Armenians in the Ottoman Empire
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Social structure of the Ottoman Empire |
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| Millet Jews · Armenians · Greeks |
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| Rise of nationalism Ottomanism |
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| Lifestyle · Ottoman court | |
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| Slavery · Devşirme | |
The Ottoman rule of Armenia or Ottoman Armenia begins with the initial accession of Mehmed II, and the Ottoman support to initiate the Armenian Patriarch in Constantinople but it was during the rule of Selim II (1524 – 1574) that Armenia become an integral part of the Ottoman Empire. This condition ended after 300 years when following the Russo–Turkish War (1828–1829), Eastern Armenia was ceded to the Russian Empire. Western Armenia remained under Ottoman rule until the Ottoman Empire itself fell in World War I.
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Background
- See also: State organisation of the Ottoman Empire
The Ottomans developed a number of unique traits into the traditional Islamic civilization, which did not have a separation between religious and secular matters. Ottomans visualized an idea that two separate “establishments” shared state power. Historians often label Ottoman sociopolitical construct the “Ottoman System,” which characterized by slave government administration (military governing) and state power (civil governing) sharing between governing and religious "establishments.” The Ottomans left the civic control to the civic institutions. That term, however, conveys a sense of structural rigidity that probably was nonexistent throughout the Ottoman period as Sultan is the highest power over everything, since with the state organization operating specific model in the first half of the sixteenth century under Suleyman I, also known as "Lawgiver", gained more definite organization.
The Armenian population's integration was partly due to the nonexistent structural rigidity throughout the initial period. Armenian people, related to the issues of their own internal affairs were, were administered by the civil administration. Townspeople, villagers and farmers formed a class called the reaya, including Armenian reaya. Civil and judicial administration was carried out under a separate parallel system of small municipal or rural units called kazas. The civil system was considered a check on the military system since beys, who represented executive authority on reaya, could not carry out punishment without a sentence from the religious leader of the person. As a dip note; Sultan was beyond the mentioned control. Ecumenical Patriarchate was the leader of the Armenian People. This whole structure named as Millet, or in Armenian case Armenian Millet
During the Byzantine period, the Armenian Church was not allowed to operate in Constantinople, because the Greek Orthodox Church regarded the Armenian Church as heretic. With the establishment of Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, Armenians become religious leaders, and bureaucrats under Ottoman Empire, more influential than just their own community. The idea that two separate “establishments” shared state power gave chance to occupy important postions, administrative, the religious-legal, and the social-economic.
Patriarchate of Constantinople
- See also: Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople and Armenian Millet
After Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453, the patriarchate came to care more directly for all the Orthodox living in the Ottoman Empire. Hovagim I was at the time the Metropolitan of Bursa. In 1461, Hovagim I was brought to Constantinople by Sultan Mehmed II and established as the Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople which the office was created solely with a political purpose. Sultan Mehmed II wanted Armenian-Greek separation. Constantinople become the real center of their ecclesiastical and national life. The Armenian patriarch and not the catholicos of Etschmiadzin, was their most important national dignitary, as part of Mehmed's wish. In the Sultan's capital, lived the largest Armenian community in the world; and his civil-ecclesiastical authority made the Sultan practically the most powerful official among the Armenians at large.
Until the promulgation of the Hatti-Sherif of 1839, the patriarch and his clients, within limits, possessed penal authority over Armenian people. At the capital the patriarch had his own jail, and maintained a small police force. His authority over his clergy being absolute, he could imprison or exile them at will; and while he was compelled to secure the consent of the Sultan to imprison or exile laymen of his community, the necessary firman was very easily obtained. The patriarchal system of government, in placing civil powers in the hands of high ecclesiastics, was an outcome of the fact that the Sultan made no distinction between church and community, and often lent the weight of its authority to maintain the integrity of the church.
The spiritual condition of the Armenian church until "national awakening" was based on superstition, ceremonialism, and priestcraft. The veneration of anointed crosses, of pictures and relics of saints, the giving of alms, the observance of penances, fasts, and vigils, and the going on pilgrimages to Etschmiadzin and Jerusalem, to most Armenians constituted the sum and substance of religion. Preaching in the Armenian church was very uncommon. The parish priests never preached. Most of the preaching was done by vartabeds sent out from Etschmiadzin, Jerusalem, and other monastic centers, with whom it was partly a matter of reciting the virtues of relics and recounting the legends of saints, and largely a matter of appealing for contributions. The Bible was not generally read. The copies of Bible were not easily accessible.
Armenian village life
At the villages, even for the ones that the population was chiefly Muslim, the Armenian quarters were settled in groups among other parts of the population. Comparatively Armenians lived in well-built and prosperous places. The houses are arranged one above the other, so that the flat roof of one house is the front yard of the one above. For safety the houses are huddled together. Armenian houses were admirably adapted to the extremes of temperature of Eastern Anatolia. In summer the thick walls and earth-cowered roofs keep the rooms cool. The nature and agricultural traditions of Armenians did stayed the same as same characteristics explained can also be found in Xenophon who described many aspects of Armenian village life and hospitality[1]. He relates that the people spoke a language that to his ear sounded like the language of the Persians[1].
There is always a village master (Bey or elderly); for entertaining the town house was part of his prerogative, and his house is the best in each village. It is not uncommon to have three priests for here thirty-five families. Most of the Armenians like to travel on horseback to a neighboring villages, sometimes for religious ceremonies (like Van festival), sometimes to fetch a bride, accompanying her, with musical instruments and clapping of hands, to their own village.
Ottoman Armenia 1453 to 1829
Armenians preserved their culture, history, and language regardless of Ottoman oppression, largely thanks to their distinct religious identity from the neighbouring Kurds and Turks. Like the Greek Orthodox and Jewish minorities of the Ottoman Empire, they constituted a distinct millet, led by the Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople. Under this system, Christians and Jews were considered second-class citizens; they were victims of elevated taxation and unable to seek legal recourse in the courts.[2] According to Turkish sources, under the Ottoman rule, Armenians formed three millets: Armenian Orthodox Gregorians, Armenian Catholics, and Armenian Protestants (which was formed in the 19th century).[3]
After many centuries of Ottoman occupation, the centres with a high concentration of Armenians lost their geographic continuity (parts of Van, Bitlis, and Kharput vilayets), because over the years, pockets of Kurds and Turks infiltrated into traditionally Armenian land. Regardless of Ottoman rule and an increasingly strong presence of Muslims, Armenians continued to be the majority group in Western Armenia well into the 19th century. They kept and defended factual autonomy in certain isolated areas like Sassoun, Shatakh, and parts of Dersim. An Armenian stronghold and a symbol of factual Armenian autonomy, Zeitoun (Ulnia) was located between the Six Vilayets and Cilicia, which also had a strong Armenian presence ever since the creation of the Pricipality (and then Kingdom) of Lesser Armenia. However, due to Ottoman interference and <a href="/wiki/Armenian_Genocide" title="Armenian Genoc