Editing Devshirme (section)

== History ==
The devshirme (from the Turkish word meaning 'to collect')<ref name="Itzkowitz 2008 p.50">{{cite book |last=Itzkowitz |first=Norman |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aapbAAAAQBAJ |title=Ottoman Empire and Islamic Tradition |publisher=University of Chicago Press |year=2008 |isbn=978-0-226-09801-2 |series=}}</ref> came up out of the {{Transliteration|ota|[[Slavery in the Ottoman Empire|kul]]}} system of slavery that developed in the early centuries of the Ottoman Empire, and which reached this final development during the reign of Sultan [[Bayezid I|Bayazit I]].<ref>{{Cite book |last1=İnalcık |first1=Halil |title=Ottoman Civilization |last2=Renda |first2=Günsel |publisher=Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Culture |year=2004 |edition=2nd |location=Ankara |pages=138 |oclc=62151678}}</ref> The {{Transliteration|ota|kul}} were mostly prisoners from war, hostages or slaves that were purchased by the state. The Ottoman Empire, beginning with [[Murad I]], felt a need to "counteract the power of (Turkic) nobles by developing Christian vassal soldiers and converted {{Transliteration|ota|[[kapıkulu]]}} as his personal troops, independent of the regular army."{{sfn|Shaw|1976|p=27}} This elite force, which served the Ottoman Sultan directly, was called {{Transliteration|ota|Kapıkulu Ocağı}} (The Hearth of the Porte Servants).{{efn|{{Transliteration|ota|Kapıkulu}} has meaning of more a 'paid servant' rather than a slave, as word's meaning shifted over years. The word {{Transliteration|ota|'kul'}} has there meanings in Turkic: 'slave', 'servant' and 'male [biological] son'; thus, in this context, they were treated as and called 'servants' through the word {{Transliteration|ota|kul}}, with {{Transliteration|ota|köle}} being the actual term used to describe literal slaves (mostly domestic house slaves).}} They were divided into two main groups: cavalry and infantry.{{efn|More classifications, such as the artillery and cannon corps, miners and moat diggers and even a separate cannon-wagon corps were introduced later on, but the number of people in these groups were relatively small, and they incorporated Christian elements.}} The cavalry was commonly known as the {{Transliteration|ota|Kapikulu Sipahi}} (The Cavalry of the Servants of the [[Ottoman Porte|Porte]]) and the infantry as the [[Janissary|janissaries]] ({{Transliteration|ota|Yeni Çeri}}, meaning "the New Corps"). The devshirme conscripts were set apart from the janissaries in that they were not a cavalry group, rather exclusively infantry.

At first, the soldiers serving in these corps were selected from the slaves captured during war. However, a new system commonly known as devshirme was soon adopted. In this system, children of the rural Christian populations of the Balkans were conscripted before adolescence and were brought up as Muslims. Upon reaching adolescence, these children were enrolled in one of the four imperial institutions: the palace, the scribes, the Muslim clergy, and the military. Those enrolled in the military would become either part of the [[Janissary]] corps (1363), or part of another corps.{{sfn|Shaw|1976|pp=112–129}} The most promising were sent to the palace school ({{Transliteration|ota|Enderûn Mektebi}}), where they were destined for a career within the palace itself and could attain the highest office of state, [[Grand Vizier]], the Sultan's powerful chief minister and military deputy. In the beginning of the Ottoman Empire, this office was held only by Turks. However, after there were problems between sultan [[Mehmed II]] and the Turkish [[Çandarlı Halil Pasha the Younger]], who became the first grand vizier to be executed, there was a rise of slave administrators devshirme. They were much easier to control for the sultans, as compared to free administrators of Turkish noble origin.<ref name="somel" /> They were also less subject to influence from court factions. From the very beginning, the Turcoman were a danger that undermined the Sultan's creation of a strong state. Thus, the establishment of this class counterbalanced the Turkish nobility, who sometimes opposed the Sultan.<ref name="brewer" /><ref name="feroz" /><ref name="somel" />

An early Greek source mentioning devshirme ({{Transliteration|el|paidomazoma}}){{efn||name=name-greek-armenian}} is a speech by Archbishop [[Isidore Glabas]], made on 28 February 1395, titled: "On the abduction of children according to sultan's order and on the Future Judgment". The speech includes references to the violent Islamization of children and their hard training in the use of dogs and falcons.<ref>Papadopoulos I. Stefanos, "Account of paedomazoma in Thessaloniki during the first occupation of the city by the Turks, ... ", Thessaloniki, 1992, pp. 71–77 (Παπαδόπουλος Στέφανος Ι., Μνεία παιδομαζώματος στη Θεσσαλονίκη κατά την πρώτη κατοχή της πόλης από τους Τούρκους, Χριστιανική Θεσσαλονίκη ... (11ος-15ος μ.Χ.), Θεσσαλονίκη 1992, σ. 71–77) (in Greek).</ref>

A reference to devshirme is made in a poem composed {{circa|1550}} in Greek by Ioannes Axayiolis, who appeals to Emperor [[Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor|Charles V of Germany]] to liberate the Christians from the Turks. The text is found in the {{lang|la|Codex Vaticanus Graecus}} of 1624. In another account, the [[Roman Catholic Diocese of Chios|Roman Catholic bishop of Chios]] in 1646 writes to the director of the Catholic Greek Gymnasion of Rome asking the latter to accept Paulos Omeros, a 12-year-old boy from Chios, to save him from the devshirme.<ref>[http://lsparnas.gr/page_flip/box5A_004-2/resources/PDF_File.pdf Zoras Th. Georgios, "Some accounts on Paedomazoma", Parnassos, vol. 4, 2 (1962), pp. 217 –  (Ζώρας Θ. Γεώργιος, "Μαρτυρίαι τινές περί το Παιδομάζωμα"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210123011036/http://www.lsparnas.gr/page_flip/box5A_004-2/resources/PDF_File.pdf |date=23 January 2021 }} (in Greek). On the Axayioli poem, pp 217–221. On the letter of bishop of Chios, pp 221–223. Original letter in Italian.</ref>

The recruitment of children took place every three to four years and at times even annually, according to the needs of the Sultan. The largest loss of children coincided with the peak of Ottoman expansion in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries under the rule of Selim I and Suleiman the Magnificent.<ref name="auto4">A. E. Vacalopoulos. ''The Greek Nation'', 1453–1669, New Brunswick, New Jersey, Rutgers University Press, 1976, p. 41; Vasiliki Papoulia, The Impact of Devshirme on Greek Society, in ''War and Society in East Central Europe'', Editor—in—Chief, Bela K. Kiraly, 1982, Vol. II, pp. 561—562.</ref>