Bursa and the Commerce of the Levant Author(s): Halil Inalcik Reviewed work(s): Source: Journal of the Economic

and Social History of the Orient, Vol. 3, No. 2 (Aug., 1960), pp. 131-147 Published by: BRILL Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3596293 . Accessed: 09/03/2012 03:50
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BURSAAND THE COMMERCE OF THE LEVANT

BY

HALIL INALCIK (Ankara,University) I. Turkey'stradewith Arabiaand India,1480-15o0. to It is not an exaggeration say that Europeanhistoriansof the from Veniceor Genoa.They drew Levanttradeviewed it essentially their evidencemainlyfrom documentspreservedin the archivesof thesecities.This evidencewas bound to be often misleading,for the and Venetians Genoeseshowedlittle interestin internal developments takenby the Ottomanrulers in the Levantand viewed the measures only in terms of their effectupon the Levanttrade.Thus it is not as to astonishing findevenin sucha greatscholar W. Heydthe general of of judgements declineand destruction the Levanttradeas a result of of the Ottomanexpansion Just as the assertions declinefor a 1). whole periodand region in Europeaneconomyin later middle-ages to have been subjected revisionand often modified underthe light 2) that therewere acof the recentinvestigations, which have indicated tually shifts of activitiesfrom one section to anotherratherthan a in generaldecline,so our own inquiries the nativesourcesconcerning of the commerce the Levant tendingnow to altersomeof the widely are held views since W. Heyd wrote his authoritative work. Thereare indeedlocal sourcesfor the historyof the Levanttrade.
The Turkish archives contain some important collections concerning the conditions of the Levant trade for the last decades of the 15th
z vols. Leipzig 1936, pp. 258, 317, 349, 507. z) See Relazioni,X. InternationalCongress of Historical Sciences, vol. vi, Rome
1955, pp. 803-957. transl. F. Raynaud, IIe r6impression, i) Histoire du commerce Levant au Moyen-dige, du

132

H. INALCIK

centurywhen world tradeand economy was going through momentous

changes 1).

In this first article we shall deal with how Bursa, early capital of the Ottoman state, became a center of the trade between the Ottoman dominions and Syria and Egypt, and what effects this new situation

of had on the commerce the Levant2). the Let us startby examining table below whichis basedupon the from the recordsof the Qdeds Bursa. of material
i) The principal collections which we are going to use in this study are: I. The The day-books which were kept at customs day-bookscalled mifreddtor ruzndmae. the principalports recorded day by day ships coming and going with the name and origin of the captain,the port of origin, merchantsor agents aboardwith their name and origin, the wares they brought specifying each item and its quantity and value and the duties levied. Precise tables and diagrams can be drawn up on the basis of this materialto show at a given port and date the imports and exports, prices and the volume of trade. Unfortunately, of these books only a few are availablenow in the archives for the 15th and the early i6th centuries. The most important ones for our for subject are the r4Zndmke the ports of Akkerman and Kilia covering the period between 1495 and 1515, in Basvekilet Archives, Istanbul, Maliye, no. 6; the rkzndmxe for the port of Kaffa for the years between 1484 and 1489, in the same archives, for Kamil Kepeci tasnifi, No. 28o; another rkZndmbe the Danubian ports from Tulkato Smederevo(Semendere)in which the books of Tulia and Yerg6gii (Giurgiu) for The oldest availablertzndm&e the port of Antalya (Satalia,Adalia) in the Archives is dated 156o, Maliye no. Ioz. II. The registers containing the accounts of muqi.tacdt the revenues which were farmed out make up a second category. They contain the customs duties revenues of various zones, customs regulations and other taxation. The most important single register of this type is a defter-i covering almost muqd.tacdt No. 7387 and 6222 and 176. III. The third importantcategory of sources is composed who in their capacity as judge, notary public and of the books kept by the Q.dis supervisor of the state financesin their zone have left us a large collection of court decisions on commercial matters, contracts, certificates, notarial deeds, and deeds of the properties of the deceased. We are fortunate to have a rich collection of these books kept by the Kcdi of Bursa of the last decades of the 15th century. They are No. 44, p. 693, and, now preserved at the Museum of Bursa, see for details Belleten,
Iktisat Fakiltesi Mecmuast, vol. 15, No. 1-4, PP. 5 1-73. Some of the documents the entire reign of Mehemmed II (I45 1-1481), in the Basvekilet Archives, Maliye of the years 15o6 and 1514-1522 and of Smederovo of the year 15 14 are noteworthy.

from these books arepublishedin Belleten,No. 44, pp. 693-7o8,and, No. 93, pp. 45-96. This collection will be our main source in this study. with the trade with Persia especially 2) In the subsequent articles we shall deal the silk trade which made Bursa an internationalmarketfor this stuff between Persia and Europe, the European cloth trade in Turkey and customs duties and prices will be also dealt with.

BURSA AND

THE

COMMERCE

I33

Merchantsin Bursa from the Arab countries

Name and origin
Khodjia Surir,

goods
pepper, cloth

value (in akia)

33242 1070

sold to
David,

bought from
-

date
1479
1480

Aleppo
Khodlja Zayn 'Abd al-

of Yaman

Adrianople
Jew

pepper and

al-Din, Aleppo Wahhab

clove

Ya'qib,

in Bursa

pepper, clove raw silk

and indigo

3900

Radjab b. Is-

1480

macil, Aleppo
200

Mohammed,

Damaskus Khodja cAl b.

Fadil 'Umar b.

--

Al-Hidjdj

Kemil

1479

gum lac and from Yaman

lynx furs, damask other goods

16700

Yacqib, Jew Istanbul

Khayr al-Din -

from Balat, -

1479
1479 1480

I2400

Shay' Allih

'Ali, from Bur-

damask (kemkjd)
1000

and Shams al-Din hammed, kemkbd manufacturer

Had_~ji Mo1480

sa settled in Aleppo
'Ali,Damaskus,

(kemkbd)
saffron 200oo -

settled in Pera

Hadjdji Khalil Hadidji cAbdi, Khooja Muhyi

1480

hammed, Hama HadjdjiHasan

Khodija Mo-

mohair of

250

1480

Angora, satin
woollen cloth

Ashrafi gold
3zoo
?17925
25oo00

silk manufacturerin Bursa

1480

and cotton

cAbd 'Allah,

Mossul

Khodja Husayn sable furs Khojda Muslih

1481
1480

al-Din.
-

al-Din

pepper

Muisa,Jew in

Istanbul

Khodja Shahab alaa

al-Din, Damaskus

cloth

1)

cAdjam Mo-

1481
-

hammed, Bursa, Ashrafi gold

Khodja Ibra-

him b. Karam Allah

pepper

527

Davud, Jew

1484

i) Aladjawas any kind of cloth with stripes of differentcolours.In the I th century documents we find aladiaof Bursa, a kind of silk cloth, cotton textiles called alad!a and aladjaof India. For the import of Indian textiles see below p. 141.

134

H. INALCIK

Name and origin

Khodja

goods
sable furs

value (in ak'a)

sold to
-

boughtfrom
Khodja Muhyi

date
1481

IHusayn, Damaskus
raw silk 3330 Ily s, velvet

al-Din
-

Ya'qfib,

1481

Aleppo
Ilusayn, mohair woollen cloth indigo, gum

manufacturer in Bursa
Khodja muslih al-Din o01
1500

Andalusia

3 o0 Mehemmed i 6oo
-

Y isuf, lac Aleppo Abu pepper (5o Hadijdji Bakr, Aleppo cantar),
ginger (i

Zayn al-Din, Aleppo Al-Hi?djd

950oo Mustafa, attar

in Seferihisar ?

15o
1500

200000

can-

tar) and other spices

22000ooo Ahmad,Aleppo
25000

Djacfar, Aleppo pepper corals Khodja

Karag6z, Bursa

1500
1300

Sandemur

in Among the Arabmerchants Bursain this periodthe exampleof al-Dinb. 'Abdal-Rahim interest al-Shimiis of a particular KhodjaSadr for us becauseof his wide-range Here is a list showingthe activities. businesshe carried in the years1479-1480. on
goods pepper, gum benzoine etc. silk damasks (qembd), brocades (kadifa mudbabbab, munaqqasha) of Bursa Woollen cloth and price (in akia) sold to bought from Mustafa Mehemmed, Beglerbeg of Anatolia Mehemmed, date May 1479 May 1479 Aug. I479

500oooHamza b. 'Abd Allah o000

3005
-

mohair (.sf)
Damask of Bursa

30000

cUmar,Damaskus

Aug. 1479 Sept. 1479

Beglerbeg
4000
-

of Anotolia

BURSA AND

THE COMMERCE

135

goods Indigo, pepper, clove, and other spices pepper, clove, indigo, gum benzoine etc. gum lac

price (in akva)

12900

sold to Khodja Mobammed, Aleppo Daivid b. Ilyas, Jew of Istanbul Yisuf b. 'Abd Allah, silk manufacturer in Bursa Mehemmed

bought from -

date Sept. 1479 Sept. 1479 April 1480

52040

4500

silk mastic of Csios (1I33cantar), European woollen cloths

960

Hiisam al-Din Celebi

March 1480 Oct. 1480

116oo

The most active of the Arab merchantsin this period, Khodja Sadr al-Din of Damaskus,traded,as appearsfrom our list, in spices and dyes importedfrom his native town as well as in Bursasilk cloths, European woollen cloths and Angora camelots (mohair).It is interesting to note that Bursa was then a market of gum mastic of CsiosI) for the Arab merchants from Syria too. He sold spices in large quantities to the merchantsof Bursa and Istanbul. Apparently he had settled in Bursa and engaged himself in the import as well as export trade. Among his customers we find Arab merchantssuch as 'Umar of Damaskus who bought from him Bursacloths which he himself had apparentlybought
1) Csios, closely dependent on the Bursa market for its trade with the East and North in this period, exporteda considerablepart of its mastic to Bursa, a fact that is confirmed by the large scale sales of it there. The Island greatly benefited from its transittradewhich enabledthe merchantsof the Westernnations without commercial priviledges to trade with the Ottoman dominions. By 1450 there is a reference to English kersey cloths in Chios. The merchandisethat the English got in exchange were silk, jewels, cotton, wines, mastic, Turkish carpets, camelots, rhubarb,pepper and other kinds of spices (see Ph. Argenti, TheOccupation Csios, Cambridge1958, of pp. 5oo-5oi). Cotton and camelots (mohair)were imported from Turkey. The great transitcenter of the Angora camelotsin this period was Bursa.In his generaltendency to show the Island as the main producer of its exports, and to minimize the exports of Turkish products, Argenti assumed that the trade of camelots depended on the production in Csios itself (p. 509). We have no indication of a Chian industry large enough to provide of the large scale export of camelots from the Island.

136

H. INALCIK

in Bursa. He must have been doing business with the Italians there deed showed that he had a credit of a large sum of too, since a Qail. 86ooo ak'a on Alessio, son of Piero, a Florentine merchant,who died in Bursa in February1479 1). Most of the Arab merchants doing business in Bursa were from Damaskusand Aleppo. In our table io out of 28 Arab merchantswere from Aleppo, 6 from Damaskus, one from Hama, one from Damiette and one from Andalusia. Khodja Muslih al-Din of Bursa, mentioned a in our table as selling a great quantityof pepper to a Jew named Mfis of Istanbul, is an example among many other Ottoman merchants who were buying spices from the Arab merchants or importing it themselves from Mecca, Damaskus or Aleppo. Also it is not a coincidence that the merchantsin our table buying spices and dyes in Bursa were in majorityJews of Istanbul. These were found in great numbers in the tradeof spices, Europeancloths and silk, not only in Istanbul,but also in the ports of Akkerman,Kaffa,Giurgiu and Kilia as the customs registers show. Our table containsonly a smallpartof the Arab merchantsmentioned in the records of the QA4di Bursa in those years. We have listed the of merchantsconsideredmost typical.The table indicatesthat the principle imports by them were spices, dyes (indigo, gum lac) and textiles (cloths of Yaman, Alad/a). It is a question whether the mohair sold by an Andalusian merchant was a product of Andulusia or of Turkey, for Turkey itself was producing and exporting mohair in great quantity. The trade in raw silk between Turkey and the Arab countries must be also limited since Turkey was getting it in great quantity directlyfrom Iran. Syriawas then producing a fine quality of cotton 2), but Turkey was at the same period a great producer of cotton and met domestic needs sufficiently.As for the spices and dyes they appearto be regular imports in great quantityfrom Syria and Egypt. Under the Ottomans Bursaappearsto have become a transitcenter of spices for Constantini) See Belleten,No. 93, p. 72, document 8. 2) F. C. Lane, AndreaBarbarigo,1418-I449, Baltimore 1944, p. 6o-65, IoI-1I3; B. Lewis, Notes and documents the TurkishArchives,Jerusalem I95z, pp. 16-17. from

BURSA AND

THE COMMERCE

137

ople (Istanbul), the Balkans and the Northern countries (Moldavia, Poland, Russia). who cameto Bursain a caravan In 1432 Bertrandonde La Broquibre, from Damaskus,tells us that part of the spices brought by the caravan
was bought by the Genoese merchants from Pera 1). About 1470 a

Florentine, Benedetto Dei, was able to claim that his fellow citizens could provide in Bursanot only for cotton, wax etc. but also for spices and they would be in a more favourableposition there than the Venetians in Alexandria,for while the latter had to pay for spices cash in Alexandriathe former could bartertheir cloths for the oriental goods in Bursa2). A more precise indication of the importance of the spice trade in Bursa was that the revenue of the duties from the imported saffron,gum lac and pepper in Bursa amounted to ioo.ooo ak'a (over Venetian gold ducats) in 1487 3). This had been even higher zooo2000
(135.000 akia) before, and the decrease can be ascribed to the conflict

between the Ottomansand the Mameluksafter the accessionof Biyezid II (1481-15 12). As 2 akcaper cantar4) was the usual duty on such goods the annual import of these three items together can be estimated as about 2500 tons (saffronwas a product of Asia Minor and must have constituted the larger part of this total amount). It can also be noted that in 15ooAbi^Bakrof Aleppo sold in Bursaat one time spices worth of 2zoo00.000, that is over 4000 gold ducats. From the reportsof Maringhi,a Florentine agent in Pera, we know that even in 1501 spices were exported, however small, from Pera to Florence. In May 5o0 he wrote to his associate in Florence (Ser Nicolo Michelozzi) that he had consigned three sacks of pepper to him
d'Outremer Bertrandon La Broquidre, de de et i) Le Voyage premiertranchant conseiller de PhilippeLe Bon, Due de Bourgogne, et annot6 par Ch. Schefer, Paris I892, publi6 PP. 135, 137. z) Heyd, II, pp. 349-50, 354. No. 93, P. 56. The three items were listed together 3) H. Inalcik, Bursa,Belleten in the defter. 4) Cantar, kantar or qintdris shown as equal to 40 okka (one okka-i,z28 kgr.) in the customs registersof this period. In a of qandnndme 972 of H. one cantarwas 44 okka (see Belleten, No. 60o,p. 677, cf. W. Hinz, Islamische Masseund Gewichte, Leiden 1955, p. 27).

138

H. INALCIK

and if wantedhe could send more. It turnedout, however,that the in differences pricesbetweenBursaand Florencewere then not large thought enoughto makeas good a profitas in the silk trade.Maringhi a theirpepper wouldmakea good profit thatif soldat24ducats cantar, 1.) too Welearn fromhislettersthatothercompanies wereimporting spices at and fromBursa Galilei Co.hadimported 24 ducats(Theofficial 2). at of in was priceof one cantar pepper Adrianople 18ducats this date3)). to askedMichelozzi send backthe unsoldpartof the pepper Maringhi to thathe hadconsigned, added:"Inanycasethereis no bargain be and expectedfrom the spices"4). Soon he learnedthat all the pepperhe In hadsentwas sold out, andhe askedif anymorewas wanted. 1503 he wrote5) that the price of peppermight go up to 27 ducatsin Peraif new suppliesdid not arrive. Thereis no doubtthatfor the sole reasonof the transportation difficulties on the long overlandroute from Mecca to Bursa,the spice tradeof Bursawith the West was never to be a flourishing one, and afterthe Portumarkets in lateron the decrease pricesin the European from Mato guese discoveryof the sea-route Indiawas, as it appears and in this factorto discourage trade Bursa letters,anadditional ringhi's in the Balkans Pera.But, the Ottomanunifyingpolicy and expansion of and Anatoliafollowedby the replacement the Italiansby Ottoman in or subjects(Muslim non-Muslim) the spicetradewith the Northern countries,kept the Bursaand Istanbul-Pera spice marketalive. This
in Merchants the ageof Medicis, CambridgeMass., i) G. R. B. Richards, Florentine z) Idem, p. io8. Ihtisdb-iEdirne,ed. 0. L. Barkan,TaribVesikalart Dergisi,No. IX, 3) Kan~nndme-i p. 173. Here is a list of pepperprices in Turkeyin this period accordingto the customs registers: akia per cantar around 50oz 950 Adrianople Akkerman 1440-I8oo akia per cantar around 1504 Kilia ak&aper cantar around 1504 2000-2400 ak'a per cantar around 15o06 Tula 1700 i 8oo akca per cantar around y515 Akkerman akia per cantar around 1525 Yerg6gii (Giurgiu) i800
1932, p. io8.

4) Richards, cit. p. II7. op. 5) Ibid. p. 272.

BURSA AND THE COMMERCE

139

market continued to be supplied with spices in the I6th century by the Syria-Bursa caravan route and the Bursa-Antalya-Alexandria route sea-route on the one hand, and the Alexandria-Csios-Istanbul
on the other 1).

The customs registersof Akkerman,Kaffa,Kilia (Kili) and Yergdigii (Giurgiu) attest to an active trade with the northern countries in
this period. From the reign of Mehemmed II (1451-1481) onwards

not only were all kinds of manufacturedgoods and natural products of the Ottoman lands 2) brought to these ports by the Ottoman merchants, Muslim, Jew, Greek, Armenian, but imported spices, dyes, sugar and European cloths were also brought by them 3). Yerggtii
received about 30 cantar (151o kgr.) pepper in eight months in 15o6 and 43 cantar (2iiz kgr.) in six months in 1515. It is also interesting

to note that in Lwow (Lemberg), the center of the Levant trade in Poland, the Italians were replaced by Armenians, Greeks, and Jews coming from the Ottoman empire3), and Su'eava, in Moldavia on the trade-route from Kaffa and Akkerman to Lwow, seems to have expandedits Levantinetradeduring this period. When in 1455 Petru III

in

i) The view that the India-Arabiatrade route was not completely cut off and Indian goods continued to arrive in Mecca and Cairo in the i6th century (Lybyer, Lane, Braudel) finds a strong confirmation in the Turkish sources (see Belleten, No. 6o, pp. 661-676). Even in 1671 a report submitted to the Levant Company in France reads: ,,De sept a huit caravanesdes Indes qui y (Aleppo) abordaient tous ' les ans et qui vont Smyrne il n'y en vient 'apresent qu'une." (P. Masson, Hist. du commerce franfais au Levantau i6e sidcle,I, p. 374). The customs registers of these ports included such goods as silks of Bursa, z) damasks, brocades, satin, tafetta, raw silk, cotton goods from Adrianople and Salonica,woollen blankets,copper hardware,mohair of Angora and naturalproducts such as dried raisins, nuts, rice, opium, soap, wines, alum. Among the shipowners are found such names as Yani of Trebizond, Dimitri, Ali Reis, Bernardoof Csios, Yorgi of Trebizond, Nikefor of Crete, Kemal Reis, Sava, Angelos, Manul, Uways of Istanbul, Toma b. Zano, and among the merchantsMarko, Yusuf of Adrianople, Andrea of Pera, Avram of Istanbul, Musa the Jew, Hamza, Kirkor, Mahmud, Lefteri, cAbd Allah of Bursa, Mihitar, Kosta, Trindafilos, Hadjdji 'Abd' AllTh, Timur, Mustafa of Karahisar, Shacbin the Jew, Ya'qfib the Jew, Hamza of Bursa, Emre of Istanbul, Stileymanof Adrianople, Yehuda of Moldavia. i w srednich, 3) See L. Charewiczowa,HandelLwowa Moldawja Multanami wviekach Z
Historytgny, I, (I9z4), PP. 36-67.

140

H. INALCIK

also enjoyeda reductionin customsrateswhich seemedto offsetthe burdenof the kharddj 2). paid not appeared By the end of the 15th centuryRussianmerchants Sea ports but also in Kilia and other Black only in Kaffa,Akkerman, Anatoliaand Bursa.An orderof the Sultanto the Qadisof Anatolia named Alexi, Gavril makes it clear that three Russianmerchants, while they and Stepan,shouldbe exempted from payingany kharddi visitedAnatoliaon commercial purposes.At the Portethey declared: we were doing businessimportinggoods from Russia "Previsiously and freely travellingin this country but this time when we were the coming from Bursato Usktidar(Scutari)" tax collectortried to subjectthem to taxationclaimingthat they were run away slaves3). in The goods importedfrom Russia were enumerated the customs to as of duties4). registers wellasin theorders the collectors thecustoms fine Russianfoxes, sables,martens, These goods were furs, especially leather (calledBulgdir), harnesses,woollen cloths (called Trski and that Russian linens,knivesandotherarms.It canbe assumed Chkmet?), the Russian-Ottoman tradewas quite extensivein this periodand the first diplomaticrelations between the two countries, established as in throughthe Khanof Crimea 1492,hadcommercial wellaspolitical with the Jagellons)motives5). (conflict here As for Ragusa we (Dubrovnik) cannot emphasize too muchhow
Wien 1922, p. 44.

Aaron recognised Mehemmed II as his suzerain by paying a yearly tribute of 2000 gold ducats, his subjectswere grantedfreedom of trade in the Ottoman dominions, especially in Adrianople, Bursa, and Istanbul By becomingkharddj-guzirs, 1). people paying tribute, they

in Urkunden tiirkischer Sprache, I) The text of this berit in F. Kraelitz, Osmanische

der z) J. Nistor, Die auswdrtigen Handelbeziebungen Moldau,Gotha 1911; see the ed. privindistoriaRominiei, M. Roller. important collection of documents: Documente 3) TheQddideeds Bursa,The Bursa Museum, Ser'iye sicilleri, No. i8/I7, v. 358 a. of 4) For the registers see above p. 132 note i. B. Spuler, Europdische Diplomatenin Constantinopel, fiir Jabrbiicher Geschichte 5) vol. I, No. 3, p. 425; H. Inalcik, Yeni vesikalara gore KirzmHankAimn Osteuropas, Osmank Belleten No. 30, pp. I85-229, F. Koneczny, meselesi, tdbiliinegirmesi ahidndme ve Vilno i928. Mengli-Girejem, SprawyZ

BURSA AND

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141

greatly the Ragusansexpandedtheir trade in the Levant at the expense of the Italians by becoming a kharddj-paying to the Ottomans1). city Even at the present stage of researchit is safe to say that with the conquest of Constantinople(Istanbul)and the unificationof the Eastern empire by Mehemmed II, the commerce of the Levant achieved a significantinternal development in favor of the native elements, and, in particular, the international trade route of Arabia-Bursa-Istanbul and the Black Sea ports experienced a renewed prosperity. In this period not only the Ottoman and Arab merchants were active in this trade but also merchantswere coming to Bursa and the Balkans directlyfrom India to do business. Mahmixd Gtwan or Gilini, powerful vizier of the Bahmanikingdom in India 2), organised regular trade relations with Turkey by 1480. According to the recordsof the Qadis of Bursa3) he sent threecommercial agents to Bursa with cloths and other commodities (not specified
in the document) in April I479. In February 1481, a larger group of

six agents who were his salaried men (wakils) sent by him reached Bursa. From their usual headquartersin Bursa some of them passed over to Rumelia (the Balkans)to trade their goods, textiles and Indian goods. A statementin one of these documents makes it clear that they prising the previous Mamelukpractices,we learnthat spices and cloths

camevia Arabia From a documentdated15485), apparently com4).

of Indiawerearriving SyriafromMeccaor fromEgyptby caravans in similar the one which B. de La Broquiere to joinedin 143z. At Kisve
near Damaskus, a customs duty of seven gold pieces and half a gold

of Mubdshiriyya collectedper load of camel.If these goods were were sold at the Damaskus market the Western to the merchants sellerpaid
I) Now see I. Boric, Dubrovnik i Turska u XIVi XV veku, Beograd 1952.

II, Venice 1899, pp. 325, 338.

z) See Journal of the Asiatic Soc. of Bengal, I-2, I935. 3) See the documents published in Belleten,No. 93, pp. 69, 75, 95. 4) Idem, p. 75. I, 5) 0. L. Barkan, Kanunlar, Istanbul 1943, p. 221; its translationinto French in R. Mantran-J.Sauvaget, Rhglements les Paris 95 1, fiscaux ottomans, provinces syriennes, For the practicesunder the Mamelukssee, Diplomatarium pp. 8-9. Veneto-Levantinum,

142

H. INALCIK

a duty at the rate of io per cent and the buyer 9 per cent ad valorem. If this was between Muslims only a small duty of broker (delldliyye) on (I per cent ad valorem spices and dyes) was to have been paid. The Westernerspaid other duties, a z per cent ad valorem a duty 7 1/3 and camel before they took their purchasesto Beyrouthto ship. Thus, per Muslims could take the Indian goods further to Bursa without being subject to the taxation that the Europeans had to pay in Damaskus. The land-routefrom Aleppo to Bursa followed roughly the ancient diagonal route across Anatolia 1). B. de La Broquiere has left us a description of this route in 1432. As we have seen, in Damaskus he joined a caravanof pilgrims and merchantscoming from Mecca with three thousand camels. The Turkish group in it included many notable men and was placed by appointment of the Sultan under a merchant of Bursa2). De La Broquierearrivedin Bursa after a journey of about fifty days via Aleppo, Adana, Konya, Akshehir, Kara-hisar(Afyon) and Ktitahya. At Akshehir he came across twenty five Arabs in a caravanserail,and in Bursa he found Florentine and Genoese merchants3). This land-route passed through Karamanid territory and was at the mercy of the Karamanidprinces, irreconcilablerivals of the Ottomans. Certain passage duties were levied at the three mountain passes in the Taurus range. These duties were six Aleppo ake'a(at this time about izo of this silver coin were worth one Venetian ducat) for a camel load, four for a horse and two for a donkey load 4). The Ottomans first secured control of the Bursa-Antalya-Alexandria sea-route in 1390 and only after a long struggle between 1464-1474 did they eventually occupy the whole territoryof the Karamanids They then 5). abolished all the passage duties (Kosunlu-badjand Kara-isalu badj,
nach osmanischer I) See Fr. Taeschner, Das anatolische WegennetZ Quelle, 2 vols. Leipzig 1924-26. et z) "Hoyarbara, estoit chiefde la caravane desplus grandsde la citi de Brousse" quy (B. de La Broquiere, p. 59). 3) The activity of the Italian merchantsin Bursa according to the recordsof the Qadis of Bursa will be dealt in a separatearticle. 4) Barkan, Kanunlar, 201. p. II., Isldm Ansiklopedisi,ciiz 75 (1956), PP. 5) See H. Inalcik, Mebmed 35. 506-

BURSA AND

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143

obviously named for the two Tiirkmen tribes) except for one at the
famous Giilek pass 1).

The sea-routewe have mentioned, it appears,was not less important for the Bursa-Arabiatrade than the land-route, especially before the Ottoman conquest of the Karamanidterritory. Already under the Seldjukidsin the I3th century, Antalya (Satalia, Adalia) was a very important transit center for the export of the products of Anatolia and the import of merchandise from Egypt and Syria, as well as from Europe 2). From an incident we learn that in 1289 an Anconian ship was carrying sugar, linen and pepper from Alexandria to Alaiye (Alanya-Candelore), a port near Antalya3). Ibn Batfita, who camefrom LUdhikiya (Lazkiye),a Syrianport, to Alaiye and thence passed to Antalya, describedit as "one of the best cities of the world" 4) and Malipierotoward 1470 wrote that it was the greatest spice marketfor Asia Minor5). Antalya, and the area where the main routes leading to Bursa lay, belonged to the Hamid dynasty until the
Ottomans invaded this region in the years 1381 and I390. The century-

for long struggle between the Ottomansand the Karamanids the control of this areaseems to have been determinedby its economic importance. The Ottomans did everything to ensure this direct route from Bursa to Egypt and Syria which were under the Mamelukswith whom commercial and political relations were considered very important by the Ottomans6). This direct sea route was also much shorterthan the land
Kanunlar, zo20). I) Accordingto the Kinfinnameof Sis dated 1519 (Barkan, p. London z) SeeW. Heyd,I, p. 548;S. LloydandD. StormRice,Alanya (Ala'iyye), Istanbul1946. 1958. I. H. Konyali,Alanya, 3) W. Heyd, I, d'Ibn ed. and II Batutah, C. Defr6mery B. R. Sanguinetti, (Paris1877), 4) Voyages 547. P. 258. 5) Annali Veneti, p. 74 (mentioned Heyd, II, 356). I, by Karamanid threatat theirrearthe Ottomans, 6) Facingthe constant nevertheless, insistedupon getting controlof Akshehir,Begshehri,Seydishehri, Ispartaregion, II to and,B yezidI (i389-1402) as well as Mehemmed endeavoured persistently fix a borderline at the Carshanba riverwhich was to ensure,on its west, the BursaAntalyaroute (see my FatihDevri,I, Ankara1954 PP- 36-37;and Mehmed Isl. II, Ansiklopedisi, 523-527). pp.

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H. INALCIK

route for it took only one week or so from Alexandriato Antalya 1), and while light precious stuff could be taken by the land-route it was necessary to use the sea-route for the bulky freight such as lumber, pitch and iron exported from Anatolia. But there too there were some obstacles. Rhodes and Cypruswere in Christianhands and the piratical activities of the Catalansand others who often found shelter in these islands, constituted a real danger to the sea communications of the Muslims in the East Mediterranean Along with other causes (the 2). threat of the Timurids and, then, Uzun Hasan) this situation accounts for the long friendly relationsbetween the Ottomansand the Mameluks until their interests came to an acute clash in Central and Southern
Anatolia by 1464 3). When the Mameluks attempted at the conquest

of Cyprusin 1426 and the Ottomans pressuredthe Knights of Rhodes in 1454, relations were strengthened between Cairo and the Porte. By 1430 when the Ottomans were at war against the Venetians the Mameluk-Venetianrelations came to the breakingpoint 4). Venice, the Karamanidsand the kingdom of Cypruswere then preparingan alliance 5). A similar alignment was to be seen later in the years 1471-1473

when Venice and Uzun Hasan, the powerful ruler of Iran and Eastern Anatolia, made an alliance against the Ottomans and Uzun Hasan sent letters to the king of Cyprus and the Knights of Rhodes exhorting them to cooperate with the army he was to send under the Karamanid princes6). Upon the sack and burning down of the outer parts of
Antalya by a strong Christian fleet under the Venetians in 1472, the
x) See Fatih Devri, I, p. 65. Shams al-Din Djazari used the sea-route fleeing from Egypt to the Ottoman territoryin the time of B^yezidI. His voyage from Alexandria to Antalya took only three and a half day. The Egyptian ambassadorsto the Ottoman court in the same period usually took the same route (see Al-'Ayni, cIkdal-Djumdn, the events of 799 of H.) en con catalan relacion el commerz) For the Catalansnow see N. Coilly Julia, El corso Estudios de His. Moderna, en el Proximo Oriente,en Flandes el Mediterraneo, y cio
Barcelona 1955. 3) See Mehmed II, Isl. AnsikL., ciiz 75, P. 524-525. 4) N. Iorga, Notes et Extraits, vol. II, p. 519-5 21. 5) Idem, pp. 501o-5o3. archives (Tokapt Sarayi Miizesi Arsivi, No. 3127/2,

6) Original copies of these letters were captured and preserved in the Ottoman
8334, 9662).

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145

besieged threatened to make reprisals on the Venetian merchants settled in Syria, that is, in the Mamelukterritory.It is also interesting to note that the quantities of spices found then at Antalya made a great impression on its pillagers1). It was apparentlyto protect the Ottoman merchantsagainst the Christianpirates that the state-owned ships were hired to the Muslim merchants there 2). Mehemmed II made a major effort in 1480 to conquer Rhodes from the Knights "to put an end to their attacks on the Muslim ships and coasts" 3). The Ottomans succeded in taking the Island only in 1522, five years after the conquest of Syria and Egypt. Thus the Ottomans secured complete control of the direct line between Alexandria and Istanbul which seems, in the long run, to have adversely affected the activity of the old Antalya-Bursaroute. Turkish merchants,especiallyfrom Bursa, were actively engaged in the import and export trade with the Arab countries using the land as well as sea routes. One of these merchants,Khayr al-Din had his will recorded in the book of the of Bursa which contains interesting Q.di details for our subject. It reads: "He said: between Hadjdji Kogi, a slave freed by Khodja Mehemmed4) and myself there were an association with a capital at the amount of 545.500 ak&athe half of which

belonged to me and the other half to aforesaid Khodja Mehemmed. From the aforesaid amount lumber, wood, and pitch worth 105.000 ak'a has been taken by my son YUisufand the aforesaid Khodja Mehemmed's son IbrThimfrom Antalya to Alexandria, also Ycisuf and Hasan, slaves of the aforesaid Mehemmed, have gone overland to Egypt taking 123.000 akia worth of Bursa cloths and saffron, also akca worth of iron, wood and lumber were sent (to Egypt) 112500 with the Sultan's ships; these were sent by my son Yeisuf; also I2000 akia worth of leather were sent by me to my sons in Egypt via the
I) See W. Heyd, II, p. 35y ; Zinkeisen, GOR, II, p. 404 note 2. No. 44, P. 701, document i2. 2) Belleten, 3) Sacdal-Din, Tdd6 I, al-Tawdrikh, 572.

4) For the importantplace of slaves and freed slaves in the industrialand commercial life in Bursa see, H. Inalcik, 15. aszr Tiirkiyeiktisadive iftimaf tarihikaynaklarr, Iktisat Fakiltesi Mecmuasz, Istanbul, vol. 15, No. 1-4, pp. 58-59.
JESHO III IO

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H.

INALCIK

Antalya port with a man named Seydi Ali, and a slave of the aforesaid Khodja Mehemmednamed Stileymantook sables, lynx furs and Bursa cloths worth Iooo125000 and also they (Khayr al-Din and Khodja akEas, Mehemmed) declared that 75 Ashrafi flori were due to them by a person in Egypt named Wazzhni Shahib al-Din..." ') The capital invested in this enterprise, about 00ooo gold ducats, was a sizeableone for the period 2). The goods exported to Egypt were mostly products of Turkey: lumber, pitch, Bursacloths, sablesand lynx furs. But among the goods in their joint possession mentionis also made
of I 1.400 Wallachian knives imported from Wallachia, soap and ginger

(Zancabil Hirbdni)imported from Arabia. Khayr al-Din stated in the

same document that he had sold 22.000 akia worth of soap to several

A of dated peoplein Antalya. regulation the customsdutiesof Antalya that cloths, raw silk, camelots(mohair),iron spades 1477 3) shows andthe like, wood andlumber werethe mostimportant itemsof export and thatspices,sugar,indigoand otherdyeswerethe leadingimports. in importsand exportsspecified more detail. They includedlumber, iron, carpets,rugs, leatherand hides, opium, slaves (white), Wallachian knives, driedfruits, pitch, a kind of light cotton textile called as lynx bugasi, furs,Londoncloths(ika-i Londra) principal exports,and
black slaves, rice, pepper, linen, sugar, dyes, and a cloth called aladja as imports. From Tripoli of Syria soap, cotton and olive oil were shipped to Antalya. Again, in this document slaves, rice, linen, and sugar come first in importance as imports and wood, leather, carpets, In a detailed day-book of the Antalya customs dated 1560
4)

we find

opium, slaves,iron, and woollen cloths as exports.Exportof lumber

to Egypt from Asia Minor had always been important5), and under the
No. 93, PP. 91-93. i) For the full text see Belleten, For a comparison see A. Barbaro's capital (about i ooo ducats) in F. Lane, 2) op.cit. p. 32. 3) Basvekilet Archives, Maliye, No. 7387. 4) Basvekilet Archives, Maliye, No. ioz02. 5) References to the import of wood from Asia Minor to Egypt in the Arabic sources (Ibn Tagribirdi, Ibn Iyis) are abundant. I am indebted to Dr. Ayalon to draw my attention to them. One of the earliestreferencesto it is quoted by P. Wittek, Istanbuler Das Fidrstentum Mentesche, 2, Mitteilungen, Istanbul I934 P. 2.

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Ottomansit continued on a large scale. According to the officialrecords the customs duties levied on wood, lumber, and pitch exported from
Antalya in 1477 amounted to 150o.oo000ak'a (about 3000 gold ducats) and to 5o.ooo akia at Alaiye 1). The export trade of lumber was put

under state monopoly and farmed out to private individuals2). A

regulation of 1477 a) provided that the undertaker of this monoply was

and to sell to buy a piece of lumber from the workers for three ak&a it for seven, a cantar (51, 280 kgr.) of pitch was to be bought for 6o akva
and sold for I20 4). (These workers were customarily only TUrkmen

nomads living on the Taurusmountains who, because of their occupathat is lumbermenand until recently a large tion, were called Tahtadji, there bore this appellation). Heavy goods such as group of nomads wood, lumber, pitch, iron, and leather were transportedby ships from Antalya to Alexandriaand as we have pointed out the Sultan's ships
were hired 5) for this purpose.

As another positive proof of the expandingOttoman-Mameluk trade in this period we can mention the fact that the Egyptian gold coin called Ashraf! was then widely used 6) in the Ottoman dominions, especially in Bursa. Its official rate varied between 42.5 and 43 akva a piece while the Venetian ducat (Efrendiz,Afrandjf)and the Ottoman gold coin varied between 45.5 and 46. 7)
I) Basvekilet Archives, No. 6222. Some regulations of state monopolies in the second half of the 5th century in the Ottoman empire are found in Kdnkrndme-i Sultan!ber muceb-i 'rf-i Osmani, ed. R. Anhegger-H. Inalcik (Ankara I956). 3) Basvekilet Archives, Maliye, No. 7387. 4) Pitch was extracted at a village called Hisard~zk. 5) See above p. 145. 6) Belleten,No. 93 (1960), documents No. 9, 26, 28, 34. or 7) Idem. Both the florin and the Venetian ducat were called efrendfi flori since both of them contained about 3.5 grams of gold.
2)