Prisons in the Late Ottoman Empire: Microcosms of Modernity

241 Pages·2014·1.58 MB·English

PRISONS IN THE LATE OTTOMAN EMPIRE

PRISONS IN THE
LATE OTTOMAN EMPIRE
MICROCOSMS OF MODERNITY
2
Kent F. Schull
© Kent F. Schull, 2014
Edinburgh University Press Ltd
The Tun – Holyrood Road
12 (2f) Jackson’s Entry
Edinburgh EH8 8PJ
www.euppublishing.com
Typeset in 11/13 JaghbUni Regular by
Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Stockport, Cheshire
and printed and bound in Great Britain by
CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon CRO 4YY
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 0 7486 4173 4 (hardback)
ISBN 978 0 7486 7769 6 (webready PDF)
The right of Kent F. Schull to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act 1988 and the Copyright and Related Rights Regulations 2003
(SI No. 2498).
Contents
List of Illustrations vi
List of Abbreviations vii
Note on Transliteration and Pronunciation viii
Preface ix
Introduction 1
1. Ottoman Criminal Justice and the Transformation of Islamic
Criminal Law and Punishment in the Age of Modernity,
1839–1922 17
2. Prison Reform in the Late Ottoman Empire: The State’s
Perspectives 42
3. Counting the Incarcerated: Knowledge, Power and the Prison
Population 67
4. The Spatialisation of Incarceration: Reforms, Response and
the Reality of Prison Life 111
5. Disciplining the Disciplinarians: Combating Corruption and
Abuse through the Professionalisation of the Prison Cadre 142
6. Creating Juvenile Delinquents: Redefining Childhood in the
Late Ottoman Empire 166
Conclusion 191
Bibliography 201
Index 217
Illustrations
Figures
3.1 1912 Prison survey questionnaire, Beirut province’s Cebele
prison 72
3.2 1914 Prison survey questionnaire, Istanbul province 84
4.1 Photograph of makeshift structures, tents and shacks located
at the walls of Karesi central prison 116
4.2 Photograph of huts located in an interior section of Karesi
central prison 117
4.3 Photograph of a sectional view facing the entrance to
Karesi central prison 118
4.4 Photograph of a section of the huts at Karesi central prison 119
Charts
3.1 1911–12 prison statistics 75
3.2 1914 prison statistics 76–7
3.3 1916–17 prison statistics 78–9
3.4 1918–19 prison statistics 79–80
3.5 1919–20 prison statistics 80–1
3.6 1911–12 prisoner socio-e conomic and occupation statistics 82
3.7 1911–12 prisoner ethno- religious and national identity
statistics 99
3.8 1911–12 prisoner age statistics 102
3.9 1911–12 prisoner marital status statistics 103
3.10 1911–12 prisoner literacy statistics 104
Abbreviations
AHR The American Historical Review
ARIT American Research Institute in Turkey
BNA The British National Archives
BOA Başbakanlık Osmanlı Arşivi (The Prime Ministry’s
Ottoman Archives)
c. circa
CUP Committee of Union and Progress
DHEUMTK Dahiliye Nezareti, Emniyet-i Umumiye Müdiriyeti,
Tahrirat Kalemi (The Secretariat of the Directorate
of Public Security, Ministry of the Interior)
DHMBHPS Dahiliye Nezareti, Mebani-i Emiriyye ve
Hapishaneler Müdiriyeti (The Directorate of Prisons
and Building Construction, Ministry of the Interior)
DHMBHPSM Dahiliye Nezareti, Mebani-i Emiriyye ve
Hapishaneler Müdiriyeti Belgeleri Müteferrik
(Various Documents of the Directorate of Prisons
and Building Construction, Ministry of the Interior)
DHMUİ Dahiliye Nezareti, Muhaberat-ı Umumiye İdaresi
(The General Communications Office of the Ministry
of the Interior)
DHTMIK Dahiliye Nezareti, Tesri- i Muamelat ve Islahat
Komisyonu (The Commission for Expediting
Initiatives and Reforms, Ministry of the Interior)
FO The British Foreign Office
IIE Fulbright Institute of International Education
IJMES International Journal of Middle East Studies
IOPC Imperial Ottoman Penal Code
ITS The Institute of Turkish Studies
MMZC Meclis- i Mebusan Zabıt Ceridesi
r. reigned
UCLA University of California, Los Angeles
WWI World War I
YEE Yıldız Esas Evrakı
ZB Zaptiye Belgeleri
Note on Transliteration and Pronunciation
I have utilised a modified system of transliterating Ottoman Turkish and
Arabic proper names and terms as suggested by the International Journal
of Middle Eastern Studies (IJMES). I have chosen not to use diacritical
markings except for the occasional apostrophy to signify both the ‘ayn’
and the hamza. Most Ottoman Turkish proper names and places are spelled
according to modern Turkish conventions, except for the fact that I have
maintained the final voiced consonant that corresponds to the Ottoman
spelling: ‘Mehmed’ instead of ‘Mehmet’ and ‘İzmid’ rather than ‘İzmit’.
Place names and words that are more familiar to English-l anguage speak-
ers, such as ‘Istanbul’, ‘Beirut’, ‘qadi’, and ‘pasha’ are spelled according
to common English usage.
The following is a guide to pronouncing certain letters in modern
Turkish and transliterated Ottoman Turkish:
• c = j, as in ‘jet’
• ç = ch, as in ‘church’
• ğ = gh, as in ‘though’
• ı = short ‘e’, as in ‘often’ or ‘i’ as in ‘girl’
• j = zh, as in ‘gendarme’
• ö = German oe, as in ‘Goethe’
• ş = sh, as in ‘short’
• ü = ew, as in ‘ewe’.
viii
Preface
When I tell people that I research Ottoman prisons, or better yet, ‘Turkish
prisons’, their horrified response is normally along the lines of, ‘Have
you seen the movie Midnight Express?’ and often, ‘Have you ever spent
time in a Turkish prison?’ The truthful answer to both queries is, ‘Yes.’
It was my first- hand experience in an Ottoman prison that led me to this
book. In 2002, I spent a few days in Istanbul in the company of a Turkish
friend. He suggested that we sit and drink tea in one of the poshest hotels
in the world, the Four Seasons. As we sat, drank, and chatted in the hotel’s
courtyard, my friend informed me that the hotel was nothing other than a
former Ottoman imperial prison. I was flabbergasted. As I looked around
the courtyard, I noticed the still discernible prison architecture, such as
its high walls, turrets, and enclosed courtyard. I wondered what the reac-
tion of the guests would be if they found out the history of this edifice.
Incidentally, the Four Seasons Hotel stands on Tevkifhane Sokak or ‘Jail
Road’ in the former imperial centre of Ottoman Istanbul, right between the
Blue Mosque, Aya Sofya (Hagia Sophia), and the Topkapı Sarayı.
Upon learning the former life of this hotel my interest was immediately
peaked. I had recently finished Michel Foucault’s Discipline and Punish
and I knew that the historiography for prisons in North America and
Europe was robust, but I had no idea what the current state of the scholar-
ship was for the Ottoman Empire. I quickly found out that it was sorely
underdeveloped and included only a few short articles on related topics
and a couple of MA theses, all in Turkish.
While researching in the Imperial Ottoman Archives in Istanbul I found
a treasure trove of untapped documents related to penal institutions and
prison reform in the late Ottoman Empire. I quickly realised how inte-
gral criminal justice reforms, including prisons, were to Ottoman plans
to restructure the empire comprehensively. I also recognised that prisons
were intrinsic to many facets of Ottoman modernity and nation- state con-
struction during the nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries.
Similar to Foucault’s assessment of French prisons, I argue that various
late Ottoman administrations utilised prisons as important instruments of
social control and discipline. The primary purpose of penal institutions is
ix