Othman Elite of Algeria

The Ottoman Algerian Elite and Its Ideology Author(s): Tal Shuval Source: International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 32, No. 3 (Aug., 2000), pp. 323-344 Published by: Cambridge University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/259512 Accessed: 19/01/2009 16:20 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cup. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1995 to build trusted digital archives for scholarship. We work with the scholarly community to preserve their work and the materials they rely upon, and to build a common research platform that promotes the discovery and use of these resources. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

Cambridge University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to International Journal of Middle East Studies.

http://www.jstor.org

Int. J. Middle East Stud. 32 (2000), 323-344. Printed in the United States of America

Tal Shuval

THE

OTTOMAN

ALGERIAN

ELITE

AND

ITS IDEOLOGY

By the late seventeenth century, Algeria and Tunisia had established regimes that were largely independent of Ottoman sovereignty in almost every regard, although the Porte continued, in strictly legal terms, to exert minimal rights of sovereignty. Michel Le Gall1 But, let there be no mistake: the more a regency of Barbaryhas become fearsome to the Christianprinces, the more the Sultan is its absolute master. He had only to utter a word to end an unjust war and fix even the terms for peace. Jean-Michel Venturede Paradis2 Separated by two centuries, these two quotations describe the role of the Ottoman On the one contradictory-terms. Empire in North Africa in very different-indeed, as where Africa is a Ottoman North hand, region independent political endepicted tities emerged out of a century of Ottoman rule, ready as it were for the eventual emergence of nation-states in the 20th century. Venture de Paradis's earlier description, however, is devoid of the hindsight gained by our knowledge of the "end of the story." It tells us that by the end of the 18th century, contrary to the contemporary accepted view of the remoteness of the Maghribi "regencies" from the imperial center in Istanbul, the three Ottoman provinces of North Africa were indeed an integral part of the Ottoman Empire, and the rulers of these provinces were obedient subjects of the Sublime Porte. While both accounts contain a degree of exaggeration, Venture de Paradis actually offers the better understanding of center-periphery relations in 18th-century Ottoman Algeria.3 Andrew C. Hess has demonstrated the importance of placing Ottoman North Africa in the imperial framework for understanding its history.4 The recent increase in the number of studies of diverse aspects of Ottoman history, of both the center and the periphery, prompted Ehud R. Toledano to propose a thesis regarding the broad framework in which 18th- to 19th-century Ottoman history should be studied, especially the relationship between the imperial Ottoman center and the Arabic-speaking provinces.5 Toledano points to a dual process of localization of the Ottoman elites and of Ottomanization of local elites, leading to the creation of Ottoman-local elites who became the predominant groups, enjoying legitimacy in their respective provinces Tal Shuval is a lecturer in the Department of Middle East Studies, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva 84105, Israel; e-mail: [email protected]. ? 2000 Cambridge University Press 0020-7438/00 $9.50

324

Tal Shuval

and in the imperial center.6This proposition seems relevant for most of the Arab provinces of the OttomanEmpire. I assume, however, that the author'sintention was to describe a continuum rather than to give a rigid model fitting all parts of the empire during the 18th and 19th centuries. In light of the analysis of the Algerian Ottoman elites' behavior, I argue that although the Algerian province formed an integral part of the Ottoman Empire, it represents an extreme case and that, unlike the two neighboring Maghribi provinces of Tunis and of Tarablusgarb,which were founded concurrently, it was very little influenced by the processes Toledano described. In Tunis and Tarablusgarb,the 18th century saw the establishment of local Ottoman dynasties backed by local Ottoman elites, the apogee of the process described by Toledano.In the Algerian province, however, inclusion of members of the local elite in the Ottoman elite was at best extremely limited, and real government rested in the hands of men arrivingfrom other areas of the empire, mainly from areas included in today's Turkey.7 Historians have not yet integrated North Africa's Ottoman elites fully into the imperial framework. This article will try to show that the behavior of the Algerian military-administrative elite (ocak)8 during the 18th century can be interpretedin terms of dynamic interplaybetween the elite's desire to preserveits relative autonomy vis-a-vis the Sublime Porteand, at the same time, its eagerness to demonstrateits loyalty to the Porte. This dynamic interplay was the embodiment of the way Ottoman politics was played. This article forms part of a larger project of analyzing the history of the elites of the Ottoman Maghrib as part and parcel of the imperial setting within which these elites operated. The first part of the article will briefly describe the foundation of the Ottoman province of Algeria. It will focus on points directly connected to the shaping of the military-administrative elite's special character.In this part, I argue that the historical conditions under which the Algerian Ottoman elite was formed and its increasing dependence on the center-which coincided with the diminishing importance of the province to the center-drove the elite to nurtureits "Turkishness"to a point at which it became ideology. Here I use Willard A. Mullins's definition of ideology for its convergence with what I describe as the Algerian Ottoman elite's ideology.9 The second part will deal with some of the tactics that the elite used to preserve its character: the recruiting of new members almost exclusively from outside the province; its policy of minimizing the numberof marriagesof its members with local women; and the attitude of the Algerian Ottoman elite toward the fruits of such marriage, called kuloglu (pl. kulogullari, sons of [the sultan's] slave). I argue that the practice of these policies, often achieved at great effort, form a patternthat can be interpreted as an intention to perpetuate the Turkishnessof the Algerian Ottoman elite. In this part, especially when dealing with the ideological side of the problem of the kuloglu, I try to show whether the phenomenon that I describe as ideology converges with at least some of Dominick La Capra's"features of ideology."10Finally, the article will examine whetherthe patternof settlementof members of the military-administrative elite in the city of Algiers, where a vast majority lived, follow the patternthat Andre Raymond discerned for the cities of Tunis and Cairo, where the wealthier members of the local population and of the Ottoman elite were living in the same quartersin the 18th century.T"A different pattern,one of segregation from the rest of the popu-

The OttomanAlgerian Elite and Its Ideology

325

lation, could be interpretedas an additionalindicatorof the seclusion of the Algerian Ottoman elite from the rest of the society. Among the source material used for this study, two sorts of documents need to be presentedbriefly:probateinventories (mukhallafat)and endowmentdeeds (waqfiyyat). The probateinventories studied were registeredby the administrationof finance (bayt al-mal), which was in chargeof inheritancesof those who died without leaving an heir in Algiers or without leaving any male heir (dasib).Also included in the registers are lists of properties of missing persons and of those who were taken prisoners by the enemy. The inventories are registered according to what appears to be a universal Ottomanmodel, as studied in other parts of the empire.12 The second type of document consists of summaries of several thousand waqfrelated documents. Most are endowment deeds, but some documents are related to legal actions concerning waqf property. These summaries were prepared for the French administrationafter the conquest of the city of Algiers in 1830. They seem to encompass the totality of the material connected with the waqf that the French managed to collect in their struggle to control all that property.13 THE

FOUNDATION

OF THE

OTTOMAN

PROVINCE

OF ALGERIA

The foundation of the Algerian military-administrative unit is directly linked to the establishment of the Ottoman province (beylerbeylik) of the Maghrib at the beginning of the 16th century. At that time, a semi-organized maritime war between European forces-mainly Spanish on one side and Ottoman and North African on the other-was raging in the western basin of the Mediterranean.Fearing that their city would fall into Spanish hands, the inhabitantsof Algiers called on a group of Ottoman corsairs for help. Headed by Oru9 and his brother Barbaros Hayreddin, these corsairs were operating in the region. In a very short time, the two men took over rule of the city and startedto expand their territoryinto the hinterland.Meeting with heavy resistance and having lost his brother Oru9, Hayreddin soon realized that he could resist both Spanish and local forces only by aligning himself with the Ottoman Empire. In answer to his request, Sultan Selim I (r. 1512-20) agreed to assume control of the Maghribi regions ruled by Hayreddinas a province, granting the rank of governor-general (beylerbey) to Hayreddin himself. In addition, the sultan sent 2,000 janissaries, accompanied by about 4,000 volunteers with the same privileges as the janissaries, to the newly established Ottomanprovince of the Maghrib, whose capital was to be the city of Algiers. This force became the basis of Algiers' janissary army.The numberof soldiers graduallyincreased, but reliable information about the size of the army comes only at the beginning of the 18th century. According to pay registers, the number of janissaries in the Algerian province during the first half of the 18th century was about 12,000.14This number declined during the second half of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, falling to 4,000 in 1830, when Algiers was conquered by the French. As will be seen, the Algerian corps was composed almost entirely of recruits from outside the province; the number of janissaries in the registers thereforedoes not include native Algerians. Most of the janissaries were stationed in Algiers, which they left to set out on their various missions, and to which they returnedwhen their missions were accomplished. It seems that the

326

TalShuval

exceptionally high number of janissaries concentratedin the city of Algiers, whose populationdid not exceed 50,000 inhabitantsduringthe 18th century,greatly affected the characterof the city, and perhapsthat of the province at large.15From the beginning, then, the "real"janissaries constituted a minority in the janissary corps. Recruitment of the bulk of the force depended on volunteers, mainly from Anatolia.16 However, all the soldiers were called janissaries.17 This title, frequently mentioned by foreign observers, appearsin OttomanAlgeria's documents, as well. Like the imperial soldiers, the Algerian soldiers called each other yolda~ (a Turkish word that is best translated as "comrade");they called their sons born of unions with local women kuloglus, implying that they considered their status as that of the sultan's servants. For the better part of the 16th century, the North African province constituted one of the frontiers between the Hapsburgs and the Ottoman Empire. The unity of the province of the Maghrib was maintained during that time. The janissary corps did not exceed its role as an army at the service of the governor-generalor his representative, enabling him to rule over the newly conquered regions of North Africa and to protect them. The 1580 truce between Phillip II and Murad III reduced the scale of war in the area, but it did not bring about peace. In 1587, the province was divided into three different provinces, which were established where the modern states of Libya, Tunisia, and Algeria were to emerge. Each of these provinces was headed by a pasha sent from Istanbul for a three-yearterm. The division of the Maghrib indicated the decreasing importanceof each of the three provinces to the imperial center. But the Algerian province would face the dangers of war for centuries to come.18 The division of the Maghrib also launched the process that led eventually to the janissary corps' rule over the province.19 From the end of the 16th century, then, the Algerian province, whose importance to the imperial center diminished drastically, had to face many dangers on its own or devise a way to emphasize its allegiance to-indeed, its dependence on-the imperial center in the hope of getting the full support of the latter in case of need. It seems that one of the solutions that Algiers's Ottoman elite chose was to emphasize its Turkishidentity and nurtureits Turkishcharacterto a point at which it became an ideology.20By so doing, the Algerian province took a different path from that of its neighboring provinces, where local-Ottoman elites were to emerge. The aim of nurturing the elite's Turkishness was twofold: it limited the number of the privileged group (i.e., the ocak) while demonstratingthe group'sloyalty to the sultan by leaving the key to its reproductionin the sultan's hands. A methodological problem I should point out at this stage is that the ideology this study refers to is not an explicit one to be found in written texts. This is my hypothesis, my way of bestowing meaning on the acts of the military-administrative elite as reflected by the documents under study and by myths propagatedby travelers and by the local population. The principal sources I am using are probateinventories registered by the administration of finance and resumes of endowment deeds that do not constitute a narrative.21A behavioral pattern, however, can be discerned when analyzing the documents. My assumption is that this pattern is not accidental and that it can be interpretedin terms of ideology. Although it refers to the modern era, Mullins's definition of ideology can serve as an explanatory category for my use of

The OttomanAlgerian Elite and Its Ideology

327

the term. According to Mullins, ideology is "a logically coherent system of symbols which, within a more or less sophisticated conception of history, links the cognitive and evaluative perception of one's social condition-especially its prospects for the future-to a programof collective action for the maintenance, alterationor transformation of society."22Ideology, Mullins notes, "is able to portraythe 'facts' in terms of their relevance for human wants and aspirations."23According to this definition, then, ideology is the cognition of a certain situation as containing a variety of possibilities; the comprehensionand evaluation of these possibilities, especially of their prospective influence on the future, create a field for common action aiming at shaping the future in conformity with what is perceived as the ideal situation for the group. The role of ideology, therefore, is to provide a logically coherent system of symbols-that is, to interpretreality in its own terms-and to mobilize individuals who accept its point of view into common action. In the case at hand, the ideology targeted the members of the military-administrative elite of 18th-centuryOttoman Algeria. The symbolic system is linked to the perception of the elite's status in regard to the imperial center and in the province. The action the ideology attempts to provoke is the maintenance of the status quo (albeit not necessarily "objectively real"), the meaning of which in this case is the preservation of the "Turkishness"of the group as the best remedy against an eventual deteriorationof its status vis-a-vis the Sublime Porte and the province. The term "Turkishness"signifies a variety of cultural features connected with the lifestyle, language, religion, and area of origin of the elite's members. These created remarkabledifferences between the Algerian Ottoman elite and the indigenous population. Thus, for example, members of the elite adheredto Hanafi law while the rest of the population subscribedto the Maliki school. Most of the elites originated from non-Arabregions of the empire. Upon arrivalin Algiers, the new recruitsunderwent a ratherlong procedureof socialization into the elite, either in the janissary barracks or through participationin the province's military activities. The cultural differences between the elites and the local population were manifested by the languages spoken by each group: members of the elite spoke Ottoman Turkishwhile the local population spoke Algerian Arabic.24The janissaries were not subjected to the same laws as the indigenous inhabitantsof Algiers. They differed from the rest of the population in their dress. According to the sources used for this study, the janissaries' active participation in Algiers's production and commerce at the end of the 18th century was surprisinglylow: only 4.3 percent of the janissary probate inventories (46 of 1,072) as against 44.7 percent of the urbanmale population (222 of 497) indicate economic activity.25These differences created sentiments of solidarity and feelings of belonging to a different and privileged group among the members of the Ottomanelite.26It should be stressed, however, that the term "ethnicity" as defined by Anthony Smith is inadequatefor this group, as it is inadequatefor the dev?irmerecruitedjanissaries of the imperial center.27 Members of Algeria's Ottomanelite were termed "Turks"by the local population. There are some indications that they accepted the appellation.This name was used by the local population when speaking of the military-administrative elite's members. For instance, in the registers of the Algerian administrationof finance, as well as in endowment deeds, the title "Turk"appears as part of the name of some members of

328

Tal Shuval

the Ottoman elite.28Likewise, to indicate in the registers that a certain person is an offspring of a janissary and a local woman, the note ibn al-turki (or kuloglu) was added to his name.29In a collection of Algerian janissary songs edited by Jean Deny, one of the songs, written in OttomanTurkish,speaks explicitly of "Turks."30 Thus, it seems safe to presume that the term was widely used in Ottoman Algiers, even among members of the Ottoman elite. As noted earlier, the first who came to help Algiers in its struggle against the Spanish continuation of the Reconquista on North African shores were the corsairs. The janissaries arrivedlater. Thus, from its inception the militia found a rival in Algiers-the organization of the corsairs (ta'ifat al-raVis)-whose economic importance and military power constituted a constant challenge to janissary supremacy.31 Because the tadifa absorbed into its ranks European converts to Islam as well as Algerians who were willing to join the corsairs, few opportunities existed for the Ottoman corps to recruit new soldiers locally. The competition between the corsairs and the janissaries went beyond recruiting to raising revenue (especially involving piracy, the most fruitful source of funds). From the 1560s onward, the janissaries gained the right to sail with the corsairs, and finally, toward the end of the 17th century, the militia succeeded in incorporatingthe td'ifa, albeit as a separate body. The janissary corps had other rivals. The Algerian militia had to deal with local hostile forces ("tribes") as well as with European powers that tried to conquer Algiers or bombard it from the sea. Moreover, the Algerian province did not always maintaingood relations with its immediate Maghribineighbors, and wars eruptedbetween them from time to time. All of these factors contributedto the formation of the military-administrative elite with its characteristic"Turkish"identity, the perpetuation of which became key to the elite's self-image and survival. This process reached its apogee during the 18th century. The perpetuation of the ruling group's Turkishness constituted the heart of the ideology discussed in this article. It meant the maintenance of the military-administrative elite's non-hereditary status. One-generation elites are a well-known phenomenon in the history of Islam: suffice it to mention the Mamluk kingdom or even the janissaries of the Ottoman Empire until the reign of Selim I.32The uniqueness of the Algerian corps lies not in its avoidance of hereditary status but in its ability to maintainthe system long after the janissary corps of the imperial center had abandoned it. This was reflected in three practices: the militia's recruitingpolicy (concentrated in the empire's heartland,mainly in Anatolia); the restrictive marriage policy of the janissary corps; and the policy regardingthe integrationof elite members'sons into the militia. The following discussion will deal mainly with the issue of janissaries' marriages with local women and with the militia's attitudes toward the fruit of such marriages, the kuloglus. But first, the corps' recruiting problem should be discussed briefly. RECRUITING

TO THE

ALGERIAN

OCAK

From its establishment, the military-administrative elite worked to reinvigorate itself by enlisting volunteers from non-Arab regions of the empire, mainly from Anatolia. Messengers were sent for this purpose from Algeria to various cities, and

The OttomanAlgerian Elite and Its Ideology

329

during the 18th century a more or less permanentnetwork of recruiting officers was kept in some coastal Anatolian cities and on some of the islands of the Aegean Sea. Recruiting was irregular.It seems that whenever the number of janissaries suffered a significant decrease, new recruits were enlisted.33The number of recruits during the last thirtyyears of the militia'sexistence (1800-30) amountedto 8,533.34It should be noted, however, that contraryto the unanimous contention of contemporarytravelers and later of the researchers,the principle of not enlisting indigenous inhabitants to the janissary corps as full members (as opposed to an auxiliary force) was not strictly kept. An analysis of 1,460 probate inventories of janissaries who died during the 18th century reveals the presence of sixteen native Algerians in the ranks of the corps (about 1% of the corps analyzed), in numbers that are equal to those of convert Christiansserving as janissaries.35As in other mattersconcerning the history of the Ottoman Empire and its various regions, one should not in this case take the "ideal type" for reality, which was always more complex.36 The low percentage of "native janissaries" in the militia is representativeof the quasi-exclusive nature of recruiting in non-Arab parts of the empire. Local recruiting in the Algerian province remained very marginal, according to the sources, even when the janissary corps needed urgently to fill its ranks. Moreover, a comparison between the rate of native recruitmentto the corps at the beginning of the 18th century (1.5%) and at its end (1%) does not indicate a growth in the process of Ottomanization.37A comparison with other parts of the Ottoman Empire at the time highlights the unusualness of the situation in the Algerian province. According to Abraham Marcus, the city of Aleppo accounted for some 4,000 locally recruited janissaries in the 18th century.38According to Jane Hathaway, by the 18th century, about 14,000 residents of Cairo were inscribed on the rolls of the Ottoman regiments.39Andre Raymond emphasizes the importance of local recruiting in most of the Arab provinces of the OttomanEmpire to a point at which "the military from local origins dominated the ocak." The same author also notes the difference between the Algerian province, where local recruitingwas almost unheardof, and the neighboring province of Tunis, where local recruitingwas graduallyreplacing that in "the Levant."40

The recruitmentpolicy, then, was one of the means employed to perpetuate the Turkishnessof the Ottomanelite. But it had to pay a high financial price in terms of the cost of keeping a recruitment network in different parts of the empire, as well as in terms of the various payments that had to be made to the district governors in the places of recruitment.41It also paid a political price: the renunciationof its freedom of action. The Ottoman elite's dependence on recruiting in Anatolia left the key to its reproductionin the sultan's hands, for his consent was needed in order to recruit.The sultan used his power over the Algerian janissary corps to perpetuatehis sovereignty in the remote province. Indeed, in more than one case, the sultan succeeded in overcoming the province's disobedience without military force by using this leverage.42In spite of the price, which was at times very high, this recruitment policy was practiceduntil the fall of the province in 1830. The importanceof recruitment for the maintenance of relations between the Algerian Ottoman elite and the Sublime Porte did not escape Venturede Paradis,who observed that due to the elite's dependence on its consent to the recruitment,"[t]he Sublime Porte is much more the

330

Tal Shuval

master at Algiers than it is in Tunis or in Tripoli....

All recruitment is done on the

Ottoman Empire'sterritory,and the Turkshold the Sultan in the highest respect."43 JANISSARY

MARRIAGES

During the 18th century, the militia practiced a restrictive policy on marriages between its members and local women. This policy was noted by travelers and by the local population: "The reason of this discouragement to marriage in the soldiery is, that, by a fundamental edict, the government becomes the heir of all Turks,or Moors, who die, or are taken by the enemy, having neither children nor brothers;and therefore, as their marriage cuts off this expectation, it is left to the Dey's pleasure to allow them only their bare pay."44A somewhat more benevolent interpretationis offered by the Algerian kuloglu Sidi Hamdanben-OthmanKhodja: "There are some Turks who are so devoted to the Regency, that many of them do not marry intentionally in order to leave their riches to the treasuryof the beit-el-mal."45As will be shown later, this is not the only possible interpretation.This policy can be understood as part of the Ottoman elite's effort to perpetuate its Turkishness and to maintain its segregation from the rest of the population. Although the date of the inauguration of this policy is unknown, there is no doubt that it was practiced during the 18th century.46This policy was directed especially at the simple soldiers who constituted about 80 percent of the janissaries. The foot soldiers, whose wealth as a group was limited compared with that of rank holders,47benefited from a whole range of privileges conditioned by their celibacy. Thus, a married soldier would lose his right of residence in one of the city's eight barracksand the daily ration of bread (four loaves) to which he was entitled. He would also lose his right to purchase a variety of products at a preferential price. These sanctions clearly indicate that policy was indeed aimed at restricting the number of marriages among the janissaries. This policy had significant results: according to the sample of nearly 3,000 probate inventories analyzed, the marriagerate among the janissaries reached only half of that of the city's inhabitants (18% and 37%, respectively). Given that the janissaries arrived in Algiers as adults, and that the civil population's probate inventories contain a number (albeit small) of babies and children, the effectiveness of the policy seems even greater.In the janissary corps itself, 13 percent of the foot soldiers and 33 percent of the rank holders were married. A comparison of the marriage rate at the beginning of the 18th century (15%) and at its end (19%) does not indicate much change. A growing rate of marriagesbetween members of the military-administrative elite and local women would have indicated localization, but the analysis of probate inventories does not register change in this respect, either.48 The militia's marriage policy made clear distinctions among holders of different ranks:the higher the rank, the more acceptable the marriageof its holder. This seems to have escaped various travelers and scholars. Hence the remarkof a great scholar and traveler of the end of the 18th century,Venturede Paradis, that "in Algiers celibacy is the key to success."49The French scholar PierreBoyer, one of the founders of modern research in Ottoman Algeria, follows the accepted wisdom in his statement that "since 1720 no one could have been elected to the office of the dey if married."50 The inaccuracy of this observation is evident if one remembersthat of the nine per-

The OttomanAlgerian Elite and Its Ideology

331

sons that held the office of dey between 1718 and 1805, at least five were married.51 In spite of this inaccuracy,the essential fact remains that the Algerian Ottomanelite did indeed have a restrictivepolicy regardingthe marriageof its members, especially of the lower ranks, during the 18th century. This policy, too, was an integral part of its strategy of preserving its Turkishness. THE

KULOGLUS

The last issue concerning the military-administrative elite's ideology to be analyzed is the problem of the attitude of the members of the Turkishelite toward their offspring. In a way, this subject encompasses the two issues discussed earlier: the militia's recruitmentpolicy and its marriagepolicy. The kuloglus were potential recruits; in fact, their inclusion in the military-administrative elite proved to be subject to many changes.52They were the fruit of marriagesbetween elite members and local women, a matter that deserved the elite's attention and was subject to a special policy, as has been shown. Many travelers and researchershave explained the militia's marriagepolicy as emerging from fear of an increase in the numberof the kuloglus.53 In order to understandthis fear, one must remember that according to various witnesses, some of whom were sons of Ottoman elites who had marriedlocal women, the kuloglus were considered the Turks'worst enemies during the 18th century. The French traveler Jean-Andre Peyssonnel, who visited the province in 1725, tells of one kuloglu's discontent at not being promoted on the grounds of his origins. "'Had we [kuloglus] been in charge, said he ... certainly we would have driven the Turks out'.The father, angered at this feeling so 6pposed to the state, killed his son with his own hands so that he would become an example, and for the love he felt for the government."54Even if the historicity of this story is doubtful, it still illustrates the way the relationship between kuloglus and Turks was perceived at the time in the Ottoman province of Algeria. Half a century after Peyssonnel's visit to the province, another traveler reportedthat the kuloglus were the Turks'worst enemies, "even more so than the Moors [local urbanites]."55In a book written immediately after the French conquest of Algiers, Khodja deplores the rupturebetween the two "castes," the Turksand the kuloglus.56 At this point, some clarifications about the kuloglus are needed. First, the term itself designates male offspring of members of the Algerian Ottomanelite and local women. In the case of an offspring of a janissary and a non-local woman, normally a Europeanslave, the child was regardedas a full-blooded Turk.57The kuloglu, however, was linked to the local population via his maternal family, and his loyalty to the Ottoman elite was suspect, for he might develop another loyalty. He was therefore considered a potential dangerto the elite. The son of a non-local woman, herself an "outsider" in the local population, represented no such danger to the Ottoman elite. He was in the same situation as the rest of the members of the ruling group, who had no maternalfamily in the province and whose loyalty to the group was exclusive. The Algerian Ottomanelite, then, had a clear policy dictating the perpetuation of its characteras a special social group separatedfrom the local population. Second, the term refers only to first-generationmale offspring. A son of a kuloglu was not a kuloglu, as was explained in 1833 by Hamdanben Othman:"the years have

332

Tal Shuval

erased from memory the primary origin, and today all inhabitants of Algiers are called Algerians."58According to Laurentd'Arvieux, in 1674 the kuloglus were enrolled by the janissary corps, but their sons were excluded from it.59The second generation mingled within the mass of the population, so that during the 18th century, the relative number of kuloglus did not increase. The slow demographic growth and the low number of marriages of Ottoman elites brought the ratio between the janissaries and the kuloglus in the period analyzed to an estimated 3:1.60 The first instance we hear of kuloglus operating as a group (on the organization of which we have no information) is in 1596, when Hizir Pasha, governor of the province (r. 1588-91, 1594-98, 1604), tried to use them in his struggle against the janissary corps.61From then on, there are echoes of violent eruptions, mainly during the 17th century.In 1629, for example, the kuloglus were driven from the city of Algiers, and a few years later they tried to reconquerit from the Turks.62Boyer claims that the struggle between the two groups dates from the time that the Janissarycorps began taking over the actual government ("la realite du pouvoir") of the provincethat is, from the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th century. Control over the government, says Boyer, gave unlimited possibilities to the newly recruited Turks. Wishing to limit the number of those who enjoyed state perquisites, the Janissaries attemptedto curb the corsair organizationthat proved too strong to be removed from participationin the government. This is why, according to Boyer, "the Turkishminority have turned against the kuloglus."63This explanation is valid, at best, for the time that the corsairs were at the height of their power,64but it is not for the period in which the janissaries gained the upper hand, from the middle of the 17th century. The continuity of the elite's attitude toward the kuloglus is related to the policy of perpetuatingthe Turkishnessof the Algerian Ottoman elite. Though it began as a reality dictated by conditions over which they had no control, Turkishnessbegan to be seen by the members of the Ottoman elite as an essential feature of the militia, to be kept and reproduced.From circumstance it became ideology. As defined by Mullins, one of the roles of ideology is to interpret an existing reality and to point to a variety of possibilities, some of which are "negative" and some of which are "positive." The Algerian members of the Ottoman elite had before their eyes a concrete example of the negative possibility, in the shape of the province of Tunisia.In thatneighboringprovince, where the perpetuationof the Turkishness of the ruling group was not insisted upon, and where the kuloglus could reach the highest echelons of government, the janissary corps had lost its supremacy first to the Muraditedynasty (as early as 1631, MuradBey's son was appointedbey), and then to the Husaynite dynasty that governed the province from 1705 to 1837).65The Tunisiansituation can partly explain the continuationof the Algerian janissary corps' recruitmentpolicy and the manifest will to distance the kuloglus from the real centers of power, even at such times that the supremacy of the ocak was undisputed. The ideological dimension of this policy is expressed by the fact that even when many kuloglus did occupy posts considered "off limits" to them, the Ottoman elite still pretendedthat they were excluded from such posts. This is clearly evident in the travelers'writings of the 18th century.66To demonstratethe degree to which kuloglus were excluded, Venture de Paradis even remarksthat "the sons of the previous dey

The OttomanAlgerian Elite and Its Ideology

333

of Algiers [Baba Ali Dey, r. 1754-66] are living as simple individuals without any state pension and with no special distinction."67 Boyer suggests that the elite's attitude toward the kuloglus has to be analyzed as a problem of balancing between a principle (the supremacy of the Turks-la race Turque)and its application. Drawing his informationfrom travelers'accounts, Boyer describes the situationat the end of the 18th centurythus: "The kuloglus are excluded from the highest posts of the central government.They cannot be dey, or khaznaji(in charge of the treasury),or wakil al-kharj (in charge of the marine), or agha al-arab (commanderof a local auxiliary army, in charge of local affairs), nor khoja-al khail (in charge of collecting tax) .. .,and of course not agha of the Janissaries (head of the odjak [commanderin chief of the army])."68As will be shown, an analysis of the province's documents draws a picture that is quite different from the one drawn by Boyer and seems to highlight the ideological dimension of the Ottomanelites' policy toward the kuloglus. This is how the Algerian Ottomanelite wanted things to be, and this is how the travelers, who relied on the information they got from members of the elite, saw the situation, without being able to see the extent to which things were really different. The analysis of probateinventories and of endowment deeds reveals a large number of high-rankingkuloglus in the service of the ocak, in military and in administrative capacities, occupying posts explicitly considered out of bounds for them. No kuloglu, it is true, was dey during the 18th century, but this seems to be the only exception. Not only did kuloglus occupy all other posts, but at times the documents give the impression that they did so in a larger proportionthan their actual number would suggest. The same analysis also shows a difference between the situation in the first half of the 18th century, when a larger number of kuloglus occupied high posts in the province, and the second half of the century, when the number is considerably lower.69This difference is also very noticeable with regard to the post of bey (governor of a district of the province). According to Boyer, only one kuloglu held the post of bey between 1748 and 1780, compared with four out of five in the province of Constantine in the period of 1700-13.7? The explanation of this difference seems to be connected to the change in the province's situation vis-a-vis the center of the Ottoman Empire. In 1659, a transition period began, in the course of which real power was transferredfrom the imperial pasha to a local ruler (who from 1671 onward bore the title of dayl, which is rendered "dey" in European sources). Political struggle between the janissary corps and the triennial pashas, followed by what seem to be internal political struggles among diverse factions in the Algerian Ottoman elite, characterizedthe transition period, which lasted until 1729. From 1711, the center ceased dispatchingpashas to the Algerian province, conferring the rank of pasha on the janissaries' nominated dey. This came about as an answer to the instigation of the ruling dey S6keli Ali Cavu? (r. 1710-18), who paid a considerable sum of money to secure his appointment to pasha. It seems that the dey realized the need to receive the title of pasha himself mainly for his own security. Between 1659 and 1710, fourteen of the fifteen governors of the province (four aghas and eleven deys) were killed, while only one of more than thirty pashas who governed the province until 1659 suffered

334

TalShuval

a similar fate. It seems, then, that the need of the dey to become pasha stemmed from the internal situation of the province rather than from any other reason.71In other words, the nomination to pasha was not the result of the need to demonstrate the province's autonomous status but of the dey's personal need to connect himself symbolically to the sultan. Thus, paradoxically, an act that is understood as symbolizing a further weakening in the relations between the Algerian province and the imperial center resulted in enhancing the province's dependence on the Porte. The last attemptto send a pasha from Istanbul to Algiers was made in 1729 under the reign of Abdi dey (1723-29): "a pasha arrived in Algiers, but he was forced to sail the high sea, and was not allowed to set foot on shore."72According to Miriam Hoexter, this incident marked the point at which the province acquired the status of an autonomous province, which it retained until the French conquest of Algiers in 1830.73The new order of things, however, "was by no means revolutionary,in the sense of a complete departureeither from the past or from Ottomannorms and standards of administration,"says Hoexter.74In a sense, this new order of things seems to have emphasized the province's need of the Porte'sprotection. Upon the death of a ruling pasha, notes Khodja, a messenger was sent from the province to notify the Sublime Porte of his death and of the nomination of a new governor by the ruling group. "This ambassador'stask was to implore the Porte verbally to grant its benevolence to the regency . . . and to obtain [a commitment] from this authority to help and protect the regency."75 The relationshipbetween the imperial center and the Algerian province during the 18th century was marked by some crises, usually occasioned by the province's refusal to adhere to the center's policy of non-belligerence vis-a-vis European powers, as happened, for example, in 1729, 1816, and 1829.76These relations were also markedby the province's need for the center in its role as arbitratorin regional conflicts, such as the ones that engendered conflicts between the Algerian province and the Tunisian one in 1701, 1729, and 1756, or the ones that brought it into conflict with its Moroccan neighbor at the beginning of the 18th century.Moreover, European threats rendered the Porte's protection imperative for the ocak. As has been shown, the weakening of relations with the center, manifested by the appointmentof the military-administrative elite's chosen leader to pasha by the sultan, enhanced the dey's dependence on the sultan. What really underpinnedthis relationshipwas the growing loss of importance for the center of what had once been a frontier province of the OttomanEmpire, whereas the province's need of the center's supportdid not diminish.77As compensation for this loss of importance for the center, the ideology thus found a new reason to exist, which in turn brought about stricter enforcement of Turkishnessin the Algerian Ottoman elite. This meant employing fewer kuloglus in the higher echelons of the province. This process is quite different from the process of Ottomanizationdescribed by Toledano for other parts of the empire, for it clearly points to a growing closure of the military-administrative elite that excluded "nonTurks"from its ranks. In the analysis of the two previous subjects-recruitment to the militia and the elite's marriagepolicy-the source material (mainly probateinventories, endowment deeds, and voyagers' accounts) was used in a ratherpositivistic way. In the analysis

The OttomanAlgerian Elite and Its Ideology

335

of the issue of the kuloglus, I use an additional source: legends and myths that were meant to explain the Ottoman elite's attitude toward the kuloglus.78 The importance of stories explaining the reasons for the bad relations between the ocak as an institution and the group of kuloglus goes far beyond the question of their historicity. In the Introductionto Between Two Worlds, Cemal Kafadar states: "Methodologically, my discussion is an attemptto transcendthe positivistic attitude, still dominant in Ottomanstudies, that every bit of information in the sources can and must be categorized as either pure fact or fiction."79He then argues that legends and myths emanating from the earliest days of the House of Osman constitute a very important source, enabling "an understandingof the gazi milieu as a social and culturalreality that sustained political and ideological debate."80This is how I interpret Algerian legends concerning the kuloglus. The legends are to be found in travelers' accounts and in Algerian chronicles and books. My assumptionis that in both cases, they emanate from the local population of Algiers. The fact that the same legend is found in both types of sources helps corroboratethis assumption. Two different explanations of the kuloglus' exclusion from certain posts in the province are reportedby the French historian H.-D. de Grammont,who does not cite his source: "This decree [the exclusion of the kuloglus] was attributedby them [the Algerian population] to Sidi Abd-er-Rahman-et-Ts'albi,a venerated maraboutof Algiers." De Grammontpoints to the impossibility of such a decree being given by that individual, because there was no kuloglu in Sidi Abd-er-Rahman'slifetime or for forty years after his death.81Another myth, notes de Grammont,attributesthe exclusion of that group to Oruc, when the problem did not yet exist.82The same legend exists in a slightly different version, in which the name of Hayreddin rather than Orugis cited.83The anachronismof these legends is obvious, and de Grammontconcludes that they were invented by the heads of the province in order to give a religious justification to such a reprehensible act: "It becomes clear that this imagined prohibition was invented by the heads of the Divan in order to cover with a kind of a religious coat an unjustifiable ostracism."84"Ideology involves mystification, illusionism, or illegitimate masking in the interest of legitimation or justification"is the first feature of ideology given by La Capra.85It seems to converge with the alleged invention of stories by the province's leadership with the aim of legitimizing their treatmentof the kuloglus. Another myth, however, was frequently used by the travelers as well as by the Algerians. This myth, which is based on a historical event, ties the kuloglus' rebellion of 1629 in the city of Algiers and their expulsion from the city to their later position vis-a-vis the Ottoman elite.86 The event itself is of no importance to the ongoing discussion. What seems to be significant is the order of the day of the dey Haci ;aban Hoca (r. 1690-95) dating from 1693, in which he reestablished the equality of the Turksand the kuloglus.87 From this point on, one can trace the reconstructionof the event of 1629 as more than a mere incident, for it graduallybecomes the reason for the restrictions allegedly imposed on the kuloglus' recruitment and eventual advancementin the province's hierarchy.Laugier de Tassy and Jean-Andre Peyssonnel describe the situation around 1725. They mention the restrictionimposed on the recruitmentof kuloglus to the militia, citing as the reason fear of "a race, who,

336

Tal Shuval

animated by the love of their native country and that of their mothers, would, in a few generations be a match for the Turks,and destroy their government."88The first time that the event of 1629 is attributedsome explanatory value is when Thomas Shaw, who stayed twelve years in the province (1720-32) states that "since the time they [kulogus] made an unsuccessful attempt upon the government, by endeavoring to seize upon the Cassaubah, they have not been much encouraged [to enroll in the Janissary corps]."89In the mid-18th-century,the event is presented as the reason for the bad relations between the two groups by an Algerian kuloglu, who notes in his chronicle: "Today [1745] the Janissaries are perfectly tranquil, and lead the most agreeable existence they have ever known. I make only one exception for the dispute that erupted between the Turks and the Kuloglus: They came to blows ... on the nineteenth day of Ramadan (12 May 1629), while the expulsion [of the kuloglus] took place on the twenty-ninth of the same month of the year 1038 (22 May 1629), that is, the last day of Ramadan."90In the last quarterof the 18th century, the event is pointed to as the concrete reason for the exclusion of the kuloglus "from the garrison of the Qasbah and from all the high posts of the government"by Venture de Paradis,who explains that when he finds no document he is reduced to using oral traditions.91Despite the very limited consequences for the ruling Turks, adds Venture, it was then that the law had been passed, and "it was so much in vigor that, when there were enough Levantine ioldachs, [the janissary corps] avoid their inscription on the payroll."92The final version of the myth is given by yet another kuloglu, Khodja, in his book dated 1833. It seems significant that the most complete account of the events is given by this last writer, who adds some colorful legend-like details, such as the stratagem employed by the Turksof disguising their Mozabite allies in women's clothing and sending them to fight the rebelling kuloglus.93The acceptance by the two kuloglu authors of the events of 1629 as the reason for their group's exclusion from the high echelons of the province, and in a sense their acknowledgment of the kuloglus' "guilt," shows not only the durability of this myth but also its importance for the acceptance and internalization of the hegemonic group's authority. Here, too, La Capra'sfeatures of ideology (the fourth feature) seem to converge with what I describe as ideology: "[i]deology is related to the hegemony of one formation, bloc, or group over others, and hegemony in this sense cannot be reduced to power for it requiresa nexus of power and consent, in other words, a form of authority at least partially accepted and internalized by all relevant groups, including the oppressed."94 THE

PERPETUATION

SETTLEMENT

OF TURKISHNESS

AND

THE

PATTERNS

OF

IN ALGIERS

The policy of perpetuatingthe Turkishelement was also expressed in the janissaries' settlement patternin the city of Algiers, where most of them were permanently stationed. A majority of them had their homes in the eight barracksthat stood in the lower city,95but even those who had chosen to reside outside the barrackstended to find lodgings in this part of the city. The concentration of the wealthier part of the Ottoman elite as well as the concentration of the rich element among the local pop-

The OttomanAlgerian Elite and Its Ideology

337

ulation constituted a geographical reflection, on the city's map, of the relations between the two groups. It is not my intention to discuss here the problem of wealth division in cities of the Islamic world. This has to do with the debate on the alleged existence of the "Islamic city" and its "Islamic essence," and with the way the Islamic society of this city is imagined to be egalitarian in the sense that no distinction is made between rich and poor-for, as is well known, the only distinction among Muslims is in their piety.96Be that as it may-as has been shown by Raymond and others, who have studied various cities in the Arab world in the Ottoman era-one common characteristic of these cities has to do with the distribution of wealth in them.97Schematically, in all of these cities we can discern a phenomenon of wealth concentrationin the central regions, aroundthe markets,where most of the economic activity took place. As one travels away from the center, the wealth level tends to decrease, until the peripheralregions of the cities become a "poverty belt." It is in these peripheralareas, however, that some rich enclaves can be found. This is explained mainly throughecological reasons (less noise than in the busy city center) and economic reasons (availability of relatively cheap land where big mansions could be built). In many respects, the city of Algiers fits this description. A detailed analysis of wealth distributionin the city among the two groups-the wealthier members of the Ottomanelite, on the one hand, and the wealthier locals, on the other98-reveals that the former did indeed tend to concentratearoundthe city's economic, administrative, and religious center. Another concentration of this group was to be found in the western partof the city, in the vicinity of the region where the ancient Berber Qasbah was situated in the pre-Ottomanera. As regards the wealthier part of the local population, they tended to concentrate in the southern part of the city, in the al-Slawy quarter.Moreover, individuals belonging to this group who had their lodgings near the city center tended to avoid the regions with concentrationsof rich janissaries. By dividing the city map into forty-eight squares of about one hectare each, and after a comparative analysis of the wealth level of each of these squares according to the probate inventories dating from the end of the 18th century, fifteen such squares were defined as relatively rich. Only two of these regions housed a mixed population of rich janissaries and rich Algerians, while the thirteen other regions were exclusively Turksor exclusively Algerians.99 Speaking of the city of Tunis in the 18th century, Raymond remarks that "the socioeconomic characteristics of the Andalusians [Muslim inhabitants of the city who arrived after their expulsion from Spain, mainly in 1609] proved to be more powerful than the community of national origin, and they determineda partitionfollowing the hierarchy of wealth; the more prosperouspart of the community merged with the local bourgeoisie, while the greater number constituted a national quarter in a popular district."100In the city of Cairo in the same period, "[t]he horizontal frontiers delimiting the social strata proved to be ... more determinant than the vertical frontiers that separated'foreign' ruling caste from the indigenous racya."101 In Cairo and Tunis, then, socio-economic circumstances had influenced settlement patterns of the population no less, and maybe even more, than ethnic origin. In Algiers, however, the situation was different. Settlement patterns indicate a mutual

338

Tal Shuval

rejection between the wealthy of the two groups, constituting a concrete reflection of the divisions between these two groups along ethnic lines, which seems quite exceptional in the Arab cities of the Ottoman Empire at that time. Even before the imperial center's abortedattemptto appoint a pasha from Istanbul in 1729, a change occurred in the relations between the province and the Sublime Porte. According to Hoexter, this date marks the end of the process that led to Algeria's becoming "an autonomous province."102 This change seems to explain in a paradoxical way the enhancement of the province's dependence on the Porte and its renewed urge to consolidate its Turkishness.The reason for the change is to be found in the struggle for power between the triennial pashas, sent from the center, and the janissary corps, as well as in the Ottoman elite's internal problems, including the dey's position vis-a-vis the elite. The implications of the new situation, however, could have meant alienation of the province from the center. As eager as the province was to maintain its new status, it obviously could not afford such alienation: it was still faced with great challenges, such as war with European powers, mainly Spain. The presence of a Spanish garrison in the city of Wahran (the French Oran) served as a permanentreminderof the fact that the province formed the front line of the empire. Besides, the struggles between the militia and the local powers outside as well as inside the province's borders persisted. All these motivations demonstrate a continuity with the main reason for which Hayreddinhad asked for the empire's help-namely, the need for protection, which was still valid. It seems, then, that the strengthening of the Turkishness of the Ottoman elite was perceived by the latter as compensation for an eventual weakening of the link with the center, as a way of telling the Sublime Porte that the Algerian province was very much Ottoman. The Algerian Ottoman elite's eagerness to manifest its Ottoman character to the center was revealed in more ways than one. For example, the two Algerian barracks, Eski Odalar and Yeni Odalar, were named after the barracks in Istanbul. The reason for this designation in Algiers, according to Deny, was the desire to imitate the habits of the Ottomancapital.103The building of the New Mosque (al-Jdmical-Jadid) by the janissaries in 1660, and the distinct imperial style of the monument, says Raymond, "can be considered as a sort of a monumental reaffirmation of Ottoman sovereignty in Algiers," a reaffirmationnecessary after the "revolution of 1659, which had enabled the militia to deprive the pasha of its powers."104This kind of "monumentalrecognition" of Ottoman sovereignty is to be found in other parts of the empire, such as Tunis (the constructionof the Sidi Mehrez mosque between 1692 and 1696) and Cairo (the Bulaq mosque in 1774).105 Discussing the transitionperiod in the province's history (1659-1729), during which the Algerian province changed from a province directly governed by the Ottoman center to an autonomous province, Hoexter observes that Algiers's Ottoman governing elite was "largely Ottoman by origin and certainly by general orientation."She claims, moreover, that they continuedjealously to guard their separateTurkishidentity because it secured their privileges as a ruling caste. "No wonder, then,"concludes Hoexter, "thatlocal institutions were forged in the image of those common in the heartlandof the OttomanEmpire."106 It seems that this observation can be carried one step further, in the direction pointed to by Raymond, regarding the erection of the New Mosque at the very beginning of the period discussed by Hoexter. Given the nature of the period, and the

The OttomanAlgerian Elite and Its Ideology

339

janissaries' takeover of power, it was in the Algerian Ottoman elite's interest to reaffirmits loyalty to the imperial center. The establishment by the ocak of a central waqf administrationfor the two holy cities of Islam was not only modeled after the evqaf-i haramaynin Istanbul, as shown by Hoexter.107The choice of the Haramayn, close to the heartof the Ottomansultans, as the object of this particularwaqf was not accidental. Here, too, one should note the reaffirmationof Ottoman sovereignty by the Algerian province. CONCLUSION

The difference between the Algerian province and the other two provinces that were founded at the same time in the Maghribwas not fortuitous. Both the Tunisianprovince and Tarablusgarbwitnessed the emergence of local powers alongside the Ottoman elite and the establishment of Ottoman-local dynasties. That is, both cases converge with the historical process that Toledano described: localization of Ottoman elites parallel to the Ottomanization of local elites and their integration into an Ottoman-local elite. In the Algerian province, however, the situation was quite different, primarily because of the ideology whose emergence was linked with the foundation of the province in the specific conditions of 16th-century Algeria and with the Ottoman elite's existence in the city of Algiers: the struggle against the organization of the corsairs (which lasted until the end of the 17th century) and the wars against foreign powers that characterized the existence of the province as an Ottoman one. Events in Tunisia contributedto the strengtheningof the ideology, as did the fear from the furtherweakening of the links with the imperial center beginning in the early decades of the 18th century.At a time that the other Maghribi provinces seem to have chosen the establishment of an Ottoman-local elite as their way of achieving some autonomy in the general framework of the Ottoman Empire, the Algerian province seems to have opted for anotherway to achieve the same purpose. Unwilling to, and maybe incapable of letting an Ottoman-local dynasty develop, the province chose what seems a paradoxical solution. The expulsion of the triennialpashas sent from Istanbul and the appointment of the dey to pasha, which meant a considerable weakening in the link between the province and the center, was combined with the perpetuationof a system that left the key to its reproductionin the hands of the sultan, and with the adoption of an ideology of maintaining the Ottoman elite's Turkishnessas a means of demonstratingits loyalty to the empire. The elite's continued Turkishness depended on its ability to recruit new members in the Turkish parts of the Ottoman Empire, and on its ability to prevent the infiltration of non-Turkishelements, including kuloglu, into its ranks. The recruitmentproblem was solved at a heavy financial and political price. The kuloglu problem was confronted in two different ways-by reducing the number of marriages of the elite's members with local women and thus reducing the number of births of kuloglus; and by attempting to prevent the kuloglus from entering the Ottoman elite. The first method seems to have been very effective, and the rate of marriages of janissaries with local women was considerablylower thanthatof the local population.The second method, however, was less effective, as is demonstratedby the relatively high number of high-ranking kuloglus in the service of the province. But here one can see the

340

Tal Shuval

tension between the ideology and the reality as it is reflected in the sources. The presence of a ratherlarge group of high-ranking kuloglus did not prevent the Algerian Ottoman elite from projecting a different image of itself, an image that was congruous with the ideology. This was achieved through the invention of traditions for local consumption, such as the one attributingto Hayreddinthe prohibitionof the kuloglus' service in the ocak and their advancement in its hierarchy.108The founder of the province could not have given such an order.His son Hassan pasha, himself a kuloglu, served as governor-general of the Maghrib three times between 1544 and 1576. It would be like asserting anachronistically,as Boyer remarks,that Louis XIV had passed laws concerning the Third Republic's Parliament.109 NOTES Author's note: I am grateful to Haggay Ram and Gabriel Piterberg for their valuable comments and observations on this article. 1Michel Le Gall, "Forging the Nation-State: Some Issues in the Historiography of Modern Libya," in The Maghrib in Question: Essays in History and Historiography, ed. Michel Le Gall and Kenneth Perkins (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1997), 96. 2Jean-Michel Venture de Paradis, Tuniset Alger au XVIIIe siecle (Paris, 1983), 35. 3It is not my intention to inquire into the issue of the downplaying of the Ottoman era in the history of the Maghrib. Suffice it to say that colonial history, history after colonization, then national histories of the Maghrib each in turn had good reason to sully or ignore the Ottoman contribution to the development of the region. For a discussion of this issue, see N. Saidouni, "Tabi'at al-kitabat al-tarikhiyya hawl al-fatra al-'uthmaniyya min tarikh al-Jaza'ir,"Al-majalla al-tarikhiyya al-misriyya, 25 (1978): 149-77. For discussions of North African historiography,see The Maghrib in Question, ed. Le Gall and Perkins. 4Andrew C. Hess, "The Forgotten Frontier:The Ottoman North African Provinces during the Eighteenth Century,"in Studies in Eighteenth Century Islamic History, ed. T Naff and R. Owen (London, 1977), 74-88. 5Ehud R. Toledano, "The Emergence of Ottoman-Local Elites (1700-1900): A Framework for Research,"in Middle Eastern Politics and Ideas: A History from Within, ed. Ilan Pappd and Moshe Ma'oz (London, New York, 1997), 145-62. 6Ibid., 155. 7RobertMantran,"Quelques apportsottomans dans les capitales des odjaks de l'ouest,"Revue d'Histoire Maghrebine 69-70 (1993): 133-39; Tal Shuval, La ville d'Alger vers lafin du XVIIIemesiecle: population et cadre urbain (Paris, 1998), 59-64. 8The term ocak (pronounced odjak) defines the province of Algeria as well as its military-administrative elite. This group is also called "janissarycorps" and "the militia." About the term and its different meanings in the imperial center and in the Algerian province, see Jean Deny, "Les registres de solde des Janissaires conservds h la Bibliotheque Nationale d'Alger,"Revue Africaine 61 (1920): 36-37. 9Willard A. Mullins, "On the Concept of Ideology in Political Science," American Political Science Review 66 (1972): 498-510. l0Dominick La Capra, "Culture and Ideology: From Geertz to Marx,"Poetics Today 9 (1988): 37794. 11AndrdRaymond, The Great Arab Cities in the 16th-18th Centuries, An Introduction (New York, 1984), 61, 68. 12Fourparts of uneven importance are distinguishable in most of the inventories. The first part is the preamble, which is three or four lines long. In it, information concerning the deceased is indicated in stereotyped formulations. Normally mentioned in the preamble are the name of the deceased, sometimes accompanied by a patronym, and, in the case of a member of the military-administrative elite, his rank. Sometimes the deceased's profession is mentioned; in the case of foreigners, his or her origin is included. Also to be found in this part of the inventory is information about the matrimonial status and address of the deceased. In some cases, the circumstances of death are also mentioned. Finally, the date of registration (not of death) is marked. In the second part of the inventories are listed the belongings of the deceased, with their value. In the end of this part, all of the values are added together, and the total (al-

The Ottoman Algerian Elite and Its Ideology

341

jumla) representsthe gross value of the person'sproperty.I used this total sum for my calculations of the owner's wealth. The third part begins with the word usqita-that is, all that was deducted from the previous total. In this rubricwe find the burial expenses, the pay for the bayt al-mal. In some cases, we also find a rent of a lodging, possibly the part still due from a wife's dowry, etc. The last part consists of the distribution of the remainderof the heritage among those entitled to it. Contraryto the situation in Damascus, for example, the existence of this partin the Algerian probateinventories is exceptional, because of the nature of the Algerian documents, which consist mainly of inheritances of persons without heirs. For a more complete description of the Algerian probateinventories, see Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 25-32. For probate inventories from other parts of the empire, see Jean-Paul Pascual, "Aspect de la vie mat6rielle ia Damas a la fin du XVIIe siecle d'apres les invantaires appres deces," in The Syrian Land in the 18th and 19th Century,ed. Thomas Phillipp (Stuttgart, 1992), 168-71; Gilles Vienstein and Yolande Triantafyllidou-Baladi6, "Les inventaires apres deces Ottomans de Crete," in Probate Inventories: A New Source for the Historical Study of Wealth,Material Culture and Agricultural Development, ed. Ad Van Der Woude and Anton Schuurman(Utrecht, 1980), 191-99. The documents used for this study can be found in the form of microfilms in the Centre d'Archives d'Outre-Mer(hereafter CAOM) in Aix-enProvence. For a list of the registers used, see n. 28. 13The summaries, written mainly in Arabic, contain information about the city of Algiers as well as about Algerian society. Normally, we find in them a very short description of the property and the name of the institution that is the final beneficiary of the waqf. Some details concerning the founder of the waqf-his or her name and patronym and his or her rank, function, or profession-are also mentioned. Finally, in the third part are to be found the date of the foundation of the waqf as well as the dates that any legal action concerning the waqf propertytook place. For a more detailed description of this type of document, see Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 32-35. For a list of the registers used, see n. 28. 14Deny, "Registres,"36. 15Shuval,La ville d'Alger, 39-55. For the number of janissaries in other Arab provinces, see Andre Raymond, "Les provinces arabes (XVIe siecle-XVIIIe siecle)," in Histoire de l'Empire ottoman, ed. R. Mantran(Paris, 1989), 353. 16Shuval,La ville d'Alger, 94-97. 17Cf. Cornell H. Fleischer, Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: The Historian Mustafa Ali (1541-1600) (Princeton, N.J., 1986), 224: "In the case of military organization, the exigencies of border warfare required that the ranks be opened to people previously excluded." 18Hess, "ForgottenFrontier,"75. 19RobertMantran,"Le statut de l'Alg6rie, de la Tunisie et de la Tripolitaine dans l'Empire ottoman," in L'Empireottoman du XVIe au XVIIIe siecle, ed. Robert Mantran(London: VariorumReprints, 1984), 5-6. 20On the term "Turkish" see pp. 327-28. 21Fora description and an analysis of the source material, see Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 24-35. 22Mullins, "On the Concept of Ideology," 510. Mullins claims: "ideology. . . is largely a modern phenomenon," dating from the end of the Ancien R6gime (p. 503); nevertheless, his definition of ideology seems much less limited in time and space than he claims it to be. 23Ibid., 508. 24Inan article analyzing janissary songs mainly from 18th-centuryAlgiers, Jean Deny emphasizes the lack of effect that Algerian Arabic had on the songwriters'language: "The songs' language seems to have almost completely escaped the influence of Algiers' local dialects. One should notice the very small number of Algerian-Arabic terms used in the [Ottoman-Turkish] text at hand." Jean Deny, "Chansons des Janissaires turcs d'Alger,"Melanges Rend Basset (Paris, 1925), 47. 25Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 136-37. For the situation in other Arab cities of the OttomanEmpire, see Andr6 Raymond, Grandes villes arabes a l'epoque ottomane (Paris, 1985), 98-100. 26The last years of Ottoman rule in Algeria saw the commencement of a process that might have led to the integrationof local elites into the military-administrativeelite. The first step in this directionwas the transferin 1817 of the dey's seat from his palace in the heartof Algiers to the Qasbathat dominatedthe city, and what seemed to be an attemptby the governor to create for himself a power base other than the janissary corps. The conquest of Algiers by the French in 1830 put an end to this process. 27Anthony D. Smith, The Ethnic Origins of Nations (Oxford and Cambridge, 1986), 30-31; Ibrahim Metin Kunt, "Ethnic Regional (Cins) Solidarity in the Seventeenth-CenturyOttomanEstablishment,"International Journal of Middle East Studies 5 (1974): 223-33.

342

TalShuval

28Miriam Hoexter, Endowments, Rulers and Community: Waqf al-Haramayn in Ottoman Algiers (Leiden, Boston, Cologne, 1998), 34, n. 11. See, for example, some of the documents used for this study including probate inventories: CAOM 15 Mi. 1, vol. 1, 2, 4; and endowment deeds: CAOM 1 Mi. 60, Z 161; ibid., 61; ibid., 64, n. 8. The name "Turk"designates mainly, but by no means exclusively, individuals originating from areas included in today's modern Turkey. The term is also used in Algerian chronicles, such as M. Al-Jadiri, Al-zahra al-na'ira fi ma jara fil-Jaza'ir hin agharat 'alayha junud alkafara, Bayern Staatsbibliothek (cod ar. 419). 29CAOM 15 Mi. 1, vol. 2, 36; CAOM 1 Mi. 60, Z. 161, 62, 82. 30Deny, "Chansons,"93 (French trans.), 129 (text in Ottoman Turkish). 31On the td'ifat al-ra'ls and its importance to the history of Ottoman Algeria, see M. Belhamissi, Histoire de la marine Algerienne (1516-1830) (Algiers, 1983). 32David Ayalon, Studies on the Mamluks of Egypt (1250-1517) (London: VariorumReprints, 1977); Gilles Veinstein, "L'Empiredans sa grandeur(XVIe siecle)," Histoire de l'Empire ottoman, 193. 33Shuval,La ville d'Alger, 64-65. 34Marcel Colombe, "Contribution a l'etude du recrutement de l'odjaq d'Alger," Revue Africaine 87 (1943): 180. 35Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 60-65. 36See, however, a special prayer by the heads of the Ottoman elite, in which they implored God to keep them from sharing the government with the Arabs: Sidi Hamdan ben-Othman Khodja, Apercu historique et statistique sur la Regence d'Alger (Paris, 1985), 123. 37Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 63-64. 38AbrahamMarcus, The Middle East on the Eve of Modernity: Aleppo in the Eighteenth Century (New York, 1989), 58. 39JaneHathaway,The Politics of Households in OttomanEgypt(Cambridge,1997), 14. On the importance of the phenomenonof artisansand tradespeople's"affiliation"with the ocaks in Cairo, see Andre Raymond, "Soldiersin Trade:The Case of OttomanCairo,"British Journal of Middle East Studies 18, 1 (1991): 16-37. 40Raymond,"Les Provinces Arabes,"354. It has been suggested by D. Ze'evi that a certain equivalence could be drawnbetween the Algerian td'ifa and local janissary forces, such as the Damascene yerliye. The resemblance, however, is superficial, because local Algerians who joined the ta'ifa were not included in the ocak's registers and did not enjoy a privileged status, as did the yerliye. According to certain sources, local Algerians who joined the ta'ifa did not have the right to bear weapons until the second half of the 18th century.See Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 85-87. On the Damascene yerliye, see Abdul-KarimRafeq, The Province of Damascus 1723-1783 (Beirut, 1970), 24-35 and passim. 41Colombe, "Contribution,"175. 42H.-D. de Grammont,Histoire d'Alger sous la domination turque (1515-1830) (Paris, 1887), 28390; Venture de Paradis, Tunis et Alger, 34-36; Hess, "Forgotten Frontier," 80-81; I. H. Uzun9arsili, Osmanli Tarihi IV/2 (Ankara, 1959), 256-58; Pierre Boyer, "Des pachas triennaux h la revolution d'Ali Khodja Dey (1571-1817)," Revue Historique 495 (1970): 105. 43Venturede Paradis, Tunis et Alger, 204. 44Laugierde Tassy, A Compleat History of the Piratical States of Barbary (London, 1750), 168. The term dey (from the Turkishdayi, maternal uncle) was used in the province of Algeria after 1671 to designate the local ruler. From 1711 on, the sultan bestowed the title of pasha and with it the position of governor in the name of the sultan on the dey. See Hoexter, Endowments, 20. 45Khodja,Apercu historique et statistique, 117. 46Boyer, "Des pachas triennaux,"88-89. 47Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 68. In 1699-1701, the average wealth of the group of 264 yoldas constituted about 50 percent of that of the group of 330 janissaries (of which they were part): 426 samimaand 859 saDlma,respectively. In 1786-1803, the average wealth of 631 yodaf was 86 riyals, compared with 144 riyals, the average wealth of the 796 janissaries. 48Ibid., 104-105. 49Venturede Paradis, Tunis et Alger, 186. 50PierreBoyer, "Le probleme Kouloughli dans la R6gence d'Alger" Revue de l'Occident Musulman et de la Mediterranee (num6ro special) (1970), 88. 51KorAbdi (1723-31), IbrahimDey Khazinedji (1732-45), Baba Ali (1754-66), Hasan Dey (179198), and Mustafa Dey (1798-1805). No information concerning the marital situation of the other four was found. Shuval, La ville dAlger, 101-2.

The Ottoman Algerian Elite and Its Ideology

343

52See Boyer, "Le probleme Kouloughli." 53Forexample, de Tassy, Compleat History, 168; Boyer, "Le probleme Kouloughli," 88. 54Jean-Andr6Peyssonnel, Voyage dans les regences de Tuniset d'Alger (Paris, 1987), 227. 55Venturede Paradis, Tuniset Alger, 109. 56Khodja,Apercu historique et statistique, 139. 57De Tassy, Compleat History, 64. 58Khodja,Apercu historique et statistique, 69; see also Boyer, "Le probleme Kouloughli," 91. 59Laurentd'Arvieux, Memoires du Chevalier d'Arvieux,6 vols. (Paris, 1735), 5:251. 60Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 107-10. 61De Grammont,Histoire d'Alger, 126. 62Onthe relations between the ocak and the kuloglus, see Boyer, "Le probleme Kouloughli." 63Ibid., 81. 64Boyer's explanation is lent further credence by comparison with the Tunisian province at a later period: when, in the mid-18th century, the bey decided to reduce the number of the soldiers in the army, it was mainly the kuloglus who had to pay the price. See Ahmad Ibn Abi al-Diyaf, Ithaf ahl al-zaman bi-akhbar muluk Tunis waCahdal-aman, 6dition critique, traduction et commentaire historique Andre Raymond (Tunis, 1994), 2 vols., 2:14-15. In the Tunisian province, however, the reigning dynasty was itself composed of kuloglus: Venture de Paradis, Tuniset Alger, 26. 65JamilAbun-Nasr, A History of the Maghrib in the Islamic Period (Cambridge, 1987), 171-73. 66D'Arvieux,Memoires, 251; de Tassy, Compleat History; 127; Venturede Paradis, Tuniset Alger, 76. 67Venturede Paradis, Tuniset Alger, 76. 68Boyer, "Le probleme Kouloughli," 85. 69Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 111-17. 70Boyer, "Le probleme Kouloughli," 88. 71The acquisition of the title of pasha seems to have resolved the problem for the rest of the 18th century: between 1710 and 1798, only nine deys governed the province, seven of whom died in their beds. 72G. Delphin, "Histoire des pachas d'Alger de 1515 a 1745-extrait d'une chronique indigene, traduite et annote," Journal Asiatique 19 (1922): 208; Hoexter, Endowments,20. 73Hoexter,Endowments,20-21. 74Ibid., 23. 75Khodja,Apercu historique et statistique, 115. 76Hess, "ForgottenFrontier,"77. 77Ibid. 78Fora discussion of the term myth, see Nachman Ben-Yehuda, The Massada Myth: Collective Memory and Myth Thinkingin Israel (Madison, Wis., 1995), 279-85. The definition that seems best to suit my use of the term is Freidrich'sand Brzezinski's, "A myth is typically a tale concerned with past events, giving them a special meaning and significance for the present and thereby reinforcing the authorityof those who are wielding power in a particularcommunity": C. J. Freidrich and Z. L. Brzezinski, Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy (New York, 1961), 99. About myth and ideology, see Haggay Ram, Myth and Mobilization in Revolutionary Iran (Washington, D.C., 1994), 8. 79Cemal Kafadar, Between Two Worlds: The Construction of the Ottoman State (Berkeley, Calif., 1995), 13. 8?Ibid., 13-14. 81De Grammont,Histoire d'Alger, 130. 82Ibid. 83Idem, "Les relations entre la France et la R6gence d'Alger au XVIIe. s.," Revue Africaine (1879): 414. 84Idem,Histoire dAlger, 130. 85La Capra, "Cultureand Ideology," 389. 86Boyer, "Des pachas triennaux,"82-84. For an account of the event, see de Grammont, Histoire d'Alger, 177-78. 87A. Devoulx, Tachrifat, recueil de notes historiques sur l'administration de l'ancienne Regence d'Alger (Algiers, 1852), 78. 88De Tassy, Compleat History, 169; Peyssonnel, Voyage, 225. 89Thomas Shaw, Travels or Observations Relating to Several Parts of Barbary and the Levant (Oxford, 1738), 313.

344

Tal Shuval

90Delphin, "Histoire des pachas d'Alger,"221. 91Venturede Paradis, Tuniset Alger, 26. 92Ibid., 181. 93Khodja,Apercu historique et statistique, 133. 94La Capra, "Cultureand Ideology," 390. 95Built on a hillside, the city of Algiers was divided into al-wata (the plateau), the flat area near the sea, and al-jabal (the hill, the hilly part). On the barracks, see Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 90-95. 96On the discussion concerning the "Islamic city," see Andre Raymond, "Islamic City, Arab City: Orientalist Myths and Recent Views," British Journal of Middle East Studies 21 (1994): 3-18. 97Idem, "Les zones de residence dans les grandes villes arabes h l'epoque ottomane: mixite ou segregation socio economique? Le cas de Tunis, Le Caire et Alep," Arab Historical Review for Ottoman Studies 9-10 (1994); Nelly Hanna, habiter au Caire aux XVIIhmeet XVIIIeme siecles (Cairo, 1991); Jean-Claude David, "Alep, d6gradation et tentatives actuelles de readaptation des structures urbaines traditionelles," Bulletin d'Etudes Orientales 28 (1975): 19-49; Marcus, The Middle East; Jacques Revault, Palais et demeurs de Tunis (Paris, 1967-78), 4 vols.; Colette Establet and Jean-Paul Pascual, Familles et fortunes a Damas (Damascus, 1994); Shuval, La ville d'Alger. 98The article discusses "rich elements of the local population" ratherthan "local elite," because the criteria used for my research dictated by the sources was the relative wealth of the local population. Indeed, there was some measure of convergence between a person's economic situation and his social status, but wealth constitutedonly one of the sources of high status. See Marcus, The Middle East, 56-63. 99Shuval, La ville d'Alger, 224-28. l??Raymond, The Great Arab Cities, 61. ?1Ibid., 68. 102Hoexter,Endowments, 20-21. 103Deny,"Registres,"221. 104Raymond,The Great Arab Cities, 106. 1?5Ibid.,106-7. 106Hoexter,Endowments, 21-23. 7Ibid., 23. 108De Grammont,"Les relations,"414. 109Boyer,"Le probleme Kouloughli," 81.