Women in the Ottoman Empire : a social and political history

Suraiya Faroqhi is Professor Emerita at Ibn Haldun University, Turkey.

It is an often ignored but fundamental fact that in the Ottoman world as in most empires, there were 'first-class' and 'second class' subjects. Among the townspeople, peasants and nomads subject to the sultans, who might be Muslims or non-Muslims, adult Muslim males were first-class subjects and all others, including Muslim boys and women, were of the second class. As for the female members of the elite, while less privileged than the males, in some respects their life chances might be better than those of ordinary women. Even so, they shared the risks of pregnancy, childbirth and epidemic diseases with townswomen of the subject class and to a certain extent, with village women as well. Women also made up a sizeable share of the enslaved, belonging to the sultans, to elite figures but often to members of the subject population as well. Thus, the study of Ottoman women is indispensable for understanding Ottoman society in general.