjeong Yi’s list. See Yi, p. 262.
505 BOA, DH. MKT. 1624/101, 23 N 1306 [23 May 1889].
506 BOA, Y. PRK. ŞH. 4/68, 10 S 1311 [23 August 1893].
507 Koltukçu means seat sellers and oturakçı means tuffet sellers but their meaning was different
according to the profession’s description in the related document.
177
being two different sectors, and every group had its guild warden. As a general rule,
guild wardens were not allowed to be involved in the matters of the other guilds.508
The Ottoman governments prepared new arrangements for newly emerging
professions to maintain order in the marketplace. The administrative duties of the guild
wardens, which were defined in these arrangements, formed the inclusive frame of the
management of the guilds with this way. For example, the government informed about
the printing houses’ working order in 1880 with a notification which was full of rules
about the guild wardens. This arrangement ordered that the individuals who made a
living on printing (typographer) had to be gathered under a one trade group. A guild
warden had to be chosen via an election that had to be approved by the Ministry of
Interior. Every printing house had to have a permit (ruhsatnâme), and the typesetters
(mürettib) and wheel-masters (çark ustası) had to have their licenses. Guild wardens
had to inform the Ministry about the printing houses without a license located at the
periphery or in the houses. Finally, the guild wardens had to prevent the printing of
unlicensed books.509
5.1.2. Sharing the Authority
The governments appointed solely one guild warden for a certain profession or
for a group of professions in general. For example, the government did not permit to
possess two different guild wardens of the vinedressers (bağcı) located outside of
Topkapı, and the guild warden who was appointed to the second place had to be
dismissed because it was against the customs.510 The guild warden position was
accepted as unique and independent, which would not be divided (allocation of one
post to more than one person) in theory, yet the examples from the archival documents
showed a different picture.
508 BOA, ŞD. 723/20, 13 C 1304 [9 March 1887]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1404/70, 19 C 1304 [15 March
1887].
509 The other points in the notification were as such: A registry book had to be prepared for all
typographers; the Ministry had to determine the amount of the taxes or license fees that both the owners
of the printing houses and the employees had to pay to meet expenses which were also determined by
the Ministry. See BOA, MF. MKT. 65/35, 22 B 1297 [30 June 1880].
510 BOA, DH. MKT. 1496/106, 12 B 1305 [25 March 1888].
178
A new practice, the seal division of guild wardenship, meant sharing the
authority of the guild warden post. In this way, the role of the masters increased as
well. For example, in 1902, the issue of division of the guild warden’s seal was
proposed to the agenda by the guild warden of the bakers. The seal was divided into
four parts, and only one part of it was given to the guild warden. The other three pieces
of the seal were taken by the masters of the bakers, which means that using the seal
was shared. But the guild wardens were not happy with this practice as in the example
of Osman Ağa, the guild warden of bakers. Osman Ağa complained about that the
Association of the Bakers (Habbazan Cemiyeti) violated his rights by collecting 30
kuruş fee with these divided seals. He asked the government to unite the seal pieces to
stop the violation of his right.511 But the government did not accept his demand, and
instead ordered to continue the use of the seals in the divided form.512 Osman Ağa
continued to send petitions to end this practice, and he stated that the Association of
the Bakers (Habbazan Cemiyeti), which was established between 1898-1899,
intervened in his guild wardenship area of responsibility.513 After the disallowance of
the guild warden’s demand, he wrote a detailed petition to the government and alleged
four main reasons for his unjust mistreatment by this association. Firstly, he stated that
he was conducting his guild wardenship duty for eight years without a fault after
receiving the one-piece seal. The other three pieces of the seal were given to Markar
and Kirkor Petro ağas, and they exercised influence over their guild members. They
collected akçes from them inequitably, which led to abuse by using these seals. The
guild warden Osman Bey showed twenty-two documents that proved his claim.
Second, he alleged that there was no reference to the division of the seal into four parts
or no information about it in the Imperial Order (Fermân-ı Hümâyûn). For this reason,
this brought lawlessness, according to him. Third, he emphasized that other guild
wardens had one piece of the seal registered in a record book, and they did not confront
511 BOA, DH. MKT. 441/15, 5 Z 1319 [15 March 1902]; BOA, ŞD. 3015/45, 15 R 1320 [22 July 1902];
BOA, BEO. 1994/149515, 10 ZA 1320 [8 February 1903].
512 BOA, DH. MKT. 655/57, 20 ZA 1320 [18 February 1903].
513 The year was pointed out as 1316, which is an early date for the establishment of esnaf associations.
It would be meant guild or it was the exceptional prototype of the associations. BOA, DH. MKT.
1095/65, 8 CA 1324 [30 June 1906].
179
with this problem. Thus, he added that he could not accept the decision about the
division of the seal by the Municipality, which was unlawful.514 As a final argument,
Osman Ağa gave an example related to his problem, which happened previously. He
stated that his next-door friend Tiftikyan experienced the same problem. Tiftikyan and
Ahmed Bey worked as two separate guild wardens of the general bathhouses (umûm
hamamcılar kethüdalığı). This condition lasted four months, and then the government
cancelled this duality after the application of Tiftikyan. He continued to carry out his
task with a one-piece seal. After presenting this as a leading case, Osman Bey ended
his petition by requesting the elimination of this unlawful situation.515 This divided
seal problem lasted more than six years. This case is a good example to the conditions
and the reactions of the guild wardens to the changing practices in the last decades of
the Empire. The protests and resistance of the guild warden to the decision of the
municipal administration demonstrate that they could be active and insistent in the
matters related to themselves. They presented their justifications and arguments to the
state center and local governments. They also did not want to give up their traditional
economic and administrative achievements because of the financial gains of the guild
warden post. They tried to maintain the continuation of the old order with their formal
rights. However, in the case of bakers, his attempts stayed futile at the end.
The division of the seals caused clashes in the service of the guild wardens
which also affected their incomes. For example, the governments assigned the income
of the porters’ guild warden of Istanbul Customs Bureau of Imports to Hafız Abdullah
Efendi, the chief warden of Kasr-ı Hümâyûn as well.516 The division of seals is an
indicator of a high amount of revenues to be shared even by the different guild
wardens.
514 “…emânet-i müşarünileyha böyle alenen hukuk-ı kethüdanemi pây-i hâl emsallerimden…(?)
mahrum ederek enfü’l-beyân şahs-ı salis merkumlar uhdesine böyle parça mühür teslimiyle vazife-i
asliyeme müdahale etmeleri hiçbir vicdan kabul etmeyeceği şöyle dursun işbu muamelenin vuku‘u asla
olmadığı emanet-i müşarünileyhânın bu babdaki cevabnâmesini katiyyen kabul etmeyeceğimden bu
babda adilane bir karar ittihazıyla mezkur parçaların iptaliyle ferman-ı hümayun mucibince hukuk-ı
acizanemin muhafaza buyrulması hususu adalet-i padişahi namına temennî eylerim.” See BOA, ŞD.
3042/58, 2 S 1326 [6 March 1908].
515 BOA, ŞD. 3042/58, 2 S 1326 [6 March 1908].
516 Nejdet Ertuğ, Osmanlı Döneminde İstanbul Hammalları, (İstanbul: Timaş Yayınları, 2008), p. 34;
BOA, İ. DH. 1022/80552, 2 CA 1304 [27 January 1887].
180
Meanwhile, gathering different professions under the same guild warden
management was profitable for the guild wardens because when the number of the
guild members increased, the incomes of the guild wardens increased directly. In this
kind of cases, the trade group complained about the practice, but it did not pose a
problem for the guild wardens. In the case of flour sellers in 1883, the guild
wardenships of the whole-wheat flour and the flour sellers were reunited even though
the license fees and taxes were different. The seal of the guild warden was divided into
four pieces, and the guild warden of the whole-wheat flour seller İsmail Efendi and the
other guild masters took them. The flour sellers complained of this decision, and they
stated that their licenses and the monthly taxes were different from the other group.
But the government approved this decision. The reason why it accepted the
continuation of this situation is that the whole-wheat flour sellers was outnumbered
compared to the flour sellers.517 The example shows that the concerns of the sellers
and their wardens were different.
Certain disputes emerged among the hierarchical order of the guilds as well,
and it demonstrates that the guild warden was a favorite position for the members of
the guilds who were charged in the management of the guild. For example, Mehmed
Ağa, the yiğitbaşı of tailors, shoemakers, and second-hand dealers, claimed that his
income was not enough to make a living and demanded to have a berat to become a
guild warden and share this position with Hacı Süleyman Ağa, the current guild
warden. The government accepted the division of the position into two. This case is
significant to see the possibility of change in the structure of the guild warden
position.518 This document is dated to a very early period but the change in the status
and structure of the guild warden post was seen in the examples occurred in later period
as well. The demand of Mehmed Ağa is related to both the flexibility in the guild
hierarchy in the last century of the Empire and the economic downturn of the period,
forcing the guild members to request their traditional financial rights or enhance their
financial circumstances by appealing new methods.
517 BOA, ŞD. 2902/3, 9 RA 1300 [18 January 1883].
518 BOA, A.} MKT.MHM. 116/72, 16 M 1274 [6 September 1857].
181
5.1.3. The Guild Warden Position as a Life-Time Income Source
The duration of service years of guild wardens was not determined or limited
in the last period of the guilds. If people from trade and manufacturing groups were
pleased with their guild wardens, there was no need to change them. But they changed
in case of death or conflict. If a change was needed, the election was being made.519
Also, the governments appointed the wardens. This post ensured a regular income for
guild wardens in theory. But incomes fell short in certain cases. Therefore, the guild
wardens tried to find a way to increase their incomes, such as demanding a rise. For
example, Halil Ağa, the guild warden of pony sellers (midilliciler), demanded an extra
income in 1857 since the amount that the guild paid him was not enough to support
himself financially, and he emphasized that he was old.520 In the course of time, the
guild warden post seemed like a lifetime income source in general. In the case dated
1896, Hacı İbrahim, the guild warden of the candle makers (mum yapımcıları),
requested from the Municipality ending of his guild wardenship because he was old
and not to be able to collect the taxes. But he requested a salary payment without
conducting his job. He wrote a petition to the government and stated that he was
appointed to this position. He added that he served for a long time in the Private
Treasury of the Ottoman Sultan (Hazine-i Hassa) and Holy Relics (Hırka-ı Saadet)
sections. He was collecting 1000 kuruş at the very beginning of his administration.
However, he lost his eye health, and this amount began to decrease. An assistant then
fulfilled this duty by proxy. Approximately 200 kuruş were collected from the
employees after he became disabled. He stated that he was at a low ebb because these
decreases. Hence, he demanded the operation of the guild warden position by the
Municipality and the appropriation of a sufficient amount of salary for himself.521 It
shows that the guild wardens saw this post as a source of income. The organic link
between the guild wardens and the craft or trade groups continued even after the
retirement of the guild wardens.
519 Çadırcı, p. 124.
520 BOA, A.} MKT. NZD. 231/92, 19 Z 1273 [10 August 1857].
521 BOA, Y. MTV. 144/57, 9 S 1314 [20 July 1896].
182
Furthermore, unofficially retired guild wardens who quitted this job tried to
take income or fees from the related group, but it was a financial burden for the guild
members. The Municipality tried to obviate this kind of acts caused by the guild
wardens. For example, the sheep trout sellers (paçacılar) stated that they decided to
pay 300 kuruş to Musa Ağa, their guild warden, guaranteed by a voucher in 1883. He
left his job a long time ago because of his health problems. They pointed out that they
would not be able to pay this amount anymore because some of the masters who signed
this voucher died or left their job and they could not pay it. They offered that Musa
Ağa could come and do his job in return for the income of the guild warden position.
If he did not accept it, the trade group could give only 100 kuruş to him. The
Municipality stated that there was no such an article in code and the employees would
not be forced to pay this amount. It was ordered that they could elect an assistant of a
guild warden and solve this problem among themselves in a proper way.522 This
example shows that guild wardenship seemed as an imprescriptible right felt into a
risky condition when the affairs of the related groups were not conducted.
5.1.4. The Abuses of the Guild Wardens and Disputes
Guild wardens were officially accepted administrators, and they were mainly
responsible for collecting fees and regulating the affairs of the guilds to some extent
on behalf of the state. They were under the supervision of the state, and the
accountability principle was valid for them too. They were known as the major official
representative and protector of the affiliated artisan and trader groups. Nevertheless,
instances from the last decades of the imperial capital do not verify this argument or
postulate in particular cases. They show that the stances of the guild wardens towards
their duties and responsibilities did not present a hopeful picture in terms of people
who deal with small scale commercial activities.
The number of complaints about the guild wardens increased in this period,
and they partially reverberated to the official documents. Instead of being the authority
of the dispute settlement mechanism, they became one of the sides in the disputes
522 BOA, TS. MA. d. 629/119, 24 S 1300 [4 January 1883].
183
about the affairs of the guilds in their last period. Even the Ministry of Interior stated
that the guild wardens abused their positions, and the emergent conflicts involving the
guild wardens were the reasons for their abolition.523
The involvement of the guild wardens in the affairs of other guilds led to
conflicts among different artisan and trader guilds and their guild wardens. The
artisans and traders generally had information about the legal decisions that
determined the limits and responsibilities of guild wardenship. Therefore, they
controlled the actions of the guild wardens and complained about them to the
municipal authorities if needed. They were also aware that only their guild wardens
had the right to control them. If a guild warden involved in the matters of another guild,
the members of the guild in question conveyed it to the municipal administration. For
example, the porters, boatmen, or bargemen often complained about the conflicts
appeared in their workplaces due to intense competition at piers. Their guild wardens
caused several conflicts, and these mentioned groups were vulnerable to the
disputes.524 In the example dated 1889, the guild warden of fire-boatmen (ateş
kayıkçıları)525 who worked between Dersaadet and Üsküdar districts only let his
eleven boats to work in this route. The members complained about their guild warden
to the Municipality since he prevented their work. It was argued that the guild warden
monopolized his position and violated the rights of the employees. This case indicates
three significant points about the working order and the rights of the employees. First,
the boatmen who were not the guild members and who worked for the guild warden’s
boats were not registered, and it shows that there was no systematic and strict control
523 BOA, DH. MKT. 2774/40, 1 Ra 1327 [23 March 1909]; BOA, ŞD. 842/26, 17 Ra 1327 [6 April
1909].
524 For example, the boatmen working at Galata Mumhane and Tophane piers complained about İmdad
Efendi, their guild warden, and demanded his dismissal. See BOA, BEO. 3416/256143, 23 N 1326 [19
October 1908]; BOA, BEO. 3427/256981, 12 L 1326 [7 November 1908].
525 Many types of boats existed in Istanbul, yet the position of the fire-boatmen was different from the
others because they were charged with fire extinguishing in the coasts of the Bosporus and the Golden
Horn. These boats were quite small and thin to be faster in case of fires compared to the other types of
boats. They were also used to transport people and goods. They were waiting at Great Pier in Üsküdar
and Çardak Pier in Eminönü. See Mehmet Zeki Pakalın, “Ateş Kayıkları”, Osmanlı Deyimleri ve
Terimleri Sözlüğü (1st vol), (İstanbul: Milli Eğitim Bakanlığı, 1983), p. 109; Mehmet Mazak, Boğaziçi
ve Kayık Kültürü, (İstanbul: Yeditepe Yayınevi, 2010), p. 57. For a detailed information on the boatmen
and boating in the Ottoman Empire, see Nejdet Ertuğ, Osmanlı Dönemi’nde İstanbul Deniz Ulaşımı ve
Kayıkçılar, (İstanbul: Kültür Bakanlığı Yayınları, 2001).
184
over them. Second, the guild warden did not act according to the benefits of the
mentioned group, and he abused in this case. As the last point, this case indicates the
collective consciousness of the employees regarding their rights.526
A petition from Kasımpaşa boatmen sealed by Ragıp from the group and his
three friends dated 1900 was one of the salient examples of the abuses of the guild
wardens. Boatmen stated that their guild warden, Mustafa Ağa, demanded 5 kuruş for
every process and 5 kuruş from each member for every year as his fee, but they were
giving 40 paras for each sealed document before Mustafa Ağa became the guild
warden of the boatmen. Therefore, the group stated that they could not pay more than
40 paras to their guild warden.527 However, their petition was not responded to by the
related government offices for more than two years, and finally, the government stated
that their petition was not accepted. Based on this, the group pointed out that the
unlawful act of the guild warden meant the downfall of their profession. It also meant
that the government tolerated the guild warden’s abuse when he acted illegally. The
boatmen again appealed to the government with a petition, and they stated that the
government had to direct them to any related department or office to solve their
problem or the investigation of the problem and the practice of the law for both two
sides.528 The reason or reasons why the problem of boatmen was not solved for a long
time is uncertain. The guild warden probably continued his practice, and the
government did not terminate it. However, regardless of this delay, this complaint
demonstrates that the group opposed to the illegal practice of their guild warden which
he did by demanding extra payments from them. They wanted to solve their problem
in the legal framework. Nonetheless, the long period struggle of this group and the
absence of a certain responsible state department, as the last point, indicates the
administrative deficiencies in the state apparatus.529
526 BOA, DH. MKT. 1636/25, 11 ZA 1306 [9 July 1889]; BOA, DH. MKT. 1659/50, 23 M 1307 [19
September 1889].
527 BOA, DH. MKT. 2419/98, 1 B 1318 [25 October 1900].
528 BOA, ŞD. 3020/35, 11 S 1321 [9 May 1903].
529 The number of complaints can be augmented. For example, Çengelköy porters complained to their
guild warden that he abused his position. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2304/50, 11 L 1317 [12 February 1900].
185
Not only the port/pier related sectors, other artisanal and trade sectors also
hosted grievances concerning the abuses of the guild wardens. For example, in a case
in 1901, the bushel-dealers (kileci) consulted the Municipality, and they stated that
their guild warden and the guild committee did not fulfill their duties about accounting
properly. With the seals of Veli and Ahmed Hamdi Ağas, they demanded ending their
problem by the government since they were suffered a lot from this abuse.530
Besides the guild wardens, the assistant of the guild wardens abused their
positions as well. The practice of collection of fees was often exposed to the abuses of
the responsible people. For example, in 1889, the bushel dealer Ahmed and his
colleagues complained about Selim Ağa, their guild warden assistant, and demanded
to change him that he collected money unfairly. But the Municipality interestingly and
inconceivably decided to arrest the group members in question and then exile them
within one or two days. They demanded the cancellation of this punishment and the
inspection of this matter.531 In another case about the guild warden assistant in 1901,
the porters of the warehouse of the Anatolian and Rumelian Railway at Sirkeci
complained about Süleyman Ağa, their guild warden assistant, and stated that their
fellows were beaten because he has heard the complaints about himself made by these
porters. The porters demanded the Municipality to dismiss him. This example shows
the solidarity among the porters against their blacklisted guild member.532 As a result,
the conflict between the guild members and their guild warden became an important
feature of the small-scale business life of the late Ottoman period.
After the new arrangements and practices, the guild wardens sometimes
resisted the decisions of the Municipality, and they insisted on the continuation of the
old order. They did not obey the decisions and orders of the Municipality since they
did not want to accept the Municipality as authority. Therefore, resistance from the
head of the guilds came into prominence as a remarkable reaction in this period. In the
case of Hüseyin Ağa, the guild warden of the caretaker of horses and Arif Ağa, the
assistant guild warden of the porters of the Commodity Custom, which dated 1885, it
530 BOA, DH. MKT. 2478/8, 9 M 1319 [28 April 1901].
531 BOA, DH. MKT. 1684/121, 2 CA 1307 [25 December 1889].
532 BOA, DH. MKT. 2519/46, 20 R 1320 [6 August 1901].
186
was stated that they falsified the licenses, so the Municipality appointed new guild
wardens instead of them until the case was concluded. The Police could take these
seals from them. But they refused to give their seals to the municipal administration.
Hüseyin and Arif Ağas pointed out that they could not give the seals until the case
ended. They also claimed that the Municipality had to take permission from the
Ministry of Interior to take back these seals and the arrest of themselves would only
be practiced by the decision of the court. But the Municipality demanded to practice
the decision as soon as possible.533 This example is significant in terms of showing the
disregarding the Municipality as the major representative in the official affairs of the
guilds.
In the case of Ali Bey, the guild warden of customs of Yağ Kapanı and Kadıköy
pier, he had berat for this position in 1904, but he claimed that his berat and seals were
retaken from him in July of 1908. The Municipality informed him that his berat is
legally invalid. He stated that he could not do his job since then. He pointed out that
only the Sultan would be able to abolish his berat, so he did not accept the decision of
the Municipality. Ali Bey evaluated this condition as entrenching his rights and
demanded the allowance to do his job and give his seals back in 1919. The Ministry
of Interior did not accept his demand since the guild warden position was abolished
long ago. It seems that Ali Bey did not acknowledge the decision of the Municipality,
and he stated that the municipal administration carried out this decision unjustly and
unlawfully. In this case, the perplexing thing is why Ali Bey waited for more than ten
years to retake his seal. He could not do his duty in the period after July of 1908, yet
he wrote his petition in 1919.534 This case also demonstrates that certain guild wardens
did not see the Municipality as the official authority. It also proves the existence of the
challenge in orientation to the new bureaucratic order. Guild wardens sometimes
warned the Municipality when took decisions without taken new legal regulations
about the market affairs. In 1890, the guild warden of Uzunçarşı winders (çıkrıkçı)
reminded that his post was taken from him and it was united with the guild warden
post of fence-makers (parmaklıkçı). This arrangement was illegal according to him.
533 BOA, ŞD. 715/21, 29 ZA 1302 [9 September 1885].
534 BOA, DH. UMVM. 88/21, 20 Z 1337 [16 September 1919].
187
Interestingly, this position was allocated to the other people without asking or
reporting to the related individuals. Hence, he laid claim to having this position.535
The guild wardens played a crucial role in guild affairs and in controlling guild
members and making them to be loyal to the regulations and other legal arrangements
in theory. In contrast to the abuses of the guild wardens, they sometimes complained
about the irresponsible behaviors of their guild members. There are examples showing
that the artisans and traders did not want to obey the decisions of their guild warden
when the latter took care of his own interests.
In 1908, the guild wardens stated that the employees did not pay the license
fees and went wherever they wanted without informing their guild wardens. Moreover,
they did not pay the expenses of the guilds (rooms). According to the guild wardens,
these irresponsible behaviors were both unlawful and caused a decrease in the
revenues of the Municipality.536 The guild wardens stressed the importance of these
two major critical issues as the justification of their claim to prevent their income loss.
In years, the guild wardenship as a representative of the old order lost its power
after the establishment of the Municipality. Both the organizational weakening in the
new administrative system and the abuses and other wrongdoings of the wardens
paved the way for the abolition of the guilds. However, the guild wardens tried to
postpone the abolition of this position as it was a significant source of income. For
example, twenty-one guild wardens demanded the delay of the abolition until the
Ottoman Parliament (Meclis-i Mebûsan) prepared a special law for this issue.537 The
disapprobation of the acts of the guild wardens directed the governments to find new
ways for regulating the affairs of the trade and manufacturing groups. Both the extra
financial burden on the trade groups and the abuses of the guild wardens extinguished
it.538 Their abolition was not solely a top-down process, yet it was also the result of the
535 BOA, DH. MKT. 1463/37, 28 S 1305 [13 October 1890].
536 BOA, DH. MKT. 1299/9, 24 Ş 1326 [21 September 1908].
537 BOA, DH. MKT. 2841/10, 23 CE 1327 [12 June 1909].
538 It was stated that the artisan and trade groups did not have to pay tax both to the guild warden and to
the Municipality at the same time since the guild warden position belonged to the Esnaf Office, which
was also under the authority of the Municipality. See BOA, DH. MKT. 2768/21, 22 S 1327 [15 March
1909].
188
grievances coming from below. Deviation of the guild wardens from their protective
responsibilities contributed to the end of their positions. Certain services which were
previously provided by the guild wardens began to be provided by the Municipality
and with this way the centralized supervision over the wardens, the marketplaces and
market actors.539
The new order in the market and new institutions did not appear all of a sudden
but also from the needs of the production, business, and the requirements of the new
economic order in general. Because, the guilds did not function parallel to the new
administrative structure of the state anymore in their last period. The municipal
administration might have wanted to remove the guild wardens due to the
abovementioned disputes and the new tax collecting practices. The abolition of the
guild warden post was intensively related firstly with the administrative reform in the
Ottoman state apparatus and its link with the affairs of the artisans and traders and
second the attempt to remove the guild wardens as intermediaries who led to many
conflicts in the last days of the guilds.
It cannot be enough to examine the guilds as the groups of artisans and the
organization only by considering the economic reasons and fluctuations emerged in
this period. The new administrative order entailed new marketplace representatives
and organizations as well. After the abolition of this post in 1910, the associations were
established instead of the guilds to meet these requirements. These newly founded
organizations, as one of the main arteries of the issue, are handled in the next section.
5.2. From Guilds to Esnaf Associations (1910/1912)
The modern bureaucracy and secular laws came with the Tanzimat reforms
also played a role in the changes in the marketplaces and in the organizational structure
of the artisans and traders as well. Bureaucratization forced these groups to act
according to the written regulations. Many ordinances and regulations were prepared
and implemented in this period for different working fields, and the governments,
including early Republican Turkey, utilized them with certain amendments.
539 For example, the Municipal tax collectors began to collect cleaning tax which was previously
collected by the guild wardens in the marketplaces. See BOA, DH. MKT. 873/55, 12 CA 1322 [25 July
1904].
189
Artisans and traders were given under the authority the Municipality by the
Supreme Council of Judicial Ordinances (Meclis-i Vala-yı Ahkâm-ı Adliye) following
its establishment in Istanbul in 1855. The classical narrative about guild wardens was
based on their protectionist role, but the reality was different, at least in the last days
of the guilds. Guilds and their wardens were the intermediaries of these groups
between the state and themselves until their abolition. Guild wardens appear as one of
the reasons for the abolition of this position and the guilds. Because, guild wardens
either elected by the guild members or appointed by the governments caused troubles
for the guild members.540 The state planned to remove this post as an intermediary in
commerce-related administrative affairs. The official documents about the abolition of
this post highlighted such reason as the emergence of the conflicts and abuses of the
guild wardens. The state officially mentioned the abolition of this post in March 1909.
It was stated that there was a need for legislation to improve the conditions of trade
groups and artisans, such as the establishment of associations that belonged to them
and make them judicially equal. The abolition of the guild warden post was put
forward as a proposal, and the Sublime Porte (Bâb-ı Âli ) was put in charge of
practicing this process.541
A memoranda (layiha) was then issued for the establishment of the associations
of artisans and traders (Esnaf Cemiyetleri Nizamnâmesi) in 1909.542 Associations are
institutions established to assist their members in their professional development and
to defend the economic and legal interests of their members. With these features,
associations are also accepted as a means of pressure defending the rights of their
members against state and private institutions.543 One of the main motives in
establishing these associations was to regulate the affairs of these groups since the old
system and order were not running properly. In this respect, the complaints about the
540 BOA, DH. UMVM. 88/38, 20 R 1331 [29 March 1913].
541 BOA, DH. MKT. 2774/40, 1 Re 1327 [23 March 1909]; BOA, ŞD. 842/26, 17 Re 1327 [6 April
1909]; BOA, BEO, 3536/265135, 26 March 1325 [8 April 1909].
542 The first record about the memoranda (lâyiha) of the ordinance was dated 1909. See BOA, DH.
MKT. 2802/17, 3 R 1327 [4 May 1909]; BOA, BEO. 3712/278388.-, 20 S 1328 [3 March 1910].
543 For the concepts of pressure and interest groups, see Yücekök, “19. Yüzyıl Osmanlı Toplumundan
Günümüz Türkiye’sine Sivil Toplum Kuruluşları ve Siyaset Sosyolojisi İlişkileri”, pp. 9-11.
190
guild wardens became one of the major reasons to prepare new memoranda.544 On the
other side, it aimed to remove the intermediaries who were guild wardens. In brief, the
establishment of the associations was not only related to the free market economy but
also related to the new bureaucratic and administrative order.
Esnaf associations, like the guilds, were the intermediary organizations that
arranged the affairs of trade groups and artisans.545 Their remarkable difference from
the guilds was their formal structure; that is to say, the division of responsibilities
among the members and the administrative posts within the organization differed them
from the guilds. The general board (heyet-i umûmiye) and the executive board (heyeti
idâre) became the main sub-bodies of the associations based on mutual supervision
and control in the new organization system. The authority was allocated to both
boards; the head (reis) stayed in the background in association matters, and only a
symbolic headship remained. The decisions were taken by the majority of the votes
within these associations. Thus, it led to the development of a partially liberal structure
within each association. However, the pluralistic structure increased the level of clash
of interests among the groups as well.
The Ordinance for Esnaf Associations (Esnaf Cemiyetleri Hakkında Talimat),
as mentioned previously, initiated a new organizational period and system for artisan
and trade groups within the whole empire. The basis of it got started from the period
of the arrangement of Law of Municipality in 1877. The first reference to establishing
the esnaf associations was mentioned in the 8th article of this municipality
regulation.546 A certain regulation/ordinance structured these bodies after a while.547
The ordinance was first issued for the artisan and trade groups in Istanbul, then in 1912
544 BOA, ŞD. 842.26, 15 Re 1327 [6 April 1909].
545 Mehmet Seyitdanlıoğlu, “Yerel Yönetim Metinleri (XVI): Esnaf Cem’iyetleri Hakkında T’alimât”,
Çağdaş Yerel Yönetimler, Cilt 8 Sayı 1, (Ocak 1999), pp. 127-128.
546 The article is about the missions of the Assembly of Municipality (Şehremâneti Meclisi). The term
“esnaf association” was first mentioned officially in this article. For Article 8, see “Dersaâdet Belediye
Kanunu”, 27 N 1294 [5 October 1877], Düstur, I/4, pp. 520-538; for in Latin alphabet, see Mehmet
Seyitdanlıoğlu, Tanzimat Döneminde Modern Belediyeciliğin Doğuşu: Yerel Yönetim Metinleri,
(İstanbul: Türkiye İş Bankası Kültür Yayınları, 2010), p. 107; BOA, ŞD. 842/26, 17 Ra 1327 [6 April
1909].
547 The memoranda of the ordinance was also announced in the newspapers with including its all articles.
See “Esnaf Cemiyetleri”, Tanin, no: 259, 3 CA 1327 [23 May 1909], p. 4.
191
it covered all these groups in the Empire.548 The ordinance mainly explains the
organizational structure of the associations, their missions and duties, and the official
process when contacting with the municipal administrators. It put the judicial and
managerial affairs of these groups in an order, which was more appropriate to the
municipal system than the old guild wardenship order. All the articles of the ordinance
were accepted equivalent to the guild system.549 However, this new organization had
remarkable differences from the organizational structure and the official status of the
guilds in terms of the administrative system.
The Ordinance for the Esnaf Associations involved articles about the
arrangements of the official relationship between the associations and the municipal
administrators in detail. It put the external affairs of the associations in order. In this
ordinance, the associations were generally depicted as the main representative of the
groups, and the head (reis) was symbolic compared to the guild wardenship system.
The main responsible office for these associations was stated as the Municipality for
the ones in Istanbul and the other municipalities for the associations established in the
provinces like in the old guild system. They were officially affiliated to the
Municipality, and they needed the approval of the municipalities that they belonged
to. These institutions were responsible for informing both the Ministry of Interior and
the Police about all approvals and cancellations of the associations.550 This
bureaucratic network indicates that associations seemed like that had to be under the
surveillance of the center and under the law enforcers. The Municipality and the Police
force collaboration constituted the main frame of the control mechanism in the esnaf
association affairs.
548 The ordinance only for Istanbul, see “Esnaf Cemiyetleri Hakkında Talimat”, 16 S 1328 [27 February
1910], Düstur, II/2, pp. 123-127; BOA, İ.ŞE. 25/14, 16 S 1328 [27 February 1910]. The regulation for
the whole Empire, see BOA, DH. UMVM. 88/40, 20 Ca 1330 [7 May 1912]; “Esnaf Cemiyetleri
Hakkında Talimat”, 20 CA 1330 [7 May 1912], Düstur, II/ 4, pp. 483-488. For the whole version of the
regulation, see Appendix E and F.
549 “Esnaf Mektebleri, Teâvün Sandıkları”, Tanin, no. 260, 11 May 1325 [24 May 1909], p. 3.
550 The associations of cattle-dealers, bakers, prayer beads sellers, and itinerant edge tool makers were
closed since they did not conform to the regulation of the associations. But the Municipality gave
permission again, and a new executive board was chosen. The new association was approved by handing
over the seals of themselves. See BOA, DH. UMVM. 88/74, 18 M 1340 [21 September 1921].
192
Although the ordinance was prepared in 1910 and revised in 1912, the
amendments continued until the end of the Empire. After the phrases of the
Municipality and the Municipal assembly, “the municipalities and the assembly of
municipalities” (devâir-i belediye ve meclis-i belediye) were added to the ordinance,
and also the Assembly of the Municipality replaced with the “Assembly of the
Administration” (meclis-i idâre).551 The articles 6, 7, 12, and 26 were revised in
years.552 The article 6 was changed to make sure that a clerk is appointed to preside
the elections of the executive board. On the other hand, the group could choose one of
their members to preside the elections, and they could notify the results with a joint
report to the municipalities. The article 7 stresses that there had to be a clerk both in
Istanbul and the provinces. According to the Article 12, money which was collected
for the expenditures of the Head of the association was also to be used by the clerk of
the association.553 Lastly, it was stated that the responsible clerk in Istanbul and the
head in the provinces had to deal with the for and against cases of the associations.554
Due to having a grasp of old customary practices and but not the current clerk system,
the old version of the ordinance was again implemented.555 As a last note for these
amendments, the article 2 was rearranged, and it was added to this article that cabbies,
boatmen, bargemen, and porters would be able to establish an organization both in
Istanbul and provinces.556 The ordinance was turned into a regulation, and this
regulation was affiliated to the Chambers of Commerce and Industry Regulation in
1925.557
551 BOA, İ. DUİT. 22/5., 13 Ca 1332 [9 April 1914].
552 BOA, DH. UMVM. 88/40, 20 Ca 1330 [7 May 1912]; BOA, İ. DUİT. 22/5, 13 Ca 1332 [9 April
1914].
553 BOA, BEO. 4341/325556, 14 Ca 1333 [7 March 1915]; BOA, MV. 239/36, 12 Ca 1333 [28 March
1915]; BOA, DH. MB. HPS. 153/51, 13 Ca 1333 [29 March 1915].
554 BOA, İ.. DUİT. 22/5, 13 Ca 1332 [9 April 1914].
555 BOA, İ.. DUİT. 21/41, 13 M 1338 [9 October 1919]; BOA, ŞD. 853/39, 14 Ra 1341 [4 November
1922].
556 BOA, MV. 255/64, 21 Ş 1339 [30 April 1921].
557 For the Regulation of Chambers, see Ticaret ve Sanayi Odaları Kanunu ve Ticaret ve Sanayi Odaları
Nizamnâmesi ve Esnâf Cemiyetleri Talimatnâmesi, (İstanbul: Vatan Matbaası, 1341 [1925]), Atatürk
Library, no: 216, pp. 66-71.
193
Although many amendments were made on this ordinance until the end of the
Ottoman Empire, there were not made fundamental changes.558 Apart from the name
changes of the institutions and political order, almost the same regulation was also
used by the Republican regime. The esnaf associations were linked to the Chambers
of Commerce and Industry, and the Regulation of 1912 was added to the Regulation
of the Chambers. According to this newly edited regulation version, the Ministry of
Trade and Economics, commerce and industry chambers, and the municipalities
became the major responsible agencies in the artisanal and trade affairs. Only the
articles of 1, 2, 4, 7, 8, 19, 21, 24, and 26 are utterly the same both in the regulation of
1912 and 1925. Yet, the other articles were changed according to the legal positions
including the Ministry of Trade and Economics, the commerce and industry chambers,
and the municipalities instead of the Municipality and its assembly. The
responsibilities of the municipalities remained the same in the new regulation. Lastly,
the article 16 forbade the establishment of trade unions and allying with blackmarketeering.
The Republican regime banned the establishment of trade unions
because they were out of the borders of association law. The issues such as a strike or
work stoppage, which were mainly related to the workers, were not included in the
regulation of associations.559 It means that trade unions and esnaf associations
officially seemed different. Therefore, it can be argued that the associations established
for artisans and traders were not as the proto-version of trade unions. The trade unions
and associations were treated separately by the state in terms of their professional
mission, member profile, and the judicial status.
The Esnaf Associations Regulation (Esnaf Cemiyetleri Nizamnâmesi) was
different than the 1909 Law of Associations (Cemiyetler Kanunu) since the former
was a specific arrangement for a certain social group. It brought different practices
from the foundation to the membership requirements. While it was the government
which was the sole authority in the implementation of the Law of Association, it was
558 Esnaf Cemiyetleri Nizamnâmesi, (İstanbul: Cihan Biraderler Matbaası, 1339-1343), Atatürk
Üniversitesi Kütüphanesi Seyfettin Özege Koleksiyonu, no: 21814, pp. 2-8.
559 Üsküdar hand painted-kerchief-makers (yazmacı) association went on a strike with its 3.000 artisans
and workers in 1921, but the Police tried to prevent this strike. The government interestingly decided
that the police intervention was not proper according to law. See BOA, DH. İ.UM. 19/1, 23 CA 1340
[22 January 1922].
194
the Municipality responsible for the implementation of the Esnaf Association
Regulation properly.560 Nonetheless, the governments supervised the foundation and
whereabouts of the Esnaf Associations as well. It was decided that the members of
these organizations had to inform and register their prospective associations to the
Municipality. They also had to declare the establishment of their associations and take
a certification in return for the declaration.561
After going into effect of the new ordinance, different trade and artisan groups
reacted differently to this new arrangement according to their working conditions, and
the number of their demands rose. For instance, simit seller, bread, börek, cookie, and
kadayıf makers wrote a petition in 1910 to establish their unique association who
worked more than 50-60 years together because they could not establish their special
organization due to the lack of the number of the members to found an association.
They applied to the Municipality to solve this issue and demanded a commissioner
who had to be ready during the election of the organization. Initially, simit seller,
bread, börek, cookie, and kadayıf makers gave information about the rules in
establishing an organization with references to the Association Law in their petition.
They highlighted that this was not an attempt to establish a trade union or a politicallyoriented
organization, yet it was an organization to provide mutual help among
themselves. However, if they had to establish separate organizations, they could not
even help their members because of the financial burden that every specific association
could create. They stated that they were composed of five different trade groups, and
every group included 20-25 people; 150-160 masters from 30 shops. They proposed
certain reasons for why they were not able to establish separate organizations. First of
all, simit seller, bread, börek, cookie, and kadayıf makers pointed out that the rent of
the meeting room (because they had to gather in different rooms for their elections and
negotiate their problems in these rooms), clerk salary (250-300 kuruş), stationery and
paper-pencil expenses could exceed their incomes because their number was low to
560 For the Law of Associations, see “Cemiyetler Kanunu”, 29 B 1327 [16 August 1919], Düstur, II/1,
pp. 604-608. An amendment was made in 1920. See “29 Receb 1327 tarihli Cemiyetler kanununa
müzeyyel kararnâme”, 15 M 1339 [29 September 1920], Düstur, II/12, p. 280.
561 After the control of the Municipality, they had to apply to the Istanbul Province (İstanbul Vilâyeti)
post with a declaration (beyannâme) to get a certificate (ilmuhaber) from it in the province system.
BOA, DH. UMVM. 88/38, 6 Ca 1331 [13 April 1913].
195
meet these expenses. They stated that they even could not pay the fees of their guild
warden in the previous period. Second, they added that it was inadequate for them to
choose the substitute members who had to be changed every year because of their low
number. Lastly, simit seller, bread, börek, cookie, and kadayıf makers remarked that
they worked for nearly 50-60 years together, and so they did not want to be judicially
separated. They had already consulted the Municipality because of this problem, but
it ordered them to obey the provisions of the related ordinance. Yet, they claimed that
the Municipality did not understand their conditions. Therefore, they reapplied to the
Council of State. They demanded not the appointment of a separate “guild warden” or
a head like in the period of autocracy, but they wanted to establish a unique
organization consisted of these five trade groups.562 Obviously, the foundation of a
separate association was an economic burden because of the administrative
expenditures for the groups who were dealing with small scale commercial activities.
This example shows that there was a resistance from the groups not to be separated
judicially to overcome their prospective economic difficulties, which increased in the
new administrative system.
The bread makers also wrote a petition to the Municipality to establish their
association in 1910, but their reason was different. The Municipality wrote to the
record the classifications of trade and artisan groups such as bread makers, jewelers,
and shoemakers under a hierarchy in division of labor including journeymen and
apprentices to inform the Ministry of Interior. Every trade group was able to establish
its organization as it was stated. It was pointed out that amele (laborer), journeymen,
and apprentice working in bakery shop wanted to have an organization independent of
their masters and the workplace owners since their superiors did not pay their salaries
properly. It goes without saying that amele and the other employees did not want to
gather under a unique organization with their masters and the owners of the
workplaces. The Municipality permitted only to establish one organization initially
since the other option could lead to disorder and redundancy. But the Ministry of
Interior then allowed them to establish a separate association on condition that not
violating the interest of the populace.563 It can be claimed that the disputes among these
562 BOA, ŞD. 847/6/5, 8 Ra 1328 [20 March 1910].
563 BOA, ŞD. 847/6, 29 Ra 1328 [10 April 1910]; BOA, DH. UMVM. 88/71, 1 Ca 1328 [11 May 1910].
196
groups shaped their organizing tradition remarkably. It indicates that no tangible
solidarity did exist among them and the demands, expectations, and concerns of the
two mentioned sides were different from each other.
Solidarity, collaboration, mutual understanding, and control among the artisans
and traders were not automatically removed during the disappearance process of the
guilds. For example, the 8th Article of the 1912 Regulation states that the craft and
trade group members could help out their colleagues who were in a bad situation or
disabled.564 Also, the collection of money for mutual assistance was pointed out in
Articles 15 and 16, which encourages solidarity among various groups.565
Associations had the legal capacity, and their founders had to inform the
Municipality when they were established.566 Four main criteria were pointed out to
establish an association according to the Article 13 of the Regulation for Associations:
They had to be coherent to the Association Regulation, appropriate to the customary
practices of the related group, to the Ottoman law, and finally to free trade policy.
Coherence to the law, the customary practices, and free trade policy shaped the general
policy towards the marketplace actors as well. The ordinances and regulations for
esnaf associations brought the establishment of separate associations that give
significant administrative information about various occupations. Every group had the
right to prepare their vocational regulation and to establish their association. Yet, they
had to verify them to the Istanbul Municipality or the other municipalities.567 Many
564 “Esnaf Cemiyetleri Hakkında Talimat”, 20 CA 1330 [7 May 1912], Düstur, II/ 4, p. 485.
565 “Esnaf Cemiyetleri Hakkında Talimat”, 16 S 1328 [27 February 1910], Düstur, II/2, pp. 125-126.
566 Ebru Kayabaş, “Osmanlı Devleti’nde Tanzimat Devrinde Cemiyetler Hukuku’nun Gelişimi”, Ph.D.
diss., (İstanbul University, 2008), p. 197.
567 For some special regulations and ordinances belonged to each profession, see Dersaadet Limanı
Umum Deniz Kayıkçı ve Sandalcı Esnâfı Cemiyeti (General Dersaadet Port Waterman and Portman
Esnaf Association), BOA, DH. UMVM. 166/54, 26 Ş 1340 [24 April 1922]; Dersaadet Limanı Umum
Deniz Kayıkçı ve Sandalcı Esnâfı Cemiyeti Talimatnâmesi, (Dersaadet: Sanayi-i Nefise Matbaası,
1337); İstanbul Umum Binek ve Yük Arabacıları Cemiyeti Dahili Nizamnâmesi (The Association
Regulation of Istanbul general riding and carterman) and Simitçi, Ekmekçi, Börekçi, Kurabiyeci ve
Kadayıfçı Esnafı Cemiyeti Nizamnâme-i Dahiliyesi (The Association Regulation of Simit Seller, Bread
Maker, Börek Maker, Cookie Maker, Kadayıf Maker), BOA, HR. HMŞ.İŞO. 82/3, 1 May 1326 [14 May
1910]; Umûm Mavna ve Salapuryacı Esnafı Cemiyeti Nizamnâme-i Dâhiliyesi (The Association
Regulation of the general barge riders and lighterman) (Dersaadet, 1336); İstanbul Yorgancı, Döşemeci
ve Mobilyacılar ile Mefruşat-ı Beytiye Esnaf Cemiyeti Tâlimatnâmesi (The ordinance of the association
of Istanbul quilt makers, upholsterer, furniture dealers and the seller of soft furnishings), (İstanbul:
Bahriye Matbaası, 1337 [1921]); Dersaadet Balıkçı Esnafı Cemiyeti Nizamnâme-i Dahiliye Projesi
(The Association Regulation of fisherman), (İstanbul: Hüsn-i Tabiat Matbaası, 1339 [1923]); Dersaâdet
197
associations were established in this period.568 In the Statistics Journal record in 1912,
it was noted that more than thirty thousand people were the members of associations
among 63 profession categories.569
Ordinances and regulations of each association involve the articles about their
internal organizational structure and inner affairs. The ordinance of the association of
quilt makers, upholsterers, furniture dealers, and the seller of soft furnishings will be
mentioned briefly to give an idea about the features of an ordinance and the structure
of the association. It was stated that the association was established for the
development of vocations and the judicial rights of its members. An artisan or trader
who wanted to be a member of the association had to pay a certain fee annually. If he
did not pay it, he would be dismissed from the association. Also, if he wanted to resign
from membership, he had to pay the rest of the annual fee. Both artisans and traders
ve Bilâd-ı Selâse Umûm Bakkal Esnafı Kalfa ve Çıraklar Cemiyeti Nizâmnâmesidir (The Association
Regulation of the grocers and journeyman and apprentices association), (İstanbul: Ali Şükrü Matbaası,
1337); Dersaadet Bakkal Esnafı Cemiyeti Talimatnâmesi (The association ordinance of Istanbul
grocers), (Dersaadet, 1337 [1921]; Dersaâdet ve Bilâd-ı Selâse’de Umûm Tuğla İmalci Esnafı Cemiyeti
Talimatnâme-i Dâhiliyesidir (The association ordinance of the brick-makers), (İstanbul: Şehzade Başı
Evkaf Matbaası, 1338); Kabzımal Esnafı Cemiyeti: Talimatnâme (The association ordinance of fruit
and vegetable middleman), (İstanbul: Ahmed İhsan ve Şürekası Matbaacılık Osmanlı Şirketi, 1336);
İstanbul ve Mülhakatı Umûm Ekmekçi ve Francalacı Fırıncılar Esnaf Cemiyeti Talimatnâme-i
Dâhiliyesidir (The association ordinance of the general baker and francala makers), (İstanbul: Zelliç
Biraderler Matbaası, 1926); Dersaadet ve Bilad-ı Selase Ayakkabıcı Esnafı Cemiyeti Talimatnâme-i
Dahiliyesidir, (İstanbul: Matbaa-ı Bahriye, 1337); Dersaadet Kaldırımcı Esnafı Cemiyeti (The
Association Regulation of Istanbul paviours), BOA, DH. EUM.THR. 101/92, 28 B 1330 [13 July 1912];
Dersaadet Umum Hancı ve Otelci Esnafı Cemiyeti Talimatnâme-i Dahiliyesi (The association ordinance
of innkeeper and hotel keepers), (İstanbul: Teşebbüs Matbaası, 1339 [1341]; Dersaadet Umum Sakalar
Esnafı Cemiyeti Nizamnâmesi (The Association Regulation of Istanbul general water carriers),
(Dersaadet, 1336); Dersaadet ve Bilad-ı Selase Bilumum Menba’ Sucuları Esnafı Cemiyeti
Talimatnâme-i Dahiliyesidir (The association ordinance of Dersaadet and Bilad-ı Selase mineral water
carriers, (Dersaadet, 1339); Dersaadet ve Bilad-ı Selase Perukar Esnafı Talimatnâme-i Dahiliyesi (The
Association Regulation of Dersaadet and Bilad-ı Selase Barbers, (İstanbul: Ali Şükrü Matbaası, 1338);
Dersaadet ve Bilad-ı Selase Umum Binek ve Arabacı ve Beygirci Esnafı Cemiyeti Talimat-ı Dahiliyesi
(The association ordinance of general riding and carter and horse riders), (İstanbul: Necm-i İstikbal
Matbaası, 1335); Hamamcılar Esnafı Cemiyeti Talimatnâme-i Dahiliyesi (The association ordinance of
bathhouse keepers), (İstanbul: Kseon Matbaası, 1337); İstanbul Umum Celeb Esnafı Cemiyeti
Talimatnâme-i Dahiliyesi (The association ordinance of general cattle dealers), (İstanbul: Minber
Matbaası, 1336); Saraç Esnafı Cemiyetinin Talimatnâme-i Dahiliyesidir (The association ordinance of
saddlers), (İstanbul: Matbaa-ı Bahriye, 1337).
568 For the list of the associations which were established until the end of the World War One, see
Toprak, Türkiye’de Milli İktisat: 1908-1918, pp. 687-688.
569 1330 (1912) Statistics Journal involves 33 different profession categories in total, and 33 of them
involve 31,121 people in number. (The total was found 30,521 with recalculation). See 1330 Senesi
İstanbul Beldesi İhsâiyat Mecmuâsı, (Dersaadet: Matbaa-yı Arşak Garoyan, 1331), pp. 250-251. See
Table 3.
198
had the right to be affiliated with an association. There was no obligation to be a
member of an association; that is, free membership to conduct a profession existed in
the last period of the empire as well. The management of an association was allocated
to the general board (heyet-i umûmiye) and the executive board (heyet-i idâre). The
head (reis) stayed symbolic in the administrative affairs. The general board was
making decisions, and the executive board was conducting these decisions. Decisions
were taken by the majority of the votes of the members. These two aspects show the
liberal structure of the association. As an officially accepted institution that belonged
to a specific ordinance with its liberal inner organization, it determined the descriptions
of the responsibilities of its members. It aimed to improve the profession with an
emphasis on law.570 The ordinance was coherent with both the Law of Association and
the Regulation for the Esnaf Associations.
In another example, the association regulation of the water carriers involved
nearly the same articles. The mission of the association was explained by focusing on
the benefits of its members and regulating their affairs. The financial, administrative,
and occupational affairs of the groups were under the supervision and the management
of the executive board.571 The influential role of the executive board shows the
structure based on plurality in this association. This board carried out the interorganizational
control mechanism. Furthermore, it was added that every member had
the right to be involved in the affairs of the related occupation that they were belonged
in case of violations, which shows the plurality in organizing. From the side of their
members, if the benefits of the groups were considered, solidarity among their
members was emphasized in the association regulations. The emphasis of solidarity
served for both nostalgic and pragmatic motives and meanings. The associations
literally became professional organizations, and the regulation or ordinance of each
profession became the occupational code of them even though not including technical
570 İstanbul Yorgancı, Döşemeci ve Mobilyacılar ile Mefruşat-ı Beytiye Esnaf Cemiyeti Tâlimatnâmesi
(The association ordinance of the Istanbul quilt makers, upholsterer, furniture dealers, and the seller of
soft furnishings), (İstanbul: Matbaa-ı Bahriye, 1337 [1921]). The ordinance was composed of six parts
and forty-five articles.
571 Dersaâdet Umûm Sakalar Esnâfı Cemiyeti Nizamnâmesi (The Association Regulation of Dersaâdet
Public Water Carriers), Türk Tarih Kurumu Kütüphanesi, no: 3490-A/2336, (Dersaâdet: 1336); For the
postcard of public water carriers, see Figure 7.
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information about occupations. As it seemed in two examples, the content of the
ordinances or regulations of the associations was so similar.
The guilds were officially abolished, and the associations became the main
representation platforms of the marketplace actors in the last decades of the Empire
and early Republican period in Turkey. Supervision over the registration, providing
identities, and collecting information about the criminal acts of their members were
conducted carefully by both the governments and the Municipality via these
associations. However, no article about the tax payments was included in the
regulations of the associations because many abuses and violations in tax and fee
collections of guild wardens happened. Therefore, the new organizational model
distinguished the managerial affairs of organizations and taxes apart. Associations
were not authorized to collect taxes. The Municipality eliminated the intermediaries;
that is to say, the guild wardens, who were not able to accommodate themselves to the
new administrative and financial order. By this way, it aimed to terminate its tax
income loss caused by the wardens. Moreover, these associations can be accepted as
the proto version of the esnaf chambers inherited in the ensuing years. Like chambers,
they did not have a role in collecting taxes; they were only the corporations that protect
the rights and working conditions of their members. The Esnaf Associations could
only help retirement issues or financial difficulties of the members.
Every separate regulation helped to integrate trade groups into the new
administrative order, and the members became more familiar with the new legal
procedures. But before ending, certain points have to be sorted by considering the
regulation for associations and each association regulation or ordinance prepared for
the craft and trade groups. First of all, the guild order disappeared, and the new
organizational system was shaped by the written regulations. Nonetheless, the state
continued to use the term “guild” after the abolition of this organization and even both
guild and association terms were sometimes used together in the regulations, as in the
example of the association ordinance of the quilt makers.572 These two terms were
officially accepted, and the continuation of their usage was related to the continuation
of the traditional bureaucratic language. The governments aimed to remove the
572 The term “guild” was used in the written ordinance. See İstanbul Yorgancı, Döşemeci ve
Mobilyacılar ile Mefruşat-ı Beytiye Esnaf Cemiyeti Tâlimatnâmesi, pp. 5-15; The association of egg
sellers used both of them as well. See BOA, DH. HMŞ. 4/4, 18 S 1338 [12 November 1919].
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individual intermediaries but not the organizations. When the first article of the Esnaf
Associations Regulation is examined, it was pointed out that the guild wardenship was
abolished rather than the guilds. The conflicts occurred because of the existence of the
guild wardens but not the guilds themselves. Therefore, there was no difference for the
governments between the guilds and the associations in theory. As a new term,
association replaced guild. But this continuity does not mean the nonexistence of the
inner organizational differences between an association and a guild. The establishment
of the general board (heyet-i umûmiye), the executive board (heyet-i idâre), and the
headship (reis) were the parts of the new structure, which was different than the guilds.
Second, the post of guild warden was abolished with the new arrangement. The
“modern” terms for positions such as head and clerks began to be used in place of
guild wardenship. These heads and clerks were the individuals who conducted the
affairs of trade and artisan groups. The prevalent discussion on the official role and the
limits of the authority of the guild wardens within the guilds invaded the literature a
long time. Despite heading to the association and meetings, the head position had a
symbolic presence because the major administrative bodies of the associations were
the general board and the executive board. These boards were fully responsible for the
Municipality. The executive board was the major supervisor in the affairs of the
associations. This new system continued in the period of Republic of Turkey as well.
Related to this change, the distribution of the tasks in an organization was explicitly
stated in the regulations. It indicates that the governments tried to preclude
arbitrariness of members and arrayed the roles of each member. The aim was to put
the internal organizational structure matters in order and prevent the individual abuses
within these associations.
Third, there is no reference to the religious and moral norms in the regulation
of the associations, and the methods of problem solution became more
professionalized and institutionalized.573 They presented a new organizational model
which was based on Western written law for the foregoing groups. They did not inherit
573 Onur Yıldırım reminds the researchers that the romanticization of the guilds as agencies of social
solidarity and craft-honor, which is a common view in the literature, should be abandoned, and more
realistic and documentable categories of scholarly research should be replaced instead of this. See Onur
Yıldırım, “Ottoman Guilds (1600-1826): A Survey”. Paper presented at the meeting of The Return of
the Guilds, Utrecht University, Utrecht, 5-7 October, 2006, p. 17.
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the old figures from the guild structure, such as guild warden or yiğitbaşı. The
establishment of the associations changed the way of the application to the official
authorities of traders and artisans from the initiatives of the individuals (guild wardens)
to the organizations. In the guild system, the guild warden had authority, and the guild
members did have a relative involvement power in their affairs. As regards to the
associations, the general board and the executive board conducted the affairs of the
related commercial groups. In this way, the overwhelming majority of them gained the
opportunity not to be subjected to the abuses of the individuals, and the boards had
control of their associations. This resulted in the development of a more pluralistic
understanding when trying to solve their affairs, but ironically conflicts emerged,
which will be handled below in the newspaper polemic.
The general and executive boards substantially created a new organizational
tradition among artisans and traders, which was different from the old guild structure.
The weakening of individual authorities provided a basis for the development of a
pluralistic understanding. These associations contributed to the spread of plurality
sentiment within organizations when the articles of the association regulations were
examined because the general board and executive board came into prominence even
though the position of the head was present in this new organizational structure.
Ironically, the developing pluralistic understanding turned into conflicts of interests,
and the divisions emerged among themselves. The involvement of the state institutions
into the matters of the associations that led to the restricted civil society was criticized,
especially in press. A polemic in Meslek and Şehremaneti newspapers in 1925 about
the authority and the circumstance of the esnaf associations shows the problems related
to these organizations in practice at the very early period of the Republican regime.
Mübahat, an assistant manager of the economics of Municipality, asserted that Meslek
newspaper accused the Municipality about the inadequate protection of it in
association affairs. But he alleged that the major responsible for the issue of
associations was the artisans and traders themselves, and they were not conducting
their affairs well. Many associations were closed thanks to malfeasances,
administrative deficiencies or repealing their selves. The Municipality tried to prevent
it, according to him, but it was not able to do it completely. He stated that the members
of the associations were not trusting with each other, and they were complaining to
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their colleagues. In this condition, the Municipality was trying to establish peace
among themselves. Mübahat added that gossip, dissension, and disorder were so
prevalent among the groups, and they were not applying to the Municipality for
positive and constructive affairs. The first thing that these groups had to do was to
protect their associations and then demand the protection of the Municipality. If a
group protected their association, the protection and help of the Municipality could
come automatically.574 As an answer to this newspaper article, it was stated that the
Municipality did not understand the role of the associations and it had no idea about
the tasks and authority of itself. It was also claimed that the Municipality took under
control these associations and intervened in their inner affairs. If the Municipality did
it, no solidarity could exist among the groups. The associations were always under the
strict control of the Reign, the CUP, and the Municipality. The necessary thing to do
was to remove the intervention and protection of these authorities and let these groups
conduct their affairs independently. The act of helping was different from intervening
in their affairs.575 Contrary to the solution of the assistant manager, the writer of the
article in Meslek newspaper emphasized the required authority and independence of
the associations. They could enhance their power by eliminating the strict control of
the state-led institutions. This polemic indicates that the associations did not act
independently from the state institutions both in the Ottoman and the Republican
periods.
The Municipality became the responsible authority for the establishment of the
associations of artisans and traders. They existed under the supervision of the
Municipality, the Police, and the Ministry of Interior together. The official dealings
were recorded, and the problems of the groups were solved mostly by these official
agents. They were the registered economic and social organizations under the control
of the state agencies and both the guilds and then the associations formed a significant
part of civil urban life as well.
574 Mübahat, “Esnaf Cemiyetleri”, İstanbul Şehremâneti Mecmûası, no: 8, April 1341 [April 1925], p.
8.
575 “Esnaf Cemiyetleri ve Şehremâneti”, Meslek, no: 22, 12 May 1925, p. 8.
203
Artisan and trade groups had to incorporate to the free trade economy in the
later decades of the Empire, and this policy was changed and consolidated with the
national economic policies of the CUP, especially after the Balkan Wars. The state
sought congruence to the free trade economy of the affairs of these groups, which was
written in the article 13 of the Regulation of the Esnaf Associations. It is compatible
with the liberal economy policy of the governments. Guild was the apparatus of the
old traditional-protectionist economic system, and it was replaced with the
associations which were the outcomes of both the new administrative order and the
liberal economic system.
Artisans and traders gained strength politically during the Young Turk period
via their associations and the CUP governments benefitted from them politically by
using the municipalities since the latter was the authority over them. It was asserted
that because of this political issue the state assigned these associations to the Chamber
of Commerce and Industry to weaken them.576 While, the 1912 Regulation, which
brought the establishment of artisan and trader associations in the whole Empire, was
the result of the legal and administrative requirements, the affiliation of the regulation
to the Law of Chambers of Commerce and Industry in 1925 was originated from the
economic motivation of the new regime. Artisan and trade groups with their
associations were linked to the firstly Municipality and then to the Chambers of
Commerce and Industry in the early Republic period in Turkey.577 The reason for this
cannot be explained only by the administrative-judicial changes and requirements. It
can be argued that the perspective of the governments towards the economic roles of
these groups also shaped this change.
Overall, guilds bear the traces of the older order, such as involving guild
warden; on the other hand, the establishment of the associations with the regulation of
1910 (then in 1912) kept pace with the new judicial, administrative, and economic
policies. The changes in the competent authorities in the affairs of the abovementioned
groups led the different perspective and policy evaluations; that is, the period of
576 İlhan Tekeli, Cumhuriyet’in Belediyecilik Öyküsü (1923-1990), (İstanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt
Yayınları, 2009), pp. 36, 39.
577 Koraltürk, p. 85; Ticaret ve Sanayi Odaları Kanunu ve Ticaret ve Sanayi Odaları Nizamnâmesi ve
Esnâf Cemiyetleri Talimatnâmesi, (İstanbul: Vatan Matbaası, 1341 [1925]), Atatürk Library, no: 216,
pp. 66-71.
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Abdülhamid II, the era of CUP administration, and the republican regime, and all these
differences have to be regarded together with the results of the circumstances of the
Ottoman-Turkish economy and the fundamental changes in the process of bureaucratic
centralization.
The judicial structure of organizing in the Ottoman Empire changed
predominantly with Western law adaptation in the legal arrangements. Numerous
associations established for the purposes of education, politics or social aid gained
ground the public space in the nineteenth century, and they had influential roles in
socio-economic life that contributed to the organizing culture as well.578 Although the
modernization perspective has been harshly criticized in the literature and the
alternative explanations have gained importance for so long, it can be asserted that the
legal transformation of these purposeful associations emerged with the requirements
of the bureaucratic modernization, new modern codes, and the changing economic
motivations, which were open to the world trade and Western-style legal
arrangements. The abolition of the guild warden post, the explicit responsibility
descriptions about the administrative roles in the new separate ordinances and
regulations of the associations, and their registration to the special and certain records
which were under the control of the Municipality are some indicators of the new
perspective of the Ottoman administrative regime as well. The “modern” legal changes
started in the Tanzimat era (roughly 1839-1876) and the CUP reframed the institutions
with more Western-affected features after 1908. This historical array can seem in the
case of trade and artisan groups at least.
578 For different examples of established associations, see Recep Çelik (ed.), Osmanlı’dan Cumhuriyet’e
Cemiyetler, (Ankara: İçişleri Bakanlığı Dernekler Dairesi Başkanlığı, 2013); Yavuz Selim Karakışla,
Eski İnsanlar Eski Cemiyetler: Osmanlı Toplumsal Tarih Çalışmaları (1904-1926), (İstanbul: Doğan
Kitap, 2017).
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CHAPTER 6 CONCLUSION This study focused on the integration of the Istanbul artisans and traders into the Ottoman state’s new administrative structure together with the abolition process of the guilds in the period between 1839 and 1922. The topic of the study is related to various interrelating and complicated matters such as economic system, political atmosphere, administrative and judicial reforms, international conjuncture, societal transformation, and cultural changes. Among these various dimensions, this study concentrated on the role of the administrative and judicial changes in transforming these groups. It also investigated the abolition process of the guilds and the role of the guild wardens in artisanal life. The previous narratives dwelt on the sharp decrease in the number of artisans and traders and the abolition of the Ottoman guilds by emphasizing the roles of the integration of the Ottoman economy into the European capitalist economic system, modernization in production techniques, mechanization, and free-trade practices. Unlike them, this study provided another explanation for the status of the artisans and traders and the abolition of the guilds. It presented the impact of the new administrative system, legislation, new institutional understanding in supervision tasks, and the change in their professional organization model on transforming these groups. Their guilds were transformed into a new institutionalized form, association, and this created a different status for artisan and trader groups than the previous periods. The Istanbul artisans and traders accommodated themselves to this new administrative order after the second half of the nineteenth century. In this manner, this study depicted the portraits of the Ottoman artisans and traders living in the late nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries. Changes in economic policy and political developments caused the increase of financial difficulties, which led to the rise in grievances among the mentioned groups. They
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were challenged with economic fluctuations. The economic decline partially damaged honesty in trading activities. Their profile changed, and the traditional artisanship became more pragmatic because of the free-trade economy. Although they lost their economic and social status in society, they were still effective in daily economic activities until the collapse of the empire. Moreover, the cases used in this study showed that artisans and traders applied the temporal and superficial ways to overcome with their extant economic difficulties. There was no mass reaction in the marketplace life. The study has also underlined the peculiarity about the increasing surveillance over the non-Muslim artisans and traders due to the political conjecture shaped by nationalist rebellions and attempts that erupted in this period. These forcible economic and political factors formed the fragmented characteristic of the artisan identity in this period. Furthermore, this study indicated that women became part of the marketplace as producers and sellers, especially when women became more visible in the public sphere from the late nineteenth century onward. Economic difficulties drove many women to the working life to make a living to contribute family income or hold the family’s responsibility while their male members were on the battlefields away from home. However, women had some difficulties, such as being the weak actors of the marketplace who tried to be involved in the men-dominated trading activities. Thus, they faced socio-cultural, ideological, and socio-economic constraints. Although the “esnaf” was identified with “man”, it eluded itself from this general acceptance. The examples showed that it had to cover women as well. These facts have shown that the identity of the artisans and traders was not frozen, and it began to transform with the changes in economic and social conjunctures. In addition to questioning the identity of the marketplace actors, the state of the last guilds had been examined. It was argued that even though these formal organizations did not change radically until their abolition in 1910, they downsized in terms of their inner organization. Guilds were affiliated with the Municipality, so they were not autonomous enough in the late Ottoman period. They were under the authority of a more controlled and centralized administrative structure in this way. The abolition of the guilds was also the outcome of this administrative restructuring.
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In this study, the legal arrangements concerning artisans and traders were also examined together with their economic conditions. Municipalization in urban governance led to the changes in conducting the administrative affairs of the artisans and traders from the mid-nineteenth century onward. It imposed a new type of administrative system for these groups. Even though these groups did not experience sharp changes, it forced them to behave with inculcating a certain mode of behavior in bureaucracy traffic, which contributed to adapt them to this new system. New modern legislation led to the emergence of new practices and discourses in the marketplace as well. The governments tried to integrate the guilds into this new administrative order. But this process resulted in the weakening of the guilds and the decrease in their efficiency. The autonomy of the guild warden on the affairs of these groups lost its influence with the Municipality’s institutionalization because wardens were taken under the control of the municipal administration. The supervision over the artisan and trade groups continued with the institutionalization of the Municipality and the Police forces, but the practices fell short due to the unsettled structures in both entities. The supervision of the marketplace inevitably entered into the border of public order thanks to the inadequacy of the number of municipal police forces. The ongoing negligence in marketplace operations due to the long absence or inadequacy of municipal police continued and both the unsettled structure and conflicts among the state agencies caused the jurisdictional debate in audit duties. Besides administrative and judicial changes, this study has also examined the economic conditions of the groups in this economic regression period. After analyzing their current economic state, their reactions and demands about the taxes and license fees were elaborated. It was shown that they were active figures and were able to react to the taxation policy of the state. The way of collection of the taxes and the change in the type of tax were also the pushing factors that paved the way for the change in the institutional affiliation of the above-mentioned groups. The governments did not discard the marketplace actors, but they did not implement sufficient protective financial measurements for them. A centralized economic policy entailed new administrative arrangements, and the state could take marketplace actors under control in this way. But the interest of the governments was weak towards these groups, which
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was related to the advantages of the free-trade economy and the low contribution of taxes that these groups paid. Furthermore, licenses, which were given in return for a fee functioned as permission to do a job, have been elaborated. They enabled to determine the number of taxpayers. Moreover, this study provided information on the day-to-day practices of the artisans and traders, which presents the marketplace life after the second half of the nineteenth century. The protection or the improvement of the economic, spatial, and hygienic conditions in the marketplace and bazaar were critical in terms of social and economic aspects. These concerns were deterrent forces in the commercial life arrangement, urban planning, and the systematization of the public health policies. On the other hand, the reactions of these groups mutually shaped the policies of the state in these fields. The Municipality and its law enforcers supervised the marketplace. In this period, they regulated manufacturing and trading activities with the written rules rather than the practices inherited from the old times. Administrative rationalization, centralized bureaucracy, and modern legal arrangements were expanded with the establishment of the municipalities in urban, and the initiatives in solving problems were allocated according to the related specialization areas of the state institutions. Institutionalized security forces supervised the market and its actors to protect public health, provide public order, and collect taxes regularly. Yet, artisans and traders were not the passive receivers of all legal arrangements. They conveyed their existing problems and demands with their petitions, and they were involved in problem-solving processes as well. Especially, the financial difficulties and the political instability had made the groups more reactive in coordinating daily economic order and relations. In this way, they accommodated themselves to the new administrative order, which was surrounded by the new free trade economy and the new concerns of the burgeoning official authorities. All these contributed to the emergence of a competitive artisanal life. On the other hand, the guild wardens were expected to be the representatives of the guilds in problem-solving processes, but they sometimes appeared as trouble-makers in certain cases. This paved the way for abolishing the guild wardenship since the state emphasized their abuses in its records. In this way, the Municipality and its
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municipal police forces became as the main responsible of the control mechanism in the marketplace without an intermediary. As being part of the “public”, the issues related to the producers, manufacturers, and sellers interested both themselves and society. The spread of the diseases among these trade groups would cause the infection of the whole society via the individuals and the goods and products that they produced and sold. Thus, the most vulnerable places in spreading the diseases were the bazaars, inns, and markets where all producers, sellers, and consumers gathered. Therefore, the Ottoman governments tried to control populous places, which had always been risky, especially in terms of contagious diseases. The guilds and the market inspectors supervised the markets and bazaars until the establishment of the Municipality, yet the initiative changed hands from these groups to the centralized state institutions. This study has shown that the government decisions on the marketplace affairs contributed to the implementation of more state-controlled spatial and public health policies. The communal health policy of the state developed with the precautions and decisions taken for these groups and the marketplace in this way. It aimed to prevent diseases before spreading. Its goal was to administer the risky process with its implemented regulations and ordinances. Hereby, the state had to maintain the official interaction between its agencies and the marketplace actors in daily commercial activities. It maintained its control and power over these groups in the free-market economy with its centralized institutions and decisions. This study examined the transition from guilds to associations as well. The abolition of the guild wardenship is explained not only as part of the attempts of the constitutional administration, but the substructure of it goes back to the policies and the experiences of the previous years.579 This study indicates that the judicial and administrative developments that occurred after the second half of the nineteenth century did the groundwork for this substructure. The main argument about the Ottoman guilds was that they were collapsed because they could not exist in the capitalist economic system, but this study has demonstrated that this cannot be the sole reason for this demise and the change of administrative structure also formed the basis 579 Celâl Yerman & Samet Ağaoğlu, Türkiye İktisadî Teşkilatında Ticaret ve Sanayi Odaları Esnaf Odaları ve Ticaret Borsaları, (Ankara: Titaş Basımevi, 1943), p. 36.
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for the abolition of the guilds. Moreover, the articulation to the new administrative
system decreased the function of the guilds. The state’s intention to remove the guilds
as intermediaries and the alleged abuses of the wardens paved the way for abolishing
these organizations. Both municipalization, which brought the institutional changes,
and human factors significantly impacted on the abolition of the guilds. The guild
wardenship as a traditional post lagged behind of the new administrative structure in
the nineteenth century, and the clash of interest of them with artisans and traders forced
the state to prepare a new arrangement for this problem. It was argued in this study
that the abolition cannot be explained only with the change in production and trading
practices. The resystematizing of the administrative structure and bureaucratization
had also enforced the institutional transformation of the guilds. Related to this fact, the
guild, as one of the main Ottoman traditional organizations, changed its institutional
form, and new associations were introduced to represent trading and artisanal life.
All in all, this study shows the social, institutional, judicial, and organizational
transformation of the artisans and their guilds considering the internal dynamics of the
late Ottoman period, which were disregarded by the economy-based explanations. It
has to be pointed out that the emphasis on the change of the administrative structure
does not mean glorifying the state apparatus because the institutional restructuring has
a transformative role in changing the state of artisans and traders and such a research
has to be dwelt on the official links. This study provides an alternative perspective
about the transforming of the status of the artisans and traders. They changed in terms
of abovementioned aspects during and after the Tanzimat period and they did not
totally weaken. It is so tough for a social group to adapt itself to a new administrative
system as the Ottoman newly established institutions already had a system that was
not settled. Therefore, both economic and administrative adaptation was difficult for
these groups, yet they partially managed it.
Some restrictions about the topic and archival research of this study have to be
emphasized to light the road of future studies. First, it is risky to deduce generalized
conclusions in this kind of a study because the number of artisan and trader groups is
quite high. There may be crucial differences among the professional groups. Also,
separate regional dynamics may give a totally different picture of the artisans and
traders. Second, related to the first restriction, the archival research of this vast number
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of professions and the districts of the empire becomes time-consuming. Third, it is
imperative to glance at the catalogues of all related administrative units, which are
high in number, because of different responsible state institutions. The documents
about the artisans and traders were recorded in these different catalogues. Therefore,
it is hard to have a compact archival catalogue about their affairs. Finally, many
petitions and official correspondences were found during the archival research, but the
results of the demands, cases or investigations, which were catalogued into different
sections, mostly could not be found. It made it difficult to analyze the reasons and
results of certain cases.
Before ending, certain points, which were related to the content of the study,
have to be noted. This study did not mention daily politics and its effects on the
transformation of artisans and traders much. But it highlighted the policies of the
public administration, legislation, and economics, and it has shown the roles of these
factors in transforming them. In addition, this study regionally limited itself to Istanbul
to reveal concrete results. Thus, it only focused on the artisans and traders of Istanbul.
But the history of the Ottoman artisans and traders awaits to be studied more, covering
different districts.
The exploration of the economic and political relations of these groups with
the Committee of Union and Progress and the early Republican period cadres with
their changing conditions can grow a new comprehensive approach in artisanship
studies. This will help to open up new discussions about the Ottoman artisanal life.
The tradition of artisans and traders inherited to the Republican Period in Turkey, and
this continuity waits for being investigated. Future researches can utilize the new
alternative approach that this study provided as well.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY PRIMARY SOURCES I) Presidency of Republic of Turkey Directorate of State Archives, Ottoman Archive, Istanbul (BOA)580 A. DVN. Sadaret, Divan Kalemi A. DVN. MKL. Sadaret, Mukavelenameler A. MKT. MHM. Sadaret Mektubi Kalemi, Mühimme Odası A. MKT. NZD. Sadaret, Nezaret ve Devair BEO. Bab-ı Ali Evrak Odası C.. ML.. Cevdet, Maliye DH. EUM. KADL. Dahiliye Nezareti, Emniyet-i Umumiye Müdüriyeti, Kısm-ı Adli DH. EUM. THR. Dahiliye Nezareti, Tahrirat Kalemi DH. EUM. VRK. Dahiliye Nezareti, Evrak Odası Kalemi DH. HMŞ. Dahiliye Nezareti, Hukuk Müşavirliği DH. İD. Dahiliye Nezareti, İdari Kısım DH. İ. UM. Dahiliye Nezareti, İdare-i Umumiye DH. MB.. HPS. Dahiliye Nezareti, Hapishaneler Müdiriyeti DH. MKT. Dahiliye Nezareti, Mektubi Kalemi DH. MUİ. Dahiliye Nezareti Muhaberat-ı Umumiye İdaresi DH. TMIK.M.. Dahiliye Nezareti, Muamelat DH. UMVM. Dahiliye Nezareti, Umur-ı Mahalliyye ve Vilayat Müdürlüğü FTG. f.. Fotoğraflar HAT. Hatt-ı Hümayun HR. MKT. Hariciye Nezareti, Mektubi Kalemi HR. TH. Hariciye Nezareti, Tahrirat İ.. DH. İrade, Dahiliye İ.. DUİT.. İrade, Dosya Usulü İ.. EV. İrade, Evkaf İ.. HUS. İrade, Hususi İ.. MMS. İrade, Meclis-i Mahsus İ.. MSM. İrade, Mesail-i Mühimme İ.. MVL. İrade, Meclis-i Vala İ.. ŞD.. İrade, Şura-yı Devlet İ.. ŞE.. İrade, Şehremaneti İ. TAL. İrade, Taltifat MF. MKT. Maarif Nezareti, Mektubi Kalemi MV. Meclis-i Vükela MVL. Meclis-i Vala ŞD. Şura-yı Devlet TS. MA. d. Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi Arşivi Defterleri 580 Individual documents are cited in the relevant pages of the study.
213
TS. MA. e. Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi Arşivi Evrakı
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YB..021. Yabancı Arşivler, Makedonya Arşivi
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Düstur
Düstur, I/1, Dersaadet, Matbaa-i Âmire, 1289.
Düstur, I/2, Dersaadet, Matbaa-i Âmire, 1289.
Düstur, I/3. İstanbul: Matbaa-i Âmire, 1290.
Düstur, I/4, İstanbul, Mahmud Bey Matbaası, 1299.
Düstur, I/5, Ankara: Başvekâlet Matbaası, 1937.
Düstur, I/6, Ankara: Devlet Matbaası, 1939.
Düstur, I/7, Ankara: Başvekâlet Devlet Matbaası, 1941.
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243
APPENDICES A. THE ORDINANCE OF THE ESNAF OFFICE581 The First Part The Way of the Establishment of the Office Article 1: The Esnaf Office consists of one director, two inspectors, seven registrars, seven assistants of the registrars, one clerk of Daily Accounts (Vukuat Kâtibi), and an assistant, which is linked to the Accounting Department of the Municipality. The Second Part The Missions of the Esnaf Office Article 2: The Esnaf Office registers the names of the trade and artisan groups and their crafts, conducts their events to a day, registers and accepts individuals who will be involved in groups, deletes an entry from a record book of individuals who will quit their job or return their hometowns, arranges the transfers of individuals who will change their classes or go to another district, the perpetual supervision and control of esnaf licenses (esnaf tezkeresi), delivers the enumerated and typed licenses to the Accounting Department which will be sent to the municipalities, reports the abuses of the guild wardens or dismissals to the Municipality, and the wealth and the capacity of the warrantee that the guild wardens introduce are investigated and controlled semi-annually and if there is a need to renew them, it should be finished up in a given time. The Third Part The Way of Registration Affairs Article 3: The Esnaf Office keeps six books including the General (Umumi) Book, Especial (Hususi) Book, the Kethüda Book, the Debt (Zimmet) Book, the Orders and 581 “Esnaf kaleminin sûret-i teşkîl ve vezâifini mübeyyin talimat”, 10 C 1309 [11 January 1892], Düstur, I/6, (Dersaadet, Matbaa-i Amire, 1309), pp. 1150-1155; BOA, A.} DVN. MKL. 33/14, 10 C 1309 [11 January 1892]. There are few and unimportant word differences between the copy of Düstur and the copy of the archival document.
244
Regulation Book (Evamir and Nizamat), and the Document (Evrak) Book and these books consist of numerous volumes. Article 4: The number of members of the trade groups and conducting their events are registered with “A” in the General Book, their members’ professions and the municipalities that they are linked registered with “B” in the Especial book, the berat and registers of the guild wardens, the names of registered one, appointed individuals and the names of warrantees with their surety bond (Kefâletnâme), and the seals that will be given to the guild wardens and warrantees are registered with “T” in the Guild Warden Book, the sorts, amount and quantity of licenses that are submitted and given back to the Esnaf Office which is linked to the Accounting Department is recorded with “S” in the Debt Book, the orders, the regulations, the guild warden berat, and the acts of the council about trade groups are registered with “C” in the Orders and Regulation Book, the summaries of the special and ordinary documents are registered with “H” in the Document book. Every page is enumerated and sealed and the number of the pages is written in the first and the last pages and every copy will agree with this regulation. Article 5: The Directory of the Office is responsible for observing and giving close attention to the recorded events and issues to a day. Article 6: The licenses given to the Office will be enregistered as debiting them to the director of the Office. The director is responsible for all mistakes occurred with the losses and delay of conducting issues and nonregistration. Even to cover the losses and costs, a different warrantee will be demanded from the director. The Fourth Part The Missions of Guild Wardens and Their Responsibilities towards the Municipality Article 7: The guild wardens will be bound over to carry out the procedure. The individuals involved in trade groups show their birth certificates to the guild wardens by producing some witnesses. The guild wardens attest the certificates to the Esnaf Office and give the licenses to these groups. Article 8: Individuals who do their job without a license and do not renew their licenses as well in the repetitive cases would face with a fine in compliance with the Regulation. If guild wardens accept individuals who do not have a license and let them do their
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job, the judicial proceeding is exercised by the municipalities that they are belonged to. Article 9: If a guild warden pays a fine three times, he would be dismissed from his position, and a new guild warden is chosen. Article 10: If a person from any trade group gives up his profession or changes his place, a certificate with information will be given to the Esnaf Office by the guild warden. His information about his name, profession, and district will be revised. Article 11: Individuals from small-scale trade groups going to the provinces or their hometowns take certificates from imam and local authorities if they live in a neighborhood; and from concierges if they stay at inns, and they prove with their licenses that they are not faulty and do not have any relation with them approved by guild wardens. The Esnaf Office certifies after expounding the necessary conducting, and the Travel Permits (Mürur Kalemi) gives the travel certificates. Article 12: Esnaf Office does not conduct proceedings if guild wardens will not confirm the licenses and the Travel Permits and it does not give license if certificates of the neighborhood and inn are not approved. Article 13: Members from any trade group who go to their hometown or give up their job transfer their workplaces and deliver their counter to the other person. They also give their licenses to the individuals who take over instead of them. The license with information in the explanation part with a mark is corrected in this way. The Fifth Part The Distribution of the Esnaf Licenses enumerated by the Esnaf Office Article 14: The licenses recorded to the Especial Book will be given to the trade groups every year, and they are delivered to the guild wardens and sealed with the current year’s seal. The amount of the licenses is recorded by taking separate bills from the guild wardens, and they are sent to the Accounting department with the inventory (Müfredat Defteri). Article 15: Guild wardens distribute the licenses to the members of any group punctually, and they deliver the amount that they get to the related municipal authority. They enter to an account them to the Debt Voucher (Zimmet Senedi). Article 16: Guild wardens deliver the licenses of the journeyman and apprentices to the related municipal who change their districts, give up their professions within one
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month after they take them or the deceased ones. Guild wardens are obligated to attest
a certificate about main reasons.
Article 17: The mentioned licenses and the certificates that guild wardens give to the
accountants are sent to the Esnaf Office punctually.
Article 18: The licenses sending to the Accounting Department is consigned by the
Esnaf Office and the inspectors control the statements of the guild wardens. If they
are right, they are sent to the related departments, and if they are not right, guild
wardens are punished.
Article 19: If guild wardens do not find the collecting district or do not report the
licenses to the Esnaf Office within a month, the amount will be collected from the
guild wardens or their warrantees.
Article 20: If the guild wardens do not collect the whole amount of the licenses and a
one month passes, the whole amount is taken from the guild wardens within six months
by the Esnaf Office from the date that the licenses are given to the guild wardens.
Article 21: If a person from any trade group loses or wastes his licence, the guild
warden attests it to the Esnaf Office with a certificate, and if it is corrected with his
personal record that a licence was given to him, one licence will be given to him by
taking 10 kuruş fee.
The Sixth Part
The Proceeding about the Itinerant Artisan and Trade Groups
Article 22: The process will be the same as the resident artisan and trade groups for
the itinerant one. The registration will be entered into the books given by the guild
wardens, and the licenses will be allocated in the meantime that the Esnaf Office will
determine.
Article 23: If members from any group exceed the time limit to take a license, the
officers of the municipalities and inspectors implement the provisions written in
Article 8, and these members will be connected to the warrantees, and they will be
precluded from doing their professions until getting the license.
Epilog
Article 24: The Ministry of Interior is in charge of the practice of this ordinance.
10 C 1309-30 KE 1307 (11 January 1892)
247
B. ESNAF KALEMİNİN SÛRET-İ TEŞKÎL VE VEZÂİFİNİ MÜBEYYİN TALİMAT582 582 BOA, A.} DVN. MKL. 33/14, 10 C 1309 [11 January 1892].
248
C. THE EXAMPLE OF A BARBER LICENSE583 583 BOA, TS. MA.e.0011. 11/83.
249
D. THE EXAMPLE OF A COFFEEHOUSE KEEPER LICENSE584 584 BOA, TS. MA.e. 0011. 11/84.
250
E. THE REGULATION OF ESNAF ASSOCIATIONS (1912)585 Article 1: All guild warden positions are abolished. Article 2: Every trade and artisan group can establish their association. Article 3: Esnaf associations will have their own meeting place, which was determined and recorded by the Municipality and the municipalities in the provinces. Article 4: There will be from six to twelve volunteer members according to the number of the members of artisan and trade groups in the association. Article 5: These members are elected via elections with a secret ballot for two years, and every year the half of them would be changed. A clerk from the Municipality or municipalities in provinces and two respected members supervise the elections, count the votes and appoint the person who pulls the large part of the votes. If there will be decedent or resigned individuals in associations, these authorities will choose from the minority. They send the official record prepared concurringly and sealed to the Municipality in Istanbul and the municipalities in the provinces to register it. Article 6: After the registering process, the association will choose its own head and notified the Municipality or the municipalities in the provinces. The names of the head and the members of the association will be registered to a special record book by the mentioned offices. Article 7: Associations will have a clerk to deal with correspondences, financial affairs, and the stated duties. Article 8: These associations promote craftsmanship. They help their members who were in difficulty or disabled. They dissolve the disputes that appeared among its members pertaining to the issues of trade and artisan groups. Associations conduct the informing process about any member or collecting warranties when needed. Cabbies, boatmen, bargemen, and porters are obliged to service if the state needs in accordance to the legislation. Organizations are responsible for the execution and carrying out of the order and notification in time. 585 Esnaf Cemiyetleri Nizamnâmesi, (İstanbul: Cihan Biraderler Matbaası, 1339-1343), Atatürk Üniversitesi Kütüphanesi Seyfettin Özege Koleksiyonu, no: 21814.
251
Article 9: Esnaf associations are responsible for registering the names, hometowns, ages, the district and number of the workplace, and if he does not have a workplace, a zone where he works at and enumerating the cases like the decommissioning in case of migration, death and leaving a place in consideration of the example taken from the Municipality and municipalities in provinces in detail. Article 10: The conditions and affairs of associations will under the control of the Municipality and provincial municipalities. Article 11: If an association shirks its own duty or retards it, the assembly that it belongs complains about this situation, and makes a selection again with the decision of the assembly of the Municipality and the assembly of the municipalities in the provinces. If any member malpractices and the Municipality is informed about this matter, mayors change them and open an investigation. Article 12: Trade and artisan groups will pay a determined and small fee for the expenses of the association and its head. This amount will be acknowledged by the Municipality and the municipalities in the provinces. More than the acknowledged amount cannot be collected. If individuals do it, they will be punished according to the penal code. Article 13: Associations will prepare a regulation regarding themselves to maintain order and promote relations among its members, show the duties of the associations, and give it to the Municipality and the municipalities in the provinces after the establishment of the organizations. The content of this ordinance should be congruent to this Regulation, customary practices of trade and artisan groups, the general judicial structure of the state and the free trade. It is registered to the record book by the Assembly of the Municipality in Istanbul and the municipalities in the provinces, and the association is enrolled. Article 14: Trade and artisan groups can help each other, but they need to certify the program and the terms and conditions about this assist to the Municipality in Istanbul and the municipalities in the provinces. Article 15: The collection, management and expense of money on the purpose of help are under the control of the Municipality in Istanbul and the municipalities in the provinces. Every attempt about this issue depends on the content of the regulations
252
provided by the state. It is forbidden for an association to collect money from trade groups unlawfully. Article 16: Associations will send the abstract account to the Municipality in Istanbul and the municipalities in the provinces according to the program approved by the government at the beginning of the year and the helping program confirmed by the Municipality and the municipalities after the investigation of them are published in the gazettes. The amount can only be protected and increased by an Ottoman financial institution, which was deployed by the Municipality in Istanbul and the municipalities in the provinces. Any other usage is forbidden. Article 17: The decisions about the affairs of trade groups and the attempt of assistance cannot become definite if the assembly of the municipality did not confirm them. Article 18: The Municipality in Istanbul and the municipalities in the provinces can object to the decisions of the esnaf associations. If the Municipality assembly and the assemblies of the municipalities recognize an opposite situation to the general provisions, old customary practices, customs, and free trade, they implement the proper legislation. Article 19: Individuals who are damaged by the decisions and practices of associations can sue for damages. Article 20: If the decisions of the associations in case of the disputes among members of trade groups acknowledged by the Municipality assembly and the assemblies of the municipalities, it seems valid and efficient for both sides like the decisions of the courts. Article 21: The decisions bringing peace are registered to an especial record book and signed and sealed by the leader and the assembly members. One copy of the decision with the seal and head and clerk signs is sent to the sides. The organization cannot demand any fee and tax to maintain compromise. Yet, only the copy of the judgement is subjected to the stamp tax like in the registration’s copy. Article 22: If the compromise decisions of an association are about the amount of 1000 kuruş or assets valuing to 1000 kuruş, the organization had registered them to the record book and approved them to the assembly of the Municipality and the assembly of the municipalities in the provinces. The state of registration is written on the overleaf of the given decree. If it is more than the mentioned amount and value, the
253
Municipality assembly in Istanbul and the assembly of the municipalities enroll after
listening to the reports of the sides, and it approves and gives the legal decision after
sealing by the sides.
Article 23: If one side does not abide by the decision, the other side can apply to the
execution office and make the decision implemented in the issue of the acknowledged
negotiated settlement by the Municipality assembly and the assembly of the
municipalities in the provinces.
Article 24: The execution office carries out the provisions of negotiated settlement,
which is under the twenty-second article. The executive officer sues the parts in case
of the disturbance of compromise. If it does not need further provisions, the executive
officer implements the provisions of the negotiated settlement.
Article 25: In case of disputes among the two different artisan and trade groups, one
member from the Municipality assembly or the municipalities, and two each member
from their associations gather under a committee and make a decision. If the dispute
cannot be ended, the decisions of the Municipality assembly and the board of
governors in the provinces decide within a week. Both sides are obliged to abide by
this decision.
Article 26: The head deals with for and against cases related to the association.
254
F. ESNAF CEMİYETLERİ NİZAMNÂMESİ586 586 Esnaf Cemiyetleri Nizamnâmesi, (İstanbul: Cihan Biraderler Matbaası, 1339-1343), Atatürk Üniversitesi Kütüphanesi Seyfettin Özege Koleksiyonu, no: 21814.
255
Appendix F (Continued)
256
Appendix F (Continued)
257
Appendix F (Continued)
258
G. TABLES
Table 2: Marketplaces in Dersaadet
Day The Location
Saturday Beşiktaş old Ali Paşa
Sunday Balat Sulu Manastır
Beyoğlu Kumkapı Selamsız
Monday The Mosque in Bahçekapısı
Kıztaşı
Tuesday Tophane
Topkapı
Şehzade Camii Şerifi quarter
Wednesday Sultan Selim
Sultan Ahmed Camii Şerifi quarter
Thursday Cerrahpaşa
Karagümrük
Küçük Mustafa Paşa
Yorgancılar in Galata
Friday
Eyüp Sultan
Üsküdar
Koca Mustafa Paşa
Kasımpaşa
Source: “Marketplaces in Dersaadet”, Salnâme-i Devlet-i Aliyye-i Osmaniyye,
(İstanbul: Mahmud, 1298), p. 511.
259
Table 3: Associations and Locations
Name Location The
amount
of
artisans
and
traders
who
establis
hed
associati
on
The
establishm
ent date of
the
associatio
n
The
number
of
yearly
meeting
of every
associati
on
The
number
of
committ
ee who
carries
out the
affairs
of each
associati
on
The yearly
revenue and
expenditure
of traders
and artisans
who
established
associations
Observati
ons
Bread Makers Havyar
Hanı
2500
Bagel and
pastry makers
Tahtakale 1000
Saddler Fatih 300
Butcher Sirkeci 1000
Blacksmith Unkapanı 100
Plasterer and
Painter
Çakmakç
ılar
3000
Goldsmiths/Jew
elers
Çarşı-yı
Kebir
1500 1324 25 12 1000
0
100
00
Scale makers
Kantarcıl
ar
100
Coffee mill
dealers
Kantarcıl
ar
80
Rope makers Zindan
Kapısı
40
Caviar and Fish
salter
Balık
pazarı
200
Cheese makers Balık
pazarı
200
Cooks Bayezid 1500
Water carrier Unkapanı 220
Car maker Fatih 150
Watch repairer Bayezid 400
Engraver Bayezid 25 1328 Every
week
6 264 206
Drayman
Passenger
cabbies
Tavuk
pazarı
4000
Basket dealers Balat 80
Porters Bahçe
kapısı
10000 1327 90 14 2400
0
240
00
Uzun Çarşı
artisans and
small traders
- 200
Sea laborer Galata 500
Cattle-dealer Tophane 700 1327 Daily 12 3263
5
231
14
1327
260
Table 3 Continued
Name Location The
amount
of
artisans
and
traders
who
establis
hed
associati
on
The
establishm
ent date of
the
associatio
n
The
number
of
yearly
meeting
of every
associati
on
The
number
of
committ
ee who
carries
out the
affairs
of each
associati
on
The yearly
revenue and
expenditure
of traders
and artisans
who
established
associations
Observati
ons
Cattle butcher
and wholesaler
Tophane 100 1328 48 12 3747
0
238
15
1328
Mest tailor Fatih 200 1222
15
290
24
1329
Tailor Ahırkapı 70
Bedestan Bedestan 80 12-24 12
Members
1 Head 12
Members
Bath house
keepers
Yeni
Cami
1000
Boatmen Galata 100
Donkey dealer Ayazma
Kapısı
150
Fish mongers Balık
pazarı
300
Gardener Asma altı 300
Pharmacist 426
Total 31121
Source: 1330 Senesi İstanbul Beldesi İhsâiyât Mecmuâsı, (Dersaadet, Matbaa-ı Arşok
Garoyan, 1331), p. 250.
261
H. FIGURES Figure 1: “Esnaflarımızda Nezaket”587 -Haydi hemşeri haydi akşamleyin adamı oynatma o senin alacağın kiraz değil! (Go along my friend, I am busy! You are not able to buy this cherry!) 587 “Esnaflarımızda Nezaket”, Türk Sözü, n. 11, 19 June 1330 [2 July 1914], p. 84.
262
Figure 2: A peddler basket seller588 588 “Sepetçiler”, no: ALB. 88/69, Abdullah Fréres, (Constantinople; Pera: Photographes de sa Majesté İmpèriale le Sultan, n.d.), taken from İBB Atatürk Kitaplığı, Visual Collections.
263
Figure 3: A Grocery Store589 589 BOA, FTG.f.. 1321. n.d. (The district is unknown.)
264
Figure 4: Five shoemakers and their workplace590
It is written as “Shoemaker’s workplace” on the wall.
590 BOA, FTG.f.. 482. n.d.
265
Figure 5: Itinerant liver seller591 591 “Ciğerci”, no: ALB. 88/170, Abdullah Fréres, (Constantinople; Pera: Photographes de sa Majesté İmpèriale le Sultan, n.d.), taken from İBB Atatürk Kitaplığı, Visual Collections.
266
Figure 6: The Comb-sellers’ guild warden Ali Ulvi, Hilmi and Cevdet Efendi from
the artisan group592
592 BOA, FTG.f.. 670. n.d.
267
Figure 7: The postcard of public water carriers593
593 “Sakalar”, no: Krt_017413, (n.d.) taken from İBB Atatürk Kitaplığı, Visual Collections.
268
Figure 8: The photograph of a sahleb seller594
594 “Sahlebçi (a drink made with milk, sugar and orchid bulb powder)”, no: ALB. 88/111, Abdullah
Fréres, (Constantinople; Pera: Photographes de sa Majesté İmpèriale le Sultan, n.d.), taken from İBB
Atatürk Kitaplığı, Visual Collections.
269
Figure 9: The photograph of an egg seller595
595 “Yumurtacı”, no: ALB. 88/176, Abdullah Fréres, (Constantinople; Pera: Photographes de sa Majesté
İmpèriale le Sultan, n.d.), taken from İBB Atatürk Kitaplığı, Visual Collections.
270
Figure 10: A Coffee Maker596
596 “A Coffee Maker Photograph”, İrtika, no: 145, 30 N 1319 [10 January 1902], p. 170.
271
Figure 11: A Carpenter Shop597
It is written as “Carpenter Workshop” on the wall.
597 BOA, FTG.f. 481. n.d.
272
Figure 12: Six tailors with their sewing machine598
It is written as “Long Live My Sultan” on the wall.
598 BOA, FTG.f.. 483. n.d.
273
Figure 13: “A baker and his sons”599
599 “Fırıncı ve Ailesi”, no: ALB. 438/6, (n.d.), taken from İBB Atatürk Kitaplığı, Visual Collections.
274
Figure 14: “A butcher shop and a bakery”600
600 “Kasap dükkanı ve ekmek fırını”, no: Krt. 16852, (n.d.), taken from İBB Atatürk Kitaplığı, Visual
Collections.
275
Figure 15: “Simit Sellers”601
601 “Simit Sellers”, no: Krt. 13877, (1927), taken from İBB Atatürk Kitaplığı, Visual Collections.
276
Figure 16: “İstanbul: Yeni Valide Camii and Market at Eminönü”602
602 “İstanbul: Yeni Valide Camii and Market at Eminönü”, no: W602543_1, Sébah & Joaillier (1890-
1910), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
277
Figure 17: “Turkish Coffeehouse”603
603 “Turkish Coffeehouse (no: 1052)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no: SS_22010314,
(1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
278
Figure 18: “Peddlers in front of the New Mosque”604
604 “Peddlers in front of the New Mosque (No: 1056)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no:
SS_22010316, (1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
279
Figure 19: “Prayer beads sellers”605
605 “Prayer beads sellers (No: 1059)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no: SS_22010317,
(1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
280
Figure 20: “Butchers”606
606 “Butchers (No: 1060)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no: SS_22010318, (1901-1906),
Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
281
Figure 21: “Public fountain at Şehzadebaşı”607
607 “Public fountain at Şehzadebaşı (No: 1124)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no:
SS_22010352, (1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
282
Figure 22: “Entrance to Egyptian (Spice) Bazaar”608
608 “Entrance to Egyptian (Spice) Bazaar (No: 1527)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no:
SS_22010499, (1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
283
Figure 23: “Young garlic peddler”609
609 “Young garlic peddler (No: 1055)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no: SS_22010315,
(1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
284
Figure 24: “Street barbers”610
610 “Street barbers (No: 1195)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no: SS_22010385, (1901-
1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
285
Figure 25: “Street coffee vendor”611
611 “Street coffee vendor (No: 1051)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no: SS_22010313,
(1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
286
Figure 26: “Savory pastry vendor”612
612 “Savory pastry vendor (No: 1197)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no: SS_22010386,
(1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
287
Figure 27: “Itinerant pudding vendor”613
613 “Itinerant pudding vendor (No: 1602)”, Max Fruchtermann Postcard Series XVI, no: SS_22010519,
(1901-1906), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
288
Figure 28: “Turkish barber shaving Prof. Sterrett on corridor of Khan”614
614 “Turkish barber shaving Prof. Sterrett on corridor of Khan”, John Henry Haynes, no: W448893_1,
(1881 or 1882), Harvard University Fine Arts Library, Digital Collections.
289
Figure 29: “Hamals Transporting a Hogshead of Wine” and “Selling Strawberries in
the Stamboul Market”615
615 Clarance Richard Johnson, Constantinople Today: The pathfinder survey of Constantinople: A Study
in Oriental Social Life, (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1922), p. 198.
290
Figure 30: “A Shop in Grand Bazaar”616
616 “Boutique dans le Grand Bazar- A shop in Grand Bazaar”, Sébah & Joaillier, no: AHTUR0112,
(1880), SALT Research Digital Collections.
291
Figure 31: Cigarette Paper and A Case617
The Turkish translation of the advice is as:
Başladığın işe aheste başlamalı fakat mütemadiyen çalışmalıdır.
Kayıtsız adam her işte geri kalır.
İki karpuz bir koltuğa sığmaz.
İnsana her şeyi kazandıran ihtiyaçtır.
Âkıl olan zaman ikbalinde mütevazı hâl-i idbarında vufur ve metin olur.
617 BOA, DH. MKT. 251/51, 22 Z 1311 [26 June 1894].
292
I. CURRICULUM VITAE
PERSONAL INFORMATION
Surname, Name: Süt, Pınar
Nationality: Turkish (TC)
Date and Place of Birth: 6 July 1989, Beykoz
email: pnarst@gmail.com
EDUCATION
Degree Institution Year of Graduation
Ph.D METU History 2021
MA Istanbul Şehir University 2014
BA METU History 2012
AWARDS
TÜBİTAK BİDEB Domestic PhD Scholarship 2014-2018
Ministry of National Education (MEB) 2015
YLSY Turkish Government Funded Scholarship Program
(Not continued)
Istanbul Şehir University Master of Arts Scholarship 2012-2014
TÜBİTAK Master of Arts Scholarship 2012-2014
DAAD Intensive Language Course Scholarship 2013
TÜBİTAK BİDEB Undergraduate Scholarship 2007-2012
CERTIFICATIONS
DAAD (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst) Berlin, 2013
Intensive Language Course Grant
Pedagogical Formation Istanbul, 2017
Marmara University
FOREIGN LANGUAGES
English (Advanced), Ottoman Turkish, German (Beginner)
293
J. TURKISH SUMMARY / TÜRKÇE ÖZET GEÇ DÖNEM OSMANLI İMPARATORLUĞU’NDA İSTANBUL ESNAFININ DÖNÜŞÜMÜ, 1839-1922 BÖLÜM 1 GİRİŞ Tez, İstanbul esnafının Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun on dokuzuncu yüzyılda ortaya çıkan yeni merkezî ve mevzuata dayalı idari yapısına belediyeler vasıtasıyla eklemlenmesini ve bu sürece uyumunu yasal düzenlemeler ve kendi deneyimleri üzerinden incelemektedir. Bu çalışmada İstanbul esnafının on dokuzuncu yüzyılın ikinci yarısı ve yirminci yüzyılın ilk çeyreğindeki durumu, ekonomik değişimlerden çok İmparatorluğun geçirdiği idarî ve hukukî dönüşümle açıklanmıştır. Esnaf yeni bürokratik düzende kendisine belediyeleşme hareketi ile yer bulabildi. Bu yüzden söz konusu süreç de belediyeleşme teması üzerinden incelenmiştir. Esnaflık yok olmuyor, sadece yeni bürokratik düzene birtakım yasal düzenlemelerle entegre ediliyor. Burada ise tıpkı Osmanlı’nın belediyecilik deneyiminde olduğu gibi esnaf açısından alınan kararların yasaya tam anlamıyla dayalı olma zorunluluğu var olsa da uygulama noktasında esnek bir süreç yaşanmıştır. Esnafla bağlantılı olarak bu grupların en önemli kurumu olan loncaların son dönemdeki durumu ve lağv süreci de tezin diğer ana inceleme konusudur. Mevcut literatürün aksine bu tezde loncalık ve kethüdalık ekonomik dinamiklerle değil idare hukukunda gerçekleşen değişiklikler, yasal mevzuat ve esnafın deneyimleri dikkate alınarak incelenmiştir. Teze göre on dokuzuncu yüzyıl sonu itibarıyla loncalar, hem bahsedilen idari dönüşümün yarattığı gereklilik hem de kethüdaların esnaf hayatında aracı olarak bulunmalarının işlevsiz hale gelmesi sebebiyle lağvedilmiştir.
294
Tanzimat döneminin öncesine uzanan modernleşme süreci bu dönemle birlikte özellikle devlet kurumlarında köklü değişikliklere zemin hazırlamıştır. İdare hukukunun önemli bir boyutunu oluşturan belediyeleşme de bu sürecin bir parçası olarak on dokuzuncu yüzyılın ikinci yarısından itibaren gelişmeye başlamıştır. İlk hazırlanan belediye kanununda da görüldüğü gibi esnaf ve esnaflıkla ilgili tüm işler belediyelerin idare ve kontrolüne bırakılmıştır. 1826’da kurulan İhtisab Nezareti bir geçiş dönemi kurumu olmakla beraber esnafın idari, hukuki ve ekonomik yönlerden gözetimi kadılık müessesesi altındaydı. Fakat belediyenin kurulması ile birlikte geleneksel bürokratik düzen yerini yeni bir idari modele bıraktı. Yeni kurulan belediyelerin kısa bir süre sonra Dâhiliye Nezareti’ne bağlanması ile de esnafın yönetimi daha merkezi ve kontrollü bir hale geldi. Esnaf üretim ve hizmetiyle üretim ve tüketim ilişkilerinde önemli bir yere sahiptir. Meslek tanımı ve yapılan iş itibarıyla oldukça fazla sayıda işi ve mesleği içerisinde barındıran esnaflıkla ilgili her ne kadar Tanzimat dönemiyle ve serbest ticaret ekonomisiyle bittiği ya da büyük zarar gördüğü iddia edilen yaklaşımlar olsa da bu çalışma esnafın bu dönemde de ekonomik hayatta varlık gösterdiğini, hatta bazı meslek ve iş gruplarının söz konusu değişen ekonomik gelişmelerden yapılan iş dolayısıyla etkilenmediğini dile getirmektedir. Dolayısıyla esnaflığın ekonomik hayattaki etkinliğinin azaldığı iddiasının aksine bu tez esnafın yeni ekonomik ve idari düzene uyum sağlamaya çalıştığını iddia etmekte ve esnafın pratikleri üzerinden bu eklemlenme sürecini incelemektedir. Esnafın dönüşümünü sadece ekonomik gelişmelerle açıklamak meselenin hem esnaf hem de devlet açısından eksik anlaşılmasına sebep olacaktır. Bu tezin de amaçlarından biri esnafı ekonomik alandan çıkarıp daha geniş bir perspektifte incelemektir. Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun on dokuzuncu yüzyıldaki idari ve bürokratik bakımdan dönüşümü esnafı doğrudan etkilemiştir. Dolayısıyla esnaflığı ve esnafı bu dönüşümden bağımsız incelemek mümkün değildir. Yeni kamu kurumlarının ortaya çıkışı, özellikle belediyelerin kurulması, esnaf açısından yeni bir dönemin başlangıcına işaret etmektedir. Klasik dönemden miras kalan kadılık denetimi ve yönetimi geri kalmış ve esnaf artık yeni yasal sorumlulara problemlerini iletmek ve bu sorunlarını onlarla çözmek zorunda kalmıştır. Belediye bir aracı olarak görüldüğü ve yeni kurulduğu dönemde verimli bir kamu hizmeti verecek durumda olmadığı için
295
esnafın da belediyenin aldığı kararları tanımama durumları ortaya çıkmıştır. Belediye kurumunun olgunlaşması ile beraber aradaki bu gerilim de zamanla azalmıştır. Giriş kısmında tezin neyi incelediği ve hangi sorular üzerine kurulu olduğu anlatılıyor. Tezde esas olarak İstanbul esnafının beledî yapılanma sürecindeki durumu ve loncalarının lağvına giden süreç incelenmiştir. Yukarıda bahsedilen temel argümanların yanında, mevcut literatürde bu konuyla ilgili detaylı çalışmanın olmaması bu tezin yazılmasındaki gerekçelerden bir tanesidir ve ilk bölümde bu konudan bahsedilmektedir. Giriş kısmında tezin konusu, literatür değerlendirmesi, tezin kaynak ve metotları ve son olarak bölüm içerikleri kısaca anlatılmıştır. Giriş kısmında yapılan kısa literatür değerlendirmesinde esnafla ilgili birçok çalışma yapılmasına rağmen esnafın geç on dokuzuncu yüzyıl ve yirminci yüzyılın ilk çeyreğindeki durumunun İstanbul özelinde detaylı bir şekilde incelenmediğine dikkat çekilmiştir. Bu çalışmada Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun başkenti İstanbul başlangıç noktası olarak belirlenerek esnafın dönüşümü incelenmiştir. Tezde de belirtildiği gibi çalışmada öne sürülen argümanlar İstanbul esnafının deneyimleri ile ilgilidir. Tez, bu dönüşümün imparatorluğun diğer bölgelerinde nasıl gerçekleştiğini merkez ve yerel aktörlerle olan ilişkiler göz önünde bulundurularak ileride yapılacak olan çalışmalarla incelenmesi gerektiğine de dikkati çekmektedir. Bu tezde amaçlanan şey ekonomik yapının sebep olduğu dönüşüme karşı bir argüman geliştirmektense esnafın dönüşümünü diğer bir boyutuyla değerlendirmektir. Önemli bir toplumsal grubun koşullarını değerlendirirken onların sadece ekonomik faaliyetlerini incelemek yeterli değildir. Esnaf özelinde devletin idari yapılanması da bu süreci şekillendirmiştir. Belediye ve yeni kolluk güçleri, yeni mevzuat, kurulan esnaf cemiyetleri ve verginin merkezileştirilmesi gibi konular da esnafın dönüşümüne katkı sunmuştur. Bu dönüşüm Cumhuriyet dönemi esnaf hayatına da miras olarak kalmıştır. Esnaf konusu Osmanlı sosyal ve ekonomik hayatını anlama noktasında önemli bir yer teşkil etmektedir. Bu tez idari dönüşümü de sürecin içine katarak konuya yeni bir boyut kazandırmaya çalışmıştır. Kurumlar üzerinden değişim bir toplumsal grubu anlamaya yetmese de dönüşüme katkı sunan temel dinamikleri anlamaya yardımcı olacaktır. Bu değişen dinamiklerin esnafın çalışma hayatını ve meslekî pozisyonunu etkilediği aşikârdır.
296
BÖLÜM 2
BİR BETİMLEME: İSTANBUL’DA ESNAF VE LONCALAR
Tezin ikinci bölümünde Tanzimat dönemi (1876’ya kadar) ve ardından
İmparatorluğun sonuna kadar olan dönemdeki İstanbul esnafının ve loncaların genel
durumu değerlendiriliyor. Bu bölümde amaç İstanbul esnafına dair genel bir çerçeve
sunmaktır. Burada esnafın sosyal bir unsur olarak toplumun neresinde olduğu,
toplumun esnafı nasıl gördüğü, klasik esnaf anlatısının nasıl değiştiği gösterilmeye
çalışıldı. Ekonomik şartların zorlaşmasıyla, literatürde dürüst ve kamu düzeni
sağlayıcısı olarak tarif edilen esnaf anlatısının yerine yeni bir esnaf profilinin ortaya
çıktığı iddia edilmiştir. Ayrıca esnaf için yeni sayılabilecek bir sosyal kategori olarak
kadın esnaflar meselesi de incelenmiştir. Kadın esnafın varlığı üzerinden yeni bir esnaf
profilinin doğduğu iddia ediliyor. Bununla beraber kadının zanaatkâr ya da küçük
tüccar olarak maruz kaldığı birtakım yapısal engellerden de bahsedilmektedir.
Bu bölümde bir meslekî kimlik olarak esnaflığın incelenen dönemdeki
toplumsal durumu ele alınmıştır. Keskin bir değişiklik geçirmemekle beraber
esnaflığın on yedinci ve on sekizinci yüzyıllarda olduğu gibi bir profile sahip olmadığı
muhakkaktır. Diğer toplumsal ve ekonomik gruplar gibi onlar da mevcut koşullardan
etkilenmişlerdir. Bu bölümde kimlerin esnaf olduğu ve toplumdaki konumları
incelenmiştir. Özellikle yeni bir sosyal kategori olarak kadın esnafın varlığı
irdelenmiştir. Toplumsal dönüşümle paralel olarak kadınların kamusal alanda daha
fazla görünür olması da fiziken olmasa da düşünce anlamında sürekli gündemde
olmuştur. Kadın esnaf konusu da bu dönüşüme paralel olarak tartışılmaya açılmıştır.
Gazete ve dergilerde kadınların çalışması, ticaret yapması zaman zaman tartışılan ve
desteklenen bir durum olmuştur.618 Ayrıca bu bölümde kadınların yeni ekonomik
düzende esnaflık çatısı altında değerlendirebileceğimiz ne tür işleri yaptıkları
irdelenmiştir. Kadınlar esnaf olarak politik, ekonomik ve sosyal bakımdan
karşılaştıkları kısıtlamalardan dolayı çarşı ve pazarda çok aktif değillerdi. Bu
zorluklara rağmen özellikle geçim zorunluluğundan dolayı günlük ekonomik
618 Elif Sabri, “Ticaret, Sanayi ve İslâm Hanımları,”, İrtika, no: 118, 17 RA 1319 [4 Temmuz 1901], s.
135; Müfide Ferit Tek, “Kadınlarımızda Fikr-i Teşebbüs, Tanin, no. 31, 18 Ağustos 1324 [31 Ağustos
1908], s. 2.
297
aktivitelerin içerisinde yer almaya çalışmışlardır. Yeni bir sosyal kategori olarak kadın esnaf meselesi diğer çalışmalarda pek bahsedilmediği için bu tezde yeni bir konu olarak ayrı bir alt başlıkta ele alınmıştır. Esnaf kavramı günümüz Türkçesinde hâlâ erkeği çağrıştıran bir anlam taşısa da kadınlar da bu meslekte yer almışlardır. Fakat kavramın maskülen çağrışımının devamlılığı tarihsel olarak erkek egemen bir yapıya sahip olan çarşı-pazar hayatından kaynaklandığı söylenebilir. Bu bölümün devamında ise esnafın temel meslek örgütü olan loncaların on dokuzuncu yüzyılın son çeyreğindeki durumu incelenmiştir. Loncaların yapı olarak ne durumda olduğu ve lonca ile ilgili ya da loncalarda ortaya çıkan sorunlar anlatılmıştır. Esnaf ve loncalarla ilgili yapılan çalışmalardaki temel problemlerden biri de genelde zamansız bir anlatının hâkim olmasıdır. Yani esnaf ya da loncalar anlatılırken yeni deneyimler bazen göz ardı edilerek zaman zaman tarihsiz bir anlatı ya da on yedi ve on sekizinci yüzyıllara sıkışmış bir anlatı yaklaşımının ön plana çıktığını görüyoruz. Bu bölümde özellikle on dokuzuncu yüzyılın ikinci yarısından itibaren olan dönemi içeren arşiv belgeleri incelenerek mevcut durum tahlil edilmeye çalışılmıştır. Böylelikle genellemelerden kaçınılarak İstanbul’daki loncaların durumu imparatorluğun son dönemindeki koşulları da göz önünde bulundurularak incelenmiştir. Belediyenin kurulması ile beraber esnaflar loncalar vasıtasıyla denetlenmiştir. Loncalar bu dönemde de ana kontrol ve yönetim örgütleri olmaya devam etmişlerdir. Kadılıktan belediye kontrolüne geçen süreçte esnafın üzerindeki baskısı daha da artmıştır. Loncalar, esnafla ilgili yapılan çalışmalarda da belirtildiği gibi aynı zamanda önemli eğitim kurumlarıdır. Buralarda hem çıraklar ve kalfalar usta olmak için mesleklerinin inceliklerini öğreniyorlar hem de ustalar çıraklarını her bakımdan hayata hazırlıyorlardı. On dokuzuncu yüzyılda Osmanlı’da yaşanan dönüşüm eğitimde de kendini gösterdi. Loncalar da birer eğitim yuvası olma özelliklerini özellikle yüzyılın ikinci yarısından itibaren kaybetmeye başladı. Çırak ve kalfalar artık oncalar yerine sanayi mektepleri, çıraklık mektepleri gibi yerlerde toplu şekilde eğitimler almaya başlamışlardır. Fakat eski usul yani usta-çırak ilişkisinin olduğu eğitim modeli de devam etmiştir. Yine de tezde iddia edildiği gibi loncaların bir eğitim kurumu olma misyonları da artık bu dönemde gündemde değildi. Usta olmaları için yetiştirilen
298
çırakların ve kalfaların bir kısmı önceden alaylı diyebileceğimiz yolla eğitim alıp
ustalaşırken yeni süreçte artık mektepli hale gelmişlerdir.
İkinci bölümün temel amacı on dokuzuncu yüzyılın ikinci döneminde
İstanbul’da esnafın sosyal anlamda ne durumda olduğunu ve loncaların son
dönemlerindeki yapılanmasını göstermektir. Bölüm eski dönemlerden farklı olarak
yeni bir esnaf profilinin var olduğunu iddia etmektedir. Son dönem loncaları ise klasik
anlatıdaki lonca yapısından farklı olsa da esnaf için önemli bir meslek örgütü olarak
kalmaya devam etmiştir.
BÖLÜM 3
EKONOMİK DURGUNLUĞUN GÖLGESİNDE İDARİ DÖNÜŞÜM VE
EKONOMİ
Üçüncü bölümde İstanbul esnafını ilgilendiren yeni idarî ve hukukî düzen yeni
kurumlar ve hazırlanan yasal düzenlemelerle inceleniyor. Osmanlı son döneminde
esnaf açısından sorumlu resmî kurumlar Dâhiliye Nezareti’ne bağlı belediyeler ve tali
olarak kolluk kuvvetleridir (zâbıta ve polis). Bu kurumlar vasıtasıyla esnafın yönetimi
ve kontrolü merkezileşti. Bu bölümde esnafın belediye ile resmi ilişkisi, belediye
içerisinde esnaf kaleminin kurulması ve yasal düzenlemelerdeki esnafla ilgili
maddeler ve kararlar incelenmiştir.619 Tüm bunlarla esnafın yeni idari yapılanmada
nasıl konumlandığı ve yeni bürokratik sürece nasıl eklemlendiği ortaya konmuştur.
Esnafın idare hukukundaki pozisyonu ve resmi işlerinin yürütülme biçimi esnafın
dönüşümünde etkilidir. Tüm bu yasal değişimler esnaf için yeni bir dönemin ve
düzenin başladığı anlamına gelmektedir. Söz konusu sorumlu kurumlar ve onların
getirdiği mevzuata dayalı merkezi işleyişin yanında dini-geleneksel referansların
yokluğu, esnaf açısından yeni bir kurumsal döneme işaret etmektedir. Bu düzen, esnafı
yeni bürokratik izleklere uyum sağlamaya itmiştir.
619 BOA, DH.MKT. 1806/103. 27 C 1308 [7 February 1891]. Önce talimat hazırlandı. Daha sonra bu
talimat nizamnâmeye çevrildi. Bkz BOA, ŞD. 2581/41. 29 R 1309 [2 Aralık 1891]; BOA, İ..ŞD..
114/6856. 10 C 1309 [11 Ocak 1892]; “Esnaf kaleminin sûret-i teşkîl ve vezâifini mübeyyin talimat”,
10 C 1309 [11 Ocak 1892], Düstur, I/6, (Ankara: Devlet Matbaası, 1939), ss. 1150-1155.
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Çarşı ve pazardaki kontroller polis ve zabıta güçleriyle yapılmaya çalışılsa da
özellikle belediyenin kurulduğu ilk dönemde zabıta teşkilatı yeterli derecede
gelişemediği için kontrollerde birçok aksaklık ortaya çıkmıştır. Zabıta önce belediyeye
sonra da polis teşkilatına bağlansa da çarşı ve pazarda esnafı kontrolde en yetkili
kolluk gücü olan zabıta, yeteri kadar gelişememiş olan bürokratik düzenden nasibini
almıştır. Bu bölümde polis ve zabıta için hazırlanan yasal düzenlemelerde esnaflıkla
ilgili olan maddeler ve kararlar kısaca incelenmiştir.620 Bu yolla esnafın hareket alanını
ve kontrollerin nerede yoğunlaştığını görebilmek mümkündür.
Bu bölümün ikinci kısmında ise esnafın ilgili dönemdeki ekonomik durumu
kısaca açıklanmıştır. İstanbul’daki mıhçı ya da tuzcu gibi serbest ticaret
ekonomisinden etkilenen belli başlı esnaf gruplarından kısaca bahsedilmiştir. Esasında
bu çalışmada ekonomik dönüşüm vurgusu pek fazla olmasa da belirli üretim ve ticaret
gruplarının yeni ekonomik düzenden etkilendiği muhakkaktır. Burada örnekler
verilmesinin sebebi ise esnafın yeni düzene karşı bir direnç oluşturduğunu
göstermektir. Esnaf özellikle on dokuzuncu yüzyılın son çeyreğinde yeni kurulan
fabrikalara karşı bir hoşnutsuzluk duymuştur. Ekonomik manada statükonun
korunması esnaf için elzemdir. Fakat devlet serbest ticaret ekonomisine uyumlu bir
şekilde çoğu zaman esnaf aleyhinde kararlar almak zorunda kalmıştır. Birçok kişi bu
yüzden işini bırakıp yeni çalışma alanları ve işler bulmaya çalışmıştır. Fakat yine de
bu bölümün gösterdiği gibi esnaflığın tamamıyla ortadan kalkması gibi bir durum söz
konusu değildir.
Bunun yanında esnafın ekonomik koşullarıyla bağlantılı olarak ödenen
vergiler ve bu vergilerle ilgili ortaya çıkan birtakım şikâyetler de incelenmiştir. Vergi
sistemini merkezileştirme politikası, esnaf açısından da oldukça kritik ve
dönüştürücüdür. Belediye kurulduktan sonra söz konusu esnaf vergileri belediye geliri
olarak kabul edildi fakat temettü vergisi kurumsallaşınca esnafın ödediği vergilerle
ilgili ihtilaf ortaya çıktı ve vergilerin merkezî hazineye aktarılmasına karar verildi.621
620 “Devâir-i belediye çavuşlarının vazâifine dair talimattır” 15 ZA 1287 [6 Şubat 1871], Düstur, I/2,
ss. 539-544. Latin harflerine çevirisi için, bkz. Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, ss. 1796-1800;
“Devâir-i belediye çavuşlarının vezâifine dair talimattır” 30 CA 1289 [5 Ağustos 1872], Düstur, I/3, ss.
520-526. Latin harflerine çevirisi için, bkz. Ergin, Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 4, ss. 1801-1805.
621 “Temettü Vergisi Nizamnâmesi”, 16 ZA 1325 [21 Aralık 1907], Düstur, I/8, s. 805.
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Verginin hangi kuruma ödendiği esnafın yasal pozisyonu ve durumu açısından önemli
bir yere sahiptir. Esnaf tezkeresi meselesi de bu konuyla bağlantılı olarak bölümün son
kısmında belgeler üzerinden incelendi. Esnaf tezkeresi bir kişinin bir mesleği ya da işi
icra edebilme yetkisini gösteren belgedir. Tezkerede kişisel bilgiler ve icra edilen
meslekle ilgili bilgiler yer almaktadır. Bu tezkere alınırken karşılığında bir harç
verilmektedir. Bu da esnafa ekonomik bir yük olmaktadır. Bundan ötürü bölümde
tezkere harçları ile ilgili şikâyetler de incelenmiştir. Vergi meselesi teknik, ekonomik
ve sosyal yönleri olan çok boyutlu değerlendirilmesi gereken bir konudur. Ödenen
vergileri sadece meblağları üzerinden değerlendirmek konuyu anlaşılır kılmaz.
Esnafın ödediği birden çok vergi ve bu grupların bu duruma verdiği tepki ve istekleri
dönemin sosyal hayatının koşulları hakkında da fikir vermektedir. Devlet açısından ise
vergilerin her zaman çok önemli olduğu aşikârdır. Esnaf vergilerinin çok fazla
mevzubahis olmasının sebebi ise bu vergilerin belediyelerin gelirlerinin büyük bir
kısmını oluşturmalarıdır.622 Sadece toplumsal bir grubu denetim altına alma kaygısı
değil, gelir kaygısı da esnaf üzerindeki baskı ve kontrol mekanizmasını
güçlendirmiştir.
Belediyeleşme hareketi ile esnafın esas sorumlu ve tâbi olduğu yetkili kurumun
değişmesi esnaf tecrübesi bakımından oldukça dönüştürücüdür.623 Dolayısıyla
belediyeleşme teması özellikle on dokuzuncu yüzyılın ikinci yarısını ilgilendiren
dönemle ilgili göz önünde bulundurulması gereken bir konudur.
Bu bölümün ilk kısmında idare hukukundaki dönüşüm ve esnafın bu yeni idarî
düzene eklemlenmesi, ikinci kısımda ise vergi hukukundaki değişikliğin esnaf
üzerinde nasıl bir dönüşüme yol açtığı anlatıldı. Bu iki alt tema, yani idare hukuku ve
vergi hukuku temaları, esasında kamu hukuku bağlamında esnafın bu alanlardaki
dönüşümlerde neleri deneyimlediği, merkezi politikaları göz önünde bulundurarak
esnafın deneyimlerinin hangi yasal çerçevede ortaya çıktığı ve şekillendiğini
anlatmaktadır.
622 “Yirmi daire-i belediyenin varidat ve masârifâtı icmalidir.”, 1325 Senesine Mahsûs Umûr-ı Belediye
Mecmûası, (İstanbul: Sultan Hamamında Bağdadlıyan Matbaası, 1325), ss. 42-90.
623 “Belediyeleşme hareketi” kavramı Avrupa’da Uluslararası Belediye Hareketi konusundan alınmıştır.
Bu konu ile ilgili önemli bir çalışma için, bkz. Oscar Gaspari, “Cities against States? Hopes, Dreams
and Shortcomings of the European Municipal Movement, 1900-1960”, Contemporary European
History, vol. 11, no.4, (November, 2002), ss. 597-621.
301
BÖLÜM 4
PAZAR YERİNDE İŞ HAYATI, MEKÂN VE HIFZISIHHA
Dördüncü bölümde İstanbul çarşılarındaki genel çalışma düzeni, dükkân ve
esnaf kontrolleri inceleniyor. İlk kısımda çarşıdaki farklı meslek ve ticaret grupları ile
ilgili ortaya çıkan sorunlar ve bu sorunların nasıl çözüldükleri anlatılıyor. Bu
kontrollerde esas gaye var olan ekonomik faaliyetlerin aksamamasıdır. Ortaya çıkan
sorunların nasıl çözüldüğü verilen örnekler üzerinden gösteriliyor. Temel olarak
satılan mal ve ürünler, dükkânların iç ve dış dizaynları ve çalışma saatleri ile ilgili
ortaya çıkan sorunlar ve bunların çözülme şekilleri anlatılıyor. Tüm bu kontrollerin
gösterdiği ortak sonuç ise Osmanlı yönetiminin temel amacının asayişin bozulmaması
ile beraber ekonomik faaliyetlerin aksamamasını sağlamaktır.
İkinci kısımda çarşıdaki mekânsal dağılım politikası, bu politikayı etkileyen
etkenler ve karşılaşılan problem ve esnafın tepkileri, devletin şehir planlama
politikaları üzerinden değerlendiriliyor. Bu politikalar esnafın günlük çalışma düzeni
üzerinde doğrudan etkili olduğu için ele alınmıştır. Seyyar dahi olsa herhangi bir esnaf
üyesinin satış yaptığı yer kontroller dâhilinde inceleniyor. Kimin nerede ticari faaliyet
yürüteceği talimatlar ve kararlarla belirleniyor. Bu kararlar verilirken de ne sadece
devlet çıkarı ne de esnaf çıkarı gözetiliyor. Esnaf mağdur olduğu durumda ise sürece
aktif bir şekilde katılıp mağduriyetinin giderilmesini talep ediyor. Mekânsal politikada
aynı zamanda genel mahallî veya merkezi yerleşim lokasyonları da göz önünde
bulundurulmuştur. Dolayısıyla çarşı-pazarın mekân politikası esnaftan ibaret bir konu
değildir. Devlet karar alırken birçok boyutu düşünmek durumunda kalıyordu.
Üçüncü alt kısımda ise merkezin esnafın kendisi ve çalışma alanları ile ilişkili
halk sağlığı politikaları farklı sektörler üzerinden inceleniyor. Bu politikalar var olan
sorunlar üzerinden çözüme ulaşmıştır ve alınan karar ve uygulamalar zamanla devletin
genel halk sağlığı politikası haline gelmiştir. Dolayısıyla özellikle halk sağlığı
politikaları açısından esnaf alanı bir nevi laboratuvar görevi görmüştür. Hastalıkların
ortaya çıkma ve bulaşıcı ise yayılma riskinin en fazla olduğu bölgeler şehir merkezinde
bulunan ve oldukça kalabalık olan pazarlar, çarşılar, kapalı çarşılar, arastalar ve
hanlardır. Bu yüzden de merkezin ve belediyelerin sağlık politikaları buralarda
302
yoğunlaştırılmak zorunda kalmıştır. Esnaf da bu politikalar bağlamında önemli bir
aktör olarak ön plana çıkmıştır. Esnaf grupları ekonomik olarak zarar görürlerse
dilekçe ile başvurarak belediyeye sorunlarını ulaştırmaya çalışmışlardır. Fakat önlem
ya da sorun çözümü olarak dükkân kapatmalar da yaşanmıştır. Söz konusu esnaf üyesi
ya da grubu ekonomik olarak mağdur olsa da devletin genel kamu sağlığı kaygıları
belirli grupların ekonomik çıkarlarının önüne geçmek durumunda kalmıştır.624 Burada
dikkati çeken nokta ise sorunların çözümünde tahkikat yapıldıktan sonra uygun bir
çözüm yolu bulunması tercih edilen bir yol olmuştur. Sorun tespiti sonrasında ise ilgili
mevzuat doğrultusunda işlem yapılacağı görülmektedir. Örneğin Ceza Kanunu’na
esnafı ilgilendiren maddeler konulmuştur.625 Mevzuat çerçevesi belirlenerek daha
bürokratik ve daha soyut (nesnel) bir sürecin ortaya çıktığını söylemek de mümkündür.
Bu bölümün alt konularından biri olan halk sağlığı konusu çevre sağlığı ile
kesişen bir konudur. Atık, zararlı atık ya da kötü koku gibi sebeplerden dolayı ortaya
çıkan sorunların çözümünde de halk sağlığı gözetilerek kararlar verilmiştir. Bu
kısımda çevre sağlığını tehlikeye sokan bazı sektörlerden örnekler verilip sorunların
nasıl çözüldüğü gösterilmiştir. Tüm bu sorunları önleyici ya da ortadan kaldırıcı
politikaların varlığı esnaflığın doğasında da değişim yaşattığı muhakkaktır. Özellikle
İhtisab Nezareti kurulmadan önceki dönemlerde esnaf hem vergi hem de temizlik gibi
önemli konularda loncalar öncülüğünde inisiyatif alıyorlardı. Yani bir çarşı bölgesinde
eğer ciddi bir çevre sağlığı problemi varsa ortak bir irade ile harekete geçerek mevcut
sıkıntılı durum ortadan kaldırılıyordu. Yeni yetkili kamu kurumlarının kurulması
esnafın bu özelliğini kaybetmesine yol açmıştır. Esnaf artık informal şekilde dahi olsa
yetkiye ya da sorumluluğa sahip olan taraf değil, sadece sorumluluk duygusu
çerçevesinde yasal düzenlemelere uymak zorunda kalan daha pasif aktörler haline
gelmiştir.
Bu bölümde çarşı ve ticaret alanlarındaki uygulamaların, merkezin kamusal
mekân ve kamu sağlığı politikalarının sistematikleşme ve rasyonelleşmesine katkıda
624 Esnafın Riayete Mecbur Olduğu Evamir-i Belediye Hakkında Talimat, (İstanbul: Matbaa-i
Osmaniye, 1335 [1919]).
625 “Ceza kanunnâme-i hümâyûnu”, 28 Z 1274 [8 Ağustos 1858]; Düstur, I/1, ss. 578-579; Ergin,
Mecelle-i Umûr-ı Belediyye, vol. 8, ss. 4491-4492; “Umur-ı Tahaffuziye ve Tanzifiye ve Zabıtaya
Muhâlif Hareket Eden Ashâb-ı Kabâhiyin Cezaları Beyanındadır”, Akgündüz, İslam ve Osmanlı
Hukuku Külliyatı, s. 653. Özellikle 1858 Ceza Kanunu’nun son bölümünde esnafın kuralları ihlal ettiği
takdirde uygulanacak olan ceza ve yaptırımların detayı bulunmaktadır.
303
bulunduğu iddia edilmiştir. Mevzuatın uygulanması ve esnafın ilgili kararlara verdiği
tepkiler söz konusu zanaat ve küçük ticaret gruplarının yeni idare düzenine uyumunu
veya zaman zaman direncini göstermektedir. Bu bölümde esnafa ait problem ve
şikâyetlerin neler olduğu, bu problemlerin nasıl çözüldüğü gösterilerek tüm bunların
yerel yönetim ve merkezî politikalar bağlamında bağlayıcı ve dönüştürücü olduğu
vurgusu yapılmıştır. Devletin esnaf politikası sadece ekonomiyi değil birçok kamusal
konuyu ilgilendiren bir politikalar bütünü olması sebebi ile oldukça önemlidir ve
yukarıda bahsedilen bu konular da tezin bu bölümünü oluşturmaktadır.
BÖLÜM 5
OSMANLI LONCALARININ DÖNÜŞÜMÜ: KETHÜDALIĞIN İLGA
EDİLMESİ VE ESNAF CEMİYETLERİNİN KURULUŞU
Tezin son bölümünde loncaların son dönemi, neden lağvedildikleri ve onların
yerine kurulan esnaf cemiyetleri incelenmiştir. Bilhassa loncaların lağvına giden süreç
anlatılmıştır. Loncalar son dönemde artık değişime daha fazla açık, aktörlerin yetki
paylaşımına gittiği bir süreç yaşamıştır. Örneğin kethüda mührünün sadece kethüdada
kalmaması, aynı zamanda ustalar arasında da mührün paylaşılması gibi pratikler ortaya
çıkmıştır. Bu yeni pratik elbette birçok kethüdanın tepkisine yol açmıştır. Kimi
kethüdanın mühürleri paylaşılsa da kimisinde alınan karar geri alınmıştır. Örneklerin
gösterdiği üzere loncalardaki en yetkili resmi görevli olarak kethüdaların yetki
paylaşımı durumlarında kararın geri alınması için uzun uğraş verdiği tespit edilmiştir.
Buradaki çabanın en temel sebebi ise kethüdanın yani kethüda mührünü bulunduran
kişinin esnaftan ödeme alabilmesi ve esnaf harçlarını toplama yetkisine sahip
olmasıdır. Mührün paylaşılması demek esnaftan kaynaklanan gelirlerin de
paylaşılması demekti. Kethüda böyle bir uygulamayla, gelir kaybı ortaya çıkması
muhtemel olacağı için mücadele etmiştir. Fakat bazı örneklerde görüldüğü üzere
çabaları sonuçsuz kalmıştır. Bu dönemde kethüdalarla ilgili diğer bir durum ise bazı
kethüdaların başka loncaların içişlerine karışmasıydı. Böyle durumlarda hem ilgili
esnaf grubu hem de o grubun loncasının kethüdası bu durumu belediyeye şikâyet
ediyorlardı. Loncalar kendi içerisinde daha özgür ve özerk hareket etme kabiliyetini
304
de kaybetmek istemiyordu. Her kethüdanın sadece kendi bağlı olduğu lonca üzerinde
yetkisi vardı. Başka lonca ve esnaf grubunun içişlerine müdahale etme hakkı
bulunmuyordu.
Son dönem loncalarının öne çıkan özelliği ise on dokuzuncu yüzyılın sonlarına
doğru birkaç benzer ya da farklı meslek ve iş kollarının kethüdalıklarının tek kişide
toplanmaya başlamasıydı. Kethüdalık pozisyon tanımı olarak da değişikliğe uğramaya
başladı denebilir. Önceki dönemlerde daha çok tek bir meslek grubunun kethüdalığını
yapma uygulaması var ise de tezin incelediği dönemde bir kişinin aynı anda birden
fazla ve farklı meslek gruplarına kethüdalık yaptığını görüyoruz. Bu durum görev
alanının belirsizliğine ya da karmaşasına ve böylece kethüdalar arasında ihtilaflara
sebep olmuştur. Bir grubun kethüdası olma ya da olmama hali sorunlarda ön plana
çıkan durumlardan biridir.
Loncaların kaldırılmasında idari yapıdaki değişiklik ve kethüdalığın pozisyon
olarak işlevsizliği, temel iki sebep olarak iddia ediliyor.626 Bu yargıya da ağırlıklı
olarak arşiv belgelerindeki örneklerden hareketle varılıyor. Klasik lonca anlatısında
kethüdalar ağırlıklı olarak esnaf gruplarının ve üyelerinin çıkarlarını koruyan ya da
korumak zorunda olan resmi temsilciler olarak kabul edilse de bu tezde görüldüğü
üzere Osmanlı İstanbul’unun son dönemindeki lonca kethüdaları bu misyonlarını terk
etmişlerdir. Hem vergi ya da harçlar konusundaki baskılar ve usulsüzlükler hem de
esnaf grubunun üyelerini değil de kayıtlı olmayan kişileri ilgili sektörde çalıştırma gibi
durumlardan kaynaklı birçok suiistimal ortaya çıkmıştır. Devlet de ortaya çıkan bu
durumdan dolayı kethüdalık pozisyonuna son verdiğini belirtmiştir. Tezin de
gösterdiği üzere loncaların temsiliyetinde en önemli kişisi olan kethüdalar loncaların
lağvına giden sürece zemin hazırlamışlardır. Bunun yanında Osmanlı
İmparatorluğu’nun özellikle Tanzimat’la beraber ortaya çıkan hukuki ve idari
dönüşümünün de loncaların lağvına sebep olduğu iddia edilmiştir. Loncaların ortadan
kalkması daha çok ekonomik sistemin dönüşümü yani geleneksel üretim modellerinin
çökmesi ve kapitalist üretim biçimlerinin yaygınlaşması ile açıklansa da bu tezde,
ortaya çıkan yeni idari yapının ve devlet mekanizmasının kadimden gelen kurum ve
sistemlerini artık kullanamadığı belirtilmiştir. Bu yüzden de loncanın artık
626 BOA, DH. MKT. 2774/40. 1 Re 1327 [23 Mart 1909]; BOA, ŞD. 842/26. 17 Re 1327 [6 Nisan
1909]; BOA, BEO, 3536/265135. 26 Mart 1325 [8 Nisan 1909].
305
çalışmadığı, işlevsiz ve yetersiz kaldığı bir düzende devlet yeni bir esnaf örgütü olarak
cemiyetleri kurmuştur. Tezin başlığında belirtilen dönüşüm denilen olgu tüm bu süreci
kapsamaktadır.
İkinci kısımda ise loncaların ve kethüdalık pozisyonunun kaldırılmasından
sonra kurulan esnaf cemiyetleri inceleniyor.627 Cemiyet denilen kuruluşun da esasında
yapı, işlev ve amaç bakımından esnaf odasına tekabül ettiği iddia ediliyor. Cemiyetler
kurulunca (loncalar resmi olarak kaldırılınca) aracı olan kethüdaların işine son verilse
de esas resmi sorumlu kurum belediye olmaya devam ediyor. Bu vesile ile
belediyelerin esnaf üzerindeki gözetim ve denetimi de artıyor. Belediyeler Dâhiliye
Nezareti’ne bağlı olduğu için bu denetimler daha kontrollü şekilde yapılmaya
çalışılmıştır.
Cemiyetler, loncalar gibi esnafın meslek örgütleridir. Kurulan her cemiyetin
bir nizamnamesi hazırlanmalı ve onaylanmak zorundaydı. Cemiyet kurmak için izin
almaya gerek yoktu ama cemiyetin kurulduğuna dair Dâhiliye Nezareti’ne hazırlanan
nizamname ile bir bildirim yapılması gerekmekteydi. Esnaf bu şekilde daha fazla
bürokratik trafiğin içerisine girdi ve bu yolla yeni idari düzene de uyum sağlamak
zorunda kalmıştır. Birçok farklı meslek ve iş kolunda esnaf cemiyeti kurulmuştur.628
627 İstanbul için hazırlanan talimat için, bkz. “Esnaf Cemiyetleri Hakkında Talimat”, 16 S 1328 [27
Şubat 1910], Düstur, II/2, ss. 123-127; BOA, İ.ŞE. 25/14. 16 S 1328 [27 February 1910]. Tüm
İmparatorluk’ta uygulanacak olan talimat için, bkz. BOA, DH. UMVM. 88/40. 20 Ca 1330 [7 Mayıs
1912]; “Esnaf Cemiyetleri Hakkında Talimat”, 20 CA 1330 [7 Mayıs 1912], Düstur, II/ 4, ss. 483-488,
Nizamnamenin tamamı için, bkz. Appendix F.
628 Bazı cemiyet nizamnâmesi ve talimat örnekleri için, bkz. Dersaadet Limanı Umum Deniz Kayıkçı ve
Sandalcı Esnâfı Cemiyeti, BOA, DH. UMVM. 166/54. 26 Ş 1340 [24 April 1922]; Dersaadet Limanı
Umum Deniz Kayıkçı ve Sandalcı Esnâfı Cemiyeti Talimatnâmesi, (Dersaadet: Sanayi-i Nefise
Matbaası, 1337); İstanbul Umum Binek ve Yük Arabacıları Cemiyeti Dahili Nizamnâmesi ve Simitçi,
Ekmekçi, Börekçi, Kurabiyeci ve Kadayıfçı Esnafı Cemiyeti Nizamnâme-i Dahiliyesi, BOA, HR.
HMŞ.İŞO. 82/3. 1 May 1326 [14 May 1910]; Umûm Mavna ve Salapuryacı Esnafı Cemiyeti
Nizamnâme-i Dâhiliyesi, (Dersaadet, 1336); İstanbul Yorgancı, Döşemeci ve Mobilyacılar ile Mefruşatı
Beytiye Esnaf Cemiyeti Tâlimatnâmesi, (İstanbul: Bahriye Matbaası, 1337 [1921]); Dersaadet Balıkçı
Esnafı Cemiyeti Nizamnâme-i Dahiliye Projesi, (İstanbul: Hüsn-i Tabiat Matbaası, 1339 [1923]);
Dersaâdet ve Bilâd-ı Selâse Umûm Bakkal Esnafı Kalfa ve Çıraklar Cemiyeti Nizâmnâmesidir,
(İstanbul: Ali Şükrü Matbaası, 1337); Dersaadet Bakkal Esnafı Cemiyeti Talimatnâmesi, (Dersaadet,
1337 [1921]; Dersaâdet ve Bilâd-ı Selâse’de Umûm Tuğla İmalci Esnafı Cemiyeti Talimatnâme-i
Dâhiliyesidir, (İstanbul: Şehzade Başı Evkaf Matbaası, 1338); Kabzımal Esnafı Cemiyeti: Talimatnâme,
(İstanbul: Ahmed İhsan ve Şürekası Matbaacılık Osmanlı Şirketi, 1336); İstanbul ve Mülhakatı Umûm
Ekmekçi ve Francalacı Fırıncılar Esnaf Cemiyeti Talimatnâme-i Dâhiliyesidir, (İstanbul: Zelliç
Biraderler Matbaası, 1926); Dersaadet ve Bilad-ı Selase Ayakkabıcı Esnafı Cemiyeti Talimatnâme-i
Dahiliyesidir, (İstanbul: Matbaa-ı Bahriye, 1337); Dersaadet Kaldırımcı Esnafı Cemiyeti, BOA, DH.
EUM.THR. 101/92. 28 B 1330 [13 July 1912]; Dersaadet Umum Hancı ve Otelci Esnafı Cemiyeti
Talimatnâme-i Dahiliyesi, (İstanbul: Teşebbüs Matbaası, 1339 [1341].
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Esnaf yeni düzende yeni kurumuyla varlık göstermiştir. Bu cemiyetleri cumhuriyet
döneminde gördüğümüz esnaf odalarının prototipi olarak değerlendirmek de
mümkündür. Tıpkı odalar gibi meslek örgütleri olmakla beraber cemiyetlerin,
loncalarda olduğu gibi verginin ya da harçların toplanma ve kontrolünün sağlandığı
bir kurum olma özelliği ortadan kalkmıştır. Vergi bölümünde bahsedildiği gibi
vergilendirme sistemi değiştiği ve vergi toplama merkezi bir sisteme dönüştüğü için
cemiyetlerin mali bakımdan bir fonksiyonu da yoktur.
Yeni kurulan cemiyetlerde heyet-i umumiye ve heyet-i idare birimleri
kurulmuştur. Loncalarda böyle bir örgütlenme modeli bulunmuyordu. Her cemiyetin
bir başkanı oluyordu ve cemiyete zorunlu olmamak kaydı ile ilgili meslek grubunu
icra eden herkes üye olabiliyordu. Cemiyet başkanları loncalardaki gibi vergi ya da
harç toplama yetkisine sahip değildi. Bu yüzden esnafın en yetkili kişisi olarak görülen
başkanın bu süreçten sonra sembolik bir göreve sahip olduğunu söyleyebiliriz. Öte
taraftan cemiyetler içerisinde iki tane heyetin kurulması ve başkanın sembolik bir
pozisyon haline gelmesi esnaf cemiyetlerinde liberal bir yapının ortaya çıkmasına da
zemin hazırlamıştır. İnisiyatif cemiyet üyelerine geçmeye başlamıştır. Fakat ironik bir
şekilde bu çoğulcu yapı kısa sürede cemiyetler içerisinde tartışmalara ve ihtilaflara
sebep olmuştur. Buna ek olarak eskiden daha çok kadı ve lonca üyeleri tarafından
kontrol altında tutulan esnaf örgütü artık belediye tarafından daha merkezi bir denetim
mekanizmasının parçası haline gelmiştir.
BÖLÜM 6
SONUÇ
Bu çalışma geç on dokuzuncu yüzyıl ve erken yirminci yüzyıl döneminde
Osmanlı İstanbul’unda esnafın yaşadığı dönüşümü incelemektedir. Bu dönüşüm
ekonomik gelişmeleri gözeterek imparatorluğun geçirdiği idari değişikliklerle ele
alınmıştır. Kapitalizmin güçlendiği ve Osmanlı’ya ithalatın arttığı bir dönemde belirli
meslek ve iş gruplarının bu süreçten etkilenmesi muhtemeldir. Fakat bu tez arşiv
belgelerini takip ederek süreçte bürokratik gelişmenin ve modernleşmenin de esnafın
hayatında ve resmi işlemlerinde değişiklikler yaşadığının altını çizmektedir. Özellikle
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esnafın yetkili resmi organının ve problemlerini iletmesi gereken resmi kurumun
belediyeler olmasıyla esnafın yasal pozisyonunda ve meslekle ilgili bürokratik
işlemlerde değişiklikler yaşanmıştır. Bu değişiklikler esnafın vergi, sorumlu olduğu
mevzuat, bağlı olduğu meslek kuruluşu gibi konular bakımından da yeniliklere zemin
hazırlamıştır.
İkinci bölümde görüldüğü üzere klasik ya da standart bir esnaf anlatısının
aksine on dokuzuncu yüzyılın ikinci yarısına mahsus bir esnaf tanımı yapılmıştır.
Esnaf kimliği de bu doğrultuda incelenmiştir. Genel kabul gören anlatının aksine diğer
toplumsal gruplarda olduğu gibi esnaf da bu dönemde değişim yaşamıştır. Örneğin
lonca düzeni anlatısındaki dürüst ve kaliteli üretim yapan ya da yapma zorunluluğu
olan esnaf anlatısı yerini daha değişken ve çok yönlü bir kimliğe bırakmıştır. Artık bu
dönemde çok sayıda esnafın çarşı ve pazarlarda kural ihlalleri yaptığını ya da yüksek
oranda suç işlediğini görebiliyoruz. Bu dönemin özel bir durumu ise kadın esnaf
meselesidir. Burada amaç kadın esnafın yokluğunu vurgulamaktan ziyade kadınların
neden çarşı-pazarda üretici ve satıcı olarak az olduğunun sebeplerini incelemektir. Bu
doğrultuda birkaç kadın esnaf örneği de verilmiştir. İkinci bölümde de ilgili dönemin
loncaları anlatılarak statik, değişmeyen lonca anlatısının önüne geçilmiştir. Loncalar
ekonomik hayatta etkilerini yitirmekle beraber bu dönemde esnâf için önemli meslek
örgütleri olmaya devam etmiştir.
Üçüncü bölümde esnafın yeni kurulan belediyelerin otoritesi altına girmesi ile
yaşanan değişim mevzuat incelenerek değerlendirilmiştir. Bunun yanında yeni
filizlenmeye başlayan polis ve zabıta birimlerinin esnaf denetimi ile ilişkisi
irdelenmiştir. Ayrıca belediyenin alt birimi olarak kurulan Esnaf Kalemi incelenmiştir.
Esnaf Kalemi lonca kethüdalarının otoritesinin zayıflamasına ve devletle aracı kurum
olarak belediyeye karşı olan sorumlulukları arttığı için onların geri plana düşmelerine
sebep olmuştur. Bu da loncaların ve dolayısıyla kethüdalığın lağvına giden süreci
hızlandırmıştır. Esnafın ele alınan dönemdeki ekonomik durumu ve vergilendirme
sisteminin merkezileşmesi de ele alınan konulardandır. Öncesinde esnaf vergisi
toplanırken 1907’den sonra Temettü Vergisi getirildi ve aynı dönemde vergilerin
merkezi bir yöntemle toplanılmasına karar verildi.
Dördüncü bölümde ise esnafın çarşı, pazar, diğer kamusal alanlar ve bazen de
sokak aralarındaki ekonomik faaliyet tecrübeleri ele alınmıştır. İncelenen örneklerin
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hepsi bir sorun ortaya çıktığı için resmi tutanaklara not edilmiştir. Bu yüzden daha çok
esnafın talep ve şikâyetleri ve bunların doğrultusunda devletin ve belediyenin bu
sorunları çözme yolları incelenmiştir. Şikâyetlerin olduğu dönemde dikkati çeken
önemli bir nokta ise genelde sorun çözücü ya da aracı olarak bilinen, kabul edilen
kethüdaların da sık sık ihtilaflı durumlarda taraf olarak yer almalarıdır. Öte yandan
esnaf bakımından da onların aktif birer pazar aktörleri olarak sorunlarına çözüm
aradıklarını görüyoruz. Tüm bu tecrübelerle esnafın yeni idari düzene uyum
sağladığını ya da sağlamak için çaba harcadığını söylemek mümkün. Bu çabalar
esnafın kimlik ve tecrübe anlamında bir dönüşüm yaşamasına yol açmıştır. Bu
bölümde ayrıca mesleklerle ilgili kontroller, mekânsal politikalar ve halk sağlığı
politikaları ile ilgili konular ve örnekler ele alınmıştır. Bölümün de gösterdiği gibi tüm
esnaf deneyimi özellikle şehir planlama ve halk sağlığı ile ilgili konularda devletin
politikalarını sistematikleştirmesine ve daha rasyonel çözümler bulmasına yardımcı
olmuştur. Son olarak tüm bu politikalar bağlamında yapılan kontroller, serbest ticaret
dönemi olsa da esnaf üzerindeki denetimin bürokrasi yoluyla devam ettiğini de
gösteriyor.
Son bölümde ise loncaların lağvı meselesi inceleniyor. Buradan yola çıkarak
esnaf cemiyetleri konusu detaylı şekilde irdelenerek esnafın kurumsal dönüşümüne
dair bir çerçeve sunuluyor. Loncaların lağvı yukarıda da belirtildiği gibi hem devletin
kamu yönetimi politikalarının değişimi ve yeni kurumların kurulması hem de
loncaların son döneminde kethüdaların görevlerini kötüye kullanmaları ile
bağlantılandırılmaktadır. Kethüdalık pozisyonu artık işlevsiz bir hale geldiği için
resmen kaldırılıp yerlerine esnaf cemiyetleri kurulmuştur. Esnaf cemiyetleri ile ilgili
de örnekler verilerek temel olarak vergi toplama sistemi merkezileştiği için bir nevi
esnaf odası yapısına sahip oldukları iddia edilmiştir.
Bu çalışma sadece İstanbul esnafını ele almıştır. Ekonomik faaliyetler ve ilgili
kamu kurumlarının farklı şekilde ve farklı yerel aktörlerle gelişmesinden dolayı burada
bahsedilen mevzuların ve çıkarımların tüm imparatorluk bölgelerini kapsamadığının
altına çizmek gerekir. Bu çalışmada ağırlıklı olarak nezaretler arası yazışmalar, resmi
karar ve kanunlar, dilekçeler ve son olarak o dönemde basılmış çeşitli gazeteler
kullanılmıştır. Esnaf gibi çok farklı sosyal ve ekonomik dinamiklere sahip bir grubun
tek boyutlu incelenmesinin yetersiz olduğu muhakkaktır. Bu tez ekonomik gelişmeyi
309
biraz gölgede bırakarak ve siyasi gelişmeleri de ön plana çıkarmayan bir esnaf anlatısı
sunmaya çalışmıştır. Amaç esnafı esas özne olarak tezin merkezine koyup yaşadığı
kurumsal dönüşümü anlatmaya çalışmaktır.
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K. THESIS PERMISSION FORM / TEZ İZİN FORMU
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ENSTİTÜ / INSTITUTE
Fen Bilimleri Enstitüsü / Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences
Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü / Graduate School of Social Sciences
Uygulamalı Matematik Enstitüsü / Graduate School of Applied Mathematics
Enformatik Enstitüsü / Graduate School of Informatics
Deniz Bilimleri Enstitüsü / Graduate School of Marine Sciences
YAZARIN / AUTHOR
Soyadı / Surname : Süt
Adı / Name : Pınar
Bölümü / Department : Tarih / History
TEZİN ADI / TITLE OF THE THESIS (İngilizce / English): THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE ISTANBUL
ARTISANS AND TRADERS (ESNAF) IN THE LATE OTTOMAN EMPIRE: 1839-1922
TEZİN TÜRÜ / DEGREE: Yüksek Lisans / Master Doktora / PhD
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