436

 NOMADS, ANIMAL BREEDING, AND AGRICULTURE
IN POST-SETTLEMENT ÇUKUROVA

iv
To my parents.
v
ABSTRACT
Ottoman Çukurova (historical Cilicia) was a borderland between Anatolia and Syria where the
surrounding mountain ranges and the Mediterranean had rendered the region challenging to
penetrate for central authorities for centuries. In this setting, various powerholders of different
capacities enjoyed autonomy that curtailed state authority in the area. Another major challenge to
state control over populations in this region was the high level of human and animal mobility.
Çukurova-based nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes constituted a substantial segment of the
population. They practiced different forms of seasonal migration with their animals in a large
area from Central Anatolia to Syria. In the nineteenth century, imperial and provincial authorities
launched a series of operations, including the Reform Division (Fırka-i Islahiye), to enhance the
state’s power in the region by controlling the movements of local populations. These operations
brought comprehensive environmental, socioeconomic, political, and cultural transformations.
Nomads and their animals were among the most affected by these transformations.
This thesis examines the environmental, socioeconomic, and political transformations that the
Çukurova region underwent in the nineteenth century with a particular focus on the experiences
of nomadic tribes and their animals by focusing on socioeconomic, political, and environmental
entanglements. It demonstrates that animals played a central role in the local transformations and
have been integral to numerous political negotiations and conflicts. Animals were more than
economic assets; they strongly shaped local cultures, traditions, and habits. The thesis also
contextualizes relationships between state agents and tribes, with an emphasis on animal-related
events. After settlement and agricultural production gained momentum vis-à-vis nomadism and
pastoralism, the relationships between people and animals of Çukurova continued to be
important parts and parcels of the regional order, however, in an altered form.
Keywords: Çukurova, nomadic tribes, forced settlement, animals, pastoralism, agriculture.
vi
ÖZET
Osmanlı Çukurovası (tarihsel Kilikya), onu çevreleyen dağ sıraları ve Akdeniz dolayısıyla
merkezi güçlerin nüfuz etmekte yüzyıllarca zorlandığı, Suriye ve Anadolu arasındaki bir sınır
bölgesi olmuştur. Bu düzen içinde, farklı büyüklüklerdeki çeşitli güç sahipleri, bölgedeki devlet
kontrolünü zayıflatacak şekilde özerkliklere sahip olmuştur. Devletin bu bölgedeki nüfus
üzerindeki kontrolüyle uyuşmayan bir diğer etken de yüksek seviyedeki insan ve hayvan
hareketliliği olmuştur. Çukurova merkezli göçer ve yarı göçer aşiretler bölge nüfusunun çok
önemli bir ögesini oluşturuyordu. Bu aşiretler, hayvanlarıyla beraber İç Anadolu’dan Suriye’ye
uzanan geniş bir sahada çeşitli şekillerde dönemsel olarak göç etmişlerdir. Merkezdeki ve
vilayetteki devlet güçleri, on dokuzuncu yüzyılda yerel grupların hareketliliğini kontrol ederek
bölgedeki kontrollerini arttırmak için içinde Fırka-i Islahiye’nin müdahalesinin de bulunduğu bir
dizi operasyon gerçekleştirdi. Bu operasyonlar kapsamlı çevresel, sosyoekonomik, siyasi ve
kültürel dönüşümlere sebep oldu. Göçerler ve onların hayvanları da bu dönüşümden en çok
etkilenen yerel unsurlar arasındaydı.
Bu tez, özellikle göçer aşiretlerin ve onların hayvanlarının tecrübelerine, kendi girift çevresel,
sosyoekonomik, ve siyasi koşulları içinde odaklanarak Çukurova bölgesinin on dokuzuncu
yüzyılda geçirdiği çevresel, sosyoekonomik, ve siyasi dönüşümleri inceler. Tez, hayvanların
yerel dönüşümlerin farklı katmanlarında merkezi roller oynadığını, ve çok sayıda siyasi
müzakerenin ve çatışmanın içinde önemli yerler tuttuklarını göstermektedir. Hayvanlar
ekonomik varlıklar olmaktan öte olarak, yerel halkın kültürünü, adetlerini, ve alışkanlıklarını
şekillendirmekteydi. Bu tez ayrıca hayvanlara ilişkin olayları odağa alarak devlet yetkilileri ve
aşiretler arasındaki ilişkileri bağlamsallaştırır. Yerleşikliğin ve ticari tarımın göçerlik ve
pastoralizm karşısında ivmelenmesinden sonra da hayvanlar ve insanlar arasındaki ilişkiler
bölgedeki esas unsurlardan biri olsa da, bu durum başkalaşmış bir şekilde devam etti.
Anahtar kelimeler: Çukurova, göçer aşiretler, zorunlu iskan, hayvanlar, pastoralizm, tarım.
vii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I want to show my gratitude to those who supported me in different ways while
conducting this research. In the first place, I would like to express my deepest appreciation to my
advisor Assoc. Prof. Yonca Köksal-Özyaşar. During my studies, assistantships, and research, she
has always been there to guide me and teach me how to develop my academic skills without
neglecting other aspects of life. She gave her time and unwavering attention to my project, and
her comprehensive comments were of great importance to my thesis writing. I would also like to
extend my deepest gratitude to Assoc. Prof. Can Nacar, who gave me invaluable insights into
meticulously working with historical texts. I also had his profound support during my studies,
which increased my morale. Being a member of the TÜBİTAK research project (119K310)
conducted by Prof. Köksal-Özyaşar and Prof. Nacar helped me better understand Ottoman
history. I would like to extend my sincere thanks to Assoc. Prof. Chris Gratien for accepting to
be on my thesis committee and sharing his extensive knowledge with me.
I’m also deeply indebted to Asst. Prof. Yaşar Tolga Cora for giving me his unwavering guidance
since I met him at my alma mater, Boğaziçi University. Our conversations with him have always
motivated me and increased my curiosity. I am also grateful to Dr. Akın Sefer for his helpful
contributions.
I also wish to thank Doğa Dilbilmez, Aaqib Javid, and Siavash Kian for their invaluable
friendship and constant support, which I will always remember with gratitude. I am also grateful
to all my friends who never let me down during my research. Among them, Hale Överoğlu,
Konstantinos Xypolytos, Evren Çakıl, Yalçın Göktaş contributed to my research with their
practical suggestions.
viii
Many thanks to Kaygısızlar family, who opened their house to me when I needed it.
Special thanks to my family. Their love and endless caring made this journey possible.
I can not express enough my gratitude to Pırıl. Her endless encouragement and support has been
the source of my motivation.
I am also grateful to Burcu Ergin, Türkan İnci Dursundağ and Irmak Taştan-Kaplan from
Graduate School of Social Sciences and Humanities at Koç University for their supports.
Thanks also to the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Türkiye (TÜBİTAK) for
their financial support during my research via the TÜBİTAK-BİDEB 2210/A program.
ix
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1. Map of the Ottoman Adana, showing plains surrounded by mountains and the
Mediterranean……………………………………………………………………………………23
Figure 2. Today’s Saimbeyli (historical Haçin)…………………………………………………25
Figure 3. Map of the Adana Plain. Scale 1/400.000. Dated 1923……………………………….27
Figure 4. Map of the Aleppo province. Scale 1/450000. Dated 1869…………………………...29
Figure 5. Tomb of the Çoban Dede in Adana…………………………………………………...48
Figure 6. Cover page of the book Çukurova Destanı……………………………...……………96
Figure 7. A newly slaughtered animal is loaded onto a donkey……………………………….105
Figure 8. Adana Municipality’s Slaughterhouse……………………………………………….106
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LIST OF TABLES AND GRAPHS
Table 1. Nomadic tribes in Çukurova, according to Ahmet Cevdet’s Tezakir…...……………..33
Table 2. Numbers of built houses for different groups in Sis…………………………………...73
Table 3. Number of built houses for different groups in Maraş and its environs……………….74
Table 4. Number of the built houses for different groups in Islahiye and its environs………….74
Table 5. Number of the built houses for Cerid and Tacirli tribes……………………………….75
Table 6. Share of sheep taxes in total revenues of Adana Province in five years………………85
Table 7. Table showing number of different types of animals around Çukurova region by
1913……………………………………………………………………………………………103
Table 8. Table showing number of ovine around Çukurova region by 1913……………….....103
Table 9. Number of animals slaughtered in Adana during the early 1930s……………………106
Table 10. Numbers of five types of livestock in Turkey by 1935…………………….……….107
Graph 1. Sheep taxes collected in Adana province during the 1870s…………………………..84
Graph 2. Sheep Taxes and Tithe collected in Adana province during the 1870s……………….86
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP……………………………………………………..……..iii
ABSTRACT…………………………………………………………………………………...…v
ÖZET………………………………………………………………………………………….…vi
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS……………………………………………………………..….vii-viii
LIST OF FIGURES……………………………………………………………………………..ix
LIST OF TABLE AND GRAPHS………………………………………………………………x
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………….1
1.1. Relevant Literature………………………………………………………………………........4
1.2. Sources and Structure………………...……………………………………………………..16
CHAPTER 2: PRE-SETTLEMENT OTTOMAN ÇUKUROVA: DEFINING THE
REGION AND CONDITIONS LED TO THE REFORM DIVISION………………...…....22
1.1. Defining the Region: A “Greater Çukurova”………………………………….......…...…...22
1.2. Human Actors: A Multilayered Social Formation…………………………………....……..31
1.3. Non-Human Actors of the Nineteenth Century Çukurova……………………………...…..41
1.4. Social, Political, and Economic Conditions Before the Reform Division….………....……51
CHAPTER 3: INTERVENTION BY THE REFORM DIVISION: STATE’S AGENDA,
RESPONSES OF THE LOCALS, REGIONAL TRANSFORMATION……..….................60
1.1. The Reform Division: Structure and Agenda……………………………………………….60
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1.2. Methods of The Reform Division……………………………………………………….…..63
1.3. Reconstruction Efforts: Preserving the Reforms……………………………………….…...78
CHAPTER 4: POST-SETTLEMENT ÇUKUROVA: CHANGING AGRICULTURAL
AND ANIMAL BREEDING PRACTICES……………………………….……………….….92
1.1. DEVELOPMENT OF COMMERCIAL AGRICULTURE AND ITS INFLUENCES…….92
1.2. ANIMALS OF ÇUKUROVA AFTER THE REFORM DIVISION………….…………..100
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………….111
BIBLIOGRAPHY……………………………………………………………………………..120
1
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
This research focuses on the history of Ottoman Çukurova’s (historical Cilicia) socio-economic,
political, and environmental transformations that began in the second half of the nineteenth
century and lasted well into the twentieth century. Surrounded by Taurus and Amanus mountain
ranges and the Mediterranean Sea, Çukurova has been a borderland between Central Anatolia
and Northern Syria. In this borderland, various people of different religions, cultures, and socioeconomic
backgrounds experienced a particular mode of life in which human and animal
mobility, ever-dynamic social and political relationships, lack of state authority, intercommunal
violence, and significantly rich fauna and flora, were distinguishing features. In this unique
setting, nomadic tribes of mostly Turcoman and Kurdish populations constituted a primary
element of the region as animal breeders, farmers, brigands, heroes, rebels, and intermediaries.
Organized by strong tribal and familial ties, these well-armed and mobile groups conducted
pastoralist lifestyles. Their pastoralist practices enhanced their seasonal mobility, helping them to
avoid state’s monitoring, taxation, and conscription efforts until the late nineteenth century. They
developed complicated and changing relationships with other historical actors of the region, such
as local dynastic families, Christian and Muslim settled populations, and state agents. Their
flocks of hundreds of thousands of animals mainly consisted of sheep, goats, cattle, camels, and
other riding animals. The Ottoman state’s persistent efforts to penetrate the region proved
successful in the late nineteenth century, after they launched the Reform Division (Fırka-i
Islahiye) in 1865 to pacify resistant localities, forcefully settle the nomads, secure organized
2
military conscription and taxation, and consequently create a direct relationship with state and its
subjects by eliminating intermediaries. The process accelerated by the Division’s intervention
caused significant changes in the region, and nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes and their animals
were at a central and destructive point of this transformation.
The transformation process operated on multiple levels in the region. Through many
decades during which the empire-wide Tanzimat policies attempted to re-organize state
organization and enhance the state-making tools in provinces, Çukurova-based nomadic and
semi-nomadic tribes were able to continue to the animal-breeding economy and considerable
mobility in the forms of seasonal migrations. These locals sustained their common and
comprehensive mobility practices, making the state’s taxation and conscription attempts
unsuccessful. As Chris Gratien convincingly argues throughout his voluminous dissertation and
book, seasonal migration was necessary in a context where malaria could claim one’s life easily.1
John McNeill discusses that the Ottomans took initial steps as early as the late seventeenth
century regarding the forced settlement of the empire’s nomads and their engagement in
agriculture.2 In the late nineteenth century, mostly ignoring the well-established seasonal
migration practice and its environmental, economic, and socio-political context, the Ottoman
central authorities’ earlier policies prioritized the forced settlement of nomads. This sudden
intervention required nomads to switch their principal livelihood from animal breeding to
agriculture. Starting in the 1860s and accelerating in the following decades, this transformation
driven by commercial agriculture disrupted modes of life experienced by nomads and animals.
1 Chris Gratien, The Unsettled Plain: An Environmental History of the Late Ottoman Frontier (Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press, 2022); Chris Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours: Ecology and Settlement in Late
Ottoman and Early Republican Cilicia, 1856-1956” (PhD diss., Georgetown University, 2015).
2 J. R. McNeill, “The Eccentricity of the Middle East and North Africa’s Environmental History,” in Water on Sand:
Environmental Histories of the Middle East and North Africa, ed. Alan Mikhail (New York: Oxford University
Press, 2012), 38.
3
In the Ottoman Çukurova, deep and strong links connected the lives of people and
animals. Animal-breeding pastoralism and high level of human and animal mobility had been
important facets of these connections. However, the execution of Tanzimat reforms in Çukurova
required the establishment of systematic conscription and taxation, which the high-level mobility
posed certain difficulties. Thus, monitoring and limiting this pastoralist mobility became a
primary goal for the Ottoman state’s centralization efforts, which intensively changed humananimal
relations in the region. In the pre-settlement Çukurova, animals had been pivotal actors
that shaped people’s lives on different levels. In addition to being significant trade items and
sources of wealth, they influenced people’s thoughts, emotions, culture, and political and social
actions. After the 1860s, when the central authorities well penetrated the region through
negotiation and force, animals gradually lost their far-reaching impacts on these multiple layers.
The execution of Tanzimat reforms in the area led to a comprehensive process of
commodification of animals, which eliminated most of the non-economic roles of the animals.
With environmental, economic, and social historical perspectives, this project attempts to
contribute to the existing literature on Ottoman Çukurova and Ottoman provincial reforms by
focusing on how Çukurova-based nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes and their animals
experienced the provincial reforms in plains and mountains between Ottoman Anatolia and
Syria. Mainly inspired by environmental histories of the Ottoman Empire, this narrative seeks to
explain the complex and significant roles those non-human historical actors, especially animals
of nomads, played in the Çukurova’s regional transformation. In this way, this work aims to
provide a complex and holistic understanding of the history of Çukurova, a melting pot in which
various cultures and modes of life have existed. Before the forced settlement of nomads in the
second half of the nineteenth century, animals played essential political, economic, social, and
4
cultural roles in people’s lives. However, the intervention of the central authorities caused major
structural changes in the regional order, vanishing the profound impacts of animals on the
multiple dynamics of the region, reducing them to commodities.
1.1. Relevant Literature
With a particular focus on nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes and their animals, this thesis
explores Ottoman Çukurova’s socio-economic, political, and environmental transformations in
the second half of the nineteenth century. The project is informed by various accounts and
perspectives to understand a complicated and multilayered historical process. Among them, the
Ottoman Empire's environmental, political, social, and economic histories are of great
importance. Informed from these sources, the thesis also compares pre-settlement and postsettlement
conditions in the region. In particular, existing literature in English and Turkish on
the themes revolving around Ottoman provincial reform, tribe-state relations, nomadic tribes,
roles played by non-human actors, late Ottoman borderlands, and Ottoman Çukurova were the
leading sources for the theoretical framework. In this regard, the writings of three eminent
scholars, Andrew Gordon Gould, Meltem Toksöz, and Chris Gratien, have been the most helpful
in learning about the nineteenth and twentieth-century Çukurova.
Reşat Kasaba’s A Moveable Empire is a broad narrative that shows the integral place of
nomads and nomadism in the Ottoman Empire. In the book, Kasaba presents a comprehensive
narrative of nomadic practices in the Ottoman Empire and nomadic and semi-nomadic groups’
centuries-long dynamic relationships with the Ottoman central authorities and its agents.3
According to the book, from the beginning, nomadism and nomadic groups have been significant
3 Reşat Kasaba, A Moveable Empire: Ottoman Nomads, Migrants and Refugees (Seattle: University of Washington
Press, 2009).
5
components of the empire's socio-cultural, political, and economic life, and central authorities
benefitted a lot from the highly reciprocal relationships with these mobile actors. However,
Kasaba asserts, especially after the massive economic, social, and political crises of the 16th and
17th centuries, the settlement of nomadic groups as a centralization step started to appear as a
primary objective for the central authorities’ agenda.4 Although there had been tensions about the
settlement, nomadic tribes and the Ottoman central authorities cooperated to an essential degree
for centuries. Showing the indispensable places of these mobile actors, Gould, Toksöz, and
Gratien focus on the nineteenth-century Çukurova.
Andrew Gordon Gould conducted early research on the Çukurova region, focusing on
state interventions to nomadic tribes in the nineteenth century. About the Ottoman state’s
intervention in Çukurova in the second half of the nineteenth century, he places the efforts of
central authorities in a global context by stating that “the expansion of settlement as a basis for
modern political sovereignty” was a common understanding worldwide at the time.5 In its
setting, Çukurova was a place where local powerholders sustained critical levels of autonomy. In
relation, to explain the provincial notables’ perceptions of the central authorities, and particularly
sultans, Gould formulates: “They accepted the Sultan as a figurehead whose support could be
useful against local enemies, but they would resist any attempt to overthrow the local balance of
power in favor of centralized control.”6 He assesses the process of state intervention and the
forced settlement as a “confrontation of two mutually alien cultures, which it was quite possible
for the Ottomans to think they were acting in the best interest of all elements of the population
4 Ibid., 55-71.
5 Andrew Gordon Gould, “Pashas and Brigands: Ottoman Provincial Reform and Its Impact on the Nomadic Tribes
of Southern Anatolia, 1840-1885” (PhD diss., University of California, 1973), 1.
6 Ibid., 3.
6
without being aware of the needless suffering and destruction they were causing.”7 According to
Gould, the primary aims of the state intervention in the mid-1860s were suppressing the uprising
in Zeytun and protecting the Muslim immigrants.8 In addition, in particular of the tribe members’
occupations, he emphasizes that animal breeding had been the primary income source while
brigandage and farming were secondary ways of livelihood.9 However, it should be clarified that
brigandage had serious political connotations, too. Işık Tamdoğan aptly problematizes the concept of
brigand (eşkıya), and referencing Suraiya Faroqhi’s idea on this issue, formulates a brigand as “anyone
who engages in malice.”10 She discusses that a decisive parameter for being categorized as a
brigand was disobeying official policies such as settlement orders.11 So, the concept often
repeated in official documents did not have well-framed boundaries. However, when sources
mention the brigandage specifically as a way of livelihood, they must be referring to intercepting
roads and robbing people.
Meltem Toksöz is another scholar who has conducted comprehensive research on
Ottoman Southern Anatolia. In her book, Toksöz focuses on economic developments and their
influences on the demography, social and political aspects of Çukurova. She considers the
thriving of Mersin as a port city with strong international connections and networks, and
expansion of a cotton monoculture-based commercial agriculture as core elements of regional
transformation.12 In addition to presenting comprehensive data on local economic, political, and
social changes, Toksöz’s book is also of historiographical importance. By focusing on civilian
7 Ibid., 10.
8 Ibid., 66.
9 Andrew G. Gould, “The Burning of The Tents: The Forcible Settlement of Nomads In Southern Anatolia,” in
Humanist and Scholar: Essays In Honor of Andreas Tietze (Istanbul; Washington, D.C.: The ISIS Press, 1993),73.
10 “kendini fesada bırakan her kimse eşkıyadır.” Işık Tamdoğan, “Nezir Ya Da XVIII. Yüzyıl Çukurova’sında
Eşkıya, Göçebe ve Devlet Arasındaki İlişkiler,” Kebikeç, no. 21 (2006): 137.
11 Ibid., 137.
12 Meltem Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton in the Eastern Mediterranean: The Making of the Adana-Mersin
Region, 1850-1908 (Leiden: Brill, 2010).
7
actors such as nomadic tribes, immigrant families, and local merchants, she emphasizes the nonstate
actors’ agency in this great regional transformation. This perspective brings a more
balanced understanding rather than assessing the process as mainly state-oriented.
Chronologically, Chris Gratien produced the most recent accounts of the region’s history.
Gratien designates the late Ottoman Çukurova as a frontier and formulates a late Ottoman
frontier in three senses; one as a political frontier where the state building is conducted, one as a
frontier where populous newcomers come and settle, and one as an “ecological frontier” which
he describes as: “one in which novel plants, animals, microbes, methods of land use, modes of
agrarian production, forms of resource extraction, and environmental understandings emerged in
tandem with the processes of state-building, settlement, and commercialization.”13 In this
context, he emphasizes the environmental aspects of the transformation process that started in the
mid-nineteenth century and lasted for many decades. In connection, Gratien underscores how
much the intervention by the central authorities starting in the late 19th century disturbed the
order of Çukurova: “the major forces that shaped the late Ottoman frontier—the modern state,
capitalism, war, and science—each changed the region’s ecology and rhythms.”14
Regarding the historiographical aspect, with an environmental historical approach, his
narrative highlights the far-reaching roles that the non-state and non-human historical actors
played. For example, he shows how much the major historical events and processes of Çukurova,
such as commercial agriculture and high labor migration, were related to the region’s dynamic
hydrological aspects.15 Concerning the overall influences of the forced settlement and following
events, Gratien shares Gould’s idea of “the needless suffering and destruction:” “Ottoman
13 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 14.
14 Ibid., 6.
15 Ibid., 114-121.
8
officials had not intended for tens of thousands of people to die as a result of the reforms in
Cilicia, but had that been the intention, it is doubtful that they could have exacted a more
immense toll.”16 However, there were certain areas in which these local actors systematically
conducted business and cooperated with the Ottoman state. In parallel with Gould’s argument on
the aspects of tribal economy, Chris Gratien too, emphasizes the Çukurova based tribal groups’
function as an animal supplier for the Ottoman army.17
In the context of tribe-state relations, by criticizing the literature that interprets nomadic
and semi-nomadic tribes as mainly problematic actors for the economy, Yonca Köksal and
Mehmet Polatel argue that having long-term historical roots, these tribal organizations played
critical roles in certain businesses such as animal trade.18 Depending on the case of Cihanbeyli, a
prominent semi-nomadic Kurdish tribe that supplied Istanbul with sheep for a long time, the
authors explain that nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes had considerable economic and political
power during the nineteenth century, and their engagement with animal husbandry played a
crucial role in tribal organizations’ gaining this power. This article also explains that Anatoliabased
animal trade networks had interregional and international layers.
Concerning the importance and extensiveness of animal trade networks in the late
Ottoman, an article written by Can Nacar and Yonca Köksal explores that in the nineteenth
century, great animal trade networks extended from Eastern Anatolia to Syria and Egypt, and
empire-wide credit structures were essential elements of this highly profitable and risky
16 Ibid., 75.
17 Ibid., 51. Also see Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 15.
18 Yonca Köksal and Mehmet Polatel, “A Tribe as an Economic Actor: The Cihanbeyli Tribe and the Meat
Provisioning of Istanbul in the Early Tanzimat Era,” New Perspectives on Turkey 61 (2019): 97–123.
9
business.19 In such an environment in which the nomadic tribes had substantial political and
economic capacity, the ways the central authorities communicated and negotiated with them
varied considerably. Since this research attempts to understand decades-long and complex
negotiations between Çukurova’s local actors and central authorities’ agents, contextualizing the
variations in these relationships is of utmost importance.
In this context, Yonca Köksal’s article “Coercion and Mediation: Centralization and
Sedentarization of Tribes in the Ottoman Empire” presents a comparative perspective regarding
the settlement process of four different central-Anatolia-based semi-nomadic tribes.20 Köksal
argues the policies of Ottoman central authorities regarding semi-nomadic tribes’ settlement
varied, and were contingent on four main factors: geopolitical location of a tribe; tribes’ spatial
boundedness to a defined area; a tribe’s internal organization and hierarchical order; and level of
a tribe’s engagement in trade. According to her, the central authorities had a continuum of
methods and tools to settle tribes, in which mediation was the priority: “The state strategy was to
further tribal hierarchy and to negotiate with tribal leaders. Coercion was employed only when
mediation failed. State centralization was a process in which both state and local actors
positioned themselves according to perceived responses.”21 In a similar vein, in his article on
applications of Tanzimat policies in Ottoman Baghdad, Ebubekir Ceylan emphasizes the
reciprocal relationship between the state and tribal formations in the Ottoman Empire and
criticizes the approach that interprets tribes as isolated, marginal entities that are intrinsically
19 Can Nacar and Yonca Köksal, “Ali Ağa’nın Koyunları ve Borçları: Erzurum-Şam-Mısır Hattında Hayvan
Ticareti,” Toplumsal Tarih, no. 323 (2020): 60–65. Reşat Kasaba credits nomadic tribes as the empire's major
animal suppliers, emphasizing their key roles for trade networks. Kasaba, A Moveable Empire, 32-33.
20 Yonca Köksal, “Coercion and Mediation: Centralization and Sedentarization of Tribes in the Ottoman Empire,”
Middle Eastern Studies 42, no. 3 (2006): 469-491.
21 Ibid., 487.
10
incompatible with central authorities.22 Depending on several examples of tribal organizations
and their dynamic relationships with state agents, Ceylan argues that incentives like the
incorporation of prominent tribal figures into state apparatus through appointments to official
ranks, tax exemptions, agricultural equipment provision, the endowment of title deeds, the
transformation of tribal organizations into official institutions had been used as effective tools to
transform targeted areas in parallel with the state’s reform agenda.23 In parallel with Köksal’s
argument about the state’s dynamic policy-making processes, Ceylan states, “The harmony of
interests between the local government and the tribes was very important and it was this
harmony which determined Ottoman approach to a particular tribe.”24 Regarding the reasons
behind this common policy about tribes, he emphasizes the central authorities’ lack of capacity
to control these provincial settings as a major cause.25 In a way showing a common characteristic
of the Ottoman state’s tribal policies, in his discussion on the Ottoman central authorities’
attempts to keep and increase their control over Libya in the late nineteenth century, Selim
Deringil discusses that: “The center's weakness meant that it was dependent on the goodwill and
cooperation of the Sanusi sheikh, the local notable, and the Bedouin.”26 As a general policy,
Chris Gratien specifies the central authorities’ approach: “In exchange for ceding authority to
local notables, the Ottoman government could protect its vital interests in Cilicia at minimal
cost.”27 A specific provincial setting could be imperative in the negotiation and application
attempts of a state intervention, which rendered each locality unique in the sense that they
22 Ebubekir Ceylan, “Carrot or Stick? Ottoman Tribal Policy in Baghdad, 1831-1876,” International Journal of
Contemporary Iraqi Studies 3, no. 2 (2009): 169-186.
23 Ibid., 177-185.
24 Ibid., 173.
25 Ibid., 173-175.
26 Selim Deringil, “‘They Live in a State of Nomadism and Savagery’: The Late Ottoman Empire and the Post-
Colonial Debate,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 45, no. 2 (2003): 339.
27 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 54.
11
experienced the Tanzimat. In this context, Yonca Köksal’s account of applications of the
Tanzimat reforms in Ankara and Edirne provides a comparative perspective.28
In this book, Köksal challenges conventional interpretations of the Tanzimat that put a
statist perspective at the center by suggesting that even though the Ottoman central authorities
had a monolithic and standard Tanzimat frame, provincial actors’ reactions decisively shaped the
process, which created unique transformations for each locus. Köksal’s narrative depends on a
comparative case between Ankara and Edirne, and she explains that individual demographic,
geographical, economic, and cultural settings in each locality had directly transformed the
attempted reforms. In parallel with her emphasis on the interactive nature of state reforms,
Köksal argues that the reform process was not a zero-sum game between local and central actors,
and different parties in the process could gain achievements synchronously.29 Similarly, Samuel
Dolbee shows that nomadic tribes around Syria and Iraq in the 19th century had intertwined
relations with other locals and state agents, and they also had sophisticated methods to negotiate
with the central authorities.30 Nora Barakat, too, shows that pastoralists had highly developed
socioeconomic and political mechanisms, and their relations with state agents and other local
parties were intrinsically involved with law-making processes in the late Ottoman Empire.31
Another comprehensive account that focuses on state-tribe relations in the late Ottoman
Empire is Yener Koç’s doctoral dissertation. Having similarities with the Çukurova case in
several aspects, Koç’s narrative revolves around themes such as Ottoman centralization efforts,
28Yonca Köksal, The Ottoman Empire in the Tanzimat Era: Provincial Perspectives from Ankara to Edirne
(London: Routledge, 2019).
29 Ibid., 6-9.
30 Samuel Dolbee, “Empire on the Edge: Desert, Nomads, and the Making of an Ottoman Provincial Border,” The
American Historical Review 127, no.1 (2022): 129-158.
31 Nora Barakat, “Marginal Actors? The Role of Bedouin in the Ottoman Administration of Animals as Property in
the District of Salt, 1870-1912,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 58 (2015): 105-34.
12
multilayered tribal organizations, and bilateral relations between nomads and central authorities
in a borderland region around Ottoman Eastern Anatolia.32 Koç strongly emphasizes that
conducting centralization projects and executing the Tanzimat reforms in various provinces were
major aims of the late Ottoman administration, while each locality experienced them in different
ways. For the Northeastern Anatolian context, Koç underscores the peculiarities of interstate
relations between Ottoman, Russian and Persian empires.33 Regarding the Ottoman Eastern
Anatolia, Zozan Pehlivan’s research is also of great importance. In her article “El Niño and the
Nomads,” Pehlivan uses a multilayered environmental perspective that analyzes severe climatic
events and their multiple influences on nomads and herd animals in the nineteenth century
Ottoman Kurdistan.34 Her detailed account shows the centrality of animal breeding practices,
animal and human mobility, and herd animals in the region for different groups of people,
primarily nomadic tribes. Her emphasis on the number of animals in the region in the mid-19th
century, over two million livestock, shows that Eastern Anatolia was a center of animal breeding
and pastoralist tribes.35
To make sense of the late Ottoman Çukurova’s peculiarities, knowing local actors is
another essential factor. In this context, in her master’s thesis, Fatma Akın focuses on the Avşar
tribe, which was one of the most populated and powerful tribal organizations in central and
Southern Anatolia, and its settlement process from the mid-nineteenth to the late nineteenth
century.36 There, Akın explains that Ottoman central authorities spent considerable effort to
restrict and control Avşar’s mobility, prevent their violent actions against other locals, settle
32 Yener Koç, “Nomadic Pastoral Tribes at the Intersection of the Ottoman, Persian and Russian Empires (1820s-
1890s)” (PhD Diss., Boğaziçi University, 2020).
33 Ibid., 165-167.
34 Zozan Pehlivan, “El Ninõ and the Nomads: Global Climate, Local Environment, and the Crisis of Pastoralism in
Late Ottoman Kurdistan,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 63, no. 3 (2020): 316-56.
35 Ibid., 330.
36 Fatma Akın, “XIX. Yüzyılın İkinci Yarısında Avşarların İskanı” (MA thesis, Gazi Üniversitesi, 2014).
13
them, and push the tribe to engage in farming starting from the 1840s. Besides emphasizing
strong continuities between earlier settlement projects and the Fırka-i Islahiye’s intervention,
Akın’s comprehensive archival research shows that Muslim immigrants’ arrival to Çukurova and
its surrounding locations immediately influenced the settlement projects and created decadeslasting
inter-communal tension between the immigrants and Avşars. In another master’s thesis,
Derya İdikurt works on the forced settlement process in the late nineteenth century Çukurova
with a particular focus on a prominent local dynasty, Kozanoğulları.37 To describe the presettlement
Çukurova’s order, İdikurt asserts that until Celali Revolts in the sixteen and
seventeenth centuries, Çukurova had been a wealthy and socially stable region, and the revolts
caused a massive vacuum of state authority, and stability. In parallel with this narrative of
decline, she suggests that the Kozanoğlu family increased their power in the region, and until the
Reform Division’s intervention, they dominated the area.
According to the existing literature, nomadic tribes have been important political and
economic actors in the Ottoman empire’s history. However, it is not possible to talk about a
unified “tribal order” or standard “tribal features.” Regarding various factors, such as their
migration routes, internal organizations, and summer and winter quarters, tribes varied
significantly. Since there were many powerholders of different capacities in Çukurova,
contextualizing the multiplicity of local powerholders is vital. In a similar context, Işık
Tamdoğan emphasized the “fluid” (akışkan) structures of local identities in the Ottoman
Çukurova, a distinguishing aspect of the ever-changing local dynamics.38
37 Derya İdikurt, “Osmanlı’dan Cumhuriyet’e Bir Âyanlık Örneği: Kozanoğulları ve Fırka-i İslâhiye’nin Kuruluşu”
(MA thesis, Nevşehir Üniversitesi, 2011).
38 Tamdoğan, “Nezir Ya Da XVIII. Yüzyıl Çukurova’sında Eşkıya, Göçebe ve Devlet Arasındaki İlişkiler,” 137.
14
Since this project also intends to explain how animals in the region took part in
Çukurova’s extensive transformation process, animal histories in Ottoman historiography are
remarkably helpful in creating a complete understanding. Onur Inal, in his article on how camels
functioned as essential members of trade and labor networks in late Ottoman Western Anatolia,
emphasizes the roles of animals as historical actors in the empire:
Together with other imperial actors, animals shaped the empire’s history in profound ways, and were in
turn shaped by it. They supplied the Ottoman people with the motor energy to cross deserts, mountains, and
steppes, to conduct pilgrimages, to conquer new lands, to move merchandise, to cultivate fields, and to turn
wheels. They also fed, clothed, protected, and entertained them.39
As Inal explains, animals and events revolving around them have always been major
parts and parcels of historical processes in the empire, and this gravity was one of the unique
conditions which rendered the 19th-century Çukurova special.
As an early example of environmental history of the early modern Ottoman empire, Sam
White explains that starting in the 16th century and lasting for a couple of centuries, a climatic
cooling negatively influenced several regions including Ottoman Anatolia.40 White presents a
comprehensive account emphasizing the intrinsic links between this climatic phenomenon and
sociopolitical turmoil in Anatolia, which materialized in a series of uprisings, i.e., the Celali
Revolts. Also underlying this climatic change’s transformative effects on landscapes, White
39 Onur Inal, “One-Humped History: The Camel as Historical Actor in the Late Ottoman Empire,” International
Journal of Middle East Studies 53, no. 1 (2021): 58. In the context of animals’ histories in the Ottoman Empire,
Animals and People in the Ottoman Empire, which provides various perspectives on the subject, constitutes an early
and comprehensive example. Suraiya Faroqhi, ed., Animals and People in the Ottoman Empire (Istanbul: Eren,
2010). For a comparative view, see Alan Mikhail’s article in which he discusses the pivotal role animals played in
the socioeconomic transformation Egypt experienced at the end of the early modern period: Alan Mikhail,
“Unleashing the Beast: Animals, Energy, and the Economy of Labor in Ottoman Egypt,” The American Historical
Review 118, no. 2 (2013): 317–48. Also see Alan Mikhail, The Animal in Ottoman Egypt (New York: Oxford
University Press, 2014).
40 Sam White, The Climate of Rebellion in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2011).
15
argues: “Çukurova farms were all but abandoned in the Little Ice Age crisis, many reverting to
swamps and forests by the 1700s, leaving few sixteenth-century settlements that could still be
identified today.”41 So, the ecological alterations of the early modern era well continued to the
late Ottoman Çukurova and had been quite influential for socioeconomic, political, and
environmental dynamics. On a regional scale, Faruk Tabak analyzes the structural changes in
Mediterranean geography during the Little Ice Age regarding several aspects, including
economy, demography, environment, and settlement patterns.42 He argues that the Little Ice Age
induced formations of swamps in plains in different corners of the Mediterranean, lessening
people’s habitation in the lowlands.43
These sources and perspectives play critical roles in this project’s theoretical framework.
First, the accounts that mainly focus on the Ottoman Çukurova and the transformation process,
largely driven by the increasing commercial agriculture, present a comprehensive understanding
of the regional change. In addition, focusing on state-tribe relationships, there are various
accounts of the Ottoman state’s Tanzimat reform policies in different locations of the empire. To
comprehensively understand these policies at the time, comparing various applications in
particular places is essential. Since this project also aims to explore roles of non-humans,
especially nomadic animals, in times of significant change, accounts revolving around animals
and animal trade present a ground for further discussion. Scholars agree that nomadic tribes
played vital political and economic roles as animal breeders. To contribute to this literature, my
master’s thesis attempts to show these roles in the Çukurova’s substantial transformation. Also,
the accounts focusing on particular historical actors, such as a dynastic family or a tribe, help to
41 Ibid., 67.
42 Faruk Tabak, The Waning of the Mediterranean, 1550-1870: A Geohistorical Approach (Baltimore: John Hopkins
University Press, 2008).
43 Ibid., 217.
16
contextualize which peculiarities made Çukurova’s transformation distinct from another
province’s experience.
1.2. Sources and Structure
Documents from the Ottoman State Archives (BOA) constitute the main archival sources for this
research. Various documents, including military reports, people’s petitions, and correspondence
between different state agents and branches, provide invaluable information about the socioeconomic,
political, and environmental conditions of the nineteenth-century Çukurova and the
Ottoman central authorities’ perceptions of the region. In the second part of the nineteen century,
different goals such as establishing well-functioning conscription and taxation systems,
preventing escalated inter-communal violence, providing regional security, and subsequently,
building a solid state authority by creating a direct relationship with people, motivated the
Ottoman central authorities to concentrate their attention on this region. Besides abundant
official correspondence, salnames (Ottoman provincial yearbooks) constituted another official
record to analyze the region’s history. These yearbooks provide detailed information about the
province’s economy, geography, demography, urban setting, and public organization.
However, depending only on Ottoman official resources poses an obstacle to observing
historical processes in their complexities and different layers. I tried to refer to various sources to
overcome this setback and create a more nuanced, multivocal narrative. British consular trade
reports provide another state discourse and perspective. In the reports used here, consuls
especially inform about agricultural settings, regional economic networks, and regional actors’
participation in trade. The existing literature shows that the region’s engagement in world trade
in the nineteenth century has been a central element for regional transformation. Thus, the
consular trade reports are helpful in observing economic conditions at the time.
17
Another useful source for this research is memoirs. Especially Ahmet Cevdet Pasha has
several writings focused on Çukurova’s conditions in the second half of the nineteenth century.
Even though this genre usually represents a non-official discourse, the case of Ahmet Cevdet
Pasha should be taken uniquely. Since he was a high-ranked statesman, the administrative chief
of Fırka-i Islahiye, and then governor of Aleppo, his thoughts on the state intervention to
Çukurova mostly overlapped with the statist perspectives. As is the case for Ahmet Cevdet,
official discourses tending to justify the state actions are unsurprising, and one should always be
critical and skeptical about them.
Another example of personal narratives, Victor Langlois’s travel writings, provides
invaluable information about pre-settlement Çukurova. Commissioned by the French state,
Langlois came to Çukurova in the early 1850s, and during his stay in different parts of the
region, he created voluminous records of his observations, thoughts, and experiences.
Folkloric elements such as poems, songs, laments, and folk stories constituted other
helpful sources for this research. The state’s massive intervention in 1865 and its aftermath
drastically altered Çukurova’s political, social, and environmental settings, which violated order
of life for most inhabitants. People who encountered this turmoil used their folklore to organize
resistance, oppose intervention, and express their anger and resentment. In this sense, the poems
of Dadaloğlu, a bard and tribesman who actively resisted the forced settlement, are significant.
Also, there are laments and folk stories about various issues, such as regional change, the waning
of the tribal order, and the violent acts of the Ottoman army. As sources mainly created and
circulated by local people, these works provide an alternative point of view rather than the state
records, which depict a quickly settled, highly profit-making region populated with happy
people. Another way to observe how the state’s forced settlement and aggressive deeds shaped
18
people’s collective memory is to analyze modern literary works. In this regard, especially Yaşar
Kemal’s literature is essential. Even though his works are mostly fictional, they are largely
informed by local collective memory, providing a bottom-up viewpoint.44
Menemencioğulları Tarihi is another valuable source that informs this thesis. As a local dynasty
with extensive tribal connections, Menemencioğulları was pivotal in the late Ottoman Çukurova.
Menemencioğlu Ahmed Bey, one of the family chiefs in the nineteenth century, commissioned
this family history which provides critical insights into intra-communal relations, local politics,
and dynamic negotiations between locals and central authorities. Thus, this thesis refers to
several possible sources to create a multivocal narrative and contribute a nuanced understanding
of these multifaceted, complex historical processes. In this context, mentioning this study’s
limitations is also necessary.
Cilicia had been a site of a late-medieval Armenian Kingdom, and Kozan (historical Sis)
served as a major religious center for the Armenian church for centuries. Different towns like
Haçin (today Saimbeyli) and Zeytun (today Süleymanlı) were populated mainly by Armenians
until the early twentieth century. Armenians were among the main local actors for the Ottoman
Çukurova. Therefore, referring to sources in Armenian can be highly helpful in understanding
the region’s history. In his research, Chris Gratien refers to many sources in Armenian, which
contributes to the comprehensiveness of the study and analysis of complex historical events. In
his The Horrors of Adana, Bedross Der Matossian, too, points out Armenian sources extensively,
which allows to understand the complicated sociopolitical processes that Adana experienced in
44 For a discussion on usage of Yaşar Kemal’s writings in an academic research context, see Burak Gürel, “Classes
and Status Groups in Times of Great Transformation: Reading Agrarian Change in Çukurova through the Lens of
Yaşar Kemal,” Hacettepe Üniversitesi Edebiyat Fakültesi Dergisi 36, no. 2 (2019): 210–12.
19
the early twentieth century.45 Therefore, in relation to these accounts that narrate multiple facets
of the region’s history, the integration of more sources in Armenian would considerably
contribute to this research and recent Ottoman historiography. Similarly, regarding the thriving
commercial networks and engagement with Eastern Mediterranean trade during the regional
transformation, referring to Arabic, French, and German sources can be extremely useful for
future research on Çukurova’s history.
In the first chapter of the thesis, I present a brief historical context of the period and
geography, focusing on pre-settlement developments and nomadic populations in the nineteenthcentury
Ottoman Çukurova. This period was followed by swift changes from an animalbreeding-
based economy and nomadism to cotton-centered commercial agriculture and
increasing settlement patterns. Having the nomads and their animals at the center during the
Ottoman centralization efforts, this narrative is informed by many different sources and
perspectives. Scholars have extensively explored the Çukurova in the Tanzimat era and
afterward, during which the Ottoman central authorities severely altered the region’s
demographic, socio-economic, and ecologic dynamics to maximize the state’s exploitation
means and render the region “efficient” for further statist agenda. In addition to those rich
accounts, a vast literature on Ottoman provincial reforms, tribe-state relationships, and the
Anatolia-based nomadic tribes’ engagement in empire-wide trade networks was beneficial. Many
scholarly works suggest that nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes played essential political,
economic, and social functions in the late Ottoman era. These works presented the theoretical
background for this thesis. After reviewing the related literature, I discussed my sources,
methods, and the project’s limitations.
45 Bedross Der Matossian, The Horrors of Adana: Revolution and Violence in the Early Twentieth Century
(Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2022).
20
The second chapter is the most voluminous one in the thesis. This chapter presents a
detailed discussion of the nineteenth-century Çukurova, focusing on the pre-settlement era. First,
I discuss the region itself. Where was the Ottoman Çukurova? Which topographical and
hydrological aspects in which ways rendered it unique? Existent literature and archival
documents demonstrate that even though the Adana Plain and surrounding mountains have been
the gravity center for the region, it had substantial geographical, socio-cultural, and economic
ties with surrounding geographies. After focusing on the “Greater Çukurova,” I examine human
and non-human actors of the region, respectively. The purpose of reviewing non-humans under a
separate subtitle is to emphasize the sophisticated and major roles these actors played. Lastly, in
this chapter, to present a ground for further comparison and discussion of regional
transformation, I demonstrate the socio-political and socio-economic conditions of the region
before the Reform Division’s intervention.
The third chapter revolves around the Reform Division’s operation. Firstly, I focus on the
Division’s strategies, methods, tools, and structure. The Division was constituted of a special
military force of elite units with highly modern equipment and an administrative branch. The
Division used its power to dominate negotiations with local powerholders of different impacts.
Beyond, there was not a unified force of locals to resist the state’s attempt, and several tribal
elites were ambitious to be on the same side as the army and secure their positions in the new
order. Using its violent capacity as an effective leverage, the Division proved successful in
establishing the state’s dominance over the region by weakening the various autonomous parties.
However, this result was also a destructive one. Especially in the early times of the operation, the
insistence on nomads’ all-year-round settlement caused high mortality among the forcefully
settled people and their animal population. In this chapter, I also focus on the administrative and
21
infrastructural projects and incentives that were used to render agriculture a proper option for
animal breeding in the region. These projects included establishing new villages, constructing
permanent houses, reclamation of swamps, roadmaking, and provision of agricultural material.
The fourth chapter focuses on the process after the forced settlement. Concentrating on
changed agricultural and animal breeding practices, trade, local power dynamics, labor
migration, and ways animals continued to be part and parcel of life in Çukurova. Led by the
expanding commercial agriculture and especially cotton monoculture, and expansion of
infrastructure and Mersin as a significant port city, Çukurova transformed into a highly settled
region with massive agricultural production. It was a decades-long process that eroded the
former order of many powerholders’ rule over different corners of the region, and people and
animal mobility was an established socio-economic practice. In this system in which the settled
order and commercial agriculture shaped other aspects of life, animals continued to exist.
However, how they existed and how people related to them differed over time when animals
became subject to a large commodification process.
22
CHAPTER 2
PRE-SETTLEMENT OTTOMAN ÇUKUROVA:
DEFINING THE REGION AND CONDITIONS LED TO
THE REFORM DIVISION
1.1. Defining the Region: A “Greater Çukurova”
Ahmet Cevdet Pasha, a prominent statesman, administrative chief of the Reform Division, and
then governor of Aleppo, defines Çukurova as: “a vast land that vertically extends from İçel
sanjak to Gavur Dağı and horizontally extends from Sis and Kars [Kars-ı Zülkadriye, today
Kadirli] to where Seyhan River flows into the Mediterannean and Karataş dock.”46 This
definition refers to territory enclosed by the Taurus Mountains in the west and north, Amanus
Mountains in the east, and the Mediterranean in the south. In modern Turkey, this region roughly
covers Mersin, Adana, Osmaniye, and the northern parts of Hatay. Today, with millions of
residents, several industrial zones, ports, and extensive and fertile agricultural fields, the region
is an important economic center for Turkey.
The region played significant political and economic roles in the Ottoman Empire.
However, a much larger geography should be considered to have a complete image of Ottoman
Çukurova and its immediate sphere of influence. Meltem Toksöz, the author of one of the
founding texts of Ottoman Çukurova histories, calls the area an “incircumscribable region” and
underscores the necessity to consider humans’ relationships with their geographical environment
46 “Çukurova tûlen İçel sancağı hüdûdundan Gâvur-dağı’na kadar ve arzan Sis’ten ve Kars’dan Seyhan nehrinin
munsabına ve Karataş iskelesine kadar mümted bir sahrây-i vâsi’adır.” Ahmet Cevdet, Tezâkir, vol. 3 (Ankara:
Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1991), 124.
23
and animals for having a wholistic Çukurova image.47 She adds that since it ignores nomadic
practices, having an Adana-centric perspective of Çukurova can be misleading in explaining the
regional dynamics.48 At the time, Çukurova was inhabited by many nomadic groups with
different transhumance orbits from Syrian deserts to Central Anatolia. The Reform Division’s
range of impact covered a larger territory than the Adana plain and the surrounding mountains.
Figure 1 shows the plains of Çukurova, the surrounding mountains, and the Mediterranean.
Figure 1. Map of the Ottoman Adana, showing plains surrounded by mountains and the Mediterranean.
47 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 10.
48 Ibid., 10.
24
At the beginning of his detailed account of the Reform Division’s intervention in
Çukurova and the forced settlement process, Fatih Sansar suggests that the settlement area was
extensive as to cover today’s Adana, Antakya, Gaziantep, Kahramanmaraş, Mersin and
Kayseri.49 A correspondence from the Ottoman State Archive dated 1867 also implies a vast
geography. A letter in this correspondence said that when the Reform Division arrived at
Çukurova, it was understood that Mount Kozan (Cebel-i Kozan), Kurd Mountain (Kürd Dağı),
Amanus Mountains (Gavur Dağları), and some of Maraş and Adana mountains had been
represented with big mistakes (pek fahiş yanlış) in the existing maps.50 Two members of the
Divison, Major (binbaşı) Hüseyin Bey and Captain (yüzbaşı) Said Efendi created a new map. A
note on the map states that Hüseyin Bey knew Adana, Kozan, Maraş, and Payas. Said Efendi
knew about Aleppo, Urfa, Zor, and the desert areas around Syria (çöl tarafları).51 Thus, the
Ottoman Çukurova can be imagined as a region centered in Adana with solid and dynamic ties
with its surrounding areas from Central Anatolia to the deserts of Syria. Given the wideness of
the region and its sphere of influence, it is necessary to limit this project’s geographical scope.
Since it is pretty challenging to cover all the geography in a single work, and it is mainly an
inquiry into what happened to nomads and their animals during the Çukurova’s agrarian
transformation, I will focus on Adana and Amik plains and surrounding highlands, where
nomadic groups were densely present.
Historically, Çukurova’s geographical formation affected its political, economic, and
social dynamics and relationships with other actors outside of the region. In the 19th century,
49 M. Fatih Sansar, Tanzimat döneminde bir iskan modeli: Fırka-i Islahiye ve Osmaniye (Cebel-i Bereket),
(Osmaniye: T.C. Osmaniye İl Kültür ve Turizm Müdürlüğü, 2006), 1.
50 BOA, A. MKT. MHM. 387-47. (25 Rabiulevvel 1284 [27 July 1867]).
51 See BOA, HRT. h. 536. (29 Zilhicce 1285 [12 April 1869]). This map consists of four pieces, and it is noted that it
was revised by Kaimakam Hüseyin Hüsnü Bey and Captain Said Efendi. Probably the same two officers who
mapped Aleppo revised this map.
25
mountains, waterways, plains, forests, and swamplands were among the main landscape
elements that influenced the region significantly. Mountain sets surrounded lowlands. Seyhan
and Ceyhan rivers, two major waterways that rise from north and flow into Mediterannean,
irrigated the plain. Vast swamps stretched along the plain.52
Mountains played pivotal roles in the Çukurova’s economic, political, and social
formation. People settled around mountain slopes and valleys. Figure 2 shows Saimbeyli
(historical Haçin), as one of those towns where people settled around mountains.
Figure 2. Today’s Saimbeyli (historical Haçin). Photo by the author.
52 Regarding the influences of swamps and marshy patches during this time, Meltem Toksöz explains: “The Mersin-
Tarsus-Adana road, at the end of the 1850s, often had to pass right through reed beds. Winter travel proved very
difficult owing to the mud. As early as 1858, foreign consulates and merchants had petitioned the local government
for the repair and elevation of the road to avoid the swamps.” Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 94.
26
Plains and mountains had intrinsically intertwined relationships in Çukurova, and they
were all bounded by multiple natural, ecological ties. In Yaşar Kemal’s novel Yusufçuk Yusuf, a
scene implies these ecological webs. In the narration, when a horse plague claimed the lives of
horses in Çukurova, eagles, vultures, and other birds came down from “Anavarza, Hemite
Mountain, Gavur Mountains [Amanus], Binboğa Mountains, Aladağ Mountains, Düldül
Mountain,”53 for the carcasses. In today’s political borders, these mountains are in Adana,
Osmaniye, Hatay, Kayseri, Maraş, and Niğde. Still, as is the case in the scene from the novel,
these mountains had been fundamental and interconnected parts of the Ottoman Çukurova.
Figure 3 shows the topographic elements of Adana in detail, emphasizing how much mountains
and hills were prominent in this geography.
53 Yaşar Kemal, Yusufçuk Yusuf (Istanbul: Tekin Yayınevi, 1980), 15-16.
27
Figure 3: Map of the Adana plain. Scale: 400.000. Dated 1923.54
In his Tezâkir, Ahmet Cevdet mentions a meeting with prominent state figures just
before the Reform Division was sent to the Çukurova.55 In his mention, he underscores the
mountains’ functions in the region’s rebellious political nature. In the meeting, he expressed that
the Ottoman state did not penetrate and keep control over the area around Amanus and Taurus
Mountains for a long time, and Hısn-ı Mansûr (today’s Adıyaman), Akçadağ, and Dersim were
54 BOA, HRT. h. 1713. (29 Zilhicce 1341 [12 August 1923]).
55 Cevdet, Tezâkir, 107.
28
uncontrolled regions. He stated that some uncontrolled regions like Cebel-i Bereket, Akcadağ,
and Dersim were in states of insurrection. Ahmet Cevdet concluded that these lands where the
state could not establish its authority became hotbeds of brigands and murderers, and, by using
this mountainous terrain, many tribes could live in a state of insurrection and unruliness.56 Ahmet
Cevdet narrates that it was discussed in the meeting that these uncontrolled regions had to be
reformed, men from there should be conscripted, and it was decided to form a military section to
execute reforms in the region. The unit was the Reform Division (Fırka-i Islahiye). Figure 4
below shows a large area where the Taurus Mountains separated Çukurova from Central
Anatolia.
56 Hîn-i fetihden beri Gâvur-dağı yâni Cebel-i Bereket bir hâl-i isyândadır. Kozan dağlarına hükûmet-i Devlet-i
aliyye hiç girmedi. Hısn-ı Mansûr tarafı bir hâl-i serkeşîde ve Akçadağ ile Dersim dahi Gâvur-dağı tavrunda
bulunuyor ve buraları birer eşkıyâ yuvası olup etrâfdaki cânîler buralara ilticâ ile hükûmetin pençesinden
kurtuluyor ve bu dağların sebebine bir çok aşâir dahi bevâdî-i isyân ve ser-keşîde dolaşıyor.
For a comparison of the Ottoman state’s attempt to pacify another resistant locality in the 19th century, see: Faisal
Husain, “In the Bellies of the Marshes: Water and Power in the Countryside of Ottoman Baghdad,” Environmental
History 19, no. 4 (2014): 638–64. Husain explains Khazail tribe of Iraq effectively utilized the Euphrates and its
floodplain to avoid the central authority’s exploitation mechanisms. In the sense of local actors’ utilization of
geography, this case has similarities with tribes’ usage of mountains in the Çukurova region.
29
Figure 4. Map of the Aleppo province. Scale 1/450000. Dated 1869.57
Ahmet Muhtar Pasha, another important statesman and a member of the Reform
Division, mentions the region in his memoirs. For the pre-settlement Çukurova, he said that the
region had potentially fertile soil, but the air was in bad condition and the plain was not suitable
for settlement. He thought that an intense reclamation process could have rendered the Çukurova
similar to Egypt.58 Ahmet Muhtar's mention of lousy air was related to swampy landscape and its
assumed danger to human wellbeing. He said:
57 HRT.h. 536. (29 Zilhicce 1285 [12 April 1869]).
58 A. Muhtar Pasha, Sergüzeşt-i Hayatımın Cild-i Evveli, ed. Nuri Akbayar (Istanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yay., 1996),
25-26. Cited in Sansar, Fırka-i Islahiye ve Osmaniye (Cebel-i Bereket), 54.
30
Even though Amik Plain and Çukurova remained idle and uncultivated mainly, they constituted a second Egypt.
Unfortunately, since the plains are uncultivated, rivers that pass through them cause damage rather than benefit; it is
a pity. Because [the plains] became hotbeds of malaria and vermin. Since [Çukurova] has a suitable temperature to
grow cotton like Egypt, it can be benefitted similarly.59
Ahmet Muhtar’s writings project the state’s plans for the territory; by altering the
landscape’s texture, the state aimed to transform the region into a more livable and exploitable
area. In line with this projection, the reclamation of swamps has been a primary element of
development projects after the Reform Division intervened in 1865.60 Relatedly, Victor Langlois
refers to the marshland patches he spotted in the northeastern part of the region.61
Along with the fact that the existence of large swaths of swamps and wetlands was a
common characteristic for the late Ottoman Çukurova, it was not peculiar to this region.
Parallelly to the argument that the Little Ice Age’s climatic effects lasted well into the 19th
century, Zeynep Küçükceran explains that wetlands and marshlands in the late Ottoman Bursa
were pivotal to several economic, social, and political events.62 In her account, Küçükceran
discusses that the lasting influences of the Little Ice Age had been influential on the enlargement
of wetlands and marshlands, made farmers grow certain crops suitable to marshy landscapes,
while conversion of abandoned lands into grasslands supported animal breeding business.63
59 Gerek Amik-ovası ve gerek Çukurova bomboş ve çoğu yeri ekilmemiş fakat gayet verimli bir ikinci Mısır kıtasıdır.
Ne çare ki içlerinden geçen nehirler, ovaların boş olması yüzünden fayda değil zarar veriyorlar. Bu hale binlerce
teessüf edilmelidir. Çünkü sıtma ve haşarat yatağı olmuştur. Mısır’da pamuk yetiştirmeğe mahsus olan sıcaklık
orada da mevcut olduğundan Mısır gibi istifade edilmek pek mümkündür. The translation to English is mine.
Muhtar, Sergüzeşt-i Hayatımın Cild-i Evveli, 25. Cited in Sansar, Fırka-i Islahiye ve Osmaniye (Cebel-i Bereket),
54.
60 Meltem Toksöz states: “To the east of Adana, between the rivers Seyhan and Ceyhan, lay the marshiest of lands in
Çukurova which remained virtually unused by nomads and settlers alike during most of the Ottoman period.”
Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 23.
61 Victor Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk, trans. Ayşe Ateşoğlu (Adana: Akademisyen Kitabevi, 2021), 325.
62 Zeynep Küçükceran, “Agriculture and Agricultural Knowledge in Bursa and Mihaliç (Karacabey) in the
Nineteenth Century” (Boğaziçi University, 2019).
63 Ibid., 49-58.
31
Chris Gratien mentions the assumptions people had regarding the harmful influences of
swampy lands: “This miasmic understanding of disease was largely shared throughout Europe
and the Ottoman Empire. Swamps and “dirty,” uncultivated land where organic matter rotted in
wet soil were recognized as producers of “bad” or “heavy” air that caused the particular variety
of fever and trembling associated with malaria.”64 Gratien explains that settled and nomadic
populations of Çukurova commonly practiced different forms of transhumance to avoid hot
summer weather and malaria without knowing mosquitos caused the disease.65 Therefore,
nomadic practices, pivotal in the regional dynamics, had robust connections with the landscape,
i.e., swamps and waterways that caused swamp formation. Thus, geography and landscape
texture were central to the formation of the 19th century Çukurova. The other central element that
rendered this region peculiar was the people. Who were the inhabitants of the region at the time?
1.2. Human Actors: A Multilayered Social Formation
At the beginning of his comprehensive narrative on Ottoman Çukurova, Chris Gratien mentions
different participants of the region’s massive transformation during the late Ottoman and early
Republican eras: “Bandits, bureaucrats, immigrants, landlords, workers, doctors, tourists,
shepherds, goats, and mosquitos…”66 Existing literature on Ottoman Çukurova, different sources
like official correspondences, contemporaries’ memoirs, and newspapers suggest that Çukurova
had a diversified social formation; there were settled communities, nomads, and groups of people
from different ethnicities, religions, and socio-economic backgrounds. Even though it is difficult
64 Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,” 56. This miasmatic understanding has influenced the Ottomans for centuries.
In an early modern context, Nükhet Varlık argues that induced by miasmatic perceptions, Ottomans attempted to
regulate urban environments so that allegedly sources of miasma would be eliminated from daily urban life. See
Nükhet Varlık, Plague and Empire in the Early Modern Mediterranean World: The Ottoman Experience, 1347-
1600 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 276. In the 19th century Çukurova context, the French
traveler Victor Langlois, too, recommends that by controlling rivers, conducting drainage and reclamation of
swamps, the existent fault odors could be ceased. Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk, 35.
65 Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,” 56-60.
66 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 7.
32
to categorize these various groups with all their peculiarities, nomadic tribes, local dynasties,
settled communities, and Muslim immigrants, muhacirs, that escaped from the war atmosphere
of Crimea and Caucasia were among the major demographic groups of the late Ottoman
Çukurova.
Meltem Toksöz provides a detailed table on Çukurova’s human population over a period
of time in her book. According to this table67: Çukurova’s population was 100.000 in 1862,
207.000 in 1871, 324.062 in 1874, and 392.997 in 1894. Tribal communities constituted a large
part of the Çukurova population.68 Depending on the numbers that Victor Langlois provided,
Chris Gratien argues that 23 tribal organizations of the region had 14.150 tents and 5.880
households around 1850.69 Most of these tribes had practiced different forms of vertical
transhumance with their large flocks, constituting a significant local economic element.
According to Andrew Gordon Gould, most of the tribal economy consisted mainly of
pastoralism, while agriculture and brigandage were of secondary importance.70 He evaluates
animal breeding purposes under two main categories, providing animal products, and rearing
riding animals like camels.71 In relation, Victor Langlois mentions seasonal migration patterns of
different groups. According to him, Karamanians72, yörüks, and Turcomans came down from
mountains to plains by September, and after they left their flocks to women and children, they
67 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 82. Similarly, Chris Gratien presents a table of population for important
urban centers of Çukurova for certain years between 1864-1935. Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 109.
68 Andrew Gordon Gould indicates that before 1865 three quarters of the tribal population was nomadic. Gould,
“Pashas and Brigands,” 214.
69 Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,” 64.
70 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 27-30.
71 Ibid., 27-30.
72 Editor’s note explains that Karamanians were the Christian people who live around Stony Cilicia [Taşlık Kilikya].
He argues, some of these people married to Turcomans and became Alevites. Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk, 406. By
the terms “Turcoman” and “yörük,” Langlois must be referring to nomads of Muslim origin. For a comprehensive
discussion on these terms, see Halil İnalcık, “The Yörüks: Their Origins, Expansion and Economic Role,” Cedrus 2
(2014): 467–95.
33
started to work as cameleers.73 As the second phase of the pattern, Langlois explained that these
people fleeced their sheep, sold the clip74, and returned to the mountains by May.75 According to
Langlois’s table, the tribal population had 467.800 sheep, 269.000 goats, 215.900 cattle, and
20.800 camels.76 At the time, these tribes varied considerably.77 In Tezakir, Ahmet Cevdet
mentions different tribes and their transhumance orbits, as stated in the table below:78
Table 1. Nomadic tribes in Çukurova, according to Ahmet Cevdet’s Tezakir.
Tribes Seasonal migration orbits Remarks
Karnitili &
Lek & Hacılar
They spend winters in places around Sis, and
in summers, they go to Harmancık yayla.
They commit theft. These three tribes are
Kurdish tribes.79
Sırkıntılı They spend winters between Sis and Adana. They commit theft. It is a Turcoman tribe.
Avşar80 They come to Çukurova over Kozan to spend
the winters.
They commit theft. It is a Turcoman tribe.
Reyhâniye They use the way in the valley between
Gavur Mountain and Kürd Mountain that
connects Amik Plain to Maraş. By this road,
they go to their yaylas in Uzunyayla.
Delikanlı & Çelikanlı They use the same way that the Reyhâniye
tribe uses to go to their pastures.
Tribes from right side
of Ceyhan River
They spend winters in Çukurova. In summer,
they pass Kozan’s mountains to reach the
uplands with abundant water and grasslands.
In the fall, they return to Çukurova.
In summers, they commit theft in
Anatolia, and in winters, they commit
theft in Çukurova. They give a share of
stolen goods to Kozanoğlus. Most of the
time, these tribes were in battle with
Cerids and Tecirlüs.
73 Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk, 52.
74 In relation, Langlois states that production of abas and dolmans (aba ve maşlah) made of camel and goat’s hair
constituted a major item for the Adana Pashalik’s economy, and there were two tanneries and ten felt factories. Ibid.,
53. He also explains, Maraş Pashalik had a wool production of 150.000-200.000 KGs, while a KG of wool’s price
was around 700 piastres in Adana when a KG of wheat’s rate was 70 piastres. Ibid., 54-55.
75 Ibid., 52.
76 Ibid., 64.
77 It also should be noted that tribal organizations could be of great variation. To emphasize this, Reşat Kasaba gives
the example of Rişvan tribe, saying that it had fourty-five subunits. Kasaba, A Moveable Empire, 24. Similarly,
Meltem Toksöz emphasizes varying inter-tribal dynamics in Ottoman Çukurova by saying that Arıklı tribe had
twenty divisions while Farsak tribe had fifteen divisions. Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 24.
78 Cevdet, Tezâkir, 113, 117, 126. This table only reflects what Ahmet Cevdet wrote in 27. Letter (tezkere) of
Tezakir. Even though the information he provides as a contemporary is invaluable, since he was a part of the state
apparatus, one must be skeptical about his interpretations. As a related discussion on how the official accounts can
be insufficient and misleading about 19th-century Çukurova, see: Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,” 171.
79 Here, Ahmet Cevdet notes, other than these three tribes, all tribes and inhabitants of Kozan were Turks.
80 There are different spellings for the name in different sources like "Afşar” and “Avşar.”
34
Regarding the tribes’ migration routes, Gould makes a neat description: “Those north and
west of the river moved through Kozan, up the Zamantı River and into the Develi area, south of
Kayseri. Those south and east of the river crossed the Gavur Dağı at Andırın and Bulanık and
went north through Marash and Elbistan and to the Uzun Yayla.”81
Chris Gratien mentions a difference between tribal groups’ mobility and settlement
practices as tent-dwelling was common in the eastern part of Cilicia, while the tribal groups in
the western part, like Menemencioğulları, had villages to spend winters.82 For these tribal
communities’ economic characteristics, he emphasized a mixed economy of animal breeding and
agriculture in which animal breeding was dominant.83 For settled populations, too, Gratien
asserts that they were engaging in a hybrid economy consisting of agriculture and pastoralism, in
which agricultural production was primary.84 In addition to agriculture and animal breeding,
brigandage has been a central element to historical Cilicia’s regional economy. For most of the
late nineteenth century, many attacks and robberies by brigands were rampant in the region. In
this context, Gould suggests that regional brigandage and piracy were major problems even
under Roman rule, and they mainly stemmed from the lack of conditions for a sustainable, and
comprehensive agricultural economy.85
The tribes had complex relationships with other actors in the Ottoman Çukurova. Ahmet
Cevdet explains that tribes of Kozan mountains served as Kozanoğlu’s infantry, while the tribes
from the right side of Ceyhan River served as Kozanoğlu’s cavalries, and Kozanoğlu functioned
81 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 30.
82 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 28.
83 Ibid., 28.
84 Ibid., 28.
85 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 13-14.
35
as a general chief (umum kumandan) while each tribe's master (kethüda) autonomously managed
their tribes.86 Kozanoğlu family was a provincial dynasty that enjoyed enormous autonomy in
Ottoman Çukurova. Andrew Gordon Gould, who has one of the earliest research in Çukurova
studies, describes the Kozanoğlu family as “the most famous and well-entrenched derebey87
family in the Adana area” and underscores that even though the family was acting autonomously,
they had official administrative titles as “kaymakam” and “müdür.”88 Following this complicated
relationship, Ahmet Cevdet narrates that at the time, it was told that Kozanoğlu Çadırcı Mehmed
Bey, head of Western Kozan, reacted to the Ottoman sultan’s orders by saying: “Ammim oğlu
[the Sultan] reigns over countries, and he [the Sultan] should tolerate Kozanoğlu’s rule over
Mount Kozan.”89 The term “ammim oğlu” literally means “son of my uncle” in Turkish. Even
though it is not an offensive phrase by nature, calling the Sultan “ammim oğlu” certainly implies
a protest and cynical attitude in which the Kozanoğlu implies equality between the Sultan and
himself. Yusuf Halaçoğlu interprets this answer of the potentate as an example of impudence
(“şımarıklık”) which came with the family’s several victories over different parties, including the
Central Anatolia-based dynastic family of Çapanoğulları, Egyptian and Ottoman armies.90
Ahmet Cevdet narrates another anecdote in this context; in a meeting at Adana Council (Adana
Meclisi) where the governor was present, a tribal chief used the word “cülûs”91 for the year
86 Cevdet, Tezâkir. Andrew Gordon Gould points that tribes served as soldiers of Kozanoğlu in return to be able to
use the roads on their way to highlands. Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 20-22. As another aspect of this complicated
relationship, even though usually the local elite have been entitled as tax-collectors and functioned as intermediaries
between the Sultan and locals, they could help to nomads to avoid taxation. Işık Tamdoğan, “Nezir Ya Da XVIII.
Yüzyıl Çukurova’sında Eşkıya, Göçebe ve Devlet Arasındaki İlişkiler,” 136.
87 Chris Gratien characterizes derebeys as: “The derebeys were tribal notables who entered the local elite by
controlling regions to legitimate their positions as de facto governors of their respective realms.” Gratien, The
Unsettled Plain, 48.
88 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 19-20.
89“Ammim oğlu bunca memâliki havza-i tasarrufuna geçirmiş. Bir avuç Kozan dağlarını dahi bana çok
görmemelidir.” Cevdet, Tezâkir, 110-111.
90 Yusuf Halaçoğlu, “Fırka-i Islahiye ve Yapmış Olduğu İskan,” Tarih, no. 27 (1973): 13.
91 This term refers to royal accessions in the Ottoman empire.
36
Kozanoğlu Ömer Ağa became chief, and even though the governor got upset about it, he did not
warn the chief.92 In the context of the complicated local politics and bilateral relationships
between provincial elites and state officials, Gould asserts that the elites carried weight in local
councils even before the Reform Division’s strike.93 In this political environment in which the
power was so scattered, the resiliency of a party was so critical. Somebody could lose and regain
a post swiftly.94
Gould counts Menemencioğulları95 and Küçükalioğulları as other major provincial
dynasties of the region at the time.96 Depending on the Kozanoğlu example, Reşat Kasaba
underscores that critical interfamilial divisions stemmed from political concerns.97 Similarly,
Menemencioğulları Tarihi affirms that having interfamilial divisions was not unfamiliar for these
families who concentrated extreme power in their hands.98 In a similar context, there has been an
“extensive intermarriage among the leading tribal families,”99 which render local politics further
complex and intricate. Gould gives an example, Deli Halil was resisting to the Reform Division
while his brother-in-law Mürselzade was cooperating with the state, and Deli Halil’s sister was
92 Here, Ahmet Cevdet underscores that the term “cülûs” is peculiar to royal accessions. Cevdet, Tezâkir, 117.
93 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 34-35. Sam Dolbee emphasizes that tribal organizations were not isolated units
regarding state-tribe relationships, and tribes usually had dynamic and mutual relations with state agents in the
empire. Dolbee, “Empire on the Edge,” 137-139.
94 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 46-47.
95 Chris Gratien underscores this dynastic family’s ascendancy in the region, especially in the first half of the
nineteenth century. Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 48-49. Andrew Gordon Gould describes Menemencioğulları as
“slightly less warlike disposition” in comparison with the Kozanoğulları. Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 22.
96 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands.” 22-25. In this context, Reşat Kasaba refers to a British consulate reports which
recognized the Kozanoğlu family’s great dominancy over other local groups such as tribes. Kasaba, A Moveable
Empire, 96.
97 Kasaba, A Moveable Empire, 97-98.
98 Menemencioğlu Ahmed Bey presents a detailed account of the Egyptian rule in Çukurova, during which he sided
with the victorious Ibrahim Pasha, while one of his brothers championed the Ottomans. Menemencioğlu Ahmed,
Menemencioğulları Tarihi, edited by Yılmaz Kurt, (Ankara: Akçağ, 1997), 100-140.
99 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 94.
37
married to another local elite of Ekbez.100 Additionally, as Işık Tamdoğan argues, it was not
unusual for a person to act as guardian and brigand simultaneously.101
In regard to settled communities in this region, important level of expansion of Arabs
towards Northern Syria and Southern Anatolia in the 7th century rendered this area borderlands
between Islamic entities and Byzantine Empire.102 In the following centuries, Çukurova became
the central site of a medieval Armenian Kingdom, and until the Mamluks’ takeover of the region
in the 14th century, different Armenian entities, baronies, and the Kingdom, ruled over Çukurova
and a large geography surrounding the region.103 After the takeover of Mamluks, Armenians
continued to constitute an essential population segment that played essential sociopolitical,
economic, and cultural roles. They engaged in a variety of businesses in different places in the
region. In the case of late Ottoman Kayseri, Armenian merchants were exporting various
products, including pastırma (a type of spicy dried beef peculiar to Kayseri), sausages (sucuk),
wool, leather, and agricultural products.104 In Adana, too, Armenians played critical roles in the
production of several commodities and exported them to different corners of the empire.105
Emphasizing the large spectrum of professions Armenians had, Bedross Der Matossian counts
some of careers of Kayseri Armenians in the late Ottoman as “doctors, dentists, pharmacists,
100 Ibid., 94.
101 Tamdoğan, “Nezir Ya Da XVIII. Yüzyıl Çukurova’sında Eşkıya, Göçebe ve Devlet Arasındaki İlişkiler,” 137.
102 A. Asa Eger, The Islamic-Byzantine Frontier: Interaction and Exchange Among Muslim and Christian
Communities (New York: I.B. Tauris, 2015), 6-7.
103 Dweezil Vandekerckhove, “Medieval Fortifications in Cilicia: The Armenian Contribution to Military
Architecture in the Middle Ages,” (Leiden: Brill, 2019), 14-50. Also see Fatma Akkuş Yiğit, “Ramazanoğulları
Beyliği’nin Kuruluşu/The Establishment of Ramadan Principality,” Gazi Akademik Bakış Dergisi 7, no. 13 (2013):
209–32.
104 Bedross Der Matossian, “19. Yüzyılda Osmanlı Ermeni Kenti Kesaria/Kayseri,” in Ermeni ve Rum Kültür
Varlıklarıyla Kayseri, trans. Suzan Bölme (HDV Yayınları, 2016), 30.
105 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 23.
38
architects, painters, poets, and musicians.”106 After the Armenian rule, the chiefdom (beylik)
under the authority of Adana-centered Ramazanoğulları dynasty concentrated their political
power in the region.
This region had a settled population for centuries, and there was a considerable settled
population in the 19th century. Meltem Toksöz points out that even though they were
outnumbered by the nomads, settled people were a part of the Çukurova under Ottoman rule,
mainly earning their livelihood with agriculture.107 However, being settled did not mean not
performing transhumance at all. As Chris Gratien explains comprehensively, transhumance was
not peculiar to nomadic tribes, but to avoid endemic malaria, a common and lethal natural
element of the plain, settled communities exercised transhumance systematically.108 According to
Ahmet Cevdet, even though Kozan’s population was settled in villages and towns, in the
summers, they went to pastures and stayed in huts called “huğ.”109
Immigrants from Caucasia, muhacirs, formed another essential demographic element of
the 19th-century Ottoman Çukurova. Especially after the Crimean War, escaping from the rising
political tensions, large numbers of Caucasian Muslims came to Ottoman domains, many of
whom were settled in the Çukurova region.110 Chris Gratien assesses the immigrants’ settlement
in Çukurova as a driving force for regional transformation, especially in the eastern parts where
they were mainly settled.111 The immigrants have also been subjects of the official agenda:
106 Der Matossian, “19. Yüzyılda Osmanlı Ermeni Kenti Kesaria/Kayseri,” 33. In the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, Armenians in the region faced massive violence, including deportations. For a comprehensive
account on the topic, see Der Matossian, The Horrors of Adana.
107 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton., 26-27.
108 Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,” 50-61. Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 35-40.
109 Cevdet, Tezâkir, 113.
110 Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,” 86-87. As a legacy of the immigrants’ settlement, today, two neighborhoods
in Ceyhan are called Büyükkırım and Küçükkırım, which pertained the neighborhood’s first residents’ Crimean
roots.
111 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 61-62.
39
“These settlers were expected to integrate into the budding cotton economy, and upon the
recommendation of the governor of Adana, the settlers received free cotton seed in order to
participate in this rapid growth.”112 According to the provincial book of 1873, a township called
Muhacirin (plural of muhacir) was settled on both banks of the Ceyhan River113 in a location 10
hours far from Adana, and the whole population consisted of Nogays. It reads that these people
were farming certain plants such as barley, wheat, cotton, and small red millet (ufak kırmızı
darı), and due to their industriousness and the good quality of the soil, they could profit.114
However, Chris Gratien mentions the provincial book of 1877, which designates newly settled
people in Osmaniye as contented agriculturalists, and discusses that these sources were ignorant
of what people experienced gruesomely during forceful settlement.115 In a similar vein to
Gratien’s argument, Şerafeddin Mağmumi, a medical doctor who visited many corners of the
Ottoman Empire during a cholera outbreak in the 1890s, commented on Muhacirin town around
Ceyhan River.116 Mağmumi says, the mayor of the town, who was also a Nogay muhacir, told
him that thirty years ago, the immigrants came there as 14.000 households, and now only 500 of
them remained due to extreme life loss caused by oppressive air conditions (“havanın
kötülüğü”).117
In time, the immigrants adapted to the challenging natural and political environment.
Ahmet Cevdet says that when the region was insecure and unstable, Nogays were trying to build
villages on both sides of the Ceyhan River while arming to protect themselves from the tribal
112 Ibid., 62.
113 Andrew Gordon Gould says that more than twenty thousand people settled around the river between 1854 and
1860. Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 63.
114 Salname-i Vilayet-i Adana (1290 [1873]), 59-60.
115 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 90-91.
116 Şerafeddin Mağmumi, Bir Osmanlı Doktorunun Anıları: Yüzyıl Önce Anadolu ve Suriye, ed. Cahit Kayra
(Istanbul: Boyut, 2008), 186-187.
117 Ibid., 186-187.
40
attacks.118 In relation, Gould emphasizes that the oppressive weather conditions, related illnesses,
and tribal attacks have claimed many immigrant lives while finding new locations to live was a
common way for the ones who endured these challenges.119 In such an attempt, organized by
officials in the early 1860s, large numbers of immigrants were settled in Uzunyayla, a massive
summer pasture that was mainly used by the different tribes, including the Avşars.120 About this
type of weather-related resettlement demands, Chris Gratien explains: “By the end of the
Ottoman period, people could apply for resettlement only on the basis of their village being
either too swampy or barren, and an inability to acclimate to a particular geography was
enshrined as the sole justification for immigrant applications for resettlement.”121 In addition to
these first waves of immigrants, thousands of Muslims uprooted by the Russo-Ottoman War of
1877-78, known as 93 Harbi in Turkish, also came to Çukurova.122
The 19th century Çukurova was a place where various groups of people from different
religions, cultures, ethnicities, and social and economic backgrounds found a place for
themselves. Even though the multiplicity of demographic elements has been a distinctive aspect
of the regional order, most parties did not have strict borders. Resiliency was a pivotal factor in
survival for many. Under extraordinarily dynamic socio-political conditions, people sought to
create efficient alliances, making the local intercommunal relationships harder to categorize.
These fluid, intersected, and intricate human and non-human relationships have further
complicated already existing multilayered demographical formations.
118 Cevdet, Tezâkir, 124. Also see Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 89-90.
119 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 62-65.
120 Ibid., 64-65. Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 62-63.
121 Chris Gratien, “The Ottoman Quagmire: Malaria, Swamps, and Settlement in the Late Ottoman Mediterranean,”
International Journal of Middle East Studies 49, no. 4 (2017): 590.
122 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 163.-164. For a podcast on the history of Atlılar village, founded by the
Circassian immigrants in the 19th century Mersin: Mehtap Çelik, interview with Harika Zöhre and Chris Gratien,
Ottoman History Podcast, podcast audio, July 4, 2013. https://www.ottomanhistorypodcast.com/2012/07/circassianimmigration-
ottoman-empire.html
41
1.3. Non-Human Actors of the Nineteenth Century Çukurova
People were not the only actors that shaped the history of this borderland region.
Animals, insects, plants, and different landscape elements were some of the important other
actors which affected the area significantly. By focusing on the agency of these actors in the
regional transformation process, one can better appreciate the intricate and multi-layered nature
of the decades-long changes. As they formed the material conditions around human inhabitants,
geographical elements and animals intrinsically influenced life in plains and mountains.
John McNeill, a prominent environmental historian, refers to the unique weather
conditions of Taurus ranges: “Two belts of climate duel for sovereignty over the Taurus. It lies
on the climatic frontier between a typically Mediterranean zone and one that is continental. This
pattern makes for tremendous uncertainty in the weather, not so much day to day but year to
year.”123 By nature, as a region surrounded by Taurus, the Çukurova had dynamic meteorological
conditions. This dynamism and the “duel” of different climate belts seem like an essential
component of the local population’s transhumant practices; people who were oppressed by the
humid climate of plains tried to find cool spots in the mountains. Similarly, the swamps covering
large parcels of Adana Plain played decisive roles in the residents’ lives. As Chris Gratien’s
comprehensive account explained in detail, mosquitos bred during warm months, and standing
waters, such as swamps, were suitable for mosquito reproduction.124 Thus, most people practiced
different levels of transhumance to avoid oppressive heat and lethal malaria.125 Mosquitos had a
123 John McNeill, The Mountains of The Mediterranean World: An Environmental History, (Cambridge University
Press, 2002), 20. For Chris Gratien’s discussion on the existence of different climate conditions in Çukurova, see
Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 25-35.
124 Gratien, “Mountains Are Ours,” 179. Also see Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 29.
125 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 20-21, 24.
42
significant say in the lives of 19th-century Çukurova’s residents. However, at the time, also other
animal species had been quite influential in shaping daily lives of residents in this region.
In his voluminous account of his travels, Victor Langlois described nineteenth-century
Çukurova’s fauna as being very rich. He counts many species of animals, from goats, sheep,
camels, and horses to impalas, leopards, and lions.126 He also mentions the abundance of water
buffalos in the region in several contexts.127 He notes that around 1850, Çukurova’s nomadic and
semi-nomadic tribes had more than one million animals.128 The animals mainly consisted of
sheep, goats, and cattle as valuable trade items and formed the backbone of the regional animal
trade.129 Similarly to Victor Langlois’ observations about the richness of the fauna, in his
comprehensive dissertation on Maraş-based tribes, Mahmut Ulubaş counts the tribes’ animals as:
sheep, goats, “calves (dana), yellow oxen (sarı öküz), grey oxen (boz öküz), black cows (siyah
inek), gray horses (kır beygir), red horses (al beygir), blue horses (gök130 beygir), bay horse (doru
beygir),” along with four different species of camels, and various cattle and riding animals.131
Notably, people classified animals according to many parameters, reflecting their comprehensive
awareness and knowledge about these animals. In this setting, tribe members in Bulgar/Bolkar
Mountain had eight different categories for goats of different ages: “1-Oğlak (a year old, male or
female goatling); 2-Çepiç (two years old male, female goats); 3-Seyis (3-4 years old male goats);
126 Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk, 38. Langlois also refers to following animals as peculiar to Çukurova: “Turcoman
horse, two species of camel, sheep, goat, water buffalo, and domestic animals etc.” Ibid., 38.
127 Ibid., 31, 135, 350-351.
128 Ibid., 43-44. Charles Texier, a French traveler who visited Çukurova during the 1830s, said that when he visited
the village where Kozanoğlu Samur Bey spent summers around Haçin, he saw many flocks of sheep, cattle, and
horses which he called “the mountain people’s only wealth” (“dağlıların tek serveti”). Charles Texier, Küçük Asya:
Coğrafyası, Tarihi ve Arkeolojisi-III, trans. Ali Suat, (Ankara: Enformasyon ve Dokümantasyon Hizmetleri Vakfı,
2002), 138-139.
129 The formation of the region’s fauna was dynamic and related with political changings. Chris Gratien emphasizing
the case that water buffalos could be brought to Çukurova first during the Abbasid rule. Gratien, The Unsettled
Plain, 43. Gratien also emphasizes the muhacirs settled around Çukurova were important horse breeders. Ibid., 84.
130 In Turkish, “gök” means the sky. This word is also used to describe color of the sky.
131 Mahmut Ulubaş, “Maraş ve Çevresinde Aşiretler: 1774-1865” (PhD Diss., Kahramanmaraş Sütçü İmam
Üniversitesi, 2016), 220-221.
43
4-Üveç (4-5 years old, male goats); 5-Kart (goats of more than five years old); 6- Yazmış (two to
three years old female goats); 7-İkili (3-4 years old goats); 8-Keçi (the ones more than ten years
old).”132 The vocabulary of animal categories used by those pastoralists was considerably more
nuanced than the vocabulary typically used by historians. Relatedly, in the interview at the
beginning of Kozanca, Pekşen Tamdoğan suggests that there is a strong interaction between a
daily language and the experienced environment and states: “Even though there are many idioms
and proverbs about being a shepherd, flocks, dogs in Kozanca,133 there is almost no expression
about sea, fish, and sailing.”134 The locals’ daily experiences with animals were so intense and
intertwined to a level that people developed superstitious ideas about them. In his notes about
nomads living around the Taurus Mountains, Ali Rıza Yalman explains that people thought four
types of horses were ill-omened.135 For example, one of these animals is a horse called çapraz
(cross), whose right and left feet are white.136 In another example, to protect animals from bad
luck [“nefes değmesi”], people attached blue beads to horses’ tails and manes.137 Animals’
influences well penetrated the quotidian practices. Chris Gratien touches on a traditional method
used for people suffering from fever: “wrapping the patient in a sheepskin to let them sweat it
out.”138 Since animal-breeding communities mostly populated the region, their animals have
always been central to regional socio-political dynamics. An investigation of the Ottoman State
Archives brings many documents about the animals of Çukurova and how they shaped the
region’s life.
132 Ali Rıza Yalman, Cenupta Türkmen Oymakları-I (Ankara: Kültür Bakanlığı Yayınları, 1993), 262.
133 The term was used to refer the vernacular used in and around Kozan.
134Pekşen Tamdoğan and Çetin Yiğenoğlu, Kozanca: Kozan Ağzı Üzerine Bir İnceleme (Adana: YEKSAV
Yayınları, 1997), 28.
135 Ali Rıza Yalman, Cenupta Türkmen Oymakları-II (Ankara: Kültür Bakanlığı Yayınları, 1993), 449.
136 Ibid., 449.
137 Kasım Ener, Tarih Boyunca Adana Ovasına Bir Bakış (Ankara: Güney Matbaası, 1957), 180.
138 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 40.
44
In the spring of 1867, after two years he came to Çukurova as the administrative chief of
a massive military force; Ahmed Cevdet Pasha, the governor of Aleppo then, sent a letter to the
grand vizier’s office to inform them that a current animal disease139 had hit Kars-ı Zülkadriye
district, and the villagers were told to bury carcasses deep or burn them.140 A few months later,
another letter regarding this issue was written to Aleppo.141 The letter explained that a
veterinarian was needed since the animal disease in Kars-ı Zülkadriye was worsening, and the
disease was expected to spread to neighboring places. However, considering there was no
veterinarian in Istanbul to go to Kars-ı Zülkadriye, it was decided to dispatch a veterinarian from
the 5th Army of Syria temporarily.142 Animal diseases could also have economic and, as in the
following case, diplomatic consequences. A letter from the Ministry for Foreign Affairs to the
presidency of the Council of the State (Şura-i Devlet), mentions a prohibition of animal
exportation from Beirut, Mersin, and İskenderun ports for four years due to scantness of farm
animals (çift hayvanı) in Aleppo, Syria, and Adana provinces.143 Even though it was decided that
the prohibition would be valid after one month after the announcement of it, the Austrian
embassy asked the officials to extend it to two months.144 The ministry finds the demand
favorable and asks the council’s presidency to decide. Animal trade and animal-related matters
also caused long discussions at the local level.
Animal trade was a significant business; animals were quite valuable in the 19th century
Çukurova. A correspondence from the summer of 1860 informs that animal exchange played
139 During his travels in Bulgar Mountains and Aladağs, Ali Rıza Yalman identifies 21 different sheep diseases
known among the nomads. Yalman, Cenupta Türkmen Oymakları-II, 454-459.
140 BOA, MVL. 1047-7. (19 Muharrem 1284 [23 May 1867]).
141 BOA, MVL. 1047-18. (29 Safer 1284 [2 July 1867]).
142 The 5th Army was the Army of Syria, and its center was Damascus. Fatih Ünsal, “Modernleşme Dönemi Osmanlı
Devleti Kara Kuvvetleri (1826-1876) (Teşkilâtı-Gelişimi)” (MA Thesis, Kırıkkale Üniversitesi, 2007), 70, 72.
143 BOA, ŞD. 3220-41. (8 Şaban 1290 [1 October 1873]).
144 The embassy’s letter is attached to this document.
45
important roles in taxation and settlement processes.145 According to a letter dated June 23, 1860,
signed by the Sarraf Civioğlu’s agent Yovanaki, the Bozdoğan tribe of Adana owed 41.751
piastres to the Civioğlu. Officials decided to bring 80 oxen of the tribe in return for the debt. By
Civioğlu’s pledge, the oxen were spared to given to settled Nogay immigrants (muhacir), to the
account of tax contractor (mültezim) Mehmed Bey’s debt to Adana province’s treasury (mal
sandığı). The second letter, dated June 23, 1860, explains the process’ another side. It shows that
from Kütük, 64 oxen worth 33.735 piastres; from Bulaçlı, 70 oxen worth 33.260 piastres; from
Cirikli, 18 oxen worth 8.780 piastres; from Yeğen, 17 oxen worth of 8.190 piastres were
collected. In total, 169 oxen worth 83.965 piastres were collected.146 Eighty of these oxen were
spared in return for what Yukarı Bozdoğan, Kütük, Bulaçlı, Cirikli, and Yeğen owed to Sarraf
Civioğlu. In another note on this letter, signed by masters of Kütük and Bulaçlı, they stated that
they bought 89 oxen worthed 42.214 piastres from the Bozdoğan tribe. The state officials were
going to give the animals to Nogays. State agents counted this sum in return of the Kütük’s and
Bulaçlı’s tax debts for the Hijri year 1276 (1859/1860). Animals were used as solid instruments
of payment, and they were in the middle of complicated debt relationships in which immigrants,
tax collectors, nomadic tribes, and state agents were parties. Another event in which animals
were in the middle of tension was reported in January 1863.147 The letter notes that eight
members of the Tecirli tribe, which was settled in Uzeyr sanjak, stole sheep from the Karahacılı
tribe and left a horse back when they were chased by soldiers. The letter says then that it was
decided that the military would keep the horse. Even though these clashes in which animals
played roles one way or another were quite common, there were some incidents of extraordinary
consequences.
145 BOA, C. ML. 676-27713. (29 Zilhicce 1276 [18 July 1860]).
146The average price is about 496 piastres per ox depending on total values.
147 BOA, A. MKT. MHM. 252-50. (20 Recep 1279 [11 January 1863]).
46
On August of 1860, a letter reported one of these events to the governor of Adana.148 As
the letter reports, five Nogays from Çukurova bought cattle (sığır) from the Bozdoğan tribe, and
after that eight horsemen from the Afşar tribe intercepted to rob them. Afşars killed one Nogay
during the quarrel and wounded another by a rifle fire. Thereupon, eight hundred Nogays raided
the Bozdoğan tribe, and villages of Kars and Andırın, killed twelve men and women, and
wounded ten of them. Then, the Nogays robbed 5.217 of animals, goods, and cash. However, the
letter states that the attacked tribe members and the villagers were innocent, and only three
households of Hadmiye and two of Afşars were among the attacked people. Since Nogays raided
innocent people, they were brought to Adana for a trial. During the trial, the Nogays asserted that
they did not raid innocent people. They also sent representatives to Istanbul, promising to return
what they robbed and pleading for getting allowances (tayinat). State officials stated that Nogays
who committed the crimes must be tried, and all stolen animals and goods must be returned to
their owners. The Nogay representatives explained that they were living peacefully, making a
living by agriculture, and complained about being attacked by bandits. The letter notes that state
officials decided to secure justice by returning the animals to their owners and trying offenders
from both parties.
Another official letter informs about the trial process.149 Es-Seyd Ahmed, the governor of
Adana, informed the Grand Vizier's office about the trial process with a letter dated November
12, 1860. The governor explained that they told parties concerned about the quarrel, robbery, and
murders to come to Adana. State officials asked immigrants to bring stolen animals with them.
The immigrants returned 1.132 cattle (kara sığır), 307 sheep and goats, ten horses, two donkeys,
two buffalos (manda), and two camels to their owners. However, the owners complained that the
148 BOA, A. MKT. MVL. 119-28. (4 Safer 1277 [22 August 1860]).
149 BOA, MVL. 606-6. (21 Cemaziyelevvel 1277 [5 December 1860]).
47
delivered animals were fewer than the stolen ones. In response, the immigrants said that the
missing animals perished. When the trial process was about to begin, the immigrants asked for
forty days of extension since they had to sow the seeds that the state provided for them. The
governor suggested that if this permission would not be granted to the immigrants, they would
ask for allowances since they could not sow their seeds, which would cause a loss for the state
treasury. Then, the officials agreed to give the extension.
These archival documents bring some questions. First, since cattle are commonly used as
farm animals, can the presence of large cattle flocks be interpreted as an indicator of thriving
agriculture? If there was thriving agricultural production, were Nogays the only farmers? Or can
it be asserted that certain tribes, at least parts of certain tribes, were already engaged in a hybrid
production that involved animal breeding and farming? This document also shows that state
agents could force a group to act in a certain way without using armed forces. By cutting the
allowances of the Nogays, the state forced them to work cooperatively. However, the state could
perform this way of pressure on a party already cooperating and engaging in a relationship of
mutual interest. This act could not work against an already armed and resisting party. Thus, it
can be suggested that when the Ottoman state tried to implement its authority in 19th-century
Çukurova, it had to actively use various means of negotiation.
Even though these animals had been at the center of quarrels for a long time in Çukurova,
they also functioned as subjects of unique gestures. In a wedding of a wealthy family of Tarsus,
sheep were among the gifts to the newlywed couple, while mutton was served at the feast.150
Likewise, these animals could be found around the ruins of an antique church or a medieval
150 Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk, 95-96.
48
castle.151 Furthermore, the very same animals around which many people fought constituted
central figures in those people’s cultures, thoughts, and emotions. Figure 5 shows the tomb of
Çoban Dede, who is a mythical character in Çukurova’s local memory.
Figure 5. Tomb of the Çoban Dede in Adana. Photo by the author
Ahmet Karataş, in his non-academic account of Adana’s local history, mentions Çoban Dede’s
story by depending on research from the 1940s.152 According to the story, Çoban Dede was a
bard from central Asian steppes and came to Ramazanoğlu Adana. When he was in Adana, he
lived in a tent among a Turcoman tribe, spent his winters at the banks of river Seyhan, and, in
summers, bred his animals among the pines of the Taurus Mountains. One day the bard met with
151 Ibid., 199, 327.
152Ahmet Karataş, Evvel Zaman İçinde Adana (Ankara: Akademisyen Kitabevi, 2016), 15-20.
49
the daughter of a local chief (bey) and fell in love with her. To see his beloved, the bard became
the chief's shepherd and worked forty years as a shepherd until his beloved passed away. Then,
loaded with such sorrow, he came to the hill where his shrine is today. And going by the legend,
when he played his pipe in deep sorrow, his flock scattered, and wolves killed some sheep
around river Çakıt. However, the chief did not believe the wolves killed his sheep and ordered
the shepherd’s execution. Then, with the local ruler Ramazanoğlu’s intervention, the shepherd
called everybody to the hill to prove himself innocent. When there was no evidence of the wolf
attack, the shepherd called the river Çakıt to testify on his behalf. When everybody thought he
had gone mad, the river Çakıt changed its course. At that moment, the shepherd disappeared.
After that incident, he began to be seen as a holy man, and people built a tomb in his memory.
From an environmental historical perspective, the story informs its audience about transhumance
routes, shows how animals, specifically sheep, could be central to social conflicts, and also
implies how people had deep and complex relationships with their environmental surroundings,
such as a river in this case. The story implies a high level of embeddedness of these non-human
actors in the collective memory and history of Çukurova. Dadaloğlu’s poems provide further
insight into the perception of nature among the locals.153
In another example of how Çukurova people created deep relations with their ecological
surroundings, the French traveler Langlois mentions his observations about the very well-known
legend of Şahmeran and its influences on the local people in Çukurova. There, he even states that
people who served milk to reptiles around castle ruins were favored by rulers, since the
153 Critizing the state-centric interpretations, Hamdi Karakal narrates the process of forced settlement in Çukurova
and afterward with a particular focus on local perspectives via analyzing folksongs. Hamdi Karakal, “Sword vs.
Mountain: Folk Songs’ Depiction of Ottoman Settlement Policies Towards Nomadic Tribes in Çukurova” (MA
Thesis, Bilkent University, 2021).
50
protagonist of the Şahmeran legend was a snake.154 In his dissertation, Andrew Gordon Gould
mentions an anecdote about Amanus-centered Çobanoğlu (literally “Son of the Shepherd”) beys.
According to the tale, a shepherd found a diamond and gifted it to the Ottoman Sultan Murat IV;
in return, he was granted the lands that became Tiyek, Ekbez, and Hacılar districts.155
When he praised Yusuf Pasha, a tribal notable whom the Reform Division killed,
Dadaloğlu identified the Pasha with a falcon and a wolf.156 In Cahit Öztelli's collection, most of
the poems by Dadaloğlu have lyric tones, distinct from the bard’s great fame for his epic
poems.157 In one, the bard equates his love for a lover and a nice horse.158 Regarding the state’s
operations against the local beys, Dadaloğlu’s poems reflect admiration for beys, resentment
about the state’s success in defeating them, and a deep nostalgia for the old days.159 Along with
Dadaloğlu, Karacaoğlan was another renowned bard from Ottoman Çukurova.160 Like
Dadaloğlu’s poems, Karacaoğlan’s poems reflect themes, events, and understanding peculiar to
the Ottoman Çukurova. In one of them, the bard refers to the joy of the one who rides an Arabian
horse (“Arab atı olan iştahlı biner”), while he says that the one who has a tribe (aşiret) goes to
summer pastures (“Aşireti olan yaylağa konar”).161 In another one, the bard praises his beloved
by likening her look to a young bittern’s look (yavru balaban bakışlı); and her smell to a
highland flower’s smell (yayla çiçeği kokuşlu).162 In another example, Karacaoğlan likens a
154 Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk, 395.
155 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 24.
156 Cahit Öztelli, Köroğlu ve Dadaloğlu: yaşamı, sanatı, şiirleri, (Istanbul: Varlık Yayınları, 1982), 92.
157 Ibid., 76-108.
158 Ibid., 79-80.
159 Ibid., 88-89, 92, 106-108.
160 With the fact that when he was born is not clear, Cahit Öztelli presents a biography of Karacaoğlan, and he
argues that the bard lived a long life in seventeenth century. Cahit Öztelli, Karacaoğlan: Şiirleri, Hayatı, Sanatı,
(Istanbul, Varlık Yayınları, 1971), 5-18.
161 Ibid., 26.
162 Ibid., 31-32.
51
beautiful woman’s walk to a sheep hit by a west wind.163 Even though it might be a pretty cryptic
description for many, the bard must have been informed with traditional local knowledge and
observations.
Inter-communal relationships were not low-key in this significantly diverse demographic,
socio-political, and environmental context. In this remarkably changing and aggressive setting,
groups of people from different paths tried to create room for their existence and thrive. Even
though the multiplicity of demographic elements has been a distinctive aspect of the regional
order, most parties did not have strict borders. In this context, animals have always played
essential roles in the regional order and daily life. They penetrated each part and parcel of the
sociocultural, political, and economic aspects of Çukurova.
1.4. Social, Political, and Economic Conditions Before the Reform Division
Before the Reform Division’s intervention and the consequently forced settlement, Çukurova had
a remarkably diverse demographic formation in which different groups gave their best to adapt to
severe political and ecological conditions. A significantly diverse range of non-human actors,
especially animals, furthered the dynamic and multi-faceted life. In this atmosphere, violent acts
among different powerholders were not uncommon. Ottoman Çukurova resembled the Wild
West, a place where the ones who could exert enough force on the other could enhance their
dominance. However, state efforts had always been to create a centralized rule, systematic
taxation, and conscription.
Meltem Toksöz discusses that starting from the early 19th century, nomadic groups took
important steps towards more sedentary lifestyles as their migratory practices became more
163 Ibid., 84.
52
regular regarding their mobility, such as routes, destinations, and schedules.164 She also
discusses that in addition to the gradual movement to settled order, there had been dramatic
shifts165: “This kind of swift settlement pattern can be observed in the aftermath of 1865 when
nomads did not settle by force but did so when agricultural development visibly increased.”166
During this evolutionary process, certain events functioned as breaking points. With this regard,
Toksöz regards Ibrahim Pasha’s rule in Çukurova as a very constructive period and assesses his
projects as exemplary: “The example was set, and the potential proven.”167 However, to fulfill
these expectations of a highly settled population and developed commercial agriculture, the
region was to wait almost half a century. Until the regional transformation driven by commercial
agriculture comprehensively changed socioeconomic order and local politics, the Ottoman state
had recurring structural concerns over the Çukurova region in the 19th century.
An analysis of archival documents from the Ottoman State Archives demonstrates these
concerns. Although various complicated factors disturbed the Ottoman state about Çukurova, the
lack of regional security and stability and the inability to conscript men and collect taxes was the
most challenging. The ongoing tension between nomadic tribes and settled populations; nomads’
harassment against traders and travelers; their resistance to being conscripted and taxed; state’s
attempts to cooperate with certain local actors to pacify others are recurring themes in the
period’s documents. With an examination of a series of official correspondence, it becomes clear
that in the 1860s Çukurova, relationships between the state and local agents and their reactions to
each other’s movements were quite dynamic, changing, and complicated. In the state’s
164 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 29-33.
165 Here, Toksöz strongly emphasizes the varying settlement processes happened in Lower Plain and Upper Plain.
She argues that there had not been a synchronic change regarding settlement, but populations in the Upper Plain
shifted to settled lifestyles in a sudden fashion. Ibid., 33.
166 Ibid., 32.
167 Ibid., 51.
53
settlement project context, collecting unpaid taxes and ensuring regional stability were
significant matters.
In a letter from June 8, 1860, the governor of Adana was told to prevent the Tacirli168
tribe’s oppression and attacks on neighboring populations, arrest the culprits, and collect unpaid
sheep taxes for two years.169 According to the plan, an armed force of locals was to be formed.
Immigrant Nogays (Nogay muhacirleri) were to provide 200 men while mountain chiefs (ağas)
from Bereketlidağı were to provide 400, and Cerid tribe and others were to provide 200 men for
the force. The state granted salary, tax exemption, and provisions to the force members in return
for their services. Regarding the sheep tax matter, Tacirlis was not the only tribe that resisted
taxation. Another letter from December 1861 stated that tax contractor (mültezim) Ibrahim Ağa
could not collect the sum of Aleppo’s sheep tax for the year 1276 (1859/1860). The amount to be
collected from Hadidian and Beni Said tribes and some villagers was 46.000 piastres.170 A few
days later a letter from January 3, 1862, noted that as the contractor for Aleppo, Ibrahim Ağa had
the right to collect sheep taxes from Bereketdağı as well, and he petitioned for the collection. The
Ministry of Finance approved his demand, and Aleppo’s governor was told to take necessary
actions.171 Similarly, a petition of a merchant from September 27, 1860, shows that the Afşar
tribe resisted paying taxes for sheep and goats.172
The unpaid amount was gigantic in another case. According to a note written to the
Ministry of Finance dated April 5, 1865, unpaid sheep taxes of Uzeyr sanjak, tribes of Sırkıntı,
Karsandı, Yukarı Bozdoğan and the unpaid amount of Adana province’s various tax items from
168 In different documents, different spellings like “Tecirli,” “Tecirlü,” “Tacirli,” and “Tacirlü” are used for this
tribe’s name.
169 BOA, A. MKT. UM. 409-61. (19 Zilkade 1276 [8 June 1860]).
170 BOA, A. MKT. UM. 525-55. (14 Cemazeyilahir 1278 [17 December 1861]).
171 BOA, A. MKT. UM. 529-71. (2 Recep 1278 [3 January 1862]).
172 BOA, MVL. 364-9. (11 Rabiulevvel 1277 [27 September 1860]).
54
previous years was around 5.217.000 piastres.173 In this context, an official note dated April 19,
1865, is illuminating regarding the tax capacity of the state in Çukurova.174 It reports that an
auction took place to sell certain taxation rights for the Hijri year 1281 (1864/1865). Collection
rights of Adana, Tarsus, and Karaisalı sanjaks’ sheep and goat taxes and other tax items of these
sanjaks were granted to the tax contractor (mültezim) Hüseyin Mazlum Efendi, in return of
1.165.000 piastres. The note explains that the amount of sheep tax (ağnam rüsumu) to be
collected this year was 18.900 piastres more than the amount collected for the same item last
time. The note interprets the animal exportation halt at that time as a factor that influenced the
changing amounts of taxes. The animal exportation halt must had meant that more animals
stayed in the region, increasing the animal taxes.
In another correspondence from June 1865, the Maraş city council (Maraş Liva Meclisi)
reports that last year the state prevented Tacirli tribe from leaving their settlements to go to their
yaylas175 for transhumance, and the tribe did not cause any harm or damage.176 Nevertheless, a
few days ago, the council notes, Palalıoğlu Süleyman of the Tacirlis and 300 households with
him attempted to go to their pastures, and on their way, they came to Haruniye. There, 200
irregulars (başıbozuks) were collected as mercenary units and assigned to guard the strait of
Haruniye with the present military forces. Since this force was not enough to prevent the group’s
mobility, backup forces from the 4th Army, present cavalries nearby, and irregulars from the
locals were assigned to block Tacirlis’ movement. After a chase and failed attempts to persuade
173 BOA, MVL. 701-60. (9 Zilkade 1281 [5 April 1865]). The document described the amount as 52 yük and 17.000
piastres. The term “yük” refers to 100.000 piastres. About the term “yük,” see Mustafa Çakıcı, “Osmanlı
Sanayileşme Çabalarında Bursa İpek Fabrikası Örneği (1851-1873)” (MA, Istanbul Üniversitesi, 2010), 23.
174 BOA, MVL. 702-72. (23 Zilkade 1281 [19 April 1865]).
175 “Yayla” means highlands where people, primarily nomads, spend their summers. It can be translated as
“highlands,” but it must be noticed that this concept has significant and historically rooted connotations in the
Çukurova context. For a comprehensive discussion on the concept, see: Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,” 50-61.
176 BOA, A. MKT. MHM. 336-3. (29 Muharrem 1282 [24 June 1865]).
55
nomads to return to their settlements, Tacirlis, and the military had a clash, after which the
tribespeople fled and left their animals of 453 cattle, sheep, and goats.
Another official correspondence contains letters from different months of 1859 and gives
essential information on how the state attempted to restrain the Afşar tribe’s mobility.177
According to the correspondence, even though the Afşar tribe was settled in Kayseri and their
harmful deeds were neutralized, they recently escaped from their settlement area, and they
committed subversive acts, as they always used to do (âdet-i kadîmeleri üzere). State officials
decided to block the tribe’s road to Çukurova. To do that, the soldiers had to guard passageways
in Sunbas, Kars, Tatarlı, and Cebel-i Kozan. The officials assigned cavalries and infantries under
the authority of local administrators. For example, 150 cavalries were sent to Murtaza Ağa,
administrator of the Kars (Kars-ı Zülkadriye), to block the ways of Kars and Tatarlı. Thus, it was
a common strategy of rule for the state to cooperate with certain locals against other locals, but it
was not the state’s only method.
An official letter to the governor of Adana explained that the Karakayalı tribe goes to the
Ereğli district of Konya every summer where there they act subversively (harekât-ı tecâvüziyye
ve gadriye) and damage crops. Central state officials ordered local state agents to compensate the
settled population’s losses and prevent the tribe from committing such acts again.178 In response,
the Council of Adana sent a letter dated May 21, 1865. In the letter, the council stated that the
state settled Karakayalı tribe, and gave them lands to farm. However, the Council argued, since
tribe members and their animals were accustomed to transhumance, forcing them suddenly to
stay in hot places would be harmful. In this context, state officials formed joint guarantees for the
tribe members not to be involved in any problematic actions in their pastures (yaylada ırz ve
177 BOA, MVL. 592-44. (11 Cemazeyilahir 1276 [5 January 1860]).
178 BOA, MVL. 707-87. (14 Safer 1282 [9 July 1865]).
56
edepleriyle meşgul olmaları zımnında kefalet-i müteselsile tahtına alındıkları). Therefore, state
agents had consciousness and awareness of how much transhumance was an embedded and
necessary practice for nomadic groups. The document also demonstrates that the central
authority’s decision could be discussed and modified at local levels.
Another example of such a local initiative can be found in a long correspondence on
animal trade procedures.179 In the correspondence, to prevent livestock theft and increase tax
revenue, it is discussed and planned to restrict animal trade to animal markets, sub-districts
(kaza), and districts (nahiye). However, in his letter from March 19, 1877, the governor of
Adana, Mehmed Tevfik, wrote to the Ministry of Interior Affairs, and he explained that Adana’s
rural settlements were far from central settlements, so prohibiting animal trade at rural sites
could badly affect this trade. He clarified his objection with an example; since animal owners
who went to a central settlement or a market from rural areas could hardly afford to bring their
animals back, they could be forced to sell their animals under the market price. This dialog
between state agents at the central and local levels illustrates that having an awareness of local
conditions was vital to create the right policies. In this document, another noteworthy element is
about a control mechanism of official authorities used at the time: joint sureties/guarantees. In
this context, Işık Tamdoğan mentions the concept “nezir,” which refers to an application in
which the Ottoman state created contracts with members of a particular group, stimulating all
members’ control over others and punishment of all if a member committed an unwanted deed.180
She argues that since the failure to commit to the agreement could bring a considerable economic
179 BOA, ŞD. 2117-59. (9 Şaban 1294 [19 August 1877]).
180 Tamdoğan, “Nezir Ya Da XVIII. Yüzyıl Çukurova’sında Eşkıya, Göçebe ve Devlet Arasındaki İlişkiler,” 139-
142. She shows, these contracts were used in various cases in the 18th century Çukurova.
57
burden on all group members, these contracts assured a continuous internal control mechanism,
which considerably lightened the state’s monitoring responsibilities.181
Along with the fact that mobility, trade, and negotiations related to animals have been a
significant aspect of the 19th century Çukurova, during this period, animals’ pivotal place in
political confrontations was not peculiar to the Çukurova case. In two instances from the midnineteenth
century, when the tribal organizations committed unwanted deeds for the officials,
Ottoman pashas reacted by confiscating camels from Muntafiq and horses and mares from
Shammar.182 In some instances, animals as the subjects of confrontation and negotiation between
central authorities and tribes went way beyond animal theft and confiscation. Concerning
animals’ centrality in social and political negotiations, Köksal and Polatel explain that the
Central Anatolia-based Cihanbeyli tribe took on the task of providing the imperial capital with
tens of thousands of sheep starting in the 1800s, and the number of sheep reached 120.000 by
1840s.183 Similarly, when he supplied sheep to meet a meat shortage in Istanbul, Çapanoğlu
Ahmed Bey was rewarded with tax collection rights in Bozok sanjak in 1755.184 In a local-level
confrontation, during the rule of Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt over Çukurova, when the Pasha gave
Menemencioğlu Ahmed Bey the task of attacking Kurdish tribes, Ahmed Bey captured
thousands of cattle and sheep as booty.185 Violent or diplomatic acts between parties like a local
ruler, central state, tribal elites, or dynastic families constituted one layer of the aggressive local
181 Ibid., 135, 142-144.
182 Ceylan, “Carrot or Stick?,” 177. In another example, it is noted that members of Shammar, Al-Cerba, Cubur, Al-
Bu Hamned tribes stole more than 3.000 animals around Mosul in a short period of time. Kasaba, A Moveable
Empire, 91.
183 Köksal and Polatel, “A Tribe as an Economic Actor: The Cihanbeyli Tribe and the Meat Provisioning of Istanbul
in the Early Tanzimat Era,” 104.
184 İdikurt, “Osmanlı’dan Cumhuriyet’e Bir Âyanlık Örneği: Kozanoğulları ve Fırka-i İslâhiye’nin Kurulusu,” 24. It
is worth noting that nomadic tribes were also of utmost importance for providing riding animals such as horses,
camels etc. Kasaba, A Moveable Empire, 32-34.
185 Menemencioğlu Ahmed, Menemencioğulları Tarihi, 119.
58
atmosphere. Intercommunal violence at the local level, mainly between nomads and settled
populations, formed another social structure layer.
Until the mid-1860s, brigandage and inter-communal violence had been rampant to
induce each local official to try their best to curtail this harsh environment.186 In some instances,
such violence can have international dimensions. In one incident, Jackson Coffing, an American
protestant missionary, was killed around Payas, leading to international pressure on the officials
to take necessary actions.187 Regarding the argument that these violent acts mainly happened
between nomadic tribes and settled population, Meltem Toksöz underscores the possibility of an
interdependent188 and harmonious way of living among settled and nomads and states that: “The
brigandage attributed to nomadic tribal tradition is often a hasty and incorrect assumption.”189
While this is a critical warning towards having biased perspectives, contemporary sources
suggest that brigandage was a common practice and even a regular career path among tribe
members.190 Relatedly, in the context of nomad-settled relationships in Ottoman Baghdad,
Ebubekir Ceylan states: “The level of nomadism and the Bedouin lifestyle were dominant
determinant for tribal aristocracy and as the corollary of this, agriculturalist tribes and the city
186 Gould, Pashas and Brigands, 48-49, 58-59.
187 Ibid., 54-56. In his dissertation, Chris Gratien allocates a whole chapter to examine this issue, the process it
induced, and the context of the international actions taken. He sees this single incident as of great importance for the
change of regional dynamics in upcoming years. Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,” 96-135.
188 As a practical example of the mutually beneficial relationships, Toksöz emphasizes that settled people allowed
nomads to use their unused agricultural lands for grazing, which provided the land with natural fertilizer. Toksöz,
Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 35. Regarding symbiotic relationships between pastoralists and agriculturalists in
general, and in particular the case of allowing animals to graze on farmlands at suitable times, Chris Gratien
formulates as: “This is one quotidian example of how lifestyles that would later come to be seen as antiquated or
primitive actually involved some rather sophisticated shit!” Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 53. Thus, even though
these very same flocks had been subjects of inter-communal tensions between settled and nomads, at the same time
they played a considerable intermediary role contributing to symbiosis. Also Wolfram Eberhard, who produces
several of the early texts on the Ottoman Çukurova’s history, interprets the nomads’ flocks’ usage of these empty
lands as a component of the symbiosis between nomads and settled. Wolfram Eberhard, “Nomads and Farmers in
Southeastern Turkey. Problems of Settlement,” Oriens 6, no. 1 (1953): 38. Also see Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk,
56.
189 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 34-36.
190 Cevdet, Tezâkir, 131.
59
dwellers were looked down by nomadic tribes.”191 Although their relationships could be uneven,
the symbiosis between nomads and settled populations penetrated even into quotidian practices.
In one example, Chris Gratien explains: “The movement of pastoralists helped conduct trade
between regions with relatively difficult conditions of transport, and pastoralists always had
extra meat and milk to sell at periods of high demand, such as religious feasts.”192 Similarly,
Wolfram Eberhard suggests that nomads were selling animal products they produced while
buying goods from the settled communities:
The co-existence of both groups, however, was for a long time quite possible and even profitable for both.
As far as the settlers had agriculture, their fields were empty after October; therefore, they did not mind the
tribes having their cattle graze on the fields and fertilize them. As far as they had arboriculture, the animals
also did no harm to the trees, once they had lost leaves. Moreover, the nomads were good customers who
bought city products as well as staple food for the winter and sold wool, butter and cheese which they had
produced in the summer camps.193
The Ottoman central authorities’ attempts to penetrate Çukurova and exploit the area’s
sources were full of challenges and included negotiations between various parties. Without the
necessary capacity or willingness to use the state’s limited sources, the central authorities often
resorted to forging alliances to control Çukurova. However, at some point, this way of
management could not satisfy the official expectation of this potentially rich region. Then, the
Reform Division was dispatched to complete the accumulated centralization efforts of the state
in the region. Among many of these attempts, the Reform Division’s intervention in early 1865
had a sheer gravity to change the course of Çukurova’s history. In the spring of 1865, under the
command and authority of Derviş Pasha and Ahmet Cevdet Bey, many well-equipped military
units were dispatched to the Çukurova region to perform the Tanzimat reforms.
191 Ceylan, “Carrot or Stick?,” 171.
192 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 130.
193 Eberhard, “Nomads and Farmers in Southeastern Turkey,” 38.
60
CHAPTER 3
INTERVENTION BY THE REFORM DIVISION:
STATE’S AGENDA, RESPONSES OF THE LOCALS,
REGIONAL TRANSFORMATION
1.1. The Reform Division: Structure and Agenda
Cezmi Yurtsever, a high school history teacher and a local historian of Çukurova,
conducted interviews with Safa Vayisoğlu, a local notable of Kadirli, during the 1990s.194 In one
of them, by looking at vast meadows and gardens, Vayisoğlu comments about Kadirli: “I cannot
imagine a better place for settlement [iskan.]”195 It is not sure whether he used the word "iskan"
on purpose, but more than a century ago, many Ottomans shared his idea about the settlement in
those lands. Stressed by several factors such as wars, famines, and migration waves, the Ottoman
state endeavored to further its state-making tools and sent the Reform Division to Çukurova to
suppress local violence, resistant movements, conduct taxation and conscription properly, and
concentrate its authority.
In the spring of 1865, central authorities of the Ottoman Empire sent a well-equipped,
sizeable military unit, the Reform Division (Fırka-i Islahiye), from the imperial capital to
Iskenderun, a port city between Çukurova and Amik Plain. Derviş Pasha, who was experienced
in commanding military operations in mountainous landscapes, led the Reform Division.
194 Records of these interviews can be seen on Cezmi Yurtsever’s personal YouTube channel. Accessed October 17,
2022. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyHxpYYCRJNx88IvtT1At7g/videos. Besides being a wealthy local
politician, Vayisoğlu was especially curious about the local history of Çukurova. Andrew G. Gould mentions
Vayisoğlu’s support for his research. See Gould, “The Burning of The Tents,” 85.
195 “Bundan daha güzel bir iskan yeri, ben düşünemiyorum.” Accessed October 17, 2022.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfpmISbmUg4&t=3s&ab_channel=CezmiYurtsever.
61
Zeybeks196, who were "popularly regarded as totally fearless,” formed the main force.197
Supported by other infantry and cavalry units, the Reform Division's total force was around
9.000 infantry, 2.000 cavalry, and supporting artillery units.198 Having technical superiority199
and filling its ranks with capable soldiers, the Reform Division had the capacity to alter the
Çukurova’s order extensively. Multiple factors induced the state to launch such a complicated
operation. Pacifying the semi-autonomous local forces, preventing inter-communal violence,
settlement of nomadic tribes, and developing an agrarian economy can be considered priorities in
the state’s agenda. By aiming to establish a stable state authority through the elimination of
mediators between the imperial center and subjects and maximizing the state’s exploitation
means, the Ottomans were not alone at the time: “In the Ottoman Empire, as elsewhere, direct
control of the individual citizen became the ideal of political sovereignty, an ideal with which
nomadism and tribalism were incompatible.”200 The forced settlement of tribes was not unique to
the Çukurova area, but it was a common policy in the late Ottoman context. According to Kemal
Karpat, during this time, 5.000 small village settlements were established for this reason in
Eastern and Southern Anatolia, Northern Syria and Iraq, and Arabian Peninsula.201
The Reform Division designed to pacify the Çukurova region and perform Tanzimat
reforms, granted the Ottoman state a very advantageous position. However, it does not mean no
196 Zeybeks were armed men from Western Anatolia, especially Aydın. They usually practiced banditry. The
Ottoman state conscripted zeybeks in different wars and military operations in the nineteenth century. Arif Yıldırım,
“1877-1878 Osmanlı Rus Savaşında Zeybek Taburları” (MA Thesis, Balıkesir Üniversitesi, 2012), 26-31, 75-85.
197 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 80-81. Ahmet Cevdet Pasha, head of the administrative branch of the Reform
Division, praises these seven battalions of soldiers, mainly of Zeybeks and partly of Albanians, for their agility and
valor. According to him, Zeybeks were such valorous that as if they were created to be soldiers. See Cevdet,
Tezâkir, 133.
198 Gould, “The Burning of The Tents,” 74. In his dissertation, Gould discusses that since the terms about military
troops like “battalion” does not specify exactly the same number of soldiers every time, and the Fırka-i Islahiye’s
total manpower could be lesser than these. Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 82.
199 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 85.
200 Gould, “The Burning of The Tents,” 71.
201 Kemal. H. Karpat, Osmanlı Modernleşmesi: Toplum, Kursamsal Değişim ve Nüfus, trans. Akile Zorlu Durukan
and Kaan Durukan (Ankara: İmge Kitabevi Yayınları, 2002), 129-132.
62
state authority existed before the Reform Division arrived in Çukurova. Starting in the 1840s,
there were attempts to conduct conscription and taxation, to settle nomadic tribes, and to prevent
inter-communal aggressions and brigandage in mountainous areas.202 State authority was there,
but it did not have the means to ensure its control at total capacity. With the Reform Division, the
state had an immense capacity for coercion and used it as leverage to compel local actors to
cooperate. Gould formulates this process as such:
One reason for the success of this expedition was its conciliatory strategy. A general amnesty was granted
to all who had failed to pay taxes, evaded military service or been disloyal to the Sultan in other ways. The
derebeys were offered generous salaries and government positions in neighboring provinces as an
inducement to surrender, although it had already been decided that they would ultimately be exiled to the
Balkans. In this way fighting was kept to a minimum203
Meltem Toksöz encapsulates the Division’s approach: “before resorting to any coercion,
the division tried consent and sought the support of certain tribal lords, promising them rank and
amnesty.”204 In a similar context, Gould emphasizes that in an early phase of the intervention, the
army could get support from certain local elites such as Kozanoğlu Hacı Bey, Çobanoğlu Paşo
Bey, and Mürselzade Mustafa Bey.205 Forging alliances from the early phases of the intervention,
the army did not encounter a united resistance. Relatedly, Meltem Toksöz emphasizes the
regionally prominent Gökvelioğulları family’s support for the Reform Division vis-à-vis
Kozanoğulları family, which demonstrates the multiplicity of local actors, scatteredness of
regional power foci, and dynamically changing political positionings.206 Aligned with the
existing literature, archival sources illustrate that there were attempts to restore order in the
202 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 52-53; Gould, “The Burning of The Tents,” 73; Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 41-
43, 89.
203 Gould, “The Burning of The Tents,” 74. The letter in that the Reform Division announced a general amnesty and
call locals to cooperate with the Division can be seen in: Cevdet, Tezâkir, 137-139.
204 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 68.
205 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 88.
206 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 69.
63
region even before the arrival of Reform Division. It can be argued that the Reform Division's
intervention was the most robust move made by the state agents toward this region. Even though
the Division’s methods varied, it is evident that engaging in total warfare was not the priority.
Rather than that, following a divide-and-rule policy, integrating suitable actors into the state
apparatus, and forcing local parties to cooperate were the primary strategies.
1.2. Methods of The Reform Division
A letter from December 1864, a couple of months before the Division’s arrival, is
illuminating regarding the situation in Çukurova. On December 27, 1864, the Great Council of
the Adana Province (Meclis-i Kebir-i Eyalet-i Adana) wrote a letter to Sultan and reported
several incidents about taxation and conscription processes in Çukurova.207 The council reported
that since Hüsnü Pasha of the 5th Army came to Adana last winter with a scout battalion, a
cavalry division (bölük), and half of an artillery battery, tribes, and Kurdish brigands who stayed
in tents in Çukurova (Çukurova’da haymenişin), could not dare to commit theft and damage
people and poor (ahali ve fıkara). In this way, the settled people and honorable (ehl-i ırz)
nomadic tribespeople enjoyed a secure environment. Similarly, the state did not allow Tecirlü
and Cerid tribes of Uzeyr and the Bozdoğan tribe of Adana to go to their pastures in Maraş. The
settled people were saved from incursions of these tribes, and Hüsnü Pasha collected a good
amount of taxes. Then, men were conscripted from the Uzeyr sub-district (kaza), Döşek, and
Cerid tribes. However, people from coastal villages at the foot of Amanus Mountains (Kıyı
Köyleri,) avoided conscription. After that, Hüsnü Pasha, with the military units, arrived in
Pazaryeri for the conscription of the Tecirlü tribe, where Hüsnü Pasha explained the importance
of conscription to the tribal notables. Although these notables complied with the pasha’s plan,
207 BOA, A. MKT. MHM. 324-4. (29 Şaban 1281 [27 January 1865]).
64
some men of the tribe fled and hid in the mountain, forest, and bushes. After these problematic
events, the letter says, Süleyman of Araplı Obası (a branch of the Tecirlü tribe) and his friends
attacked unarmed 7-8 soldiers who were transporting wood. Since the soldiers were unarmed,
they escaped.
The document states that the tribe members wounded and captured one soldier who could
not manage to escape and brought him to Hacı Osmanlı, one of the coastal villages. Hearing the
incident, Pasha followed the tribe members, but they drew their guns at the Pasha and released
the hostage the next day. According to the letter, even though the tribe’s harmful actions needed
to be curtailed, the military did not take action. Because the present military forces were
insufficient, and it was the beginning of winter. Then, the army units went to the Cerid tribe
where the Süleyman of Araplı Obası and his branch were around. To make an example for
others, the military made a blockade around Araplı Obası, and after an armed conflict, the
military prevailed. After this, the army took 1.884 sheep and goats, 469 cattle (karasığır), 14
camels, nine donkeys, and one horse from the tribespeople. These animals were brought to
Adana, and the government made an offer to the tribe. If the tribe members agreed to be
conscripted and did not cause violence, the government would return all the animals to the tribe.
However, if the tribe continued to avoid cooperation with the state, then the animals would be
sold at auction, and the revenue would be counted towards the tribe’s unpaid taxes.
This long letter from Adana Council shows several regional phenomena of the time. First,
the state did not see every nomadic tribe in a similar way. Even though certain tribes were
nomads, if they were honorable ones (ehl-i ırz), the state did not aim at them directly and tried to
protect them. Here, it needs to be clarified what “ehl-i ırz” means. It can be translated into
English as “honorable people.” However, in the 19th century Çukurova's political context, it was
65
probably a reference to people who did not act violently and cause problems for the state.208
Second, the state agents negotiated with the local actors. In the example of the Tecirlü tribe, the
state used animals as leverage to compel the tribe to cooperate. The subject of the negotiation
implies that animals played key roles in certain occasions that shaped the region’s history. Last,
before the Reform Division’s arrival, the Ottoman state’s authority was already present in
Çukurova. The military was able to make certain locals cooperate with them, but it failed to do
so in several cases. Then, the arrival of the Division should be assessed in such social and
political contexts.
An official correspondence dated May 1865 is insightful regarding the state’s perspective
on the relations between pacification and exploitation of the region.209 The first letter in the
correspondence starts by stating Bereket Mountain and Mount Kozan have long been under the
control of local notables, who were remainings of old lords (derebeyleri), and the state could not
find the opportunity to establish its authority there. However, this time the state decided to
conduct a robust reform process in the region. The operation’s success depended on expelling
rooted notables with their families from the area where they enjoyed dynastic lives. The report
explains that since these families were accustomed to living in dynastic ways, it would not be
appropriate to let them suffer from misery now. It adds that decent livings were to be provided to
these exiles, and the region could create more significant benefits in their absence. Even though
the letter explains this plan by attributing it to Sultan’s great mercy, there was obviously a
tradeoff. The state wanted to eliminate possible threats to its authority in Çukurova, and notables
would have comfortable lives in return for giving up their autonomy over the mountains. As an
208 Yonca Köksal’s article “Coercion and Mediation” is an exemplary work in this context. Köksal analyzes the
factors that made the state approach different tribes differently. Köksal, “Coercion and Mediation: Centralization
and Sedentarization of Tribes in the Ottoman Empire.”
209 BOA, İ. MVL. 531-23818. (21 Zilhicce 1281 [17 May 1865]).
66
example of this practice, Mustafa Pasha, the dismissed governor of Uzeyr Sanjak, and his family
were relocated to Istanbul. A salary of 3.000 piasters was assigned to him and his family, and his
two sons were employed as state servants.
Another report by the Reform Division commanders, dated July 27, 1865, shows the
Division’s method of establishing state authority in Çukurova.210 The commanders informed that
they had started to build barracks in Nigolu. Another barracks was also being constructed in front
of Tiyek. The administration there established an administrative unit (müdürlük) by combining
the villages of Hacılar, Tiyek, and Ekbaz. It also established a sub-district (kaza) at Kürd
Mountain.211 Commanders explained that it seemed necessary to establish a sub-district (kaza)
around Nigolu and incorporate the mentioned two administrative units into the one in Nigolu.
Several prominent figures of the region were members of the district’s council. Karayiğitoğlu
Kadri Ağa, one of the most popular agas of Ulaşlı212 and, other Ulaşlı agas from Kaypakoğulları
were among the members. Households from these agas’ tribes were going to be settled in this
district. Commanders Ahmet Cevdet and Ibrahim Derviş also reported that the Delikanlı tribe's
chief (boy beyisi) Hüseyin Ağa and one of the chiefs of Çelikanlı tribal units were council
members too. Here, the Ottoman state incorporated strong figures, who had influence in the
region to official bodies. Rather than conducting a total war that might cause high cost, casualty,
and social turbulence, the state agents established state authority via cooperation with present
cadres.
210 BOA, MVL 711 – 125. (13 Rabiulevvel 1282 [6 August 1865]).
211 In his discussion on reform projects in late Ottoman Libya, Selim Deringil refers to Osman Nuri Pasha’s, a highranking
bureaucrat who served as governors of Hicaz and Yemen, ideas on provincial reform process. In parallel
with the initiatory steps taken by the Fırka-i Islahiye, Osman Nuri Pasha saw establishment of administrative units
and construction of state buildings in a reforming area of great importance. Deringil, “‘They Live in a State of
Nomadism and Savagery’,” 327-330.
212 Andrew Gordon Gould counts Karayiğitoğlu, Kaypakoğlu, Çendoğlu, Alibekiroğlu, and Kelemenoğlu as the
Ulaşlı branches by 1840. Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 24.
67
In the context of the Reform Division, a letter from October 1865 gives essential
information about the Ottoman state’s methods and motives in pacifying the Çukurova region.213
The letter explains that the Division forced Dede Bey from Payas and Deli Halil from Kürt Dağı
to surrender after their insurgencies. Since their village was burnt down, the Division decided to
relocate the villagers of Kapılı to different places. Also, as a preventive measure, seven people
from the village were taken as hostages to be released at the end of the settlement process.214
Later, it is explained that it was decided to grant salaries to chiefs of mountains who became
obedient and capitulated (rüesâ-i cebelden arz-ı itâat ve inkıyad eden). Chiefs who actively
resisted the soldiers, like Dede Bey and Deli Halil, had to be punished. In this negotiation
process between the army and local notables, prominent people of the region, like the governor
of Western Kozan, Ömer Ağa, a member of Develi district's local dynasty, Muhammed Efendi,
and high-ranked officials, went to the army camp, announced their obedience, and made
promises to obey reform efforts, conduct the census and provide necessary logistics to the
Reform Division. Cooperative figures like Ömer Ağa and Muhammed Efendi were honored with
gifts like watches and khilats,215 but these were not the only benefits for the local actors who
cooperated with the state. In this process of compromise, Bayramoğlu Mıgırdiç was appointed as
a council member to Eastern Kozan, while Hacı Bey, brother of Yusuf Ağa, was appointed as the
administrator (müdür) to Eastern Kozan to substitute Yusuf Ağa who avoided to cooperate with
213 BOA, İ.DH. 1293-101637. (11 Cemazeyilevvel 1282 [2 October 1865]).
214 Taking hostages was not unique to this case. For further discussion on this practice, see Tamdoğan, “Nezir Ya Da
XVIII. Yüzyıl Çukurova’sında Eşkıya, Göçebe ve Devlet Arasındaki İlişkiler,” 144-145.
215 Khilat (hil’at) is a caftan that khalif or a ruler gifts to honor someone. See: Filiz Karaca, “Hil’at,” in İslam
Ansiklopedisi, accessed on May 10, 2023. https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/hilat. For another example of official
practice giving khilats to prominent provincial actors in the Ottoman Baghdad context, see Ceylan, “Carrot or
Stick?,” 175. In his discussion on reform attempts in the late nineteenth century Hicaz and Yemen, Selim Deringil
too mentions to usage of these precious gifts, khilats, as tools to ensure prominent provincial actors’ support and
loyalty. Deringil, “‘They Live in a State of Nomadism and Savagery’,” 329-331.
68
the Reform Division. Later in the correspondence, the situation about the Gavur Dağı (Amanus
Mountains) is mentioned.
According to the explanation in the letter, all around Amanus Mountains had fertile
lands, but since brigands of mountains (eşkiya-i cebel) were harassing farmers, these lands were
not benefited; once the security and stability were established, this region would especially
benefit Adana’s treasury. Since keeping Amanus Mountain and its environs safe was essential to
the reforms, there were plans to build towers in Bacburnu and Hacı Osmanlı. Also, since this
area was far from Payas, a new district named Osmaniye was going to be established to settle
households (ocak) from Tecirlis and Cerids. As planned, large settlements started to appear after
the Reform Division entrenched its authority.
Another letter, dated one week later, reported the army’s victory in the operation area.216
The letter says that Kozanoğulları, who once ruled over the region, now yielded to the state, and
members of Kozanoğulları were dispatched to different places like Sivas, Kayseri, Adana, and
Istanbul.217 Certain members were going to be inducted into the military (Silahşöran-ı Hassa)
and military academy (Mekteb-i Fünun-i Harbiye). It is explained in the letter that the Reform
Division’s operation had two major axes, one was pacifying the mountain chains called Bereket
and Gavur Mountains, and the second was to pacify Mount Kozan. The first part of the mission
was accomplished by a crushing power (kuvve-i kahire) and Sultan’s mercy. Secondly, as the
letter reads, even though the question of Mount Kozan seemed worse at the time, thanks to the
Sultan and the şeşhane rifles’ echoing sounds which doubled the soldiers’ powers, the question
was solved effortlessly. According to the letter, the army controlled these vast lands called the
216 İ.DH. 1293-101633. (18 Cemazeyilevvel 1282 [9 October 1865]).
217 Andrew Gordon Gould discusses that the true intention of the Porte had always been to exile the prominent
families and people who could exert authority in the region to Balkans. He comprehensively explains what happened
to these families immediately after the intervention, Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 107-110.
69
Bereket and Kozan Mountains, which had become hotbeds of unrest, malice, robbery. Lastly, the
letter mentions a plan to publish this news in newspapers. This official letter had an arrogant
tone. It reports the pacification of the mountainous region around Kozan and Amanus. The
official discourse in the letter targets Kozanoğulları, again implying the family’s gravity in the
region at the time. Here, it is underscored that certain family members were integrated into the
state apparatus besides dispatching the members to different cities. Lastly, the state’s capacity for
violence was constantly mentioned as a powerful leverage used to compel other parties to
cooperate.
Another letter was sent to the imperial center in the following days. This letter from
October 1865 was also about the immediate measures taken in the post-intervention process.218 It
says that since Hasan Kethüda, one of Dede Bey’s companions, and Monla Hasan were wrong
people (uygunsuz adem), they should not have stayed in the region anymore. The plan was to
exile Hasan Kethüda and his ten family members to Edirne, and Monla Hasan to the village of
Kertel. However, the state found several local notables suitable for cooperating. Hacı Bey, a
member of Eastern Kozan’s dynasty and appointed as administrator (müdür) previously, was one
of them. At the time, he gave his word to serve the state zealously until the reforms succeeded,
but he was also asking for an official order (buyruldu) that grants his lifelong salary as soon as
possible. Hacı Bey sent his message via mufti of Eastern Kozan, Mehmed Tevfik Efendi. The
letter reads that Hacı Bey’s brother, Mıstık Ağa, moved to Kayseri, and the mufti worked loyally
and actively to make reforms in Eastern Kozan successful. In return for their cooperation, it was
planned to pay 2.500 piastres to Hacı Bey, 1.000 piastres to Mıstık Ağa, and 300 piastres to
Mufti Mehmed Tevfik Efendi as salaries.
218 BOA, İ.DH.1293-101635. (24 Cemazeyilevvel 1282 [15 October 1865]).
70
The letter also mentions Reyhaniye. It says the people of Reyhaniye still had a tribal
form, and there had to be a governmental presence to transform Reyhaniye into a proper town.
The figure for this task was Mürselzade Mustafa Bey, who had been cooperative with the army
from the very beginning and who was also a kapıcıbaşı219, a member of Reyhaniye’s dynasty
and, then, the protector of Reyhaniye road.220 He was assigned as administrator (müdür) there.
His task was to settle the Reyhaniye people who were still living in tents and to build a
government office, a courthouse, and other official buildings by using the unpaid taxes of
Reyhaniye from previous years. The letter also explains that another notable of the region,
Alibekiroğlu Ali Ağa understood that it was pointless to escape or resist when he saw the
strength of soldiers and the arrival of Albanian soldiers. Then he came to the army and asked his
brother Deli Fakı to settle in Adana. It also reports that the people of Sis left the mountains and
came to their homes; masters of villages and tribes lost their power and yielded. Even Ahmet
Ağa, son of the Western Kozan’s governor, Ömer Ağa, came to the army. Similarly, Eastern
Kozan’s villages and Yusuf Ağa subordinated. It lastly reports that the Reform Division planned
to assign its different tasks to state servants in the area and planned to stop the operation
temporarily before the arrival of winter to prevent soldiers from becoming exhausted.
In the following month, another letter was sent to the imperial center. The letter dated
November 16, 1865, tells that Yusuf Ağa, former administrative of Eastern Kozan, first yielded
to the army but then tried to escape and rebel, and was subsequently killed by soldiers.221 It
narrates the account in the following way. When Yusuf Ağa was going to be brought to Samsun,
he tried to run, but one of his companions, Monla Hasan Kahya caught him and gave him to the
219 A honorary title.
220 Reyhanlı members were actors of an early attempt of settlement in Amik Plain in 1840s, but they failed to
continue a sedentary life and economy due to the lack of sustainable political and environmental conditions. Gratien,
The Unsettled Plain, 52-53. Also see Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 38.
221 BOA, İ.DH. 1293-101639. (26 Cemazeyilahir 1282 [16 November 1865]).
71
army. Then, Yusuf Ağa attempted to escape for the second time, and in the process was killed by
the soldiers. The Division decided to grant one of mills (değirmen) of Yusuf Ağa to Monla
Hasan Kahya in return for his services. Moreover, a general plan for the Kozanoğlu family was
to cut their links with the region, sell their properties at auction, and send family members to
Istanbul. The only exception was Kozanoğlu Ahmet Pasha who was assigned as the Governor of
Kütahya. The letter also mentions that taking the bandits of Kırıntı under control was necessary
for reforms. To do that, these people had to be brought to Çukurova in a forceful way if they
resisted. The letter lastly reports that it was encouraged to carry out a census, conscription, and
conduction of the poll tax (iane-i askeriye).
Another report about the operation process, dated November 1865, is quite informative.222
It says the plan was to assign Samur Ağa, late Yusuf Ağa’s nephew, to the imperial guards
(Silahşöran-ı Hassa) and enroll Yusuf Ağa’s two other nephews and his son in a high school in
Istanbul. Other plans for Kozanoğlus were sending Mehmed Ağa, son of Hüseyin Ağa, to
Kayseri and sending Ahmet Ağa, son of Derviş Ağa, and two sons of Mehmed Ağa to town
Everek in Develi district, Kayseri. After they arrived at their settlement places, these people had
life-long salaries. Salaries were 800 piastres for Hüseyinağazade Mehmed Ağa and
Dervişağazade Ahmed Ağa, 600 piastres for Mehmed Ağa’s son Hamza Bey and 200 piastres for
Hamza Bey’s brother Mustafa Bey. Since Ömer Bey was dead, 2.350 piastres of his salary were
to be assigned to his family, and the remaining was left to the state treasury.223 The letter reports
that Hüsnü Pasha was appointed the governor of the newly established Kozan sanjak. The letter
also mentions that the late Mehmed Ağa’s sons, who were sent to Istanbul will receive salaries.
222 BOA, İ.DH. 1293-101640. (15 Cemazeyilahir 1282 [5 November 1865]).
223 It later notes that since one of Ömer Bey’s wives, Fettan Hanım, passed away, 100 piastres for her share were to
be reduced from the total amount.
72
Salaries were 300 piastres for Samur Ağa and 200 piastres for his younger brother Ali Bey.
Samur Ağa was going to be employed by the military and Ali Bey was going to study at the high
school of Mekteb-i İdadi-i Şahane. As these examples confirm, integrating members of the local
elite into the state apparatus had been a consistent policy as a layer of local reforms. During the
intervention and afterward, providing the targeted people with sustainable living conditions was
crucial for sustaining the reform’s success. In this context, Reform Division’s another attempt
was to build houses for the forcefully settled ones.
Ahmet Cevdet and Derviş Pashas sent a letter on January 14, 1866, to the imperial
center.224 In the letter, they reported that Çelikanlı and Delikanlı tribes’ settlement process was
progressing successfully. They explained that 100 households from each tribe were settling in
Islahiye in Maraş sanjak; more than two third of them settled, and the remaining ones were
waiting for their homes to be done. Other 120 households of the Delikanlı tribe were settled in a
place called Altuntop in Dumdum plain by establishing a new village called Altuntop; 100 other
households from the same tribe were settled in the same plain by launching a new village called
Gümüştepe, and 100 other households were settled by establishing a new village, Selim Dede. At
this time, 100 households of the Çelikanlı tribe were settled in the newly established Örtülüpınar,
and 125 households from the same tribe were settled in Arpalı Höyüğü, another freshly installed
village. Pashas underscored that this settlement process provided order and security.225
224 BOA, İ.DH. 545 – 37922. (4 Ramazan 1282 [21 January 1866]).
225 Even though the pashas reported the settlement of 225 households of the Çelikanlı tribe in Örtülüpınar and Arpalı
Höyüğü, other letter in the correspondence reports the settlement of 220 households in these villages.
73
In the context of providing the settled people with houses, another official
correspondence from September 1866 shows that the state launched a large-scale building
project to settle nomadic groups of the region.226
The tables below show the building data according to the document:
Table 2. Numbers of built houses for different groups in Sis.
Names of settler groups / Settling places Numbers of houses
Hacımirzalı tribe 52
Candik tribe 34
Mısırlı 13
Yeniköy ve Yörüğlü 109
Kabasakal tribe 101
Sırkıntılı tribe 515
[total] 824
İdem Aşireti 46
Gürün Aşireti 94
Alapınar and various settlements
(kara-i saireler)
50
Tecirli tribe 240
Cerit tribe 211
Bozdoğan tribe 256
[total] 1721
226 BOA, İ.MVL. 559-25130. (25 Rabiulahir 1283 [6 September 1866]).
74
Table 3. Number of built houses for different groups in Maraş and its environs
Names of settler groups / Settling places Number of houses
Sinamillü tribe 606
Atmalu tribe 137
Yukarı Kılıçlı Aşireti & Akça Koyunlu 202
Aşağı Kılıçlı Aşireti & Hacı Babek 156
Ceceli tribe 53
Kıllıoğlu obası 33
İloğlu obası 47
Çakallı ma’ Hopurlu Aşireti 111
[total] 1345
Table 4. Number of the built houses for different groups in Islahiye and its environs.
Names of settler groups / Settling places Numbers of houses
In Islahiye 213
Çelikanlı tribe 117
Delikanlı tribe 58
[total] 388
The correspondence also noted that 46 shops were built in this project, and the tribes
lived under the administration of Maraş, Adana, Kozan and Payas districts; and, during winters,
they stayed in tents called hu (hu tâbir olunur haymeler) and in summers they went to pastures
and stayed in their tents which were made of goats’ hair (kara çadır).227 Another critical point in
this official discourse is an emphasis on civilization. It stated that transforming those nomads’
227 Kara çadır is one of the central elements of nomadic life in Anatolia. “Kara” means black, and it refers to the
color of goats’ hair. For a comprehensive discussion on these tents’ usage by nomads, see: Kemal Reha Kavas,
“Mimariyi ‘Dokumak’: Anadolu - Batı Toros Göçerlerinde Çevre - Kültür İlişkisi,” Bilig / Türk Dünyası Sosyal
Bilimler Dergisi, no. 64 (2013): 231–58. Nomads did not only use goats hair in the construction of their tents.
Mehmet Ak suggests, skins of various animals, such as goats, cows, and blacksheep (karakoyun) were also used by
nomads in different corners of Anatolia. Mehmet Ak, “Batılı Gezginlerin Gözlemlerinde Yörük/Türkmen Çadırları,”
Türkiyat Mecmuası 29, no. 2 (2019): 351.
75
lifestyles from nomadism to civilization (bedâvetten hazârete tahvil eylemek) was a primary and
quite beneficial objective for the state.
Another correspondence containing letters from the summer and fall of 1866 explains
that houses were built in Pazaryeri and Bacburnu to settle Cerid and Tacirli tribes.228 According
to this document, settled villages and the number of houses were as follows:
Table 5. Number of the built houses for Cerid and Tacirli tribes.
According to this document, Tacirlis
and Cerids were notorious for their aggressive
attitudes against the settled population and
travelers; it says, in winters, Cerid and Tacirli
tribes stayed in Aleppo,229 and in summer days,
they scattered around different places and
mountains in Adana, Maraş, Elbistan, and
Sivas, with the pretext of transhumance. The
letter says that since these tribes had malignancy and aggressiveness (habâset ve şekâvet) by
their nature, they caused only damage to the settled population and travelers by intercepting
roads and committing murders. However, it was gladly reported that now these tribes were
settling around the Bacburnu, a large and fertile land in the Osmaniye district. They started to
engage in agriculture and were becoming settled agriculturalists. Even though the settlement
process, in particular, and the execution of the Tanzimat reforms in Çukurova in general, had
228 BOA, İ.DH. 551 – 38360. (1 Rabiulevvel 1283 [14 July 1866]).
229 It should be noted that today’s administrative borders do not exactly overlap with the borders of the late Ottoman
period. As a political center, Ottoman Aleppo had administrative authority over today’s Southern Anatolian cities
like Hatay and Osmaniye.
Name of settlements
(karye)
Number of houses
İzzettin karyesi 47
Dervişiye karyesi 123
Cevdetiye karyesi 81
Rızaiye karyesi 48
Yaveriye karyesi 46
Tevfikiye karyesi 40
Şükriye karyesi 23
Azizli karyesi 43
[total] 451
76
many setbacks, there was much evidence showing that the state tried to preserve reforms at its
utmost capacity. It should be noted that this village construction layer of the forced settlement
process had a spatial focus: “Sedentarization was applied throughout the Cilicia region, but
Upper Çukurova was the main locus of village construction. At least 3,800 houses and 35
villages were built for these communities under the auspices of the Reform Division, paid for by
the Ottoman government and private donations.”230
As one of the examples of this preservation effort, in a statement from the Council of the
State (Şura-i Devlet) from June 16, 1870, it is explained that previously, by settling 76
households of both Muslims and non-Muslims and building a government office, the Reform
Division initiated reforms in Payas.231 However, later, severe weather conditions (vehâmet-i
hava) hampered the progress.232 In this context, it is stated that since severe air conditions formed
an essential obstacle for the settlement, it was not fair to force house and business owners to
work and stay in the town; the ideal thing to do was to encourage people to live there by
reclaiming the swampy land.233 In this context, an investigation was launched. The investigation
showed that the first swampy land extended between Iskenderun and Payas, and its size was
about 811 dönüms234. For the reclamation of this land, an amount of about five yük and 87.000
(587.000) piastres were needed. The second swampy area extended between Payas and Burnaz
and surrounded 1.880 dönüms of land, and 99.060 piastres were required for the reclamation.
The third one was the Burnaz Reed Bed (Burnaz Sazlığı), which contained 11.854 dönüms of
230 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 67.
231 BOA, ŞD-2114-22. (16 Rabiulevvel 1287 [16 June 1870])
232 Similarly, Meltem Toksöz counts opening of canals for drainage among municipal efforts happened during
Mersin’s development. Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 92.
233 Although swamps were perceived as notorious for being unhealthy and harmful, Meltem Toksöz points outs that
they were beneficial for the land’s fertility. Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 23.
234 In the late Ottoman Context, a dönüm refers to an area of about 919 square meters. Feridun Emecen, “Dönüm,”
in İslam Ansiklopedisi, accessed on July 11, 2023. https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/donum
77
land, and the necessary amount for this land’s reclamation was about nine yük 83.000 (983.000)
piasters. Here, it is discussed that even though the land proclamation was costly, selling and
farming the reclaimed land would bring revenue. So, this aspect of the settlement had different
dimensions, like alteration of the landscape and land ownership as well. The state agents knew
that the lands covered with large swamp swaths were not suitable for habitation, and reclamation
projects were of great importance for further settlement efforts.
In the second half of the 19th century, Ottoman Çukurova was where nomadic tribes and
local dynasties enjoyed significant autonomy; swamps extended along with large territories, and
a lack of regional stability and security notoriously diminished trade activities and agricultural
production. In those decades, the Ottoman state had zealous attempts to establish its authority
over the empire and increase its means of extraction, namely conscription, and taxation. In this
context, the state’s interventions in the Çukurova region were intensified, and with the Reform
Division’s operations in 1865, the region faced significant structural transformations.
During the Çukurova’s complicated reformation process, there was no monolithic
peripheral structure; local agents and their relationships with each other and the state could vary
remarkably.235 Regarding the state, there could also be diverse approaches and internal
negotiations. Therefore, the reformation process was not linear, and the participating parties’
positions would change depending on conditions. The methods were also numerous. As burning
down villages, taking hostages, and engaging in a battle would be options, building shops and
houses, and creating agricultural fields would also be ways to establish the state authority in the
region. Since it was a multi-layered process that lasted for decades, there is much more to be
235 For a comprehensive examination of the Ottoman state’s changing relationships with different nomadic tribes
that had contrasting internal dynamics and structures, see: Köksal, “Coercion and Mediation,” 479-487.
78
mentioned, and by covering the events of the following years, a more comprehensive discussion
of the period can be conducted.
1.3. Reconstruction Efforts: Preserving the Reforms
After the initial efforts to pacify the region and force the local actors to cooperate, the Ottoman
state was aware that the reconstruction projects and the creation of socio-economic alternatives
for people were vital to transforming the region. These initiatives for the transformation were
multiple. Even though many projects mentioned in the official documents of the 1860s did not
materialize or materialized to a limited extent, an analysis of such documents is essential to
understand how the state agents perceived, understood, and designed this provincial
transformation. Meltem Toksöz explains these projects’ actual place for reforms: “Thus, a large
part of Çukurova remained more or less nomadic until technical improvements began to allow
for habitation. That is probably why many travelers described Çukurova as almost empty at the
beginning of the 19th century.”236
Infrastructure projects constituted a primary aspect of the post-intervention efforts by the
state. In this context, an early example of official correspondence from the 1866 summer shows
that there was a plan to install a telegraph line between Adana and Tarsus.237 Thereupon,
prominent merchants from Mersin offered that if the line was to be extended to the port of
Mersin, they were ready to pay for telegraph poles and workers’ wages. However, the center
refused the offer by saying that although it was a good offer, the treasury could not afford other
parts of the system, like telegraph wires. They said it was best to do this extension in the
236 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 27.
237 BOA, MVL. 1059-36. (23 Rabiulevvel 1283 [5 August 1866]).
79
future.238 Therefore, Mersin, which was going to be an extremely important trade hub in the
coming decades, was not a key place in the eyes of the central authorities yet. Another tool to
know about and consequently control over the region was geographical maps. As referred to in
the introduction of this thesis, the state realized that there were misrepresentations of the region
until the Reform Division went there, and the maps had big mistakes.239 Two officers prepared a
map of Aleppo province to fix the situation, and Governor Ahmet Cevdet planned to print the
map in the provincial press. In this context of the state’s efforts to learn about the region and its
population, in another letter from 1870 summer, the General Council of the Adana Province
discusses that tribes from Karataş went to Divle and Karaman in the summers, which entails
difficulties in tax collection and policing.240 They reported that there were 4.000 households of
nomadic tribes and decided to investigate the region with the following questions: How many
tribes were there, what were their names, where they stayed, and where were the good places
with water sources, pastures, and good air to settle the tribes? Since the tribes went to pastures in
summers and to winter quarters in winters with their flocks and camels, and damaged people and
goods on their way, the state planned to prevent the tribes from transhumance, settle them in
appropriate places, make houses with stone and adobe, and familiarize tribe members with
agriculture. However, a tribe’s settlement could last for years and require negotiations. The state
wanted to understand and scale the region as a part of the transformation. In addition, since
environmental conditions had central importance in the daily life of the 19th century Çukurova,
238 Yonca Köksal’s comparative work on Edirne and Ankara’s Tanzimat experiences shows that local actors’
participation in reconstruction projects and cooperation with the central administration played key roles in provincial
reform processes. In the case of Edirne, especially the thriving merchant class actively supported the state’s
reconstruction projects since the reconstruction was quite beneficial for their works. Köksal, The Ottoman Empire in
the Tanzimat Era.120-124.
239 BOA, A. MKT. MHM. 387-47. (25 Rabiulevvel 1284 [27 July 1867]).
240 BOA, ŞD. 2114-39. (1 Cemazeyilevvel 1287 [30 July 1870]).
80
the state had to deal with them to sustain the reforms. Reclamation projects had the utmost
importance among the efforts of the state agents for the regional transformation.
In a letter from June 6, 1869, the governor of Adana reports that the accumulation of
water from different sources caused the formation of swamps and reed beds between Payas and
Adana, forcing the settled people to leave the area.241 He says that if the accumulated water
flowed through ditches, the damage would end, and securing fresh air in the area would benefit
both the state and the people. The governor demanded the appointment of two engineers for the
reclamation. On this demand, three officials were appointed to the region, and Mr. Ervin, who
was trained in France (in Paris Şose Mektebi), was the chief engineer. As another aspect of
infrastructure projects, construction of roads, too, was mentioned in the documents. In a letter on
infrastructure works in the region, it is reported that the Sultan was happy about broadening the
roads from Sis and Kars-ı Zülkadriye towns in Kozan to the town of Haçin, construction of a
new bridge over the Göksu river and, settlement of 300 households of Tecirlü tribe from the
district of Haruniye in Maraş by forming five villages (karye).242 The letter says that the tribal
members were nomads and they used to commit brigandage (şekavet) for a long time. However,
since the last year, they were settled in Adana and Maraş as a part of the regional reforms. The
imperial center encouraged the local government to continue such reformative works.
A letter from the summer of 1870 shows that the General Council of the Adana Province
(Meclis-i Umumi-i Vilayet) decided to develop madder and opium agriculture in the Rum district
(nahiye) of Bilanköy.243 The letter discusses that the state settled people who became familiar
with agriculture in the region. It also argues the development of madder and opium production
241 BOA, İ. DH. 598-41673. (7 Cemazeyilahir 1286 [14 September 1869]).
242 BOA, A. MKT. MHM. 382-37. (15 Muharrem 1284 [19 May 1867]).
243 BOA, ŞD. 2114-45. (1 Cemazeyilevvel 1287 [30 July 1870]).
81
would contribute to the living conditions of settled people. To do that, the council decided to
bring opium seeds from Karahisar-Sahip and madder seeds from Ereğli. In a similar context in
1866, it was decided to provide 4000-5000 olive grafts from Mytilene, where high-quality olives
are grown, and to graft wild olive trees in and around Mount Kozan.244 Therefore, the state
attempted to prepare sustainable conditions for agriculture with various projects of various
scales. However, after becoming fully aware of the unsustainability of a sudden switch to a
sedentary lifestyle, the central authorities allowed seasonal migration of tribes to a limited extent.
In this context, the Administrative Council of Adana (Adana Vilayeti İdare Meclisi)
mentioned a petition from Tacirli and Cerid tribes in 1876.245 The tribes explained that they were
accustomed to going to pastures, but the Reform Division forbade their move to pastures with the
idea of preserving reforms. The tribes said that this ban caused them considerable loss of people
and animals. Since their primary subsistence was animal breeding and trade, they suffered from
poverty under the new conditions. They also underscored that the loss of people caused a
diminishing number of men to be conscripted, and even though they had fertile soils, agriculture
was seriously damaged, which meant a loss to the treasury. Learning about the situation, the state
allowed them to go highlands in Cebel-i Bereket for three months. However, the ground was
stony (sengistan), transportation was difficult, and there was not enough space for animals and
nomads. Besides, animals were dying because there were no pastures. For these reasons and by
promising not to involve any violent actions, the tribes demanded to be allowed to go to their old
pastures between Haçin and Andırın. The Administrative Council commented that since these
tribes were accustomed to travel to pastures in hot seasons, it was understood that forbidding
them from pastures entailed considerable loss of people and animals. The council highlighted
244 BOA, A. MKT. MHM. 349-43. (10 Şevval 1282 [26 February 1866]).
245 BOA, ŞD. 2117-55. (6 Cemazeyilahir 1293 [29 June 1876]).
82
that all types of animals these two districts (nahiye) bred were sold to merchants from
neighboring places.
The document continues; nevertheless, the Tacirli and Cerid lost their trading capacity
and even needed to buy animals. The council emphasized that these people were already taken
under control (daire-i terbiyeye girmiş), and the reforms were carried out anyway. Thus, there
was no harm in sending them to their pastures. Besides, the highlands in Cebel-i Bereket were
assigned to Nogays, and it was clear that the area was insufficient to further accomodate both
Tacirli and Cerids. After their settlements in Adana, the state prevented Sırkıntı, Bozdoğan,
Karakayalı, and other tribes from going to their pastures. However, since officials understood
that this ban caused the loss of people and animals, they allowed the tribes to go to the pastures
as they used to do earlier. The council asked for permission for the people of Cerid and Tacirli
districts to be allowed to go their pastures as long as they continued cultivation, paid their taxes
on time, did no cause any damage on their way. It said that allowing them to go to the pastures
would not harm the reform process and it would be beneficial for the tribes’ wellbeing. In
response, the Council of the State (Şura-i Devlet) explained that since these people did not settle
thoroughly, such permission for pastures would cause them to revert to their previous practices.
Consequently, it would set a bad example for parties willing to revert to nomadism. Thus, the
council refused to grant the permission.
This particular petition illuminates several phenomena about the Çukurova’s reform
process. Firstly, the state could be flexible in sustaining its policies. When the official authorities
saw that strict prevention of tribes’ mobility could cause considerable damage to people and
animals, certain tribes were allowed to go to their pastures as they used to do. This decision also
implies that the authorities were aware of the necessity of transhumance. However, they could
83
treat different parties in different ways. While Bozdoğans, Sırkıntıs, and Karakayalıs were
allowed to continue their transhumance as they were used to, Tacirlis and Cerids were exposed to
strict prevention. There might have been multiple explanations for this, but each party’s different
level of cooperation with the state seems to be one of the most compelling reasons. As Yonca
Köksal argues, depending on the tribes’ structural dynamics, different tribes’ levels of
cooperation with the state could vary considerably, leading the state to treat various parties
differently.246
The correspondence also shows that more than a decade after the Reform Division’s
intervention, many tribes performed animal breeding and cultivation synchronically. Thus, it can
be interpreted as the state’s previous efforts to limit animal breeding and to extend agriculture
were not only about economic motives but also political ones. Cultivating cereals and cotton did
not only mean agricultural taxes but also that the cultivators had to be in their fields for definite
periods; the state could find, monitor, and control people more easily. Once the state’s control
mechanisms were entrenched enough, nomadism posed less danger to the state authority. To see
whether animal breeding had continued to be an essential revenue source immediately after the
state intervention, provincial yearbooks of the state (salnames) from 1870s can be checked.
Provincial yearbooks are official accounts that provide comprehensive information on
provinces. They mention several topics like a province’s administration, military, economy,
history, and nature. However, different yearbooks of different provinces can differ considerably.
For example, yearbooks of Erzurum province for 1288 (1871),247 1291 (1874)248, 1292 (1875)249,
246 Köksal, “Coercion and Mediation,” 479-487.
247 Salname-i Vilayet-Erzurum (1288 [1871]), 156-157.
248 Salname-i Vilayet-Erzurum (1291 [1874]),148-150.
249 Salname-i Vilayet-Erzurum (1292 [1875]), 156-158.
84
and 1294 (1877)250 provide tables that show numbers of animals in the province. However,
yearbooks of Adana published in 1870s do not have similar tables. However, five of these
yearbooks of Adana have tables of provincial revenue. In these tables, collected sheep taxes
(ağnam rüsumu) are given.251
Graph 1. Sheep taxes collected in Adana province during the 1870s.
250 Salname-i Vilayet-Erzurum (1294 [1877]), 140-142.
251 Salname-i Vilayet-i Adana (1289 [1872]), 140; Salname-i Vilayet-i Adana (1290 [1873]), 137; Salname-i Vilayeti
Adana (1294 [1877]), 132; Salname-i Vilayet-i Adana (1296 [1879]), 210; Salname-i Vilayet-i Adana (1297
[1880]), 163. Information for the taxes of 1874 is taken from Report by Consul Skene On the Trade, Navigation,
Agriculture, Manufactures, Public Works and Revenues of North Syria for the year 1874. In the Graph 1,
information of sheep tax for 1294 (1877) is obtained from BOA, İ. MMS. 65-3070. (2 Safer 1297 [15 January
1880]). In this context, Victor Langlois refers to Adana Pashalik’s different revenue items in his travel notes.
According to him the Pashalik had 17.000 piastres (4250 francs) of animal tax (“sürü hayvanlarından alınan
vergi”), 2.000 piastres (500 francs) of camel tax (“develerden alınan vergiler”), and 3.000 piastres (750 francs) of
nomads’ tent taxes (“yörük çadırlarından alınan vergi”). Langlois, Kilikya’ya Yolculuk, 61. In addition, Langlois
states that yörüks who come down to plains pay an extra tax of 5 piastres, and also the state charges a fee of 1 piastre
on top of delalil tax for each camel sold, while the fee’s rate was about 2.5% for each cattle sold, and 5 paras for
sheep and goats. Ibid., 62.
0
500000
1000000
1500000
2000000
2500000
3000000
3500000
4000000
4500000
5000000
1287
(1870)
1290
(1873)
1874 1292
(1875)
1294
(1877)
1295
(1878)
1296
(1879)
Sheep Tax (Piastres)
85
Table 6. Share of Sheep Taxes in Total Revenues of Adana Province in five years
Share of Sheep Tax in Total Revenue
1290 (1873) 19.35%
1874 9.26%
1292 (1875) 18.69%
1295 (1878) 14.42%
1296 (1879) 18.1%
The table and the graph show that taxes for sheep in Adana province fluctuated and decreased at
certain years during the 1870s. During this decade that immediately followed the years of the
state intervention, there were several factors that could influence animal breeding. At first, there
were direct effects of the forced settlement and consequent animal losses. Although the literature
suggests that Adana was not directly influenced by the 1873-1875 Central Anatolian famine, it
was a far-reaching natural phenomenon. During the decade, there were also incentives by the
state to increase agricultural production. However, the percentage of sheep taxes in the
province’s total revenue indicates that even though it fluctuated, it remained an important income
source. The existent data shows that in the first years following the state intervention by Fırka-i
Islahiye, animals still played major economic roles. Since the official discourse presents
agriculture as the main alternative to animal breeding, a comparative look between the sheep tax
and the tithe (tax for agricultural production) might be enlightening.252 However, it should be
noted that there were structural problems with tax collection practices and the preparation of
official tax figures at the time. So, even though official data about tax collection can be very
252 In the yearbook of 1873, it is noted that since the amount of 1873’s tithe is not known yet and the weather was
droughty, this approximate amount is calculated by comparison to the previous year.
86
helpful in tracing important trends, it is hard to learn the exact numbers of collected tax from
these tables.
Graph 2 Sheep Taxes and Tithe collected in Adana province during the 1870s.
According to the table above, tithe revenues experienced considerable decreases during
most of the decade. Again, agricultural production and taxation of this production were open to
many external impacts. As one of the possible factors, Meltem Toksöz mentions a rampage in
tax abuses during the time.253 Understandably, yearly changes in natural factors like weather
conditions were also influential on the level of agricultural production. In addition, Chris Gratien
states, the end of the US Civil War stopped the extraordinary levels of cotton production in the
region.254 It can be assumed that this relatively negative table contradicts the Çukurova image
depicted in the yearbooks. The yearbooks are mostly repetitive texts, and it is constantly
emphasized that most of the province has quite a fertile land suitable for cultivation of various
crops. In these texts, Çukurova is an agricultural hub that produces cereals, fruits, and vegetables
253 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 141-143.
254 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 71-73.
0
2000000
4000000
6000000
8000000
10000000
12000000
14000000
16000000
1287 (1870) 1290 (1873) 1874 1292 (1875) 1295 (1878) 1296 (1879)
Sheep Tax (Piastres) Tithe (Piastres)
87
enough to be exported to other cities and countries. For example, it is said that wheat, barley, and
cotton are exported from Adana to different places like Istanbul and Europe; Tarsus exports most
of its cereal and cotton products to Europe and neighboring cities; in Anamur, different products
like cereals, tobacco, lemons, oranges, various vegetable are cultivated, and the surplus is
exported to Cyprus, Beirut, and Alexandria; in Silifke, different agricultural products like
cereals, watermelon, beans, and cotton are cultivated, and they are occasionally exported to
Cyprus.255 While agricultural production is constantly emphasized, the same texts rarely mention
animals. It is reported that in Osmaniye, most people are engaged in agriculture, but still, many
cattle (kara sığır), sheep, and goats. In the yearbook of 1877, it is reported that the people of
Gülnar cultivate different products while tribal groups (aşiret takımı) are making a living from
agriculture and animal products.256 Even though animal taxes remained an important source of
income and animal breeding continued to be a way of making a living for many; animals are
disproportionately less represented in the provincial yearbooks.
There might be several explanations for this. In his dissertation, Chris Gratien touches
upon this issue and suggests that the provincial yearbooks might have ignored particular local
dynamics, and the state’s capacity to know about the region was limited.257 In the context of postsettlement
Çukurova, these approaches are convincing. From a statist perspective, it was a time
when increasing agricultural production allowed the state to collect regular taxes, monitor and
conscript people, and transform idle landscapes into fertile cultivation fields. Thus, following the
government's political agenda, it is understandable that official discourses could overemphasize
255 Salname-i Vilayet-i Adana (1290 [1873]), 55-56, 67, 101; Salname-i Vilayet-i Adana (1294 [1877]), 114-115.
256 Salname-i Vilayet-i Adana (1294 [1877]), 119.
257 Gratien, “The Mountains Are Ours,”, 171.
88
the agricultural aspect of the region while ignoring the animals. However, Ottoman state officials
were not alone in suggesting that Adana was already an agrarian hub.258
British consul of Aleppo, James Henry Skene, reported that eighty percent of people in
Adana were making a living by agriculture.259 Also, his tables for the province’s commercial
activity show that agricultural products had the biggest share in the regional trade. For example,
in 1874, wheat worth 25.000 £; barley worth 200.000 £; cotton worth 23.700 £; sesame worth
22.000 £; madder worth 3.000 £ were exported and shipped from Mersin. In comparison, wool
worth 7.500 £ and hides worth 18.000 £ were exported as animal products.260 Similar to the
silence of Ottoman official documents about animals, the consulate report informs little about
them. As an internal trade item, the consul reports that dried beef worth 1.200 £ was sold.
Another trade item was carpet. As the producer of carpets, the consul mentions: “Turcoman
tribes, which weave them, not being dependent for their support on harvests but flocks, have
enjoyed their habitual livelihood, and extended their industry.”261 The consul also mentions that
tanneries in Adana provide hides from Turcoman tribes’ livestock. So, there is fragmental
information in the consulate report about animals.
Depending on the provincial yearbooks and the consulate report for 1874, it can be
argued that Çukurova experienced important economic and demographic changes in the 1870s.
Agriculture became the main occupation, and life in the region was shaped around it. A closer
look to archival documents helps to explain how the region was pacified and transformed into an
258 Even though the effects of the cotton-boom happened in 1860s were massive for Çukurova, it was not the first
time the region became a center of cotton production. The region served as a cotton producer also in early modern
context, and also during the Egyptian rule in Çukurova. Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 46, 61.
259 “Report by Consul Skene on the Trade, Navigation, Agriculture, Manufactures, Public Works and Revenues of
North Syria for the year 1874,” in Reports from Her Majesty’s Consuls on the Manufactures, Commerce, &c., of
Their Consular Districts. Part VI. (London: Harrison and Sons, 1875), 1706.
260 Ibid., 1701. Other items on the export table are rags, wax, and sundries.
261 Ibid., 1705.
89
agricultural economic center; reclamation projects, forced settlement of nomads, investments in
infrastructure and agriculture were some of the initiatives of the state. However, as all the
sources attest, nomads and their animals were still important elements of the region and the lack
of information about them is surprising. In this time of great change, certain ecological events
played extraordinary roles. Even though it did not directly hit the Çukurova region, the famine
that hit Central Anatolia between 1873 and 1875 was one of those events.
British Consul Skene mentions a terrible famine in Ankara in his report on North Syria
for the year 1874.262 This calamity, later known as the 1873-1875 famine, caused extreme
suffering as one of the biggest famines in 19th century Ottoman and harmed even Syria, a
relatively distant corner of the empire. Lasting around three years, the famine claimed the lives
of thousands of people and animals and caused massive migration waves. Skene observed that
the devastating process influenced his consulship area. He explains that North Syria’s trade
mostly depended on the Anatolian market, which the consul describes as an area starting from
the Taurus Mountains to the Black Sea shores, where fairs took place annually, and these events
constituted a significant revenue for Northern Syrian traders.263
Many hundreds of lives having been lost from sheer starvation, a large proportion of the rural population
having emigrated to other parts of Turkey in search of work or alms, and the remaining inhabitants being in
a very critical condition between want and occasional relief from Constantinople, it could not be expected
that the usual fairs should be held, or that merchandize should be sent to the towns and villages for sale.264
The famine, which was strong enough to damage even distant places like Syria, was
horrible for Central Anatolia. In her dissertation, Özge Ertem analyzes the impacts of the Central
Anatolian famine of 1873-1875 in different contexts like the economy, environment, and social
262 Ibid., 1686.
263 Ibid., 1691.
264 Ibid., 1691.
90
relationships.265 According to Ertem’s account, the droughty summer of 1873 can be accepted as
the starting point of the famine, which lasted until the spring of 1875.266 During this period,
Central Anatolia experienced extraordinary climatic conditions like freezing winter, droughty
summer, and failure of crops, which entailed massive emigration waves.267 During the famine
and its aftermath, people and animals died extraordinarily due to starvation, diseases, and lack of
care.268 Ertem asserts that the center of the famine was Ankara, but it directly affected an area as
large as to reach Konya, Niğde, and Tokat. However, she argues that considering the large
migration waves, the famine’s consequences affected a larger area.269 Similarly, Yener Bayar
counted Izmit among the places that the famine hit because it became a center for the immigrants
who tried to find a refuge.270 Thus, due to unbearable conditions in the immediate famine area,
immigration waves emerged as a major result of this calamity.
Adana was not in the immediate famine area, but this process indirectly impacted the
city, which was among the cities where the immigrants took refuge.271 When needy immigrants
came to Adana, smallpox and typhus claimed thousands of people’s lives in the city. Grain
exportation in Adana paused when the government prohibited the exportation of this item to feed
people there.272 Similarly, Yener Bayar interprets Adana’s role in the famine process as an
indirectly affected place. For example, he mentions that Adana had an enormously productive
crop in 1874, so they asked for large numbers of seasonal workers to harvest. However, in the
265 Özge Ertem, “Eating the Last Seed: Famine, Empire, Survival and Order in Ottoman Anatolia in the Late 19th
Century,” (PhD diss., European University Institute, 2012).
266 Ibid., 41-44.
267 Ibid., 41-47.
268 Ibid., 41.-47, 72-73. Yener Bayar explains that the famine caused dramatic animal losses, and it posed fiscal
problems for the state treasury. Yener Bayar, “1873-185 Orta Anadolu Kıtlığı” (MA, Marmara Üniversitesi, 2013),
23, 54.
269 Ertem, “Eating the Last Seed,” 41.
270 Bayar, “1873-185 Orta Anadolu Kıtlığı,” 9.
271 Here, other places Ertem counts are Konya, Bursa, Tarsus, and Istanbul. Ertem, “Eating the Last Seed,” 176.
272 Ibid., 47, 173.
91
same year, people starved to death in Adana, and 1.018 people fled from the famine area were
living on Adana’s streets.273 Bayar adds that the local government complained about the
immigrants in Adana, stating that the previous year was already droughty, and the presence of
the immigrants worsened the situation.274
These sources argue that the extreme climatic conditions did not hit the Çukurova region
immediately, but the famine and its social consequences affected the region. It can be asserted
that Adana, as an already settled urban center, became a hub for immigrants and the social and
economic tension that the migration waves brought. The region already had its ups and downs
and being a refuge for immigrants meant extra effort and cost. It seems that the local government
in Adana was not very enthusiastic about caring for these natural disaster victims. It tried to keep
the province’s resources for themselves. It is almost impossible to assess the misery the
immigrants suffer from. However, the present evidence is insufficient to suggest that this famine
caused a significant change for the animals in Çukurova at the time.
During the years immediately following the Reform Division’s intervention, the Ottoman
state’s endeavors to transform the Çukurova region rapidly increased. The primary aims of state
agents were to settle nomads, to conduct large-scale building and reclamation projects, and to
record, tax, and conscript people. In many incidents, the state’s zeal for rapid change rendered
the lives of people and animals in Çukurova difficult. People and animals who survived these
immediate years experienced a very different Çukurova in the following decades.
273 Bayar, “1873-185 Orta Anadolu Kıtlığı,” 77, 95.
274 Ibid., 95. Bayar also notes that 1893 was an unproductive year for Tarsus and Mersin. Ibid., 80. Regarding a role
local officials played during that period, Meltem Toksöz states: “Especially in time of crisis, as during the famine of
1873-1874 and the 1877-1878 War, administrators, including the kaymakam (local governor) of Mersin, made
profits through their collaboration with merchants.” Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 89.
92
CHAPTER 4
POST-SETTLEMENT ÇUKUROVA:
CHANGING AGRICULTURAL AND ANIMAL BREEDING PRACTICES
1.1. DEVELOPMENT OF COMMERCIAL AGRICULTURE AND ITS INFLUENCES
“Old proud days were left in laments and folk songs. After the settlement, the ones who could
run away fled; others died in Çukurova’s heat. The ones who survived desperately learned how
to farm. They did not want to settle, not to mention to be recorded by the state. For centuries,
they had been traveling through steppes with their flocks.”275
The forced settlement and the subsequent rapid commercialization of the region changed
Çukurova extensively. The transformation lasted for decades and greatly influenced the area’s
demographics, ecology, local politics, economy, and culture. From the state’s perspective, the
Reform Division’s intervention was successful. Local potentates who had considerable political
and militaristic capacity were either integrated into state apparatus, mostly as council members,
or exiled. At the cost of the lives of the tribal population and their animals, the state managed to
penetrate the region to establish its exploitation mechanisms. Well influenced by regional and
global crises such as the Russo-Ottoman War and the cotton boom due to American Civil War,
the plain became a hub of immigrants while the agricultural economy skyrocketed.276 In this
275 “Eski görkemli günleri ağıtlarda, türkülerde kalmıştı. İskandan sonra kaçan kaçtı, kaçamayanlar, Çukurun
sıcağında kalanlar kırıldılar. Kırılmayanlar ekip biçmeyi öğrendiler çarnaçar. Onlar yerleşmeyi sevmiyorlardı.
Hükümetlerin kayıtlarına geçmeyi hiç sevmiyorlardı. Yüzyıllardır bozkırlarda sürüleriyle ora senin bura benim akıp
duruyorlardı” Yaşar Kemal, Demirciler Çarşısı Cinayeti (Istanbul: Tekin Yayınevi, 1983), 360-361. The translation
to English is mine.
276 Meltem Toksöz describes the transformation powered by the settlement of nomads, development of large-scale
commercial agriculture, and advancement of Mersin as an influential Mediterranean port city as a process that
changed Çukurova from a “mostly a marshland with few settlements and a large nomadic population” to a “major
region of commercial cotton agriculture and textile production that placed it among the leading areas of Anatolia and
the Ottoman Empire.” Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 3. Chris Gratien identifies that this type of Çukurova
description as well restated by several historians, and comments as: “… there is nothing that makes cotton fields
93
locale of multi-religious and multi-cultural existence, different segments of society experienced
the decades-long process asymmetrically. Although many historical actors must have
experienced the effects of massive changes in multiple ways, certain changes were more visible.
Alteration of the centuries-long seasonal migration practices after harsh negotiations was
one example of more visible changes. Immediately after the intervention, the official policies
were mainly in line with the comprehensive prevention of seasonal migration and mobility of
larger groups, such as tribes. This process exposed the forcefully settled ones to several
detrimental factors, such as oppressive air and illnesses that caused the loss of so many people
and animals.277 After this highly pernicious phase and consequent negotiations with the
forcefully settled, the Ottoman government adopted a relatively lenient approach. In the context
of the lengthy negotiations between central authorities and Çukurova’s residents on seasonal
migration of different forms in the post-settlement process, Chris Gratien aptly identifies the
government’s move, which tolerated the tribal mobility once it ceased to threaten the state’s
exploitation mechanisms: “While local practices certainly might have differed, in the official
discourse, the yayla season was no longer part and parcel of the economic activity of those
communities. The yayla was purely a retreat for those who could not take the heat of the
lowlands.”278 Thus, curtailing the pastoral economy and leading tribal people to agricultural
production, mostly without their consent, has been a primary policy for the central authorities.
In this context, it should be noted that even though certain groups in particular area could
invest in pastoralism or farming more intensively, these industries were not mutually exclusive.
inherently better than swamps or dense population preferable to sparse population.” Gratien, “The Mountains Are
Ours,”, 6-7.
277 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 69-70.
278 Ibid., 87. Gould, too, interprets the official attitude in a similar way. Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 161. In this
context, Gould elaborates on major aspects of the seasonal migration. He counts three, one is a “nomadic
wanderlust,” other is conducting a pastoral economy, and the last is escaping malaria. Ibid., 171-172.
94
Reşat Kasaba emphasizes this accommodating relationship between farmers and tribes in
Ottoman Anatolia and suggests that tribal members could cultivate uncultivated land or work for
a farmer; “they could incorporate it [farming] into their seasonal migration.”279 Similarly, in her
article on 18th century Çukurova, Işık Tamdoğan emphasizes the “fluid identities” and argues
that it was usual for a nomad to work in farmland or settle down in a city.280 However, the level
of fragmentary occupation of the tribes with agriculture contrasted with the official agenda.
Large segments of the Çukurova population were pushed to participate in commercial agriculture
in uneven and different ways.
As the cotton boom became the transformative engine for Çukurova, every existent party
played their unique role: “But the 1870s marked the beginning of a new period in Çukurova,
particularly as the Forced Settlement and settlement of immigrants began to pay off. Settled
population had increased and the non-settled worked as seasonal agricultural workers.”281 The
rapid increase in commercial agriculture created an immense demand for agricultural labor,
usually provided by immigrant laborers of various ethnic and religious backgrounds.282 The tribal
population constituted another significant source of much-needed agrarian labor in the years
following the intervention by the Reform Division.283 Andrew G. Gould explains that newly
settled people in the Eastern part of the plain were conducting large-scale agricultural production
by the early 1880s.284 In accordance, Meltem Toksöz emphasizes the large land-holding patterns
279 Kasaba, A Moveable Empire, 32.
280 Tamdoğan, “Nezir Ya Da XVIII. Yüzyıl Çukurova’sında Eşkıya, Göçebe ve Devlet Arasındaki İlişkiler,” 137.
281 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 160.
282 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 101-102. Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 199.
283 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 143. In this context, Toksöz underscores the centrality of the tribal population’s
transformation into agricultural labor: “Whether in the 1830s or the 1870s, attempts at commercialization required
some sort of monitoring of the nomads. This was necessary not only to provide security and order for agricultural
settlements but also much-needed labor in this landscape of sparse population” Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and
Cotton, 20.
284 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 166-167.
95
developed in Ceyhan Plain after the 1880s and states that by 1895, most deeds were granted for
250 dönüms or more.285 In the context of the early commercialized western part, Meltem Toksöz
points out that this large-scale economic shift was also intrinsically bound with local politics:
“Old powers that could not adapt to the new economic structure based on agricultural surplus
began to lose both money and power.”286 In a similar line of argument, Chris Gratien summarizes
commercialization’s structural effect on regional dynamics: “Until the 1860s, the mountains had
served as the stronghold of local power and political legitimacy, but by the beginning of the
twentieth century, the city of Adana was unquestionably Cilicia’s center.”287 This change caused
cultural changes, too. New artworks were dedicated to commercial agriculturalist Çukurova.
Figure 6 below shows the cover page of Çukurova Destanı (Legend of Çukurova), and it tells
much about the new imaginations of the region: Endless tracks of cotton and wheat surrounded
by mountain ranges.288
285 Meltem Toksöz, “Bir Coğrafya, Bir Ürün, Bir Bölge: 19. Yüzyılda Çukurova,” Kebikeç, no. 21 (2006): 105.
286 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 162.
287 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 108.
288 Ahmet Vefa Aray, Çukurova Destanı (Adana Yurt Matbaası, 1947). However, all legends from this time were
not admiring the rapidly growing agricultural investments. In the same period, in 1948, a local bard from the region,
Aşık Bayram, composed a poem named Pirinç Destanı (Legend of Paddy), in which he harshly criticized the
enlarging paddy fields that worsened a high rate of malaria. Şerif Korkut, Isıtma ve Çeltik (Ankara: Yeni Matbaa,
1950), 48-49. In his book, Chris Gratien extensively discusses the process in the first half of the 20th century when
massive paddy fields covered different corners of Çukurova, and also refers to this poem. See Gratien, The Unsettled
Plain, 223-229.
96
Figure 6. Cover page of the book Çukurova Destanı
In his poem “The Cotton Field” (“Pamuk Tarlası”), Aray also credits cooperation between
humans and animals:
It is the power of oxen that plows this field,
It is the human’s arm that makes the field breathe.
Öküzün gücüdür burayı süren,
İnsanın koludur aldıran soluk.289
In this environment of thorough change, Toksöz considers incorporating nomadic groups
and nomadic elites into thriving commerce and bureaucratization as a major component of
289 Ibid., 10. The translation to English is mine.
97
regional transformation.290 Regarding the incorporation of nomads into the capital accumulation,
Toksöz asserts that tribal elites contributed as investors, and many others became wage laborers
in agriculture.291 The tribal population’s engagement with the accumulating capital in Çukurova
materialized through agriculture and in several other ways. For example, they took part in the
logistics business after the repairment of the Adana-Mersin road.292 As a demographical
reflection of the increased labor migration, Naci Akverdi suggests that the thriving economy
pulled large populations, consequently rendering Adana as a multi-cultural venue rather than a
center for a closed community.293 Edwin John Davis, a British traveler who visited Çukurova in
the 1870s, gives the numbers of 50.000 to 70.000 for temporary agricultural workers, including
Syrian Arabs and Kurds from various cities.294 Davis comments that most of the time,
agricultural workers were exposed to diseases and extreme weather conditions, which rendered
them sick and weak; however, Davis states that once the workers survived the work of a couple
of weeks, they could collect enough money to sustain their families for some months.295
Both Chris Gratien and Meltem Toksöz strongly emphasize that the transformation
process materialized considerably differently in the eastern and western parts of the Çukurova, as
commercialization, development of infrastructure, and urbanization materialized faster in the
west.296 In this context, by mentioning the establishment of a railway between Adana and Mersin,
Gratien gives an apt example to show the asymmetry better: “Suddenly, a provincial district like
Osmaniye was no longer just as far from Adana as Mersin, it was six times farther from the
290 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 97. Also see Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 110, 122.
291 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 135-136.
292 Ibid., 94.
293 Naci Akverdi, Adana: Cumhuriyetten Evvel ve Sonra (Ankara: Ulus Basımevi, 1937), 18.
294 E.J. Davis, Life in Asiatic Turkey. A Journal of Travel in Cilicia (Pedias and Trachoea), Isauria, and Parts of
Lycaonia and Cappadocia (London: Edward Stanford, 1879), 172.
295 Ibid., 172.
296 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 96, 108. Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 158.
98
provincial capital than was the growing port.”297 Consistent and gradual expansion of Mersin as
an international port city that functioned as a medium between the world's different ports and
south Anatolia contributed extensively to the commercialization.298
As always has been the case, all these political, social, and urban changes in Çukurova
were very well reflected in nature. Regarding the post-settlement process, Chris Gratien
demonstrates the complex links between de-population and de-forestation of highlands due to the
increasing urbanization in city centers, followed by erosion that contributed to wetland formation
in the plains. He explains that the forests were used to provide wood for increasing urbanization
waves, which caused the acceleration of deforestation and consequent erosion. He concludes that
water masses that passed the eroded landscape arrived at the plains, spurring marshland
formation.299 This case is exemplary for demonstrating how complex and intertwined
relationships between commercialization, construction of state authority, and ecological changes
were and how much a critical environmental historical perspective can reveal ignored facets of
historical processes. During the following decades of the forced settlement, swamps have
continued to be a major natural subject that influenced people’s and state’s acts in important
ways. To desiccate still-existent wetlands, eucalyptus trees were planted.300 Stemming from
highly practical reasons, different areas of the regional transformation intersected. In one
example, creating road systems was contingent on the desiccation of swamps.301 Even though
this complex and gradual transformative process, which started in the late 1860s and lasted for
297 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 110.
298 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 88-93.
299 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 113.
300 Ibid., 114-116. In this context, Turkish Republic created a eucalyptus forest in Tarsus’ Karabucak location to
desiccate the massive marshland there. See Serkan Baya, Cuma İvrendi, and Bayram Duman, “Tarsus Karabucak
(Okaliptüs) Ormanı,” İçel Dergisi 3, no. 1 (2023): 42–46.
301 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 116.
99
decades, created a breakthrough change in the region’s order, certain aspects of the previous era,
such as inter-communal violence and zeal for autonomy, were quite persistent.
Chris Gratien points out a case when officials examined notorious Delikanlı and Çelikanlı
tribes’ oppressions against people in Islahiye, and concluded that “However, because the tribal
leaders were themselves part of the local government, the villagers’ complaints had long fallen
on deaf ears.”302 In 1878, when the Russo-Ottoman War broke out and became the central item in
the government’s agenda, a much more organized incident, Kozanoğlu Ahmed’s insurgency
shook the local dynamics in Çukurova.303 Sources and archival documents on the incident
demonstrate that the army forces were capable of suppressing it without a significant
impediment.304 Even under these unusual conditions, the seizure of animals was an aspect of the
tension. After the Kozanoğlu Ahmed’s insurgency in 1878, some participators pardoned by the
general amnesty demanded their animals which were captured during the mutiny.305 According to
the official correspondence on the incident, two animals were sold on behalf of the military. The
military commander granted two animals to someone, and he also let the people take a couple of
camels (mehar deve) as booty since the animals belonged to an infamous bandit. Another
correspondence from this time reports that even though Kozanoğlu Ahmed Pasha dispatched his
men to damage telegraph lines, soldiers repressed them and concentrated their control over the
area.306 During the following decades after the Reform Division’s intervention, the tribal
population encountered unstable and heavy conditions.
302 Ibid., 112.
303 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 151-157.
304 Ibid., 155.
305 BOA, ŞD. 2118-52. (25 Şaban 1296 [14 August 1879]).
306 BOA, İ.DH. 774-63021. (6 Şevval 1295 [3 October 1878]).
100
While highly accelerated agricultural production and commercialization meant more
income for some, many more were suffering in the nascent large swaths of farmlands; labor
migration became a substantial aspect of the plain to sustain mammoth agricultural production,
and it led migrant agricultural workers to suffer from oppressive weather conditions and related
diseases.307 Along with the unaccustomed air quality and illnesses, the lack of well-established
bureaucratic practices posed another thwart to the settlement process. Andrew Gordon Gould
interprets the tardiness in registering land plots granted to tribes and the lack of coordination in
distributing title deeds as a major factor that impeded the settlement of tribes.308 He describes the
tribes’ experience as marginalized and excluded: “By 1869, when the economy began to
improve, the tribesmen had either been reduced to the status of serfs or had reverted to
pastoralism.”309 As another aspect of continuity, even several decades after the dedicated move
of the Ottoman State, sheep theft continued to exist in Çukurova as a form of livelihood.310
Adaptation to the settled order was not hasty, and many back and forths existed. More than a
decade after the Reform Division’s arrival, many buildings and settlements in the eastern
Çukurova were abandoned and unused.311 During this time and the following decades, animals
continued to be an important part and parcel of the region in various ways.
1.2. ANIMALS OF ÇUKUROVA AFTER THE REFORM DIVISION
In Yaşar Kemal’s Demirciler Çarşısı Cinayeti, the narrator touches on several aspects of
the forced settlement in Çukurova, such as the exiles, malaria, restriction of seasonal migration,
307 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 118-119.
308 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 150-151, 184-185.
309 Ibid., 147.
310 Gratien, The Unsettled Plain, 114.
311 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 159-160.
101
settlement, and establishment of the new order.312 In addition to these examples, the narrator’s
description of these people, as well as the experiences of their animals, regarding the forced
settlement aligns with the literature:
The Ottoman gave them fields from the fertile Çukurova lands. Who wants land? Who sows and harvests
the land? They became hostile to these fertile lands. They became hostile to trees, birds, grass, and bugs of
those lands. After all, they did not know how to plow, sow, and harvest… They were animal breeders, and
the animals were being decimated more than people in this bloody Çukurova.313
After the forced settlement, the presence of animals and Çukurova’s people’s relation to
animals continued. Although agricultural production became the leading business, animals were
still important trade items. A detailed official correspondence reports that 1.096.667 sheep
counted in 1879 for the sheep tax.314 According to British Council Skene’s trade report for 1870,
29.380 sheep and 1.814 oxen were exported from Alexandretta port.315 Alexandretta was the port
Aleppo and Adana used. In the late Ottoman, regional merchants from neighboring provinces
used this port to export large numbers of animals to Egypt. Relatedly, an official correspondence
shows that since the army and people had problems in procuring meat, state officials prohibited
sheep export from this port.316 In an earlier example, the British Consul Henry D. Barnham
reports that factors like Egyptian officials’ encouragement for local animal breeding, or plague in
Aleppo negatively influenced cattle export to Egypt.317 Council Skene also reports a “lucrative
312 Kemal, Demirciler Çarşısı Cinayeti, 110-112.
313 Ibid., 110. The translation to English is mine.
314 BOA, İ.MMS.65-3070. (2 Safer 1897 [15 January 1880]).
315 “Report by Consul Skene, on the Trade of the Provinces of Aleppo and Adana in the year 1870,” in Commercial
Reports received at the Foreign Office from Her Majesty’s Consuls in 1871. (London: Harrison and Sons, 1871),
1089.
316 BOA, DH.MKT.2612-53. (23 Cemaziyilahir 1325 [3 August 1907]).
317 “Report on the Trade of the Province of Aleppo for the Year 1896 and on the Trade of the Vilayet of Adana for
the Years 1895-96,” in Foreign Office. 1897. Annual Series. No: 1952. Diplomatic and Consular Reports on Trade
and Finance. Turkey. Report for the Year 1896 on the Trade of Aleppo and Adana. (London: Harrison and Sons,
1897), 3.
102
trade” of dried meat.318 However, the business was not always profitable. As the British Council
Thos. S. Jago informs, a famine hit Adana in 1887.319 Jago explains, the famine claimed the lives
of two thirds of livestock in Adana.320 This famine’s influences can be observed by looking at
cattle export of the region in 1887 and 1888. In 1887, cattle worth 20.000£ were exported from
Adana, and in 1888, the value of exported cattle was 3.900£.321 In this context, Edwin John Davis
presents detailed information about various topics, like, animal-breeding, slaughtering, and meat
prices:
The same course is pursued with butchers; e.g. in February and March, 1875, meat was 5 to 6 piastres per
oke; a little pressure was applied by the medjlis, and it gradually descended to 3.5 piastres. In general,
however, meat is very cheap. Good mutton in summer costs 2.5 piastres per oke (= a little less than 2d. per
lb. in English); in winter it costs 5 piastres per oke. But usually in winter only goat’s meat can be obtained,
and it is both bad and dear. In the spring very few animals are slaughtered, as they are in bad condition, and
also on account of the Greek and Armenian Lenten Fast, which is observed very strictly by the women,
although not by the men. In October and November about 1500 head of cattle are slaughtered in the vilayet
of Adana, and their flesh made into “Pastourma,” i.e. dried and spiced beef highly flavoured with garlic.
Very little fresh beef is eaten, as the meat is generally lean and tough, for no care is taken to supply the
animals with good food, and only a little straw is given to them in the stalls; but in the ploughing season the
oxen which do all the ploughing (no horses being employed), are fed with half an oke to an oke of cottonseed
in the morning, and again at night, besides straw. If cotton-seed be dear, barley is given instead. All
through the spring and early summer there is a great abundance of grass.322
The harsh measurements targeting the seasonal migration did not entail a decisive
shrinkage in animal breeding in the area. As Table 7 and Table 8 demonstrate, people continued
to breed significant numbers of various animals in the region.
318 Report by Consul Skene, on the Trade of the Provinces of Aleppo and Adana in the year 1870, 1090.
319 “Report on the Trade and Commerce of the Adana Vilayet for the Year 1887,” in Foreign Office. 1888. Annual
Series. No: 406. Diplomatic and Consular Reports on Trade and Finance. Turkey. Report for the Year 1887 on the
Trade of the Vilayet of Adana (Aleppo) (London: Harrison and Sons, 1888), 1.
320 Ibid., 1-2.
321 “Report on the Trade and Commerce of the Adana Vilayet for the Year 1888,” in Foreign Office. 1889. Annual
Series. No: 571. Diplomatic and Consular Reports on Trade and Finance. Turkey. Report for the Year 1888. On the
Trae of Adana (London: Harrison and Sons, 1889), 4.
322 Davis, Life in Asiatic Turkey, 184-185.
103
Table 7. Table showing number of different types of animals around Çukurova region, by 1913.323
Province Equine
(feresiye)
Bovine
(bakariye)
Ovine
(ganemiye)
Various animals
(mütenevvie)
Total
Aleppo 125087 132825 1570259 11456 1839627
Adana 96133 289848 1093415 13580 1492976
Niğde 80863 241899 1036927 9350 1369039
Kayseri 62378 144543 600353 2280 809554
İçil 13816 68582 662595 4221 749214
Maraş 34900 77550 396560 550 509560
Table 8. Table showing number of ovine around Çukurova region, by 1913.324
Rams
(Koç)
Female
sheep
Lambs Wether
(Burma)
Male
goats
Female
goats
Baby
goats
Wether
(Goat)
Adana 5214 239884 118475 40380 16350 426322 173763 72848
Halep 38069 243471 223044 19499 512970 374651 136049 22586
İçil 1721 59795 30730 4392 5305 344522 184860 31270
Kayseri 15400 243083 128000 95000 10950 53122 31500 12593
Maraş 1660 87000 42650 - 3250 177000 85000 -
Niğde 8320 236177 266140 88400 3541 67929 44170 26200
A decade after the forced settlement, the relationship between animals and people was
still quite dynamic and intertwined with the economy, politics, dietary habits, culture, and
agricultural practices. As a major factor, parallelly to the waning of nomadic culture and
pastoralist animal breeding, animals became subject to an extensive commodification process. At
that point, millions of animals were left as sources of meat, losing their cultural and political
roles systematically. The Ottoman state’s major attempts to execution of Tanzimat reforms in
Çukurova did not aim to eliminate animal breeding, rather, this process led to an immense
alteration of the animal breeding. The commodification of animals and animal products and the
following sociopolitical and economic transformations were not peculiar to Çukurova. Sarah D.
Shields demonstrates in detail that once Mosul became a supply center of animals and animal
323 Memalik-i Osmaniye’nin 1329 Senesine Mahsus Ziraat İstatistiki, (Istanbul: Ticaret ve Ziraat Nezareti, 1330
[1914]), 562-563.
324 Memalik-i Osmaniye’nin 1329 Senesine Mahsus Ziraat İstatistiki, 565-568.
104
products for various countries around the Mediterranean in the nineteenth century, this process
put sheep at center of social, economic, and political negotiations and conflicts.325 In the process,
she argues, the animals became a key factor in connecting to world markets as valuable
commodities, which led an intense communication and business between urban merchants and
animal breeding nomads.326 So, similarly to the Çukurova case, animal-related events strongly
shaped socioeconomic and political dynamics in the late Ottoman Mosul, showing the important
impacts of animals and animal breeders in the local order.
In the late Ottoman Çukurova, central authorities’ concern with animals and animalrelated
industry continued various ways. A year after the Reform Division’s intervention,
mutasarrıf of Adana wrote to Ahmet Cevdet, then the governor of Aleppo. The mutasarrıf
complained about several aspects of the city, such as thousands of bachelor men roaming
around,327 dirt and piles of rubbish in the streets, bad odor caused by the dirt, and slaughterhouses
(kanaras) in the city. According to him, places like slaughterhouses and tanneries had to be
moved outside the center to keep Adana as a proper city center.328 Naci Akverdi, in his book
Adana: Cumhuriyetten Evvel ve Sonra, consistently compares early modern Republican Adana
and the late Ottoman Adana with a systematic emphasis on the Republic’s achievements.
Interestingly, one of the most highlighted aspects of urban change is slaughtering practices.
325 Sarah D. Shields, “Sheep, Nomads and Merchants in Nineteenth-Century Mosul: Creating Transformations in an
Ottoman Society,” Journal of Social History 25, no. 4 (1992): 773-89.
326 Ibid., 776-778.
327 Bachelor men have long been rendered as subject of criticism in urban settings as possible sources of crime and
disorder. For a detailed discussion, see Işıl Çokuğraş, “Istanbul’da Marjinalite ve Mekân (1789-1839):Bekâr
Odaları ve Meyhaneler” (PhD diss., Yıldız Teknik Üniversitesi, 2013).
328 Akverdi, Adana, 20-21. These concerns regarding relationships between urban hygiene, presence of animal
products, and assumed unhealthy odors was not peculiar to the mutasarrıf of Adana. In an official correspondence
from 1848, it is ordered that butchers had to stop to hanging animal products like intestines and skins in their shops,
since it was a time of cholera and unhealthy odors could render things worse. A. MKT. 140-89. (18 Şaban 1864 [20
July 1848]). In a news from Sabah, it reads that even though slaughterhouses (salhanes) were being removed from
city centers due to their assumed harms to human wellbeing, one slaughterhouse in Beyoğlu’s Ada Street stayed
there, and residents of the neighborhood complained about it. Sabah, 28 Mart 1307 [9 April 1891], no.582, 2. There
was a clear implication of foul odor.
105
Akverdi explains that in the early twentieth century, animals were slaughtered under unhygienic
conditions, where the slaughtered animals’ blood and offal scattered around; bad odor from
carcasses disturbed people, especially on hot days; the slaughtered animals were immediately
loaded onto donkeys and carried “in a quite disgusting manner” to butchers.329 In accordance
with Ayverdi’s description, Figure 7 shows a donkey carrying a newly slaughtered animal.
Figure 7. A newly slaughtered animal is loaded onto a donkey.330
To compare, Akverdi explains that Adana’s municipality established the city’s -modernslaughterhouse
in 1932 to procure “the most important nutrition item” (“Adana halkının en
329 Akverdi, Adana, 36.
330 Ibid., 37.
106
mühim gıda maddesini”)331 of Adana’s people under appropriate conditions.332 Figure 8 shows
the new slaughterhouse and workers processing carcasses.
Figure 8. Adana Municipality’s Slaughterhouse333
As Table 9 below shows, Adana had consistent meat consumption during the early 1930s and
sheep and goats continued to be the most consumed.
Table 9. Number of animals slaughtered in Adana during the early 1930s.334
Year Sheep Goats Lamb Cattle
(sığır)
Calf
(dana)
Buffalo
(manda)
Buffalo calf
(malak)
Number KG
1932 25691 8131 25 2181 556 182 22 36788 1023817
1933 31318 7346 61 2011 279 108 13 41136 1035602
1934 30233 5867 35 2144 246 141 9 38675 1029300
1935 33482 5957 71 2188 580 321 22 42621 1169255
331 It is a common assumption that meat dishes constitute a major part in Adana’s cuisine. For a discussion on food
culture of Adana, see Musa Dağdeviren, “Adana Mutfağı,” in Adana’ya Kar Yağmış: Adana Üzerine Yazılar,
compiled by Behçet Çelik (Istanbul: Iletişim Yayınları, 2012), 321-333. In their book chapter, Samuel Dolbee and
Chris Gratien explore the roles food played in history of Southern Anatolia and Syria with a critical perspective. See
Samuel Dolbee and Chris Gratien, “Adana Kebabs and Antep Pistachios: Place, Displacement, and Cuisine of the
Turkish South,” in Making Levantine Cuisine: Modern Foodways of the Eastern Mediterranean (Austin: University
of Texas Press, 2021), 47-68.
332 Akverdi, Adana, 37-39.
333 Ibid., 38.
334 Ibid., 40. In the context of the place of animal products in the local economy, Akverdi states that 14.605 KG of
intestines worthed 56.289 Liras and 269.715 KG of wool worthed 128.491 Liras were exported from Adana in 1936,
while exported barley worthed 49.053 Liras and wheat worthed 108.184 Liras in the same year. Ibid., 58.
107
At this time, another author, Cemal Arif Alagöz, assessed animal breeding as a major branch of
agricultural production in the country, emphasizing that farmers from all around Turkey practiced a
hybrid model of animal breeding and farming.335 Table 10 demonstrates the number of different types of
livestock in Turkey by 1935. According to the table, the total number of animals is 27.861.000, and sheep
consisted approximately 44.5% of all. Table 9 and Table 10 show a clear intensity of sheep among the
animals bred.
Table 10. Numbers of five types of livestock in Turkey by 1935.336
Animal type Sheep
(koyun)
Angora goat
(tiftik keçisi)
Hair goat
(kıl keçi)
Water buffalo
(manda)
Cattle
(sığır)
Animal number 12.436.000 2.737.000 6.778.000 540.000 5.370.000
In his book, Kasım Ener, a prominent figure for the 20th century Adana who also served
as a parliamentary member for Adana and Mayor of Adana, quoted notes from a traveler who
visited Çukurova in the early 1900s.337 There, the notes give invaluable information about
animals and animal breeding at the time:
Animal breeding is limited to plain, and even with small development in pasturages, cattle breeding
(sığırcılık) could significantly develop. Since demand for meat is limited in villages, various types of small
black goats and sheep with heavy fur constituted animals there;” yoghurt and cheese made of those
animals’ milks are the main food items of tribes (aşiretler;)” “The camel specie is a crossbreed of Puhur
camel and dromedary (hecin), I have not encountered riding camels of Arabia. Here, camels are used as
proper transportation means. When they see caravans of camels, which are usually attached to plains and
deserts, in interior areas or mountainous lands climbing paths which a horse could hardly climb, people
amaze. One can argue, camels became climbing animals here. Even though horses (beygirler ve atlar) seem
small and modest-type, they are very strong. I traveled thousands of kilometers using these animals and I
did not experience any problem. By taking so less pauses, they walked 10-15 hours per day, and some hay
and four handfuls of barley was enough to them. Sometimes, although they could not eat or drink for all
day, they bore with troublesome flies/mosquitos [sinek] and oppressive hot on burning steppes. Similarly to
Arabs, here the people have a connection horses. Donkeys and mules are used as pack animals. There are
no many mules, any they are more valuable than horses [beygir]. As it is the case for all shepherd
communities, dogs are quite valuable in Çukurova. Muslims get extremely angry with who harm dogs.
335 Cemal Arif Alagöz, Anadolu’da Yaylacılık (Ankara: Ankara Halkevi, 1938), 9.
336 Ibid., 9.
337 Ener, Tarih Boyunca Adana Ovasına Bir Bakış, 174-184.
108
Here, you find various breeds from wolf-dogs to mongrel coyotes [“çakal bozmaları.”] Each tribe has a
dog type peculiar to them. It is surprising that there are many breeds of dogs and they are released, but
breeds stay preserved. If the people were not negligent here, sericulture would have been a developed
business. There are abundant mulberry trees and climate conditions are suitable for the development of
these trees.338
Animals and people shaped each other’s lives in numerous ways in the Ottoman Çukurova.
Decades after the Reform Division’s intervention and the forced settlement, animals were still in
Çukurova, but not as mobile herds which covered long distances along transhumance routes.
People’s experiences with animals differed a lot during that time. In an official correspondence
written to Health Ministry (Tıbbiye Nezareti) in 1888, it is reported that oxen and water buffalos
(camus in Turkish) were infected with typhoid in Bilan district, Aleppo.339 Urged to curtail the
incident’s effects, proposed actions included the prevention of the export of infected animals and
informing Adana governorate to act accordingly to the decisions. In another incident, the
physician of the Payas municipality reported that many animals that grazed on the pastures
between Payas and Osmaniye were infected with lung fever (zatürre) and were dying.340 The
state ordered to take necessary actions to prevent the disease’s contagion, including burying the
carcasses in deep pits and pouring lime on them. These incidents and the actions that the officials
planned to take were a part of similar empire-wide developments. In its issue dated January 23,
1893, the newspaper Bursa Osmanlı Gazetesi presented a document of regulations regarding
actions to take in case of animal diseases.341 There were eighteen articles in the regulations,
which suggested a series of actions, including isolation of infected animals, reporting the disease
to officials, dispatching of veterinary, and control of butchers. Almost two decades after these
regulations, animal diseases were still major problems for the Ottoman people, and taking
338 Ibid., 182. The translation to English is mine.
339 BOA, DH.MKT. 1536-120. (20 Zilhicce 1305 [28 August 1888]).
340 BOA, DH.MKT. 1487-3. (6 Cemazeyilahir 1305 [19 February 1888]).
341 Bursa Osmanlı Gazetesi, 14 Kanunuevvel 1308 [23 January 1893], no. 106, 2-3.
109
necessary measures was costly and exhausting for people and state agents. In his memories,
Ahmet Şerif, an Ottoman journalist, mentions his observations of his visit to different places
around Çukurova in 1910.342 In his comprehensive account, Ahmet Şerif refers to animal
diseases in Adana, and the difficulties the government officials had in taking action, including
the insufficient budget.343 He also suggests that after Muslim immigrants came from the Russian
domains in the mid-nineteenth century, those people’s cattle caused animal diseases.344
Therefore, it can be argued that empire-wide processes and policies had transforming impacts on
relations between people and animals in Çukurova, and state presence became much more visible
in these relations. However, as it had been the case always, Adana’s local dynamics were
shaping this transformation, too.
In an example of quotidian practices, as another layer of the relationships people established
with animals:
Among the workers of Çukurova, regional specialties coalesced into a rich corpus of street food: skewers of
liver cubes, mumbar, şırdan (sheep stomach stuffed with rice and meat), and Mersin’s iconic tantuni (a
sandwich of strips of beef or lamb boiled and stir-fried in cottonseed oil: perhaps the clearest example of
how cotton both created the need for cheap workers’ fare and shaped food preparation techniques). And of
course alongside all of these dishes was Adana’s kıyma kebabı (grilled ground mutton spiced with lots of
red pepper), which would later come to be called Adana kebab.345
Countless events around animals continued to be parts and parcels of the post-settlement
Çukurova world, as they had always been. Andrew Gordon Gould assesses the period
immediately after the forced settlement as a moment of transition and in-betweenness: “What
had been achieved was, at most, a symbiosis of tribal and settled population, a transitional
plateau between the nomadic anarchy of the days before 1865 and the total sedentarization of the
342 Ahmet Şerif, Anadolu’da Tanin: Birinci Gezi, ed. Çetin Börekçi (Istanbul: Kavram Yayınları, 1977), 151-323.
343 Ibid., 160-164.
344 Ibid., 155-156.
345 Dolbee and Gratien, “Adana Kebabs and Antep Pistachios,” 51.
110
present.”346 Until the harsh intervention of the Ottoman state in the mid-1860s, animals of
Çukurova were beyond being trade items, and valuable commodities. In a well-established
setting where a great segment of the population engaged in pastoral animal-breeding, animals
had been an essential part of seasonal migration. During these centuries-long practices and
traditions that shaped the social, political, and environmental dynamics in Çukurova, animals had
embedded places in the regional order. However, once the Ottoman state launched its
comprehensive centralization projects in the area, animals lost their central roles in
socioeconomic, political, and cultural networks, becoming only commodities.
During this transition process, animals and people suffered together. Many of people and
animals lost the order they were accustomed to in a short time. Only a privileged minority was
able to enjoy the new highly commercialized Çukurova. Concentrated state power and authority
merged with nascent capitalists’ passionate endeavors to maximize profit. Animals were always
there. The central authorities boasted about how they slaughtered and consumed animals. While
Çukurova became a source of extensive wealth and pride for the state and a few in the following
decades after the 1860s, thousands of nomads and animals became ill and died. The nomads lost
their property, and social order they were born into, and the joy of yayla.
346 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 167.
111
CHAPTER 5
CONCLUSION
“They had one helpless suffering. From shepherds to beys, the grief of their defeat by Ottoman
was like poison to their hearts. It was something they could not forget about.”347
Çukurova had a unique order before the Ottoman state established its authority and control
mechanisms over this region. The population was multireligious and multiethnic, and there were
nomads, settled people, and immigrants from different corners of the Balkans and Caucasia.
Even though the relationships between different groups were not always antagonistic, intercommunal
violence was a significant phenomenon. Since both topography and climatic
conditions facilitated transhumance, one of the essential characteristics of the region was human
and animal mobility. By the late nineteenth century, this order, during which the state could not
penetrate into the region, became intolerable for the central authorities.
By the mid-19th century, Ottoman central authorities intensified their attention on the
region and launched several attempts to establish strong control there. Consequently, the Reform
Division was sent there in the spring of 1865. The Division’s operation successfully achieved the
state’s primary aims, such as instituting systematic conscription and taxation, neutralizing
autonomous and resistant local actors, limiting animal and human mobility, and securing trade
routes. However, the same process exhaustively altered the region’s order by changing its
environmental, sociocultural, political, and economic aspects. While different parties involved in
347 “Varsa varsa bir onulmaz dertleri vardı içlerinde… Osmanlıya yenilgilerinin acısı Beyinden çobanına kadar bir
ağı gibi çökmüştü yüreklerine. Bu unutamadıkları bir şeydi.” Kemal, Demirciler Çarşısı Cinayeti, 109. The
translation to English is mine.
112
the process were impacted in different ways and scales, many nomadic and semi-nomadic tribe
members and their animals were at the receiving end of this transformation. They starved to
death, lost their loved ones, suffered from various diseases, were impoverished, and were forced
to live in a place against their choice.
Adana-centered Çukurova region was located between Anatolia and Syria, which
rendered the area a passage point. Even though it primarily consisted of extensive plains and
surrounding mountain ranges, Taurus and Amanus, the region, and its people had very organic
and multi-layered relationships with neighboring areas and its populations. One factor
contributing to this dynamic and far-reaching formation was the high level of human and animal
mobility practiced in the region. Nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes constituted a major
demographic part of the region, and these people and their animals had been practicing seasonal
migration through various intersecting routes. These mobility networks substantially contributed
to the dynamism of regional order while they rendered the state’s penetration into the region
harder. In addition to these tribal populations, settled populations of multiple religions and
ethnicities embodied another demographic component of the region. Among the Christian
population, Armenians had been living in Çukurova for centuries, and different districts like Sis
(in today’s Kozan), Haçin (today’s Saimbeyli), and Zeytun (today’s Süleymanlı) had been
populated primarily by Armenians. Even though the settled communities conducted businesses in
a range, smalltime farming was predominant. Among Muslim populations of the region, certain
families like Menemencioğulları and Kozanoğulları enjoyed privileged lives and functioned as
intermediaries between locals and the state agents. Another large population segment was
Muslim immigrants, muhacirs. Settled by the Ottoman state in Çukurova, these people had
113
different occupations like horse breeding and farming. At the same time, they had challenging
times due to diseases and inter-communal violence.
The region also had an extensively rich fauna that thrived in the region’s rich ecological
setting, from numerous species of wild animals to sheep, goats, cattle, and camels to elegantly
bred horses of Circassian muhacirs. In addition, as Chris Gratien’s comprehensive research
demonstrated, insects like mosquitos have been quite influential members of this diverse
ecological order. In a sociocultural setting where nomadism and tribal order prevailed, animals
shaped many things, how people earn their living, when and where to migrate, what to eat, what
to make a roof from, and when and with whom to fight. In many incidents, animals were central
to political and economic negotiations and conflicts between different parties, such as tribes,
settled populations, and officials.
In the eyes of high-ranking bureaucrats, the region had great economic potential.
However, due to the autonomous and resistant stances of the local actors against the state,
officials were able to operate only to a limited extent in the region. This led the state to practice a
“divide and rule policy,” during which the officials cooperated with local actors such as the
dynastic family of Kozanoğlu and certain tribes. In a political environment where neither state
nor local actors could have decisive control over the plain and mountains, every party kept its
interest by using all suitable means. These means included performing aggression against a
weaker party or forging alliances with other locals or officials; in any case, regional actors had to
be flexible to adapt to dynamic political conditions. In these controversial conditions, as a
common type of asset, animals were mainly at the center of strife. The state followed active
policies in the region to maximize its exploitation and control capacities. However, curbing
tribalism and nomadism, two major elements of the Ottoman Çukurova, was a common aspect of
114
several official policies. The Reform Division’s intervention in 1865 became a breaking point
for the regional order.
The Reform Division (Fırka-i Islahiye), led by Derviş Pasha and Ahmet Cevdet Efendi, a
very well-equipped military party with an administrative branch, reached Çukurova in the spring
of 1865. Aiming to conduct Tanzimat reforms in Çukurova, the party had multiple objectives:
Intensification of the central authorities’ control over provincial subjects, neutralization of local
potentates, alleviating intercommunal violence and banditry, the establishment of efficient
conscription and taxation, rendering the region an agrarian production center driven by the cotton
monoculture, settlement of nomads by preventing or limiting seasonal migration patterns.
Although existing parties of Çukurova could challenge military forces in several ways before, the
operation was well prepared this time. With a significant capacity for coercion, the Reform
Division forced most local powerholders to cooperate without any firm opposition. Following
this method, the Division followed comparatively lenient policies by conducting a combination
of multiple methods, including sending local potentates and their families to exile, integrating
some of the local powerholders into state apparatus, and granting various incentives, such as tax
exemptions and provision of housing and agricultural materials. However, even though armed
battles and executions did not commonly happen during the process, keeping nomads and their
animals on plains caused terrible damage to these groups, especially in the years immediately
after 1865. Andrew Gordon Gould interprets how the tribal population experienced the
provincial reform in Çukurova: “For the tribesmen who have been the object of this study forced
115
settlement was a disaster. It destroyed their power, their economy and their way of life and
decimated their population.”348
The state planned large-scale infrastructure projects as an extension of the Division’s
operation. Even though many could not be completed, these projects paved the way for a
significant transformation of the region. Due to malaria-caused devastations, the reclamation of
marshlands had a primary place among these projects. Establishing local-level representative
councils, villages, towns, and the endowment of title deeds were important factors in shifting to a
settled, agriculture-driven order. Even though factors like bad harvests or far-reaching events like
the 1873-1875 Famine of Central Anatolia disturbed the region’s social and economic stability,
Çukurova experienced consistent economic and urban growth. During this time, while
agricultural production proliferated and material conditions for animal breeding eroded
gradually, animals continued to constitute an important source of revenue. During the 1870s, as a
result of local reactions to the forced settlement, the state accepted the seasonal migration by
these groups. Many people conducted this combined way of life during the time and the
following decades.
The Reform Division changed Çukurova significantly. Tribal order, in which nomadism
and animal breeding were the main aspects of life, diminished. Settled life and commercial
agriculture constituted two main sociocultural and economic components of the new order. In
contrast with the preceding practices, large-scale agricultural production became common in the
post-settlement period. Led by cotton farming, agricultural production created a highly profitable
business option for many. The major development of Mersin as a major Eastern Mediterranean
port city with productive connections with other Mediterranean ports and Anatolian cities played
348 Gould, “Pashas and Brigands,” 225.
116
a crucial role in Çukurova’s commercial agriculture networks. Accumulation of great wealth due
to agricultural production and trade, Çukurova became increasingly urbanized, with growing
infrastructure systems. However, the growth and its influences on different demographic groups
were uneven. Many thousands became seasonal workers in farmlands, while a small group of
people, including the tribal elite, enjoyed great wealth after they invested in agriculture. In
contrast with the privileged tribal elite, tribe members became wage laborers in large farms in the
plains, where they once spent winters with their animals. Even though animals were still there,
they were no more members of the seasonal migration cycle. Then, urban people boasted about
how high techniques they had developed to slaughter animals and process meat. However, even
though their central role in the region’s sociopolitical life eroded, animals continued to share
Çukurova with people in changing ways, as they had always done.
My findings support Yonca Köksal’s and Ebubekir Ceylan’s ideas on tribe-state relations
in the nineteenth-century Ottoman. During the Reform Division operation, the state agents
primarily tried to negotiate with provincial elites. Granting official posts and providing financial
incentives were among the state’s most common methods. Using direct violence was costly, and
the state used it when it did not have a more effortless option. The state and tribes were multilayered
organizations, and they used complex strategies to achieve their goals. The findings of
the thesis also support Chris Gratien’s arguments on the late Ottoman Çukurova’s transformation
and its environmental effects. Environmental factors like large marshlands and mountains
increased human and animal mobility in the region. The same environmental setting shaped the
state’s strategies during and after the Reform Division. Rendering the region’s natural aspects
suitable for state rule became a primary effort for the central authorities. The findings also align
with Meltem Toksöz’s and Andrew Gordon Gould’s views. The Reform Division’s intervention
117
largely changed the socioeconomic and political setting in Çukurova. Commercial agriculture
and settlement became two major aspects of the new rule.
The findings also support the perspectives emphasizing a symbiotic life between nomads
and settled, and a mixed economy of pastoralism and agriculture. As Reşat Kasaba and other
scholars argue, nomadic tribes and settled populations shared the same geography for a long
time. However, there was intercommunal violence when state control was lacking. In addition,
people did not solely practice agriculture or pastoralism. Many people performed both in
different capacities.
The thesis contributes to the literature by demonstrating that animals were pivotal actors
in the nineteenth century Çukurova. Animals and animal products were important trade items
and people used them for various purposes including nutrition, subsistence, and transportation.
Different types of animals also influenced the culture and traditions of local people, showing the
embeddedness of animals into people’s lives. Animals were at the center in important
negotiations and clashes between local and central actors during the late nineteenth-century
Çukurova. The eradication of the nomadic culture diminished the centrality of animals in the
political context. An increasing commodification process excluded animals from an intertwined
life with people, lessened their far-reaching roles in the regional order, and reduced them to food
items. As a result, the commodification of animals caused structural changes in relationships
between humans and animals. Animals were once the source of inspiration for lyric poems, and
local folk stories. After their main function became being meat sources, their other roles mostly
vanished. However, animals continue to influence the lives of the Çukurova people even today.
After over a century, several factors, like technical developments, state-society relations,
and market-driven concerns, continue shaping Çukurova’s pastoralists’ lives. A YouTube video
118
released in mid-May 2023 shows that Turkey’s Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry granted
solar panels and compact coolers to pastoralists from Adana.349 In the video, pastoralists
explained that having these panels and coolers is important to preserve animal products like milk
and cheese. At the same time, a villager commented that “Animal breeding has become so good
now” (“malcılık çok güzel oldu”). In transforming forms and extents, animal breeding and animal
and human mobility have been pivotal features of the Çukurova region for centuries. Intrinsically
intertwined and intersected with the economy, politics, culture, and demographics, these
traditions, practiced mainly by nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes, constituted important facets of
state-society relationships in the empire. To create a holistic understanding of Ottoman
provincial histories, it is significant to focus on these tribal populations and their animals. As this
thesis attempts to explain, many historical events and processes about animals have been central
in the formation of local dynamics in this part of the eastern Mediterranean.
To better understand the history of not only Çukurova but also interconnected regions,
such as Anatolia and the Levant, analyzing complex nomadic practices and trade networks is
important. Thanks to the already rich corpus of the Ottoman provincial reforms and increasing
numbers of environmental histories of the empire, there is thriving literature in this regard. In the
case of interconnected areas around Çukurova, further studies focusing on earlier periods will be
constructive for understanding which continuities and breakings shaped this extremely diverse
and dynamic historical region’s history. In the context of the early modern Çukurova, Meltem
Toksöz comments as follows: “The liveliness of 17th century Adana, however, was in sharp
contrast with the rest of this huge region as the landscape beyond the city gave the impression of
349 Accessed on 10 June, 2023. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHsYvjPkjU&
ab_channel=%C4%B0lkeHaberAjans%C4%B1
119
an empty space.”350 Further research focusing on multiform interregional commercial, cultural,
political and ecological networks and patterns would illuminate the historical processes and
actors of those lands that seemed empty
350 Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton, 19.
120
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