GEZADAVID

THE OF TEMESVAR IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

he length of the Ottoman period in Hungary is often taken as having T lasted 150 years. In reality, this period is valid only for certain cen• tral territories, while large areas in the southern region, including lands which now belong to other countries, were subjected to Ottoman occupa• tion for a much longer time. Of the existing within the boundaries of the Hungarian Kingdom, the beylerbeylik of Temesvar, 1 our present topic, had the longest history, being the centre of a p~al,k for 164 years. It is known that the was captured in 1552 and was immediately made the seat of a province. Its territory changed continuously until 1566, the year of the conquest of Gyula, when this important castle also became the centre of a sancak, incorporating the whole of the former sancak of Arad as a nahiye.2 Needless to say, further smaller or larger changes hap• pened later too. For instance, the possession of the castles of Jeno3 and Lippa4 was often disputed. With the peace of Karlowitz, important territorial losses were inflicted upon the (from now on eyalet) of Temesvar. The new borders were drawn along the rivers Maros5 and Tisza and consequently all the settlements north of the river Maros, that is the entire sancaks of Gyula (except perhaps two or three settlements) and Pankota, 6 and important parts of the sancaks of Csanad7 and Lippa, were lost8. However, approxi• mately two thirds of the original extension of the vilayet of Temesvar re• mained in Ottoman hands. The Ottomans knew very well that the strategic importance of Ternes• var had grown immensely after 1699. This fact was expressed on several occasions, most clearly in an order from 1705: «Earlier, on this side of the Danube (i.e. north of it) there were many castles and palankas on the

I - Rumanian Timi!joara, German Temeschwar. 2 - On this sancak sec my "A torok h6doltsag kora" [The Ottoman Period], in: Be• kescsaba tortenete. Elslf kotet. A kezdetektlfl 1848-ig [The History of Bekescsaba], Bekescsaba, 1991, p. 208. 3 - Rumanian Ineu. 4 - Rumanian Lipova. 5 - Rumanian Mure§. 6 - Rumanian Pincota. 7 - Rumanian Cenad. 8 - The province had~ no places west of the Tisa That region belonged to Buda.

OM, n.s. XVIII (LXXIX), I, 1999 114 GEZADAVID

Muslim borders in the ofVarad,9 Eger and Ujvar10 for the defence of the country and for the repelling of the enemy. However, by the order of Allah, all of them fell into the hands of the enemy and instead of the castles and palankas of the three eyalets, the single remaining castle on this side of the Danube is Temesvar». 11 For this reason they partially re• stored the castle, which had suffered significant damage during an assault in 1696, as well as increasing the number of its defenders. Another document from 1705 shows the great increase in the number of soldiers. According to this source, originally there were 1,848 soldiers in Temesvar. Next a small number, and then a larger group of Janissaries from Eger were added, making a total of 1,500. In 1700-170 l, i. e. not long after the conclusion of the peace in Karlowitz, an extra 940 soldiers arrived. The total was then almost 4,300 soldiers in Temesvar, a very high number. 12 The increase was thus almost 150 per cent within a matter of one and a half or two years. In the same period the total number of soldiers serving in the whole eyalet was approximately 5,300. 13 This means that some 80 per cent of all soldiers were stationed in the centre of the province. This fact, apart from any psychological shock, explains well why there was no serious re• sistance in the rest of the eyalet after the fall of Temesvar in 1716. The central administration knew very well how important it was that the number of soldiers remain at this high level. This is shown by the re• action to two consecutive letters of complaint against the above men• tioned Janissaries from Eger. They had revolted and, even after some of them had been sent to the most dangerous regions, that is to the defence of the rivers and the Transylvanian borders, they still continued their op• pression of the population. In this situation their prompt punishment could have been expected. The sultan, however, wrote to the petitioners that nothing could be done against the Janissaries until after their numbers had been made up by the arrival of new soldiers. For otherwise there was the danger that most of the subjects would gird themselves with swords and would become hayduks, thus resulting in disorder on the marches. 14

9 - Rumanian . 10 - Slovakian Novc Zamky, German Neuhiiusel. 11 - Karacson, lmre, Torok-magyar okleveltar, 1533-1789 [Turkish-Hungarian Ar• chives, 1533-1789), Lajos Thall6czy, Janos Krcsmarik, Gyula Szekfii (eds.), Buda• pest, 1914, p. 322, no. 353. Most of the material in this collection and referring to Tcmesvar was used by Szcntklaray, Jeno, Ujabb reszletek a delmagyarorszagi torok hodoltsag torte11eteb{J[ [New Details on the History of the Ottoman Occupation of Southern Hungary], (=trtekezesek a torteneti tudomanyok koreblfl), Laszlo Fejcrpa• taky (ed.), Budapest, 1917, p. 26-30. 12 - Karacson, op. cit., p. 324, no. 354. To give a comparison, the highest number of paid soldiers in Buda was somewhat less then 3,000. 13 - Idem, p. 324, no. 355. 14 - Idem, p. 322-324, nos. 353-354.