Sanjak of Tirhala
Sanjak of Tirhala Ottoman Turkish: Liva-i Tirhala | |||||||||
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Sanjak of the Ottoman Empire | |||||||||
1395/6–1881 | |||||||||
![]() Central Greece in the early 19th century, showing the sanjak of Tirhala ("Trikhala") in the centre | |||||||||
Capital | Originally Trikala (Tirhala), from the 18th century Larissa (Yenişehir i-Fenari) | ||||||||
History | |||||||||
• Ottoman conquest | 1395/6 | ||||||||
1881 | |||||||||
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Today part of | Greece |
The Sanjak of Tirhala or Trikala (
History
In the mid-14th century, Thessaly had been ruled by Serbian and Greek lords and enjoyed great prosperity.[2] It was conquered by the Ottoman Turks in successive waves, in 1386/7, the mid-1390s, and again after 1414/23, and the conquest was not completed until 1470.[1] Trikala itself fell probably in 1395/6 (although Evliya Çelebi claims it happened as early as 1390).[2][3]
The newly conquered region was initially the patrimonial domain of the powerful marcher-lord (
Thessaly was generally peaceful, but did see the occasional conflict. Thus in 1570 the Venetians raided the region of Fenarbekir (
The 17th century saw the progressive weakening of the Ottoman central government, and the replacement of the
After 1780, the ambitious Ali Pasha of Ioannina took over control of Thessaly, and consolidated his rule after 1808, when he suppressed a local uprising. His heavy taxation, however, ruined the province's commerce, and coupled with the outbreak of the plague in 1813, reduced the population to some 200,000 by 1820.[1] When the Greek War of Independence broke out in 1821, Greek risings occurred in the Pelion and Olympus mountains as well as the western mountains around Fenarbekir, but they were swiftly suppressed by the Ottoman armies under Mehmed Reshid Pasha and Mahmud Dramali Pasha.[1]
After the establishment of the independent
Thessaly remained in Ottoman hands until 1881, when it was handed over to Greece under the terms of the Treaty of Berlin.[1] The last Ottoman census, carried out in 1877/8, listed 250,000 inhabitants and 2,500 buildings for the sanjak,[2] with a total population for Thessaly (including the region of Elassona, which remained Ottoman until the Balkan Wars) estimated at 285,000 Greeks, 40,000 Turks and 40,000 Jews.[1]
Administrative division
For most of its history, the sanjak formed part of the
According to the 17th-century geographer
After the Tanzimat reforms of the 1840s, Tirhala became part of the
References
- ^ ISBN 978-90-04-11211-7.
- ^ ISBN 978-90-04-11211-7.
- ^ ISBN 3-920153-56-1.
- ^ de Vaudoncourt, Guillaume (1816). Memoirs on the Ionian Islands, Considered in a Commercial, Political, and Military Point of View. London: Baldwin, Cradock and Joy. p. 147.
- ^ Rumeli und Bosna, geographisch beschrieben, von Mustafa ben Abdalla Hadschi Chalfa. Aus dem Türkischen übersetzt von J. v. Hammer (in German). Vienna: Verlag des Kunst- und Industrie-Comptors. 1812. pp. 99–105.
- ISBN 3-920153-56-1.
- ISBN 3-920153-56-1.
Further reading
- N. Beldiceanu, P. Nasturel, "La Thessalie entre 1454/55 et 1506", Byzantion LIII (1983) pp. 104–156
- M. Delibaşi, M. Arikan, "Sûret-i Defter-i Sancak-i Tirhala I", Türk Tarih Kurumu, Ankara 2001, pp. 26–27
- M. Kiel, "Das Türkische Thessalien. Etabliertes Geschichtsbild versus Osmanischen Quellen", in Die Kultur Griechenlands in Mittelalter und Neuzeit, publ. R. Lauer, P. Schreiner, Göttingen 1996, pp. 145 –146
- D. Tsopotos, Γη και γεωργοί της Θεσσαλίας κατά την Τουρκοκρατίαν, Volos 1912, pp. 33–59.