The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of 1585 Revisited
The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of 1585 Revisited
The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of 1585 Revisited
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'< * Journal of the Economic and WiPw (it) |7eSHo|
BRILL Social History of the Orient 52 (2009) 460-504 brill.nl/jesh
Baki Tezcan*
Abstract
In 1585-8, the Ottoman silver currency, the akge, was officially devalued by 100% against
the Venetian gold ducat and foreign silver currencies, and its silver content was reduced by
44%. Some scholars have interpreted this devaluation and debasement as a consequence of
the silver influx from the Americas, whereas others have referred to the difficulties that the
Ottoman state had to face in financing its war effort against the Safavids in Persia. This
study suggests that the unification of a number of distinct regional monetary zones in an
interregional imperial economy by the second half of the sixteenth century must be regarded
as an important factor that contributed to the monetary crisis of 1585.
Keywords
Ottoman Empire, devaluation, debasement, economic integration, monetarization
One of the enigmas of early modern Ottoman history has been the debase
ment of the main Ottoman silver currency, the akge, around 1585. Almost
425 years after the event neither the exact date of the debasement nor the
dynamics that brought it about can be established with any precision.
Although most scholars acknowledge the existence of a relationship
between the influx of Spanish silver from the Americas into the Ottoman
Empire and the debasement, the reason why an abundance of silver should
bring about such a debasement of the silver currency is not quite clear.
According to Bernard Lewis, "[t]he Ottoman rulers, accustomed to crises
of shortage, were quite unable to understand or meet a crisis resulting from
an excess of silver," and thus took the same measures that they would have
taken if they faced a shortage, hence the debasement.1
Halil Inalcik asserts that the devaluation and debasement were "a conse
quence of the flood of American silver." The relationship he creates between
the two events is based on the theory of a general price increase caused by
the influx of American silver followed by a devaluation and debasement
which was inspired by Earl Hamilton's work.2 Using multiple sets of data,
Omer Lutfi Barkan demonstrates that the Ottoman economy experienced
a general price increase which was very similar to the changes in the Euro
pean economy. According to Barkan, the rise in prices and the devaluation
of the akce were parallel developments that were brought about by "inter
national movements in precious metals, changes in trade patterns, the
tremendous expenditures of the Ottoman government for various wars
undertaken at the time, and a great population increase which took place
in most of Europe, as well as in the remainder of the Mediterranean world,
during the sixteenth century."3
?evket Pamuk has recently revised Barkan's price indices and found an
error in his calculations for the years 1555 and 1573, the only years in the
sixteenth century prior to the devaluation for which Barkan had price data.
After Pamuk's correction, the price increases between 1489 and 1573
expressed in grams of silver were reduced to 31% from 60%. After this
1) Bernard Lewis, "Some Reflections on the Decline of the Ottoman Empire." Studia
Islamica 9 (1958): 119-20.
2) Halil Inalcik, "Notes on a Study of the Turkish Economy during the Establishment and
Rise of the Ottoman Empire." Tr. Douglas Howard [revised translation of "Osmanh Impa
ratorlugunun kurulus ve inkisafi devrinde Turkiye'nin iktisadi vaziyeti iizerinde bir tetkik
munasebetiyle." Belleten 15 (1951): 629-90]. In The Middle East and the Balkans under the
Ottoman Empire: Essays on Economy and Society, Halil Inalcik (Bloomington: Indiana Uni
versity Turkish Studies, 1993): 241, 243-4; Earl J. Hamilton, "American Treasure and
Andalusian Prices, 1503-1660: A Study in the Spanish Price Revolution." Journal of
Economic and Business History 1 (1928): 1-35
3) Omer L. Barkan, "The Price Revolution of the Sixteenth Century: A Turning Point in
the Economic History of the Near East." Tr. Justin McCarthy [abridged translation with
revisions of "XVI. asnn ikinci yansinda Turkiye'de fiyat hareketleri." Belleten 34 (1970):
557-607]. International Journal of Middle East Studies G (1975): 13.
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462 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
4) ?evket Pamuk, A Monetary History of the Ottoman Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni
versity Press, 2000): 122; compare Barkan, "Fiyat Hareketleri": 569. See also ?evket Pamuk,
"The Price Revolution in the Ottoman Empire Reconsidered." International Journal of
Middle East Studies 33 (2001): 69-89; ?evket Pamuk, "Prices in the Ottoman Empire,
1469-1914." International Journal of Middle East Studies ?>G (2004): 451-68; ?evket Pamuk,
Istanbul ve Diger Kentlerde 500 Yilhk Fiyatlar ve Ucretler, 1469-1998 (Ankara: Devlet Ista
tistik Enstitusu, 2000).
5) Omer L. Barkan, "Edirne Askeri Kassami'na ait tereke defterleri (1545-1659)." Belgeler
3.5-6 (1966): 87, 155, 447.
6) Niels Steensgaard, The Asian Trade Revolution of the Seventeenth Century: The East India
Companies and the Decline of the Caravan Trade (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
1974): 79; Pamuk, A Monetary History of the Ottoman Empire: 125, 132, 137.
7) The deficit of 12,830,005 akces noted by Baki (Jakir, "Geleneksel donem (Tanzimat
oncesi) Osmanh biitce gelirleri." In Osmank Maliyesi: Kurumlar ve Butgeler, eds M. Gene
and E. Ozvar. 2 vols. (Istanbul: Osmanh Bankasi Arsiv ve Arastirma Merkezi, 2006): vol.
1: 171, is misleading. First, there is a calculation error, the deficit according to (fakir's
numbers should have been 8,841,285 akces. Second, (Jakir did not include the treasury's
profit of 4,912,497 akces from tefdviit, an income item that is constituted by the difference
of exchange rates in receiving and expending funds in currencies other than the akce. While
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 463
the treasury counted most gold ducats for 59 akces when it received them as income, for
instance, it valued them at 60 akces when it spent them; on this practice and its later evolu
tion, see Baki Tezcan, "Tefavut." Osmanh Ara?ttrmalan I Journal of Ottoman Studies 24
(2004): 333-44. The 6,000,000 akce credit the treasury received from the sultan is also not
included among the income items although its repayment is noted among the expendi
tures. If one were to revise the total income accordingly, it rises to 279,649,967 akces,
producing a surplus of 2,071,212 akces; Halil Sahillioglu, "III. Murad donemine ait 1582
83 (hicri 990) tarihli biitce?ceviriyazi." In Osmanh Maliyesi Kurumlar ve Biitceler, eds
M. Gene and E. Ozvar. 2 vols. (Istanbul: Osmanh Bankasi Arsiv ve Arastirma Merkezi, 2006):
vol. 2: 33, 46. The surplus of 36,165,890 akces for the same year that is shown in Pamuk,
A Monetary History of the Ottoman Empire: 133, is the amount of money carried over to
the next fiscal year, which includes funds worth 34,094,678 akces that were carried over
from the previous year; the difference between them, 2,071,212 akces, is equivalent to the
actual surplus.
8) The figures for 1583 [and 1574] are: 16,905 [13,599] janissaries, 8,346 [5,957] cavalry
soldiers (altt boluk), 3,736 [2,124] auxiliary troops (cebeciydn, tobciydn, arabaciyan-i fob),
and 9,220 [7,495] cadets (acemiydn), making a total of38,207 [29,175] souls. Since 16,905
janissaries received 39,008,019 akces, 10,000,000 would be enough to pay the yearly sala
ries of another 4,000 janissaries. Yet since most probably Osman Pashas soldiers were
recruited to become janissaries after a few years of service, their pay scale should have been
lower, so he may have had more than 4,000 troops; for 1583 figures see Sahillioglu, "1582
83 tarihli biitce": 45; for 1574 figures, see Koci Bey, Kogi Bey Risalesi, ed. Ali Kemali Aksiit
(Istanbul: Vakit, 1939): 27-8.
9) Halil Sahillioglu, "Kurulustan XVTI. asnn sonlanna kadar Osmanh para tarihi uzerinde
dir deneme." Ph.D. dissertation (Istanbul Universitesi, 1958).
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464 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 465
taxation and land laws. Whether this was a conscious policy,10 or just a
matter of necessity in the relative absence of efficient central political
tools of enforcement, is open to debate. Different regional currencies were
among the local practices that the Ottoman administration continued to
allow in its eastern and southern provinces. Thus the empire was divided
into a number of currency zones in which coins of different weights con
stituted the major denomination in daily use. As will be shown later in this
study, the Ottoman center benefited from the existence of these zones as
long as gold was comparatively cheaper in them than it was in the capital.
The limits of these zones were probably dictated by the geographical
limits of the economic units rather than by political boundaries. For
instance, despite its political unity, the Safavid Empire included two dis
tinct currency zones. Similarly, although both greater Syria and the Hejaz
had been part of the Mamluk Empire, the two regions had slightly different
units of silver currency.11 Thus, as the political inheritor of different eco
nomic zones, the Ottoman Empire consisted of different currency zones.
Although the akce reigned supreme in the central lands of the empire,
that is to say in the Balkans and in western as well as central Anatolia,12 the
eastern and southern lands that were conquered in the sixteenth century
used quite a number of different currencies. As will be discussed below, the
exchange values of these currencies among themselves seem to have been
determined by the regional gold?silver ratios. Thus rather than the silver
content of the coins in question, their varying values against the Venetian
ducat, or the Ottoman sultani^ seem to have been the decisive factor in
10) See Halil Inalcik, "Ottoman Methods of Conquest." Studia Islamica 2 (1954): 103-29.
n) Stephen Album, A Checklist of Islamic Coins, second ed. (Santa Rosa: Stephen Album,
1998): 126. The silver coins of Aleppo and Mecca, for instance, are valued differently in an
inventory of the Ottoman imperial treasury from 1518; Halil Sahillioglu, "The Role of
International Monetary and Metal Movements in Ottoman Monetary History, 1300
1750." Tr. liter Turan and Rhoads Murphey [translation of "Osmanh para tarihinde diinya
para ve maden hareketlerinin yeri (1300-1750)." Geli?me Dergisi Special Issue (1978):
1-38]. In Precious Metals in the Later Medieval and Early Modern Worlds, ed. J. F. Richards
(Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 1983): 297, Table 4a.
12) I would suggest that the widespread use of the akce in Anatolia and the Balkans by the
beginning of the sixteenth century must have been the result of a long process of economic
integration and a certain degree of monetarization, which, if studied, may shed further
light on the various debasements under Mehmed II.
13) In the period under study the two gold coins, the Venetian ducat and the Ottoman
sultani, were identical in weight and fineness. Since I use a number of Ottoman terms to
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466 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
denote the different silver currencies in circulation, I prefer the ducat to denote the stan
dard gold coin of the region in order to prevent further confusion by introducing yet
another Ottoman term.
14) Ciineyt Olcer, Sultan Yavuz Selim ?ah bin Bayazid Han Donemi Osmanli Sikkeleri
(Istanbul: Yenilik, 1989): 182-6.
15) On the origins of the designation nisf, see Paul Balog, The Coinage of the Mamluk Sul
tans of Egypt and Syria (New York: The American Numismatic Society, 1964): 47, 387.
16) Pamuk, A Monetary History of the Ottoman Empire: 95; Sahillioglu, "Osmanli para
tarihi": 96, n. 9; Ahmed Akgiinduz, ed., Osmanli Kanunnameleri ve Hukuki Tahlilleri.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 467
Although the weight of the Mamluk gold coin was less than the Otto
man one, that of the standard Mamluk silver coin was more than the Otto
man akce, weighing around 1.4-1.5 g. in the late fifteenth century, and ca.
1.1 g. in the early sixteenth century, if one were to rely on the weight of
extant coins. When Selim I conquered the area, the gold coins struck in his
name followed the standard of the ghawri ashrafls, which were the most
recent and the least valuable in terms of silver currency. Yet the silver coins
struck in the name of Selim I by the first Ottoman governor of Egypt seem
to have lowered standards even more, and probably continued the trend of
debasement visible since the late fifteenth century.17
Around 1522, new silver coins were struck that were decreed to be
equivalent to the value of two and a half of the former coins, meaning
those that had been struck by the first Ottoman governor. Twenty-five of
the new silver coins were to be worth one gold ducat. Although there
seems to have been quite a bit of opposition to this policy, the Ottoman
administrative code (kanunname) of Egypt, dated to 1524-5, sanctioned it.
According to this code, out of a 100 dirhems (307.2 g.) mix of silver and
copper, which was to contain 84% silver, 250 paras were to be struck. Thus
each para was supposed to weigh 1.23 g. and contain 1.03 g. of silver. Not
surprisingly, the average weight of a sample of 4 silver coins struck in Egypt
in the name of Siileyman I (r. 1520-66) is thus 1.22 g. Moreover,
25 of these paras were to equal the value of a gold coin struck in accord
ance with the standards of Istanbul, and the future gold coins to be struck
in Egypt were to follow that standard, that is ca. 3.55 g. of pure gold for
a sultani.18
Although there is no conclusive evidence, what seems to have happened
in 1522, and was indeed sanctioned in 1524-5, was a restoration of the
9 vols. (Istanbul: Osmanh Arastirmalan Vakfi, 1990-6): vol. 3: 260, 272; Sahillioglu,
"Ottoman Monetary History": 297, Table 4a; Halil Sahillioglu, "1524-1525 Osmanh biit
cesi." Istanbul Universitesi Iktisat Fakiiltesi Mecmuasi 41 (1982-3): 434, 437-8.
17) Norman D. Nicol, Raafet El-Nabarawy, and Jere L. Bacharach, eds, Catalog of the
Islamic Coins, Glass Weights, Dies and Medals in the Egyptian National Library, Cairo
(Malibu, CA: Undena Publications, 1982): 95, 98; Sahillioglu, "Osmanh para tarihi":
96-7, n. 9, 11; Olcer, Osmanh Sikkeleri: 159; Stanford J. Shaw, The Financial and Admin
istrative Organization and Development of Ottoman Egypt, 1517-1798 (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1962): 65.
18) Sahillioglu, "Osmanh para tarihi": 97, n. 11; ibrahim Artuk, Kanuni Sultan Suleyman
Adma Basilan Sikkeler (Ankara: Turk Tarih Kurumu, 1972): 64-65; Akgundiiz, Osmanh
Kanunndmeleri; vol. 6: 139.
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468 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 469
verified by the fact that Egypt sent its tribute to the Ottoman capital in
gold coins, a point that will be revisited below.
It is also interesting to note that while the Egyptian para contained only
1.03 g. of silver, it was valued at 2 akces in relation to the Ottoman akce,
which was supposed to contain 0.73 g. of silver at that time.22 Intrinsically,
the para should have been worth 1.4 akces, or 1.5 akces at the most. Thus
the Egyptian para was definitely overvalued in terms of its silver content.
This only makes sense when the exchange value of the para and the akce
against the gold ducat is taken into consideration. Using the gold ducat as
a measure according to which 25 paras equaled 55 akces, one would expect
the para to be worth 2.2 akces (55/25). This is significantly closer to the
official exchange rate of 2 akces to the para. The respective values of the
para and the akce against the ducat must therefore have been decisive for
establishing their exchange values against each other?not a comparison of
their silver contents.
The available evidence thus suggests that Egypt and the Levant which
constituted the Ottoman para zone, on the one hand, and Anatolia and
the Balkans, where the akce reigned supreme, on the other, had different
gold?silver ratios in the early sixteenth century. Although these two
regions are close to each other, this difference was not new. For instance,
for the Middle Ages, the ratio of gold to silver is suggested to have
been 1:14 in the Muslim Middle East while it was 1:18 in Byzantium.23
What this meant in practice was that one could get a unit of gold in
exchange for 14 units of silver in Cairo, go to Constantinople, exchange
that unit of gold for 18 units of silver, bring the silver to Cairo, convert it
to gold again, and keep an extra 4 units of silver as a 28.6% profit created
by arbitrage opportunities. This same sort of opportunity apparently also
existed in the early sixteenth century, as the gold?silver ratios in Cairo
and Istanbul were 1:7.25 and 1:11.3, respectively.
Arbitrage opportunities occur when two market zones function rela
tively independently from each other; due to less developed market rela
tions zones are either not well informed about each other's respective
22) For the value of the para in terms of the akce in Egypt, see Akgiinduz, Osmanli Kanun
ndmeleri'. vol. 6; 111. Three financial regulations from the Adana area that date from
ca. 1526, 1536, and 1547 give the exchange rate of the para as 2 akces as well; Akgunduz,
Osmanli Kanunndmeleri: vol. 5: 608, 613, vol. 7: 191.
23) K. N. Chaudhuri, "The Economic and Monetary Problem of European Trade with
Asia during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries." The Journal of European Economic
History 4 (1975): 343.
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470 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 471
Even at the new rate of the para against the ducat, silver was slightly
more valuable in the Levant than it was in the central lands of the empire
as one needed 2.6 g. less silver to get a ducat in Aleppo than one would in
Istanbul. Yet in the 1550s, Egypt was experiencing a silver drainage to an
unknown destination, where silver must have been even more valuable
than it was in the para zone. As is evident from an imperial order sent to
the governor of Egypt in 1552, among the solutions offered was an increase
of the copper content of the para. Although no action was taken at the
time, around 1565 a debasement did take place in Egypt the exact ratio of
which is open to debate. An Arabic source suggests that it was around
8.7%, yet depending on slightly different interpretations of the text, it
might have been as much as 16.5%.26
Interestingly enough, within the next few years the Ottoman akce went
through a similar debasement. Sometime around 1566, the number of
akces to be struck from 100 dirhems of silver increased from 420 to 450,
decreasing the silver content of the akce from 0.73 g. to 0.68 g.27 Yet nei
ther in the Levant, nor in the central lands of the empire did an official
devaluation against the ducat take place, which suggests that the govern
ment was trying to make silver more valuable in relation to gold. Silver was
most probably moving to an unidentified destination where it was more
valuable than in the Ottoman domains, as is suggested by the correspond
ence between the capital and Egypt in 1552, and the government was try
ing to keep it in the imperial zone by increasing its value against gold.
In short, the available evidence suggests that the Ottoman central
administration aimed to keep its currency zones separate by trying to
restore pre-conquest rates, as was the case in Egypt in 1522-5. Moreover,
the correspondence of 1552 between the Ottoman center and Egypt
implies that the Ottoman administrators perceived their domains as differ
ent currency zones; otherwise a debasement limited to Egypt would not
have been considered. Yet the evidence also suggests that while Egypt and
26) Sahillioglu, "Osmanli para tarihi": 85-7, 98 (n. 18); compare Pamuk, A Monetary History
of the Ottoman Empire: 96 (n. 18); Muhammad Ibn Abi al-Surur, Al-Minah al-rahmaniyya
ft al-dawlat al-uthmaniyya, ed. Layla al-Sabbagh (Damascus: Dar al-Bashair, 1995): 172,
however, supports Sahillioglu's argument and suggests that the para was debased by ca.
8.7%. For different interpretations of the relevant statement in this text, see Baki Tezcan,
"Searching for Osman: A Reassessment of the Deposition of the Ottoman Sultan Osman
II (1618-1622)." Ph.D. dissertation (Princeton University, 2001): 314-5, n. 44.
27) The exact date of this debasement is not known, but it was in effect by 1572; Sahillioglu,
"Osmanli para tarihi": 64, 74 (n. 7).
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472 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
II
Another currency zone in the Ottoman Empire can be characterized as the
realm of the sahi, originally a Persian silver currency that continued to
circulate in Safavid Persia even after the Ottomans struck their own sahis
following the conquest of the western Safavid lands during the reign of
Suleyman I. The market value of the Ottoman sahi in terms of the akce
and the para has a lot to do with the Persian shahi?* which was introduced
by the Safavid ruler Shah Ismail in the early sixteenth century.
The Safavid coinage went through a number of debasements during
the sixteenth century, but only those that happened in the second half
of the sixteenth century seem to have had an impact on the Ottoman
akce. Around 1501, at the outset of the reign of Shah Ismail, the Safavid
50 dinar piece called shahi weighed 9.4 g.29 According to Stephen Album,
in 1518 the weight of the shahi was reduced to 7.88 g. Around 1530, it
28) In order to distinguish the Persian from the Ottoman coin, the former will be referre
to hereafter as shahi, the latter as sahi.
29) H. L. Rabino di Borgomale, Coins, Medals and Seals of the Shdhs of Iran, 1500-1941
(Hertford: Stephen Austin and Sons, 1945): Table II (following p. 8); see Tezcan, "Search
ing for Osman": 315-6 (n. 46), for a discussion on the accuracy of this weight.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 473
was further reduced to 6.22 g. Some ten years later, the shahi weighed
5.25 g. Around 1547, the shahi was debased once again to 4.67 g.30
Thus, if Album's conclusions are correct, between 1501 and 1550, the
Safavid shahi lost half of its silver content. The Ottoman akce, however,
did not go through any debasements between 1491 and the reign of
Selim II (1566-74). Consequently, one could claim that the Safavid debase
ments of the first half of the sixteenth century did not have an impact on
the Ottoman akce.
This picture, however, changes in the second half of the sixteenth cen
tury. Berengo, our Venetian merchant in Aleppo, provides some valuable
information regarding a Persian debasement in his letters of 1555. That
year no silk arrived from Persia since the Safavid shah himself had bought
500 loads of it for export to India. Yet the shah paid the merchants half the
price "because he has made the money the half of what they were worth in
spite of the protests of the people, i.e. his coins are called saie [shahi] they
are worth here 18 soldi a piece, and he has made two out of one and given
them out as good coin."31 In a subsequent letter, Berengo states that the
new shahi that the shah had struck was worth half the value of the old one,
i.e. 9 soldi. At this time, 18 soldi were worth approximately 0.11 gold
ducats. Thus one would expect the former Persian shahi to be worth
4.5 paras, and the new one 2.25 paras at 40 paras, or maidins, per ducat.
Berengo cites the very same values.32
Berengo is not the only source which suggests that the Safavids under
took a major debasement before the Ottoman one. Fernand Braudel states
30) Album, A Checklist of Islamic Coins: 126-7; Hinz, Islamische Wahrungen: 59-61, relying
on Rabino di Borgomale, Coins, Medals and Seals of the Shahs of Iran, 1500-1941: 28, 30,
regards the denomination of these coins differently, yet he does agree that the shahi lost a
lot of its silver content during the reign of Tahmasp. I took Albums western Safavid stan
dard into consideration here. The Safavids also had an eastern standard in the provinces of
Khorasan and Gurgan, while the province of Mazandaran had its own standard; see Album,
A Checklist of Islamic Coins: 126, n. 138.
31) Quoted by Steensgaard, The Asian Trade Revolution of the Seventeenth Century: 419; this
particular letter is dated November 3, 1555.
32) Tucci, Lettres d'un marchand venitien Andrea Berengo, 1553-1556: 92 (letter #86, dated
November 15, 1555), 101 (#93, November 17), 113 (#100, November 17), 126 (#109,
November 18); see also letters #87, 88, 91, 96, pp. 93, 95, 98, 106. 20 soldi made a lira,
and in 1533 a Venetian gold ducat was valued at 7 lire and 18 soldi; in 1562, its value is
recorded as 8 lire; W. A. Shaw, The History of Currency, 1252 to 1894, third ed. (New York:
G. P. Putnam's Sons and Clement Wilson, 1896): 317. If we take 8 lire as the value of the
ducat in 1555 as well, we would arrive at (18: [8 x 20] =) 0.1125.
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474 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
that the Ottoman devaluation of the mid 1580s "followed a similar deval
uation in Persia,... which had devalued the currency by 50 per cent at a
stroke." Inalcik, who perhaps relied on Braudel, states that a 50% devalua
tion occurred in Persia in 1585. However, Steensgaard asserts that he did
not find any evidence in support of Braudel s statement, although he was
aware of the debasement that Berengo refers to, which he prefers to regard
simply as "a 50% devaluation in terms of money of account." Pamuk, on
the other hand, believes that there might have been a devaluation in Iran
in 1584, and suggests that, if proven, this devaluation would have been a
major factor in contributing to the Ottoman devaluation and debasement
of the later 1580s, yet he adds that the evidence is not clear.33
Although twentieth-century studies tend to concentrate on the 1580s to
date the Safavid devaluation, which is probably due to Braudels wording,
the primary source of Braudels source carries us further back. Braudel cites
J. W. Zinkeisen,34 but the ultimate source is an Italian physician, Minadoi
(1540-1615), who, after taking his medical degree, traveled for seven years
in the Ottoman dominions. In his book on the Ottoman-Safavid wars,
which he wrote in 1587 with an account of the events of the war through
to the end of 1586, he states:
Touching the reuenues of this kingdome [Safavid Persia], the common opinion is, that
in the dayes of Kinge Tamas [Tahmasp (1524-76)] the crowne did yearely receaue into
the Chamber of Casbin, foure or Hue millions of gold, which afterward he caused to
be worth eight millions, by a sudden enhaunsing of the value of his coyne, geuing in
commandment by most seuere Edictes, that ouer all his Empyre, for a certayne space,
all the money that he had receaued, should bee taken and accompted for asmuch more
as it was worth, and accordingly made pay to his souldiers and Sultans, & all other that
were in his pay. Which example (mee-thinkes) was well followed by Amurat the now
king of the Turkes [Murad III (1574-95)], who receauing at the Citty of Cairo the
Cechino of gold [sequin] for xliii. Maidini, he put it out againe in Constantinople, to
pay his Capigi and Ianissaries, withall lxxxv. Maidini, commanding that it should be
of that value ouer all the Citty, and countryes subiect vnto it.35
33) Fernand Braudel, The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II,
tr. Sian Reynolds. 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row, 1972): vol. 1: 540, vol. 2: 1195;
Inalcik, "Notes on a Study of the Turkish Economy": 253, n. 109; Steensgaard, The Asian
Trade Revolution of the Seventeenth Century: 419; Pamuk, A Monetary History of the Ottoman
Empire-. 137.
34) J.W Zinkeisen, Geschichte des osmanischen Reiches in Europa. 7 vols. (Gotha: F. A. Perthes,
1840-63): vol. 3: 802-3.
35) Iohn-Thomas Minadoi, The History of the Warres hetweene the Tvrkes and the Persians, tr.
Abraham Hartwell (London: Iohn Wolfe, 1595): 76.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 475
36) Walther Hinz, "The Value of the Toman in the Middle Ages." In Ydd-ndme-ye Irdni-ye
Minorsky, eds Mojtaba Minovi and I. Afshar (Tehran: Publications of Tehran University,
1969): 90-5.
37) Album, A Checklist of Islamic Coins: 127-8; I omit Albums discussion of the eastern
standards within the Safavid Empire, which would not have had much of an influence on
the Ottomans.
38) E. Delmar Morgan and C. H. Coote, eds, Early Voyages to Russia and Persia. 2 vols.
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476 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
(London: Hakluyt Society, 1885-6): vol. 2: 387-9, 391-2. Other letters published in the
same volume confirm the centrality of the shahi; see, for instance, pp. 394, 396.
39) Since, according to Berengo, the former shahi was worth 4.5 maidins, and 40 maidins
were worth a gold ducat, which at the time was worth 60 akces, one shahi prior to its
devaluation should have been worth (60: 40 x 4.5 =) 6.75 akces. As for the exchange value
of the shahi in terms of the maidin, or para, in the absence of smaller currency, one could
imagine that its current value might have been 5 maidins.
40) In a letter from Shirvan dated August 8, 1566, Arthur Edwards states that the "Dollars"
the Ottomans bring with them to Iran are valued at 10 shahis; Morgan and Coote, Early
Voyages to Russia and Persia: vol. 2: 401. Around the same time, the large silver coins of
Central Europe, that is the "Dollars" Edwards talks about, were valued at 40 akces in the
Ottoman Empire, thus 4 akces should have made one shahi. Moreover, taking the value of
the Venetian ducat as a constant that equates 10 Goldmark of 1871, Hinz calculates the
value of the Persian shahi in 1566 as 66 2/3 Pf., and that of the akce in 1564 as 16 2/3 Pf.,
supporting the argument that the Persian shahi after its devaluation was valued at 4 akces;
Islamische Wdhrungen: viii, 43, 60.
41) See, for instance, Artuk, Kanuni Sultan Suleyman Adina Basilan Sikkeler. 68, no. 173;
the weight of this coin might have been more than 4.4 g. since the extant coins may have
been subject to clipping. On the other hand, there are also coins of this sort that are much
lighter, and which may have been struck after a debasement, or may represent a different
denomination; see Artuk, Kanuni Sultan Suleyman Adina Basilan Sikkeler. 23, no. 61.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 477
42) Not surprisingly, after the debasement of the 1580s, the silver content of the akce was
eventually reduced to 0.32 g. in 1600, at which weight seven of them would weigh 2.24 g.,
and 14 of them 4.48 g., which is quite close to the weights of the Persian shahi in its old
and new forms.
43) Sahillioglu, "Osmanh para tarihi": 101, n. 36. Sahillioglu states that the production of
the 3.84 g. Ottoman sahi coins started in Baghdad in February 1566; "Ottoman Monetary
History": 286. The rate of debasement suggested here is a very rough approximation.
Although we know that the Ottoman sahi was supposed to weigh 3.84 g. in 1566, we do
not know the official weight of the larger coins that were struck by Suleyman I earlier, the
heaviest extant example of which from the Baghdad mint is 4.4 g.; Artuk, Kanuni Sultan
Suleyman Adina Basilan Sikkeler. 23.
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478 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
44) Laurence Chapman, an English merchant, in a letter from Qazvin dated April 28, 1569,
asserts that "twelve duckets... [make] one hundred sixe and fiftie shawghs" i.e. 13 shahis
for a ducat; Morgan and Coote, Early Voyages to Russia and Persia: vol. 2: 413. The very
same letter in Richard Hakluyt, ed., The Principal Navigations Voyages Traffiques & Discov
eries of the English Nation. 12 vols. (Glasgow: James MacLehose and Sons, 1903-05): vol. 3:
142, reads "... 165. shaughs," which is probably a mistake in rendering 156. Hinz, "The
Value of the Toman in the Middle Ages": 92, relies on the latter edition of the letter, thus
his figure needs to be corrected. Moreover Hinz takes these ducats to be Hungarian ducats
although there is no such qualification in the letter. The context, which is the price of kersey
clothes in Aleppo, rather suggests that it should be Venetian ducats. For the weight of the
shahi, see above, p. 475. In the Istanbul of the late 1560s, a gold ducat was worth 60 akces
while 450 akces were struck from 307.2 g. of silver, thus (307.2: 450) x 60 = 40.96; see
n. 27 above.
45) See for instance, Hinz, Islamische Wahrungen: 14 (a quote from 1579), 43 (from 1577);
William Barret reports from Aleppo in 1584 that in Baghdad and Basra 8 sahis make a
ducat of account; Hakluyt, The Principal Navigations Voyages Traffiques & Discoveries of the
English Nation: vol. 6: 10, 12. The ducat of account in late sixteenth-century Levant
included 40 paras (8 sahis) which was the value of the real ducat between the 1550s and the
late 1570s; seeTucci, Lettres dun marchand venitien Andrea Berengo, 1553-1556: 354, and
the quotes in Hinz, Islamische Wahrungen: 12-4.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 479
silver as was used for 1.4 akces in the 1520s, it was valued as 2 akces
because the Ottoman government had determined the exchange values of
its two different silver currencies according to their respective values against
the gold ducat. When their values changed in relation to the ducat in the
mid-sixteenth century, their exchange value against each other changed as
well. If one applies the same principle to the sahi, one would expect a sahi
to be worth 7.5 akces, as the ducat was worth 60 akces and most probably
8 sahis at the time. The value of the sahi against the akce which one finds
in the Ottoman records is very close to this and must therefore have been
calculated according to this principle.46 Had the center been motivated by
the intrinsic silver content of the sahi, a sahi that contained 3.84 g. silver,
which equaled 5.6 akces, would have been valued at 5.5, or at most
6 akces. The official value of 7-7.5 akces assigned to the sahi makes it clear
that the center determined the exchange rate of this regional currency in
terms of its relative value against gold, which was also the principle used in
the determination of the paras value in the early sixteenth century, rather
than its intrinsic silver value.
The assumption of the administration must have been that the trade
with Safavid Persia had a certain monetary impact on the eastern and
southeastern provinces. A devaluation in the Safavid Empire could at best
have had an influence on those areas but not really on western Anatolia, let
alone the Balkans. The fact that previous Safavid debasements had not had
an impact on the Ottoman akce shows that this assumption was not neces
sarily wrong.47 The Ottoman administration thus responded to the ques
tion at hand with the experience of the past, which was an experience
based on more limited trade zones with multiple local economies in which
different gold?silver ratios could operate, creating arbitrage profits for the
few who were well-connected in many zones.
The Ottoman administration regarded its domains as separate, exclu
sive, and mainly self-sufficient units. The regional markets were supposed
to operate with the regional currency, and interregional trade was sup
posed to be under governmental supervision and was to be conducted with
goods, or gold. Giicer, for instance, shows how regulated the grain market
46) Although the government decreed the exchange value of the sahi as 7 akces, this was
most probably its value when it was part of a payment made to the treasury. In 1582, the
government accepted sahis at 7 akces each, yet counted them as 7.5 akces when they were
used in payment; see Sahillioglu, "1582-83 tarihli biitce": 32, 44.
47) See above, pp. 472-473.
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480 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
48) Liitfi Gii^er, "XVI. yiizyil sonlannda Osmanli Imparatoriugu dahilinde hububat ticareti
nin tabi oldugu kayitlar." Istanbul Universitesi tktisat Fakultesi Mecmuasi 13 (1951-2): 79-98.
49) Gucer, "XVI. yiizyil sonlannda Osmanli Imparatoriugu dahilinde hububat ticaretinin
tabi oldugu kayitlar": 79-81; Anonymous, "Hirzii'l-Muluk." In Osmanli Devlet Teskildtina
Dair Kaynaklar: Kitab-i Miistetdb?Kitabu Mesalihil Miislimin ve MendfiTl-Muminin?
Hirzii'l-Muluk, ed. Yasar Yiicel (Ankara: TurkTarih Kurumu, 1988): 178.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 481
Merchants coming from Anatolia, who used to bring either gold coins or
goods to barter with, now brought silver, converted it to sahis in the mint
of Diyarbekir, and used the sahis for their purchases.50
Since around this time 450 akces were struck from 100 dirhems of sil
ver, one may suppose that the price of silver could not have been any
higher than 450 akces per 100 dirhems in Anatolia. Most probably, it was
actually a little cheaper than that since one had to pay certain fees for the
mint. If one took 100 dirhems of silver to the southern mints of the empire,
one could get 80 sahis.51 These sahis were worth at least 560 akces at
7 akces a sahi. Thus 450 akces worth of silver produced an extra 110 akces
worth of purchasing power in the Levant, which amounts to a profit of
24.4%.
After the finance director of Aleppo had explained this situation to the
capital in 1572, the Ottoman center responded favorably to his request
and ordered the exchange rate of the sahi to be reduced to 4 paras. Although
at 4 paras the sahi would make 6 akces and would still be overvalued, the
arbitrage profit would be reduced to 6.7%. Yet it seems that the order was
of no avail. European travelers noted the value of the sahi at 4.5 paras in
1574, and at 5 paras in 1577 and 1579.52
Thus the sahi started to be used in the greater Syria area at the latest by
the early 1570s. Minting sahis soon became quite popular in the region
and spread from the mint of Baghdad to the mints of Aleppo and Diyarbe
kir. By the late 1570s investors had raised their bids for the tax-farms of the
mints that struck sahis by almost 25,000 ducats.53 In 1582, the provincial
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482 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
54) See the document cited by Ender, Numismatik ile ilgili Belgeler. 13, no. 135. In 1584,
Barret stated that in Baghdad a sahi was equivalent to 5 paras "as in Aleppo"; Hakluyt, The
Principal Navigations Voyages Traffiques & Discoveries of the English Nation: vol. 6: 10.
55) Pamuk, A Monetary History of the Ottoman Empire: 103.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 483
Thus, the para in the Levant seems to have acquired a value that was
independent of its silver content. Just as the $5 bills in circulation today
are equivalent to five $1 bills although they contain exactly the same
amount of paper, so the sahi was worth five paras although its silver con
tent was much less than that of five paras combined. That this was indeed
the case is also proven by the contemporary exchange rates of these two
silver coins in relation to the ducat. As late as 1579, a Venetian ducat was
valued at 40 paras, or 8 sahis in Egypt, and 42 paras in Tripoli, while in the
latter city the sahi was valued at 5.5 paras, which suggests that the going
rate of the ?ahi at ca. 5 paras was accepted even when one was dealing with
gold currency.56 These figures also indicate that in the Levant gold had
become comparatively cheaper in relation to silver, as 8 ?ahis included less
silver than 40 paras yet they were accepted as the equivalent of a ducat.
One could also argue that silver had become more expensive in relation
to gold, which may be ascribed to the Persian devaluation. The gold?
silver ratio prevalent in the Safavid Empire was adopted in the eastern
provinces of the Ottoman Empire as these areas were in close contact with
Persia. Yet as the eastern provinces came to be integrated into the larger
imperial market, the gold?silver ratio of Persia moved to the west, cance
ling out arbitrage profits that could be realized in the context of the rela
tively isolated existence of two different economic zones. Although in the
first half of the sixteenth century a similar development had taken place
between Egypt and the Levant, on the one hand, and the central lands of
the empire, on the other, that integration had occurred at the gold?silver
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484 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
ratio of the center. This time, however, the ratio of the periphery was per
meating the center.
Thus a local Ottoman currency, which was meant to be used exclusively
in the former Safavid lands, entered daily usage in greater Syria and Egypt;
it found acceptance at a face value that was more than the value of its silver
content, increasing the total amount of money in circulation, perhaps, in
order to finance the increased volume of trade. Although the Ottomans
sanctioned this use by permitting the production of sahis in Levantine
mints, the administration was actually following the requirements of eco
nomic developments rather than initiating them, as becomes clear from
the unsuccessful attempt of the government to reduce the exchange value
of the sahi. However, there was yet another development that accelerated
the process which led to the official debasement and devaluation of the
akce: the influx of Spanish silver from the Americas.
Ill
Starting in the mid 1570s Spanish silver reals entered the Levant in ever
larger quantities, which contributed to the expansion of the use of the sahi
as the main currency of payment in the area and beyond.57 Before their
arrival in such large quantities, the reals were valued at 40 akces per piastre,
or a piece of eight reals, which the Ottomans called gurus.58 However, after
they flooded the Ottoman market, the Spanish reals came to be valued
in terms of their weight. The unit with which the market operated was
90 reals, which weighed 100 dirhems.59 In 1555, 100 dirhems of Venetian
silver coins were valued at 300 paras. A quotation from a document from
57) Steensgaard, The Asian Trade Revolution of the Seventeenth Century: 78; Micheline Bau
lant, ed., Lettres de negociants marseillais, les Freres Hermite, 1570-1612 (Paris: A. Colin,
1953): 13, 15 (n. 11), 25, 36.
58) Although Ottoman financial records do not differentiate between different types of
large silver coins until the early seventeenth century, it seems that the gurus valued at 40
akces could well have been the Spanish piastre, or the Joachimsthaler of Central Europe,
after which the Spanish piastre, or the "piece of eight [reals]" was modeled, hence the name
"dollar." Sahillioglu quotes an entry from the daily record book of the imperial treasury
dated to early September 1569, according to which several guruses valued at 40, 20, and
10 akces entered the treasury; "Ottoman Monetary History": 282 n. 30. These three values
would only make sense if one were referring to the Spanish real pieces of eight, four,
and two.
59) Barret, in Hakluyt, The Principal Navigations Voyages Traffiques & Discoveries of the English
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 485
Tripoli dated April 1582, the earliest source I could find for the value of
Spanish silver, suggests the same price.60
One would expect that with the arrival of the Spanish silver the amount
of silver available in the market would increase, and thus the price of silver
would decrease. However, not only do we have no idea about the exact
quantity of silver that entered the Ottoman Empire, we are also clueless
about how much silver was in circulation to begin with. For the influx of
silver to make an impact on the imperial market, it had to represent a size
able portion of the already accumulated stock. Unfortunately, we are far
from the point at which any estimates of these figures can be made, but
contemporary sources do offer a clue as to why the price of silver actually
increased.
If, as the Damascene authorities wrote to Istanbul in 1582, no one
was asking the mint to strike paras when one could get 80 sahis out of
100 dirhems of silver that were valued at 400 paras, then the price paid for
90 Spanish reals would be expected to rise toward 400 paras. That is to say,
if the foreign merchants who brought silver to the Levant were sufficiently
informed of the silver market, they would be expected to negotiate the value
of their silver in accordance with the amount of sahis that one could strike
out of 100 dirhems of silver. Thus 300 paras per 90 reals weighing 100
dirhems, which had been the price of silver in 1555 when there were no sahis
in the Levantine market, would not have held for long after April 1582, the
date of the first lump-sum quote I could find. Not surprisingly, the following
note, most probably reflecting the situation in 1583, suggests that the old
price paid for 100 dirhems of silver was indeed abandoned soon:
Nation: vol. 6: 10, 12, 13; G. Hermite's letter from 1584 in Baulant, Lettres de negociants
marseillais, les Freres Hermite, 1570-1612: 60.
60) Tucci, Lettres dun marchand venitien Andrea Berengo, 1553-1556: 95; Baulant, Lettres de
negociants marseillais, les Freres Hermite, 1570-1612: 36.
61) Sir William Foster, ed., The Travels of John Sanderson in the Levant 1584-1602. With his
Autobiography and Selections from his Correspondence (London: Hakluyt Society, 1931): 292.
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486 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
While a single real is 4 paras, and the dollar, a piece of eight reals, is
(4x8=) 32 paras, 90 reals make ([9 ducats of account x 40] + 10 =) 370
paras in Aleppo, which is more than the 360 paras that one would expect
them to make at 4 paras per real. The only explanation for this phenome
non is that 90 reals were traded as 100 dirhems of silver, which would
make 80 sahis that are worth 400 paras. Buying 90 reals for 370 paras?
which must have been paid either in goods, or sahis, since 370 paras actu
ally included more than 100 dirhems of silver?and then converting them
into sahis would create, at these rates, a profit of 30 paras, which is almost
8 reals. In Tripoli, where no official mint existed, no such immediate prof
its could be made.62 Thus the value of 90 reals was not as high in Tripoli as
it was in Aleppo, where a mint struck sahis.
Some of the sahis produced in the mint of Aleppo in 1582 found their
way to Anatolia and the Balkans. The mints in western Anatolia and the
Balkans did not produce ?ahis. Yet the balance sheet of the imperial treas
ury for the fiscal year of 1582-3 suggests that the ?ahi must have entered
the daily monetary transactions in the central lands of the empire as well.
During this fiscal year the value of the sahis that entered the Ottoman
treasury was more than 53.5 million akces. The contributions of the
provincial treasuries of Aleppo, Damascus, Erzurum, and Baghdad, where
the sahi could be expected to circulate at this time, were a little less than
45 million akces.63 Even if one assumes that all of the contributions
from these provinces reached the treasury in the form of sahis, which is
quite unlikely, at least 8.5 million akces worth of ?ahis must have been paid
into the treasury from sources of income located in the central lands of the
empire.
This note, written by Sanderson s apprentice John Hanger, is not dated, yet the price quoted
for a peso, or 90 reals, which is 100 dirhems of silver, seems to be the same as the one
quoted by G. Hermite, a French merchant, on May 1, 1583, in Aleppo; see Baulant, Lettres
de negotiants marseillais, les Freres Hermite, 1570-1612: 51. Thus Hanger, who joined Sand
erson in 1599, was probably copying something from an earlier date because the exchange
rates of the 1600s were quite different, and the piastre had replaced the ducat as a money
of account; compare Baulant, Lettres de negotiants marseillais, les Freres Hermite, 1570-1612:
39, 132-45. Also William Barrett must have been the same person as William Barret who
was earlier noted in Aleppo in 1584; see n. 45 above.
62) Actually, a mint was opened in Tripoli on a local initiative to strike sahis sometime
around 1585, yet the government ordered it to be closed down; see Sahillioglu, "Osmanli
para tarihi": 264 (n. 18).
63) Sahillioglu, "1582-83 tarihli biitce": 35, 38-9.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 487
There is both archival and literary evidence to suggest that the sahi
circulated not only in Anatolia, but also in the Balkans. Selaniki, an Otto
man chronicler of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, states
that the overvalued sahi came from the borderland between the Ottomans
and the Safavids and reached the farthest points of Rumelia during the
reign of Murad III (r. 1574-95). Selaniki is not exaggerating, as the sahi
even reached beyond Rumelia and was recorded in the principalities of
Wallachia and Moldavia.64
The dynamics of the expansion of the sahi beyond the zone where it was
meant to circulate is of great significance for our understanding of the
devaluation of the Ottoman akce against the ducat and the piastre in 1585
6, as well as its debasement. The actual debasement of the akce was directly
related to the expansion of the sahi into Anatolia and the Balkans. Sahilli
oglu argues that as the government did not take steps to adjust the exchange
rates of the various coins in circulation, "the money changers, counterfeit
ers, and guilds took matters into their own hands and clipped the corners
of the undervalued akce."65 Since the exchange rate of the sahi was
7 akces, the public would be expected to clip the akces to the point at
which 7 of them would weigh the same as a ?ahi.
Moreover, as the correspondence of the Ottoman authorities in Aleppo
with the center in 1572 suggests,66 in the early 1570s silver had already
started to move from Anatolia to the Levant in the hands of merchants,
since its purchasing power was stronger there. Thus the spread of the sahi
and its acceptance at an overvalued rate even in tax payments to the gov
ernment might well have caused some scarcity of silver for striking akces in
the central lands of the empire, or it might have raised the price of silver.
In order not to lose the silver in the market to the Levantine mints that
offered overvalued sahis in payment, Anatolian mints might well have
increased their buying price of silver, which could only work if they were
to produce akces at a debased weight, or add some copper to the silver
content of the akce.
There is evidence that debased akces were struck in Anatolian and Bal
kan mints already in the 1570s when the use of the sahi expanded in the
64) Mustafa Selaniki, Tarih-i Selaniki, ed. M. Ipsirli. 2 vols. (Istanbul: Istanbul Universitesi
Edebiyat Fakiiltesi Yayinlan, 1989): vol. 1: 427; Pamuk, A Monetary History of the Ottoman
Empire: 93.
65) Sahillioglu, "Ottoman Monetary History": 286.
66) See n. 50 above.
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488 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
Levant,67 and there are also indications that the silver brought by the Euro
pean merchants could find its way to these mints. In May 1583, G. Her
mite, a French merchant in Aleppo, recorded the price of [90] reals as 9.25
ducats of account at the mint and 9.5 in the contraband market.68 Debased
akces in their turn could increase the value of the sahi in terms of the akce,
or make the Levantine mints feel free to produce debased sahis. And there
is indeed evidence which suggests that the counterfeit production of sahis
by private individuals, as well as by unauthorized mints, had already started
by 1583.69 Hence the references to the sahi in literary and archival sources
as an alloyed and counterfeit coin (magsusy kem-ayar; zagal).70 Once the
debased akces made the sahi worth more than its prescribed value?which
had been an inflated one to start with and thus created a market for debased
sahis?the price of silver would be expected to increase further. And
indeed, Hermite notes in April 1584 that the value of [90] reals rose fur
ther "for the increase [in the value] of the sahis that are eight akces."71
It is at this point that the Safavid wars come into the picture. In imme
diate need of cash, the treasury had to accept the overvalued sahis as pay
ment instead of expecting gold coins from the Levant, which in turn
opened new avenues for the expansion of the use of the sahi as suggested
by the balance sheet of the imperial treasury for 1582-3. But more impor
tantly, when a commander general was on campaign, and funds from pro
vincial treasuries were assigned to him for expenditures in the east, as had
been the case with Ferhad Pasha in 1583-5, tax farmers may have felt freer
to use debased sahis in their payments since a commander in war would
not have the luxury to refuse funds brought to his treasury.
Once debased sahis started to be produced and possibly found accept
ance by the treasury for military campaigns, the price of silver could rise
further to exceed its ceiling of 400 paras, or 10 ducats of account, which is
the equivalent of the 80 sahis that one could strike from 100 dirhems
of silver. This expectation is substantiated by the letters of French mer
chants from Aleppo in 1584 and 1585. According to these letters, the price
67) See, for instance, the orders cited by Ender, Niimismatik ile ilgili Belgeler. 5 (#50),
10 (#96-7).
68) Baulant, Lettres de negociants marseillais, les Freres Hermite, 1570-1612: 51.
69) See the orders cited by Ender, Niimismatik ile ilgili Belgeler. 15 (#145, from 1583;
#150 from 1584), 16 (#155 from 1585).
70) Selaniki, Tarih-i Selaniki: vol. 1: 427; Sinan Pasha, Telhisdt (originally untitled), Siiley
maniye Kiituphanesi, Esad Efendi 2236, f. 70a.
71) Baulant, Lettres de negociants marseillais, les Freres Hermite, 1570-1612: 63.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 489
72) Baulant, Lettres de negotiants marseillais, les Freres Hermite, 1570-1612: 60, 63, 72.
73) Hinz, Islamische Wahrungen: 43.
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490 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
50 and 45, and of the drachms of medium grade 55."74 This observation
suggests that the old exchange rate of 60 akces to the ducat was still valid
even though the akces in question included much less silver than pre
scribed. It seems that gold had become cheaper in relation to silver, follow
ing the developments in the eastern provinces and the Levant. It was this
development that the government was reacting to when it finally devalued
the akce in September 1585.
IV
74) Mustafa Ali, Mustafd 'Alt's Counsel for Sultans of 1581, ed., tr. Andreas Tietze.
(Vienna: Verlag der dsterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1979-82): vol.
184. Ali's remarks about the 1585 devaluation constitute a later addition to the text
75) The rates were to be considered two akces lower, i.e. 108 and 63 akces respectively
the treasury received these in the form of income items; see Sahillioglu, "Osmanh
tarihi": 75 n. 12.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 491
60 akces respectively in 1584 and early 1585. Although their prices may
have risen somewhat further prior to September, the ratio of the value of
the ducat to that of the gurus in the free market seems to have been quite
different from the new ratio instituted by the government. The actual
figures for 1584 and early 1585, 85 and 60 akces in Istanbul, or 47 and
33 paras in Baghdad, as well as available figures for 1582, around 70 and
50 akces in Istanbul for the ducat and the gurus respectively,76 suggest that
the gold ducat was worth around 1.4 gurus. On the other hand, the former
official exchange rates for the ducat and the gurus were 60 and 40 akces
respectively, which implies that the ducat had been valued at 1.5 gurus. In
1585, however, the government valued the ducat around 1.7 gurus.
Berthier, a French diplomat in Istanbul, wrote on February 5, 1586, five
months after the official devaluation, that the value of the ducat had been
raised "higher than it was [in the market] ."77
It seems that the market forces had made gold ducats somewhat cheaper
in relation to silver (1.4 piastre as opposed to 1.5), or silver had gained in
value against gold, developments that had been observed earlier in the
Levant and the eastern provinces as a result of the spread of the sahi. Istan
bul was thus about to join the rest of the empire in a different gold?silver
ratio. The Ottoman government aimed at reversing this trend. In order to
comprehend the motives of the government, some overview of the role of
gold in Ottoman finances in the sixteenth century is in order.
Although the lands that made up the Ottoman Empire had quite a
number of different currencies, some of which have been referred to above,
the currency used for fiscal transactions between these lands as well as
large-scale commercial transactions, at least up to the 1570s, had been the
gold coin, either the Ottoman sultani, or the Venetian ducat, which were
more or less of the same weight. The balance sheet of the Ottoman central
treasury for the fiscal year 1582-3 suggests that the relative absence of gold
in the revenues might have been a more important issue than silver scarcity
in the decision of the Ottoman administration to devalue the akce.
The Ottomans had started to strike gold coins during the reign of
Mehmed II (1451-81), yet the available evidence from various inventories
76) For the figures from 1582, 1584, and 1585, see Sahillioglu, "Osmanh para tarihi":
74 n. 11, 231 n. 1; for the figures from Baghdad, see Hakluyt, The Principal Navigations
Voyages Traffiques & Discoveries of the English Nation: vol. 6: 10.
77) Cited by Cemal Kafadar, "When Coins turned into Drops of Dew and Bankers became
Robbers of Shadows: The Boundaries of Ottoman Economic Imagination at the End of the
Sixteenth Century." Ph.D. dissertation (McGill University, 1986): 65.
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492 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
suggests that the share of gold in the pool of currencies in circulation was
not great before the reign of Suleyman I.78 The extant balance sheet of the
imperial treasury for the fiscal year 1524-5 includes a list of currencies,
together with their respective numbers in coins, in which payments to the
treasury were received. According to this balance sheet, 7.9% of the total
income reached the treasury in gold specie, 47.5% of which in sultanis.79
Although a similar balance sheet for 1547-8 does not provide the same sort
of list, a number of entries nevertheless refer to some of the income items
that were received in gold coins, however without much specification as to
whether these coins were of Ottoman or foreign origin. These entries sug
gest that in 1547-8, at least 21.8% of the total income was received in gold
coinage.80 Not surprisingly, the increase in the payments made to the treas
ury in gold had to do with the Arab provinces, where gold was in relative
abundance.81
In 1524-5, the contribution of the Arab provinces to the imperial treasury
was minimal: in all 5,268,145 akces, almost exclusively in gold coinage on
a total income of 141,272,658 akces. Moreover, the comparative notes
added to the entries, which record the income from the same items in
the previous fiscal year 1523-4, suggest that the Arab provinces were then
unable to send any surplus at all, which is probably why the treasury closed
the year with a deficit of almost 2,000,000 akces.82 In 1547-8, however, the
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 493
have postponed the dispatch of the Egyptian tribute to 1525. The events may also have
affected the finances of Aleppo.
83) Compare Omer L. Barkan, "H. 974-975 (M. 1567-1568) mali yihna ait bir Osmanh
biitcesi." Istanbul Universitesi tktisat Fakultesi Mecmuasi 19 (1957-8): 302, 307; Sahillioglu,
"1582-83 tarihli biitce": 38, 46.
84) Barkan, "954-955 (1547-1548)": 275.
85) See n. 78-80 above.
86) Barkan, "H. 974-975 (M. 1567-1568)": 299, 302-4. There are a number of inconsis
tencies in the figures of the document; I tried to go by the totals whenever possible.
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494 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
both financed themselves and provided surplus revenues for the expendi
tures of the center elsewhere. It would probably not be an exaggeration to
claim that the westward and eastward expansion of the empire during
the reign of Suleyman I was financed by the center at the expense of the
Arab provinces.
Second, Ottoman finances benefited greatly from arbitrage profits.
Collecting its revenues in gold coins from the Arab lands where a slightly
different gold?silver ratio was still in effect in the second half of the six
teenth century made these revenues more valuable in Istanbul than they
were, for example, in Egypt. To give an example, let us assume that the
tribute of Egypt, 500,000 ducats, that was supposed to enter the personal
treasury of the sultan every year, was sent in silver currency. Up to 1585,
500,000 ducats were worth 30 million akces in Istanbul according to the
official exchange rate. The silver currency equivalent of the Egyptian trib
ute was 20 million paras, again according to the official exchange rate
of 40 paras a ducat. After the Egyptian debasement of 1565, at the most
optimistic estimate, 328 paras contained 100 dirhems of silver, which was
necessary to strike 450 akces. Thus had the Egyptian tribute been sent in
paras to be melted and converted into akces, the treasury would have
received 27,439,024 akces, which is 2,560,976 akces less than if the trib
ute had been sent in gold. Hence the Ottoman central treasury made a
profit of 9.3% by maintaining different gold?silver ratios in its central
lands and its southern provinces. Every 10 akces worth of revenue col
lected in silver in the Levant was worth almost 11 akces to the central
treasury. Separate currency zones, which could only operate in the absence
of full integration, and the profits of arbitrage associated with such an
economic setting, were in the interest of the Ottoman center.
When one looks at the balance sheet for the fiscal year of 1582-3, how
ever, it seems that the Ottoman center was losing its arbitrage profits. The
Arab provinces, with the exception of Egypt, could not procure much
gold. This particular balance sheet provides very detailed lists of the various
kinds of specie, including those that were carried over from the previous
fiscal year, those that entered the treasury during 1582-3, and those that
were carried over to the next fiscal year. The very existence and detailed
nature of these lists are suggestive of the significance the Ottoman admin
istration attached to the emerging problem of gold?silver ratios. Accord
ing to these lists, 15.5% of the total income entered the treasury in gold
coins. The balance sheet also indicates that Egypt sent a tribute of 522,228
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 495
gold coins, which went straight into the personal treasury of the sultan.87
Once the value of this tribute is deducted from the total value of all gold
coins that entered the treasury as part of the revenues for 1582-3, the
remainder is 10,316,728 akces worth of gold coins.
The reason for the relative lack of gold coins is not that the Arab prov
inces failed to support the central treasury with their usual contributions.
On the contrary, the provinces of Aleppo and Damascus seem to have sent
their largest contributions ever when one compares this balance sheet with
others.88 The contribution of the provinces of Aleppo and Damascus,
which used to send their payments in gold coinage in the past, is 37,087,420
akces worth, almost 27 million more than the total value of gold coins that
entered the treasury, excluding the tribute of Egypt. Apparently, the treas
uries of the finance department in Aleppo and Damascus failed to procure
gold. Instead they seem to have used sahis, of which the revenues included
53,546,933 akces worth, which is slightly more than 20% of the total
revenues for 1582-3, or 23% if the Egyptian revenue is excluded from the
total, since it went straight into the private treasury of the sultan.
When the revenues of the Levant were sent in sahis as opposed to duc
ats, as was the case for this year, the central treasury was losing money. For
instance, in 1582-3, the provinces of Damascus and Aleppo made a con
tribution of ca. 37 million akces to the central treasury, most of which
must have been in sahis. Let us suppose that all of this contribution was
sent in gold coins as opposed to sahis. 37 million akces worth of sahis
equaled 5,285,714 sahis, which would make 660,714 gold coins in accord
ance with the official rates of 5 paras a sahi and 40 paras a ducat. This
much gold would make 39,642,840 akces in Istanbul. Hence the treasury
lost more than two and a half million akces which it would have made had
the contributions been sent in gold.
Thus in the early 1580s the sahi became the second most important cur
rency after the akce in Ottoman revenues, replacing gold coins to a great
extent, and causing a great deal of loss in arbitrage profits for the Ottoman
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496 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
center. Moreover, for the Ottoman center more was at stake than a simple
loss of future profits. A change in the gold?silver ratio that would make
silver more valuable against gold would have the effect of decreasing the
value of the Ottoman gold reserves in the private treasury of the sultan in
the imperial palace. Even in the most dire straits that Ottoman finances
went through during the Habsburg wars in the 1590s and the 1600s, and
during the four accessions that took place between 1617 and 1623, which
created an immense burden on the treasury because of the accession ben
efits paid to the soldiers, the private treasury of the sultan was still able to
cover the deficits of the central treasury. Thus the amount of gold that had
been accumulated during the sixteenth century must have been immense.
Consequently, one would be justified in claiming that it was quite impor
tant for the Ottoman center to protect the value of its gold reserves.
In sum, the Ottoman center had several reasons not to accept the new
gold?silver ratio, which had been carried by the sahi, the child of the
integration of the Ottoman economic zones into a big imperial market in
a period of economic expansion, from the Safavid borders to the Ottoman
capital. It is this observation rather than the fiscal difficulties which the
treasury faced in financing the war effort, which did not really exist at this
point as far as the balance sheet of 1582-3 is concerned, that may help to
explain the intervention of the Ottoman administration in September 1585.
As noted above, the Ottoman administration devalued the akce more
than the market had done. While the most recent market rates prior to the
devaluation were 85 akces for the ducat and 60 akces for the gurus, the
official rates were announced at 110 and 65 akces respectively. The deci
sion was thus clearly aimed at making gold more valuable in relation to
silver, or at stopping the spread of the gold?silver ratio of the south and
the east to the center of the empire. In that sense the assumption that
Murad III was aiming to increase the value of his treasury is a point
well made.89
But more importantly, the devaluation was aimed at the destruction of
the sahi, which the administration had come to regard as a major problem.
In 1591, when Sinan Pasha reminded Murad III that he had accomplished
a great deal since assuming the grand vizierate little more than two years
earlier, he noted that he had succeeded in eliminating the sahi from
89) That was the interpretation of some contemporaries; see Cemal Kafadar, "Les troubles
monetaires de la fin du xvie siecle et la prise de conscience ottomane du declin." Annales:
economies, societes, civilisations AG (1991): 385.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 497
circulation.90 It was Sinan Pasha who had taken over and completed the
debasement operation started by Mehmed Pasha in 1588, three years after
the devaluation.91
Although the Ottoman economic market had started to operate with
the de facto debased akces, the government did not make extensive use of
these akces in salary payments. Even after the devaluation of the akce
against the gold ducat and the gurus in September 1585, at least some
of the soldiers of the central army continued to receive their salaries in
good akces for a few years. As noted by Reinhold Lubenau around 1587,
although the exchange rate of the gurus, which used to be 40 akces, had
risen by this time to 80 akces, the Janissaries received their salaries in
the old akces, 40 of which still made a gurus.92 Thus the devaluation of
the akce and its official debasement had not taken place at the same time.
In September 1585, the government devalued the de facto debased akce
while apparently still using the good akces in salary payments. It was only
in 1588 that the Ottoman administration decided to pursue a full-scale
official debasement of the akce by replacing all of the coins in circulation
with new ones that were going to contain 0.38 g. of silver as against to the
former standard of 0.68 g.93
In April 1589, when the imperial cavalry troops rebelled because they
were being paid in debased coinage, they asked for the execution of the
vizier Mehmed Pasha and the finance minister Mahmud Efendi, whom
they held responsible for the official debasement. While recounting the
incident, Selaniki makes the executioner say to Mahmud Efendi: "Are you
the one who struck akces from the mines at [the rate of] eight akces [per
90) Sinan Pasha, TelhisaP. f. 70a; for the dating of this telhis, see Suraiya Faroqhi, "Die Vor
lagen (telhise) des Grosswesirs Sinan pasa an Sultan Murad III." Ph.D. dissertation (Uni
versitat Hamburg, 1967): 36-7, 212, 218. One could also add that Sinan Pashas references
to his former grand vizierate and his governorship in Damascus in its aftermath, as well as
his statement that it had been almost two and a half years since he had assumed his post for
the second time, suggest that the telhis in question must have been written in the summer
of 1591, before his dismissal in August.
91) Kafadar, "The Boundaries of Ottoman Economic Imagination at the End of the
Sixteenth Century": 93-4.
92) Hinz, Islamische Wahrungen: 46.
93) Sahillioglu, "Osmanli para tarihi": 66, 224-5, 233-4 (n. 27-34). In addition to the
documents cited by Sahillioglu, see also Ender, Niimismatik ile ilgili Belgeler: 18, no. 174,
177.
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498 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
dirhem]?"94 Although it is not clear whether the akces in which the cavalry
troops received their salaries were the officially debased ones, the context
of this remark as well as the timing of the incident right after the beginning
of the debasement operation suggest that this was the case.95
It seems that the imperial army had a strong leverage against the admin
istration in expecting their salaries to be paid in good coin. Yet this was
becoming more difficult given the de facto debasement of the akce since
at least the 1570s. An alternative for the good akce would have been the
ducat or the gurus, but neither was used much in the market. After
the expansion of the use of the sahi, the piastres that entered the country
were converted into ?ahis in order to take advantage of the overvaluation
of the coin. As for the ducat, the southern provinces, its principal source,
now sent their yearly contributions in overvalued sahis and probably kept
the ducats for themselves.
In 1585, by valuing the gurus at 65 akces, five akces above its most
recently quoted market value, the government was hoping to stop the con
version of Spanish silver into sahis by outbidding the profits made
by minting ?ahis. As for the quite high value of the ducat at 110 akces,
25 akces more than its most recent market value, this overvaluation of the
ducat suggests that the administration was trying to reverse the trend that
made silver more valuable than gold. At a higher exchange rate, the center
thought, the southern provinces would again send their tributes in gold
coins as opposed to overvalued ?ahis. Yet the overvaluation of the ducat led
to yet another round of practical debasement for the akce, pushing the
exchange rates yet further up. Although the government tried to keep the
value of gold relatively high, eventually the ducat and the gurus were val
ued at 120 and 80 akces respectively, which meant a return to the old ratio
of 1.5 guru? per ducat through a devaluation of 100% in comparison with
the pre-1585 rates of 60 and 40 akces.
94) Selaniki, Tarih-i Seldnikr: vol. 1: 211. Selaniki was not present in the capital at this
point; see p. 209.
95) According to Ali, it was the more than 1,000,000 akces, which were delivered by
"Kartakoz, the tax-farmer of the levy on wine sales," and were initially refused by the finance
minister Mahmud Efendi, which caused the trouble; Kafadar, "The Boundaries of Otto
man Economic Imagination at the End of the Sixteenth Century": 77. Ali, like Selaniki,
was not in the capital at this time and his account is based on what he had heard from
second hand sources. Sahillioglu believes that these akces may well have been the product
of the official debasement; "Osmanli para tarihi": 228.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 499
When the debasement had finally been fully realized in 1588, however,
the rate of this debasement was not what one would have expected it to be.
If the value of both gold and large silver coins increased by 100%, one
would expect the debasement to reduce the size of the akce by half. Yet the
new akces contained 0.38 g., which indicates a debasement of 44% from
0.68 g. Thus the official gold?silver ratio was changed from 1:11.5 to
1:13.1, making gold relatively more expensive than silver.
The Ottoman central government was clearly aiming to reverse the trend
toward a unification of the Ottoman currency zones with a gold?silver
ratio that had made silver relatively more expensive than gold in the east
ern and southern provinces. Yet this effort proved unsuccessful; as the
southern provinces were reluctant to follow suit and debase their curren
cies accordingly,96 the debasement operation took the empire back into the
earlier part of the sixteenth century, when separate currency zones with
different gold?silver ratios co-existed. Over the next ten years, during
which the de facto debasement and devaluation of the akce continued, the
situation proved impossible to sustain.
In 1600 the Ottoman center undertook yet another debasement, which
reduced the silver content of the akce to 0.32 g., this time without an
accompanying devaluation in terms of the ducat, thus changing the gold?
silver ratio once again from 1:13.1 to 1:11. This decree, which made silver
relatively more expensive than gold, was an acknowledgement of market
realities on the part of the administration.97 Sanderson, an English mer
chant in Istanbul at the time, did not have much faith in the operation.
However, this time the debasement did prove to be successful, at least for
more than ten years to come.98 Moreover, in 1600 another debasement
took place in Syria, and this was accompanied by an official devaluation.
The new rate of the ducat and the weight of the para, which was decreed
at 80 paras of 0.48 g. each, suggest that both the Levant and the central
lands of the empire had finally become united in the same gold?silver
ratio, since in both areas one needed ca. 38 g. of silver to get a ducat.99
96) Selaniki, Tarih-i Seldniki: vol. 1: 430; Sahillioglu, "Osmanh para tarihi": 223-4.
97) Katib Qelebi, Fezleke. 2 vols. (Istanbul: Ceride-i Havadis Matbaasi, 1286-7 AH): vol. 1:
142-3; Sahillioglu, "Osmanh para tarihi": 225.
98) Foster, The Travels of John Sanderson in the Levant 1584-1602: 202; in 1610, George
Sandys, an English traveler still quoted 120 akces for a ducat in Istanbul; see A Relation of
a Iourney begun An: Dom: 1610 (London: W. Barrett, 1615): 73, 77.
99) Muhammad Ibn Jum'a, "Al-bashat wa al-qudat." In Wuldt dimashqfi al- 'ahdal- uthmdni,
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500 B. Tezcan /JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
In the late seventeenth century this process of the unification of the dif
ferent zones of the empire was to take its final shape. During the mid-sev
enteenth century the large European silver currencies, mostly called gurus
with an accompanying adjective, such as tarn, or kamil for the
Spanish piastre, came to be used as a common currency in the Ottoman
Empire,100 which led to the creation in the late seventeenth century of an
Ottoman kuru? that was meant to be used all over the empire. This new
imperial large silver coin was accompanied by the adoption of the para as
an imperial small silver currency that was minted in Istanbul as well as in
Egypt. Although the akce eventually disappeared, the para survived through
to the end of the Ottoman Empire and was even used during the early
period of the Turkish Republic as a monetary unit that denoted 1/40 of
a kurus. The kurus survives to this day in Turkey as well as in Egypt
(pronounced [qjirsh) to denote a penny.
Thus it was in the sixteenth century that the foundations of the early
modern monetary system of the Middle East were laid through the unifi
cation of different zones of regional currencies into a unified imperial zone.
Although the ?ahi, the coin that played a significant role in this process,
eventually disappeared together with the differences in the gold?silver
ratios of the Ottoman provinces, the Egyptian para came to replace the
akce. The fact that para came to mean money in modern Turkish is a
reminder of the market forces that unified a number of different monetary
zones in the sixteenth-century Middle East.
A final question I would like to address is whether one can talk about a
"monetarization" of the Ottoman economy parallel to all of these develop
ments. This article does not prove that a monetary economy emerged in
the Ottoman domains during the sixteenth century. After all, the emer
gence of a monetary economy based on the idea of production targeting a
market where goods are bought and sold, and not bartered, is not some
thing that one can precisely date to a certain moment in the gradual devel
opment of the use of money. Even if there were strict criteria to determine
the existence of a monetary economy, such as the amount of money in
circulation, the velocity of circulation, and the relative value of the
non-monetary sector, it seems doubtful whether one could gather enough
ed. S. al-Munajjid (Dimashq, [s.n.], 1949): 26. Yet the fineness of the new para is not indi
cated, thus there might still have been a discrepancy between the gold?silver ratios.
ioo) Pamuk, "In the Absence of Domestic Currency: Debased European Coinage in the
Seventeenth-Century Ottoman Empire." Journal ofEconomic History 57 (1997): 345-66.
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The Ottoman Monetary Crisis of1585 Revisited 501
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502 B. Tezcan I JESHO 52 (2009) 460-504
Consequently, even though one cannot assert that the Ottoman economy
of the late sixteenth and the early seventeenth centuries was a fully-fledged
market economy, it is justified to claim that the Ottoman economy of this
period was much more market oriented and much more monetary than it
had been a century before.101
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