Janissary

JANISSARY

JANISSARY. The Janissaries (from yeniçeri, meaning 'new soldier' in Turkish) were an elite standing force of infantrymen, first formed by the Ottoman Sultan Murad I around 1380. Legally slaves (kul ) of the sultan, they served over the centuries as bowmen, crossbowmen, and musketeers. The Janissaries were distinguished from the main body of the army, which was made up of cavalrymen (sipahis) drawn from the freeborn retinues of provincial officials and notables. Janissary recruits were chosen from groups of boys who were taken into Ottoman service in periodic levies on Christian peasant families, predominantly those in the Balkans. The boys were brought to Istanbul, converted to Islam, despite Islamic prohibitions against the forcible conversion of Christians, and then trained for military service.

ORGANIZATION AND TACTICS

The Janissary corps was originally organized in the late fourteenth century when a group of prisoners of war were converted to Islam and personally attached to the sultan. It grew from approximately 20,000 men in the late sixteenth century to well over 100,000 by the early nineteenth century, even though it came to include many non-combatants in later years.

The organization became an important Ottoman military force soon after it was established because the Janissaries were perceived to be the sultan's most trustworthy soldiers as well as disciplined troops with particular small arms skill. They received special privileges and benefits to secure their sole allegiance to the ruler, with their group solidarity reinforced by the way they were organized into small companies of celibate warriors living in barracks and receiving constant military training.

The colonel of each company was called the çorbaci ('soup cook') and wore a soup ladle as his rank insignia to symbolize humility before the sultan although he never actually served food himself. The head of the whole Janissary force was the agha, one of the most important officials in the realm. He served on the Imperial Divan, ranking just below the main Ottoman viziers (ministers) but above other military commanders. The Janissaries lived together in large barracks within the cities in which they were stationed. They were forbidden to marry until they retired from active duty. Several Ottoman grand viziers and admirals had served as members of the Janissary corps during their careers.

The Janissaries' military technique was to rush very quickly into battle after a breach had been made in fortress walls or to outflank an enemy cavalry force that had already charged first. They would then attack with handguns or rifles as appropriate. In peacetime, Janissaries served as guards in fortresses and towns and as firefighters in major Ottoman cities. Although Janissaries were principally a land force, there were naval Janissaries who helped man Ottoman ships.

The Janissaries were famous for their distinctive marching style and headgear. Their special military bands are believed to have inspired military bands all over Europe. The Janissary corps was closely connected with Bektashi dervishes, a popular mystical order regarded by many Muslims as heterodox. To commemorate the Islamic millennium in 1591–1592, the sultan allowed the master of the Bektashi order and eight dervishes to become part of the Janissaries.

JANISSARIES IN WAR

The Janissaries made significant contributions to many important Ottoman victories, among them the conquest of Constantinople in the spring of 1453, the battle against the Iranian Safavids at Chaldiran in 1514, and the defeat of the Mamluk armies at Marj Dabik in 1516. In all these confrontations, the Janissaries administered the final decisive blow after a series of preliminary assaults, usually in swift gunfire attacks. Each of these encounters fueled European perceptions of the Janissary corps as a kind of Ottoman "secret weapon" able to use firearms more effectively than any adversary. Perhaps the greatest moment of Janissary victory was at the battle of Mohacs in 1526, when Janissaries were able to mow down scores of Hungarian cavalry with precise rifle volleys. Many contemporary observers believed that the quality of the Janissary corps diminished in the late sixteenth century when the sons of Janissaries, and freeborn Muslims generally, were permitted to join, and the corps' slave discipline was compromised. This assessment, however, is belied by subsequent Janissary victories in the seventeenth century. Many strains weighed on this group, including inflation and the continual devaluation of Ottoman money, which substantially lowered salary values.

JANISSARIES IN THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES

In the early seventeenth century, when economic and social unrest threatened the stability in the empire, the Janissaries became more deeply involved in royal politics. The young sultan in 1621, Osman II, blamed the Janissaries for the Polish defeat of the Ottomans at Khotin. Osman did not trust their loyalty since he associated them with his uncle and rival, the previous sultan Mustafa I, who had just been deposed. Within a year, Mustafa became Sultan again (with his mother behind the throne), and the Janissaries killed Osman II. Many of the regicides were hunted down and executed in retribution for Osman's death, but the Janissaries' kingmaker role was in no way diminished.

Throughout the seventeenth century, the Janissaries had a fearsome reputation for fomenting unrest instead of fighting in combat. The distinction between the urban craft guilds and the Janissaries had already started to blur, a development that reduced unit cohesion and undermined the Janissaries' fighting capacity. The Janissaries came to be blamed for a series of military defeats, beginning with unsuccessful Ottoman campaigns against the Habsburgs in the 1690s that led to the Treaty of Carlowitz, the first permanent Ottoman surrender of territory to European powers.

The "Tulip Era" of the 1720s was a time when European ideas and fashions became extremely popular in the Ottoman Empire, challenging the traditional system in the wake of a string of Ottoman military failures. This era of social change, combined with the financial weakness and inept administration of the government at that time, produced tensions that culminated in a popular revolt to overthrow Sultan Ahmed III (1703–1730). Patrona Halil, a noncombatant, illiterate Janissary, led this uprising.

JANISSARIES IN THE ERA OF OTTOMAN MILITARY REFORM

Count Alexandre de Bonneval was assigned in the 1730s to modernize the Janissaries. Despite slight improvements in their military capabilities, the Janissaries still had great difficulties adapting to modern warfare and did not receive adequate funding. Further disasters were in store, such as Janissary mismanagement of naval forces that led to a terrible defeat at Chesme in 1770 during the Russo-Ottoman War.

The Ottomans then turned to another European adviser, Baron de Tott, to begin modernizing the military by establishing a naval engineering school in the 1790s. This began an educational transformation in the Ottoman military that totally left out the Janissaries. New army units with no connection to them were organized under Sultan Selim III (ruled 1789–1807) in a military and financial program called the Nizam-i Cedid ('New Order').

By the late eighteenth century, though, the Janissaries would prove difficult to dislodge. As their importance as soldiers waned, they had developed considerable economic and coercive power in major Ottoman cities and were able to thwart reformers' direct assaults on their status for several decades. When they were ordered in 1807, for example, to wear European-style uniforms, the Janissaries staged a revolt and put a new sultan, Mustafa IV, on the throne.

However, general reform trends worked against them. Another sultan, Mahmud II, took power in 1808, and gradually developed strong alliances with advocates of change that resulted in drastic action against the Janissaries eighteen years later. During the so-called "Auspicious Event" in 1826, Mahmud carried out a secret plan to surround the Janissary barracks with artillery and kill everyone inside. The Bektashi order, so closely associated with the Janissaries, was outlawed in the Ottoman Empire in December 1826. This incident, which occurred as enemies with more modern armies were trouncing the Ottomans, ushered in the era of profound military and social reform that extended over the next few decades.

See also Islam in the Ottoman Empire ; Ottoman Dynasty ; Ottoman Empire ; Sultan ; Tulip Era (Ottoman Empire) ; Vizier .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Goodwin, Godfrey. The Janissaries. London, 1997.

Inalcik, Halil. The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age, 1300–1600. Translated by Norman Itzkowitz and Colin Imber. New York, 1973.

Itzkowitz, Norman. Ottoman Empire and Islamic Tradition. Chicago, 1972.

Ernest Tucker