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Winter-Quartering Tribes: Nomad–Peasant Relations in the Northeastern Frontiers of the Ottoman Empire (1800s–1850s)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 December 2023

Yener Koç Open the ORCID record for Yener Koç [Opens in a new window]
Yener Koç*
Affiliation:
Department of Core Academics, Kadir Has University, Istanbul, Turkey
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E-mail: yenerko@gmail.com
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Abstract

Focusing on the winter quartering of Kurdish nomadic tribes among peasant villages, this article discusses the patterns of Kurdish nomadism and nomad–peasant relations in the Ottoman sanjaks of Muş, Bayezid, and Van during the first half of the nineteenth century. It argues that the political structure of these regions and the requirements of animal husbandry among the nomads not only created a distinct pattern of nomadism among the Kurdish tribes, but also led to the polarization of relations between nomads and peasants. Moreover, the article observes how nomad–settled, tribe–peasant relations in these regions evolved as a result of the gradual sedentarization of the pastoral nomads and related changes in their subsistence economies starting from the mid-nineteenth century. Finally, this article provides a background for a better understanding of the intercommunal tensions and conflicts over land in the Ottoman Empire of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review of Social History , Volume 69 , Issue 1 , April 2024 , pp. 47 - 66
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis

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References

1 “Northeastern frontiers of the Ottoman Empire” is taken here to refer to the northern parts of the province of Van and the province of Erzurum bordering the Qajar and Russian empires.

2 Tanzimat was an age of reform, from 1839 to 1876, which aimed to modernize and centralize the Ottoman Empire.

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12 Norman Lewis, Nomads and Settlers in Syria and Jordan, 1800–1980 (Cambridge, 1987), pp. 8–9; Wolf-Dieter Hütteroth, “Settlement Desertion in the Gezira between the 16th and 19th Century”, in Thomas Philipp (ed.), The Syrian Land in the 18th and 19th Century (Stuttgart, 1992), pp. 285–291; M. Talha Çiçek, Negotiating Empire in the Middle East: Ottomans and Arab Nomads in the Modern Era, 1840–1914 (Cambridge, 2021), pp. 68–72.

13 This does not mean, however, that all members of the nomadic or settled groups are hostile to one another.

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18 Martin van Bruinessen, Agha, Shaikh and State: The Social and Political Structures of Kurdistan (London, 1992), p. 193.

19 Janet Klein, The Margins of Empire: Kurdish Militias in the Ottoman Tribal Zone (Stanford, CA, 2011), p. 14.

20 Ibid.

21 Matthew Ghazarian, “A Climate of Confessionalization: Famine and Difference in the Late Ottoman Empire”, International Journal of Middle East Studies, 54:3 (2022), pp. 484–504.

22 Ibid., pp. 490–494.

23 Zozan Pehlivan, “El Niño 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 (2020), pp. 316–356, 317.

24 For a discussion of different forms of pastoral nomadism, see Anatoly M. Khazanov, Nomads and the Outside World (Madison, WI, [1984]1994), pp. 18–25.

25 Due to tribal mobility, population surveys could not be carried out among several nomadic tribes of the region. The numbers given in this text are mostly estimations by government officials, travellers, and British and Russian consuls. See BOA (The Ottoman Archives, Istanbul), HAT 811/37227 (11 April 1822); Mehmed Hurşîd Paşa, Seyâhatnâme-ı Hudud, transl. Alaattin Eser (Istanbul, 1997), pp. 232–234, 262–267; M.A. Jaba, Recueil de notices et récits Kourdes (St Petersburg, 1860), pp. 1–4.

26 Yener Koç, “Nomadic Pastoral Tribes at the Intersection of the Ottoman–Persian and Russian Empires (1820s–1890s)” (Ph.D., Boğaziçi University, 2020), pp. 237–253.

27 Although winter quartering was a widespread practice among these Kurdish tribes, there were also settled and transhumant branches of these tribes in the region.

28 The migration patterns of these nomadic tribes are briefly mentioned in John Frödin, “Les formes de la vie pastorale en Turquie”, Geografiska Annaler, 26 (1944), pp. 267–269. For nomadic pastoral communities of the empire's northeastern frontiers, see also Koç, “Nomadic Pastoral Tribes”.

29 Yusuf Halaçoğlu, Anadolu'da Aşiretler, Cemaatler, Oymaklar (1453–1650), vol. 5 (Ankara, 2009), pp. 2486–2489; Şeref Han, Şerefnâme Kürt Tarihi, transl. Mehmed Emin Bozarslan (Istanbul, 1971), p. 295. For a study of the Süleymani Confederation and their migration to the north, see Erdal Çiftçi, “Migration, Memory and Mythification: Relocation of Suleymani Tribes on the Northern Ottoman–Iranian Frontier”, Middle Eastern Studies, 54:2 (2018), pp. 270–288.

30 Han, Şerefnâme Kürt Tarihi, p. 295.

31 M. Mehdi İlhan, Amid (Diyarbakır) 1518 Detailed Register (Ankara, 2000), pp. 172–181. Several Mühimme records mention the tensions between the Zilan tribe and Erzurum's peasants when nomads migrated to the summer pasturing grounds. See Gülay Kahveci, “29 Numaralı Mühimme Defteri (984/1576), Tahlîl-Özet-Transkripsiyon” (MA, Istanbul University, 1998), pp. 187, 199, 212, 219.

32 BOA, AE SAMD III 92/9167, 15 Receb 1138 (19 March 1726); BOA, AE SAMD III 11/1031, 8 Muharrem 1137 (27 September 1724).

33 Faruk Demirtaş, “Bozulus Hakkında”, Ankara Üniversitesi, Dil Tarih Coğrafya Fakültesi Dergisi, 7:1 (1949), pp. 42–46.

34 Gündüz, Anadolu'da Türkmen Aşiretleri, pp. 108–109.

35 White, The Climate of Rebellion, p. 242.

36 Faruk Tabak, The Waning of the Mediterranean, 1550–1870: A Geohistorical Approach (Baltimore, MD, 2008), p. 169.

37 Koç, “Nomadic Pastoral Tribes”, p. 52.

38 Xavier de Planhol, “Geography, Politics and Nomadism in Anatolia”, International Social Science Journal, 11:4 (1959), pp. 525–531, 528; Çiftçi, “Migration, Memory and Mythification”, p. 5.

39 For a discussion of nomadic pastoralism in ancient times, see Roger Cribb, Nomads in Archaeology (Cambridge, 1991).

40 Demirtaş, “Bozulus Hakkında”, pp. 39–42; Mehmet Rezan Ekinci, “19. ve 20. Yüzyıllarda Milli Milan Aşireti”, in Tuncay Şur and Yalçın Çakmak (eds), Aktör, Müttefik, Şaki Kürt Aşiretleri (Istanbul, 2022), p. 221; Frödin, “Les formes de la vie pastorale”, pp. 219–272; İsmail Beşikçi, Doğu'da Değişim ve Yapısal sorunlar (Göçebe Alikan Aşireti) (Ankara, 1969). See also Pehlivan, “El Niño and the Nomads”.

41 Demirtaş, “Bozulus Hakkında”, p. 39.

42 Ibid., p. 40.

43 Beşikçi, Doğu'da Değişim, p. 165.

44 Sırrı Erinç, Doğu Anadolu Coğrafyası (Istanbul, 1953), pp. 23–29.

45 T.J. Wilkinson, Archaeological Landscapes of the Near East (Tucson, AZ, 2003), p. 197.

46 Koç, “Nomadic Pastoral Tribes”, pp. 54–61.

47 Paşa, Seyâhatnâme-ı Hudud, pp. 232–234, 262–267; Otto Blau, “Die Stämme des nordöstlichen Kurdistan”, Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft, 12:4 (1858), pp. 584–598, 714, 745; W. Spottiswoode, “Sketch of the Tribes of Northern Kurdistan”, Transactions of the Ethnological Society of London, 2 (1863), pp. 244–248.

48 BOA, MB 7/46, 11 L 1264 (10 September 1848), BOA, MVL 678/45, 23 Zilhicce 280 (30 May 1864), BOA, HAT 718/34245 D, 29 Z 1247 (30 May 1832).

49 BOA, HAT 804/37129 F, 1229 Şaban 12 (30 June 1814).

50 British Foreign Office (FO), National Archives, London, 78/366, James Brant and A.G. Glascott, “Report of a Tour through a part of Koordistan”, Erzeroom, 15 July 1839, p. 62.

51 Frödin, “Les formes de la vie pastorale”, p. 67.

52 For information on the yurdluk-ocaklık system, see Gábor Ágoston, “A Flexible Empire: Authority and Its Limits on the Ottoman Frontiers”, International Journal of Turkish Studies, 9:1–2 (2003), pp. 15–31; and Özok-Gündoğan, The Kurdish Nobility in the Ottoman Empire.

53 For a list of districts ruled as yurdluk-ocaklık districts, see BOA, HAT 490/24028, 29.12.1250 (1835).

54 BOA, HAT 804 / 37129 F, 1229 Receb 19 (7 June 1813).

55 Gülseren Duman Koç, “Governing a Frontier Sancak in the Ottoman Empire: Notables, Tribes, and Peasants of Muş (1820s–1870s)” (Ph.D., Boğaziçi University, 2018), pp. 67–69.

56 BOA, I.MVL 116/2793, 15.03.1264 (20 April 1848).

57 It should be noted that, although rare, direct payment to the peasantry was also evident in the sources. For instance, in the late 1830s, the chief of the Haydaran tribe, Sultan Agha, admitted in conversation with the British Consul, James Brant, that his tribe received winter quarters, but emphasized that they paid for the hay they received from the peasantry. See James Brant and A.G. Glascott, “Notes of a Journey Through a Part of Kurdistán, in the Summer of 1838”, Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London, 10 (1840), pp. 341–434, 413.

58 Gülseren Duman Koç, “A Negotiation of Power during the Age of Reforms in the Ottoman Empire: Notables, Tribes and State in Muş (1820–1840)”, Middle Eastern Studies, 57:2 (2021), pp. 209–226, 216.

59 For the collection of the wintering tax by the governor-general of Erzurum, see Brant and Glascott, “Notes of a Journey Through a Part of Kurdistán”, p. 413.

60 Erdal Çiftçi, “Fragile Alliances in the Ottoman East: The Heyderan Tribe and the Empire, 1820–1929” (Ph.D., İhsan Doğramacı Bilkent University, 2018), pp. 104–115; Eralp Yaşar Azap, “1820–1823 Osmanlı-İran Savaşı” (Ph.D. Istanbul University, 2021), pp. 36–42.

61 Koç, “Nomadic Pastoral Tribes”, pp. 95–98.

62 Ibid.

63 Duman Koç, “Governing a Frontier Sancak”, p. 271.

64 BOA, C.ML 115/5126.

65 Brant and Glascott, “Notes of a Journey Through a Part of Kurdistán”, pp. 348, 353, 375, 376.

66 Ibid., p. 353.

67 Ibid., pp. 398, 405, 412.

68 Mela Mehmûdê Bayezîdî, Adat û Rusûmatnameê Ekradiye, transl. Jan Dost (Istanbul, 2012), p. 115.

69 Ibid., p. 116.

70 BOA, I.MSM 51/1334 (1848).

71 Turkey No. 16 (1877) Reports by her Majesty's Diplomatic and Consular Agents in Turkey, Respecting the Condition of the Christian Subjects of the Porte: 1868–75 (London, 1877), Consul Taylor to the Earl of Clarendon, Inclosure in No. 13, p. 18.

72 BOA, MVL 232/53, 17 Ca 1266 (31 March 1850).

73 BOA, ML.VRD.TMT 6799 (1844).

74 British Foreign Office (FO), 78/443, James Brant, “Report on the Trade of Erzeroom for 1840 and on the State of Pashalık”, Erzeroom, 21 January 1841, pp. 112–113.

75 British Foreign Office (FO), 78/491, James Brant, “Report on the Trade of Erzeroom for 1841, and on the State of Pashalık”, Erzeroom, 20 January 1842, p. 204.

76 British Foreign Office (FO), 78/572, James Brant, “Memorandum Regarding the State of Moosh”, Erzeroom, 9 December 1844, p. 33.

77 BOA, I.MSM 51/1334 (1848).

78 Turkey No. 16 (1877) Reports by her Majesty's Diplomatic and Consular Agents in Turkey, p. 26.

79 Ibid., p. 18.

80 Koç, “Nomadic Pastoral Tribes”, p. 157.

81 BOA, I.MSM 52/1351 (13 ZA 1264).

82 Paşa, Seyâhatnâme-ı Hudud, pp. 237–238; Koç, “Nomadic Pastoral Tribes”, p. 225.

83 Sabri Ateş, The Ottoman–Iranian Borderlands: Making A Boundary, 1843–1914 (Cambridge, 2013).

84 Köksal, Yonca, “Coercion and Mediation: Centralization and Sedentarization of Tribes in the Ottoman Empire”, Middle Eastern Studies, 42:3 (2006), pp. 469–491CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

85 Meltem Toksöz, Nomads, Migrants and Cotton in the Eastern Mediterranean: The Making of the Adana-Mersin Region, 1850–1908 (Leiden and Boston, MA, 2010); Chris Gratien, The Unsettled Plain: An Environmental History of the Late Ottoman Frontier (Stanford, CA, 2022); Norman Lewis, Nomads and Settlers in Syria and Jordan, 1800–1980 (Cambridge, 1987); Samira Haj, The Making of Iraq, 1900–1963: Capital, Power, and Ideology (Albany, NY, 1997), pp. 9–27.

86 On nomad sedentarization and the disputes between nomads and peasants in the sancak of Muş, see Duman Koç, “Governing a Frontier Sancak”, pp. 269–280; Erdal Çiftçi, “19. Yüzyılın Temel Gelişmeleri Çerçevesinde Muş’ta Aşiretler”, in Murat Alanoğlu, Mustafa Alican, and Mehmet Özalper (eds), Muş Tarihi (Istanbul, 2021), pp. 292–298.

87 For the “civilizing mission” of the Ottoman Empire in tribal spaces, see Deringil, Selim, “‘They Live in a State of Nomadism and Savagery’: The Late Ottoman Empire and the Post-Colonial Debate”, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 45:2 (2003), pp. 311–342CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

88 BOA, I.MSM 52/1351,13 ZA 64 (11 October 1848).

89 Paşa, Seyâhatnâme-i Hudud, p. 233.

90 Duman Koç, “Governing a Frontier Sancak”, pp. 273–277.

91 Mark Sykes, “The Kurdish Tribes of the Ottoman Empire”, The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, 38 (1908), pp. 451–486, 476.

92 BOA, I.MVL 188/5680 (1849); and BOA, I.MVL 337/14534, 1271 (1855).

93 Blau, “Die Stämme”, p. 594.

94 BOA, I.MVL 121/3044 (1848); and BOA, 168/63 (1848).

95 BOA, HR.SYS 1781/20, 17 ZA 68 (2 September 1852); BOA, MVL 131/20, 11.05.1269 (20 February 1853).

96 Duman Koç, “Governing a Frontier Sancak”, pp. 208–209.

97 BOA, A.MKT.UM 15/44, 9 C 1266 (22 April 1850).

98 BOA, HR.MKT 196/56, 27 Şevval 1263 (8 October 1847).

99 BOA, HR.SYS 2934/65, 15 RA 1268 (8 January 1852).

100 BOA, MVL 261/15, 19 ZA 69 (24 August 1853).

101 BOA, MVL 92/98, 17 Şevval 1266 (26 August 1850). See also Duman Koç, “Governing a Frontier Sancak”, pp. 276–277.

102 BOA, I.MVL 269/10320, 19 C 69 (30 March 1853).

103 BOA, MVL 679/74, 13 Muharrem 1281 (18 June 1864).