RELATIONS BETWEEN OTTOMAN CORSAIRS AND THE IMPERIAL NAVY IN THE 16th CENTURY MEHMET KURU Submitted to the Graduate School of Arts and Social Sciences in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Sabancı University June 2009 RELATIONS BETWEEN OTTOMAN CORSAIRS AND THE IMPERIAL NAVY IN THE 16TH CENTURY APPROVED BY: Yrd. Doç Dr. Yusuf Hakan Erdem ………….……………. (Thesis Supervisor) Doç. Dr. Halil Berktay .............……............... Prof. Dr. Tosun Terzioğlu ……............................. DATE OF APPROVAL: 10.08.2009 i © Mehmet Kuru, 2009 All Rights Reserved ii ABSTRACT RELATIONS BETWEEN OTTOMAN CORSAIRS AND THE IMPERIAL NAVY IN THE 16th CENTURY Mehmet Kuru History, M.A. Thesis, Spring 2009 Thesis Supervisor: Y. Hakan Erdem This thesis endeavors to present an analysis of the nature of the relations between ottoman corsairs and the imperial navy in the 16th century. Recruitment of corsairs as naval officers by Ottoman central authority to make up for the insufficient numbers of skilled seamen was presented as a fact in various works. However, there is no study to explain construction period of this relationship and to define the system. This thesis aims to construct a model to explicate this relationship. As of the mid-fifteenth century, Ottoman seapower started to strengthen and Empire conquered several crucial harbors and islands in Black sea and Mediterranean until the end of this century. Ottoman Imperial navy gained a strong infrastructure thanks to these conquests. Apart from Imperial navy, Ottoman corsairs' attacks that were based on these harbors increased and they strengthened gradually. In 1495, an old corsair, Kemal Reis was taken into Ottoman service, thus he became a pioneer for the recruitment of corsairs to Imperial Navy. This was a turning point regarding relations between corsairs and imperial navy. Second and more important stage was promotion of Barbaros Hayrettin Pasha as a Kapudan Pasha of Imperial Navy in 1534 and formation of Cezayir-i Bahr-i Sefid province as a province of Grand Admiral. Therefore, relations between corsairs based North Africa and central authority grew stronger. In this study, a subjective periodization for purpose of analysis was used ; Pre- Kapudan Pasha Era, formation of Kapudan Pasha post and post-Lepanto era. On the other hand, both parts of this relation, Ottoman imperial navy and Ottoman corsairs were handled simultaneously. Corsairs could be independent as pirates, semi-dependent as privateers or dependent as naval officers and those were not opposite poles in early modern world. There was not a strict line between legal and illegal acts and this was considered as a part of early modern world in conceptualization of this relationship. iii ÖZET 16. YY'DA OSMANLI KORSANLARI İLE MERKEZI DONANMA ARASINDAKİ İLİŞKI Mehmet Kuru Tarih, Master Tezi, Bahar 2009 Tez Danışmanı: Y. Hakan Erdem Bu tez, 16. yy'da Osmanlı korsanları ile Donanma-i Humayun arasındaki ilişkinin analizini yapmayı amaçlamaktadır. Osmanlı merkezi yönetiminin, korsanları donanma hizmetine alarak onların denizcilik bilgisinden faydalandıkları tezi çeşitli akademik yayınlarda sürekli tekrarlansa da bu ilişkinin nasıl kurulduğu ve sistemin nasıl işlediği konusu üzerine bir çalışma bulunmamaktadır. Tezin amacı bu ilişki üzerine bir model kurmaktır. Osmanlı İmparatorluğunun deniz gücü 15.yy ortalarından itibaren yükselişe geçmiş, imparatorluk, yüzyıl sonuna kadar Karadeniz ve Akdeniz'de pek çok liman ve adayı ele geçirerek donanma için önemli bir altyapıya sahip olmuştu. Bu süreçte merkezi donanma dışında Osmanlı korsanlarının saldırılarında da artış görüldü. Korsanlar da Osmanlının eline geçen adaları ve limanları üs olarak kullanarak saldırılarını gittikçe arttırdılar. 1495 yılında korsan bir reis olan Kemal Reis'in devlet hizmetine alınarak, donanmanın başına getirilmesiyle korsanların donanma hizmetine alınmasının önü açıldı. Bu korsan-merkez ilişki açısından bir dönüm noktası oldu. İkinci ve daha önemli aşama ise 1534 yılında Barbaros Hayrettin'in Kapudan-ı deryalığa getirilmesi ve Cezayir-i Bahr-i Sefid eyaletinin kurularak Kapudan Paşa'ya bağlanmasıydı. Bu tarihten itibaren Kuzey Afrika'yı üs olarak kullanan korsanlar ile merkez arasındaki ilişkiler güçlendi. Çalışmada, konuyla ilgili olarak; Barbaros Hayrettin paşa öncesi dönem, kapudan paşa dönemi ve İnebahtı savaşı sonrası dönem olmak üzere öznel bir dönemleştirmeye gidilmiş, bununla birlikte ilişkinin iki tarafı merkez donanma ve korsanlar birlikte ele alınmaya çalışılmıştır. Donanma hizmetine alınan korsanlar, devletin izniyle düşman kıyılarına ve gemilerine “yasal” yağmada bulunan yarı- bağımsız korsanlar ve Osmanlı kıyılarına saldıran “harami” korsanların devlet açısından konumları tanımlanmaya çalışılmıştır. Bu değerlendirme yapılırken erken modern çağda yasal-yasadışı arasındaki çizginin çok net olmadığı vurgulanmış ve bu durum korsan- merkez arası ilişkilerin kavramsallaştırılmasında gözönüne alınmıştır. iv ACKNOWLEGMENTS I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my thesis supervisor Hakan Erdem, for his suggestions, comments and especially patience all through my thesis process, and to the jury members Halil Berktay and Tosun Terzioğlu for their comments that help me to clarify my thoughts. I am also thankful to the whole history faculty for everything they taught me during my graduate years at the Sabancı University. I am indebted to generosity of Palmira Brummet who kindly shared her unpublished article with me and to Giancarlo Casale has very kindly responded to my questions and offered important suggestions on critical matters. I would like to thank to İdris Bostan who spared time to my questions. I owe my dept of gratitude to Aykut Mustak for his enormous support and encouragement for my thesis. Without his marvelous retentive memory and his rich library, I could not finish this work. Along with him, I should also thank to Ahmet Tunç Şen who provided me articles from overseas libraries and contributed to my study with stimulating questions, and Emre Erol to his companionship and his wisdom in all my graduate days. I would also like to thank Hasan Karataş for teaching me Ottoman and many thanks to librarians in the Information Center at the Sabancı University who made my research process simpler. I am also grateful to Barcelona football team, especially Lionel Messi, who made me relieved in my stressful days, and producers of playstation and PES 2008, they made life bearable for me. Here I would like to thank Ali Murat Uğurlu who became a good companion to play PES 2008 and provided me a comfortable and pleasant home atmosphere. As well, participants of tour de France accompanied to me via television, I am thankful to each of them. I should also thank to Selen Nur Uysal who listened kindly my long and boring thesis presentation and Pınar Ceylan, she is the sweetest and smartest trouble of my life. If she did not encourage me to study history, this thesis would be never written. In the end, I have to mention my family, their endless love, care and support during my lifelong education. Without them, I could not accomplish this thesis. Finally, I would like to thank to Alev Zeybek, my love who has supported me through this process. She was the source of my happiness and she proved that Aragon was mistaken, il y a d'amour heureux. v Ömürlerini beni adam etmeye adayan anneme, babama ve doğdukları günden beri bana katlanan Fatih ile Ferda'ya... Tez konumu seçmemde farkında olmadan bana yardımcı olan İhsan Oktay Anar'a teşekkürlerimle: “Kimdir bu Kırbaç Süleyman?” “Korsanın teki işte! Geçmişini de geleceğini de, yedi ceddini de bilsen ne çıkar, kerksen ne çıkar.” (İhsan Oktay Anar, Amat, p 81) vi TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………………….....1 CHAPTER I THE CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK OF PIRACY/PRIVATEERING.......................10 I.1. Explanation of Terminology.....................................................................................10 I.2. The Conceptual Framework of Piracy / Privateering in the Early Modern Era.......14 I.3. A Brief History of Mediterranean Corsairs until the Era of Ottomans Corsairs.......21 CHAPTER II THE RISE OF OTTOMAN SEAPOWER AND THE FIRST PERIOD OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE IMPERIAL NAVY AND THE OTTOMAN CORSAIRS UNTIL THE ERA OF KAPUDAN PASHA..............................................26 II.1. The Formative Period of Ottoman Seapower …………….....................................26 II.2. The Simultaneous Rise of Ottoman Corsairs and Imperial Navy...........................32 II.3. Ottoman Corsairs: Holy Warriors of Islam?............................................................40 II.4. The Ottoman Empire as “a Seaborne Empire”........................................................48 II.5. Barbary Corsairs and The Barbarossas ...................................................................52 CHAPTER III THE INCORPORATION OF CORSAIRS AND THE INSTITUTIONALIZATION PROCESS: THE KAPUDAN PASHA ERA.................................................................59 III.1. The Formation of the Kapudan Pasha's Navy …...................................................59 III.2. The Relationship between the Ottoman Corsairs and the Imperial Navy after the Kapudan Pasha………………………............................................................................67 III.2.i. Corsairs Recruited for Naval Service………………...........................................67 III.2.ii. The Employment of Volunteer Captains by the Imperial Navy..........................76 III. Piracy and Central Authority