The Ottoman Empire had a complex legal and criminal justice system. Punishments for crimes could change according to a person’s religion, gender identity, and even age. Punishments were intended to protect discipline, honor, and social structure in the highly moralistic Ottoman society. They not only punished offenders physically but also monetarily and morally to deter others from committing the same mistakes.
1. Beheading
Beheading was one of the oldest forms of punishment in the Ottoman Empire. In the early years of the Ottoman principality, around the 14th century, beheading emerged as a punishment reserved for severe crimes like espionage, treachery, and blasphemy.
Executioners who carried our beheadings were some of the most disliked people in Ottoman society. Their work was viewed as a contradiction of Islamic values and therefore, they were often ostracized by their communities. To combat this, a mask was required to be worn by executioners to protect their anonymity.
Beheadings continued well into the 17th century. In 1683, Grand Vizier Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa was executed in this way after an unsuccessful military campaign in Europe. After the 18th century, the state preferred hanging as the dominant form of execution.
2. Pillory and Stocks
Tradesmen, merchants, and tailors who committed fraud and deceived their customers were often put in the stocks. Like in Europe, Ottoman stocks consisted of a large wooden board—with bells attached—that was placed around an offender’s neck. He would be forced to march down the street, surrounded by janissaries, the sultan’s imperial soldiers. These janissaries would loudly announce the perpetrator’s crimes, which was both a method of humiliation and a way of informing townspeople of a dishonest salesman.
The 16th-century Lutheran Stephen Gerlach spent time in Istanbul as a chaplain to the imperial ambassador. While there, he wrote about a baker who was punished in this way for making bread loaves that weighed less than what customers had paid for. Instead of a wooden board, the baker had a four-sided stone with a hollow center placed over his head. The cowbells that hung on the sides rattled as he walked through the streets. When tired, the criminal was allowed to rest if he paid five silver coins.
3. Banishment
Social harmony and peace in the community were some of the most important aspects of life under Ottoman law. Those who repeatedly displayed morally questionable behavior were often threatened with eviction from their homes, neighborhoods, and even their cities. Early modern Ottoman court records reveal that many women were keeping company with men who were “namahrem” (i.e., a man she could legally marry) and were banished from their neighborhoods and forced to relocate to other towns and cities. It was largely the neighborhood folk who would initiate these complaints to the court.
Throughout the 19th century, the banishment of political dissidents and government officials who became a nuisance or threat became more common. They were often “forcibly relocated” to smaller towns where they did not have local ties or a support base.
4. Blinding
Blinding was a rare yet brutal form of punishment that occurred in Ottoman history. It was believed to have been adopted from the Byzantines, who frequently had political opponents and pretenders-to-the-throne blinded. This was viewed as a handicap that would prevent them from gathering political support and leading armies.
One such instance occurred in the mid-14th century. After uniting and revolting against their fathers’ rule, princes Savci Bey (son of Ottoman sultan Murad I) and Andronikos IV (son of Byzantine emperor Ioannis V) were both blinded per their fathers’ orders. While the Byzantines performed this brutal punishment by pouring boiling vinegar into the eye, the Ottomans brought heated metal close enough to the eye to fuse the two eyelids shut.
5. Rowing
Before the invention of steam-powered ships, Ottoman ships, or galleys were propelled using oars. Rowing was a strenuous job, often relegated to slaves and prisoners of war. However, criminals were also forced to work as galley rowers. Ottoman law considered this an alternative to a prison sentence since the criminal was restricted to a small area and had their freedom taken away. The term of the sentence could vary from months to years, with many prisoners being pardoned during their sentence.
According to historian Mehmet Ipsirli, this punishment was carried out throughout the 16th century, when the Ottomans were at the height of their power in the Mediterranean Sea. Only adult men were given this sentence, regardless of their religious or ethnic background. This punishment was inflicted even as late as the 19th century when steam frigates were used by the Ottoman navy.
6. Labor Camps
By the end of the 19th century, the Ottoman government had established labor camps in territories like Cyprus and Rhodes. Prisoners were sent to these camps and transferred to other places around the empire to participate in farming and road-building initiatives. This form of punishment was called “kürek” (oar), stemming from a previous punishment of rowing oars on galleys.
Crimes like murder and theft could land a person in an Ottoman labor camp. Felony slander, a term that denoted the slander of a government official, could likewise result in up to ten years of hard labor.
In the 20th century, during the period of Ottoman decline, kürek punishment was mostly confined to prison workshops and factories. Laborers received a small stipend for their work, a percentage of which went to the state for the prison’s upkeep.
7. Bastinado
Bastinado (falaka in Ottoman Turkish) is a form of punishment that involves beating the soles of a person’s feet with a cane or stick. This was a common form of punishment throughout Ottoman history as it both punished and humiliated the victim amongst their peers. It was especially applied to socially miscreant behavior like inebriation, harassment of women, or intentionally selling faulty products to the public.
Aside from being tried in court and handed a bastinado sentence, victims could also be punished on the scene of the crime by an official called a falakaci. The falakaci roamed the neighborhood, carrying his cane, ready to bring his wrath upon anybody caught committing these petty crimes.
8. Stoning
Stoning was another rare form of punishment that the Ottomans adopted from other legal systems. Although it is not prescribed in the Quran, some scholars argued that stoning adulterers was encouraged in a hadith, or saying of the Prophet Muhammad. Due to this disagreement, the Ottomans tended to steer clear of stoning and adulterers were given lesser sentences like fines.
However, interpretations of Islamic jurisprudence could vary according to time and place in the Ottoman Empire. There were only two instances of stoning being used as a punishment in Ottoman records. One was recorded in 1522 during the reign of Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent. A man and woman committing adultery were both stoned to death.
The second occurred in 1680 when a Muslim woman, Ayse, was caught having sexual relations with a Jewish man, Mihail. Left at the discretion of a particularly harsh judge, the woman was buried up to her neck and stoned in Sultanahmet Square, now a popular historical site in Istanbul. The man was beheaded.
9. Monastery Imprisonment
The Ottoman legal system was a complex structure made up of both religious and secular laws. Not only were Islamic laws implemented, but so were those of religious minorities like Christians and Jews.
Christian communities—such as the Greek Orthodox and Armenians—had patriarchates in Istanbul that interpreted religious laws that would be applied to their respective communities. This did not mean that they were immune from the Ottoman secular law (kanun). Instead, it gave ethnic and religious minorities some agency, which encouraged them to preserve order in Ottoman society.
Christian subjects were not immune to imprisonment in ordinary prisons and towers. However, they also had a special type of imprisonment called Manastirbend. This referred to the imprisonment of men in monasteries, sacred places of worship. By doing so, Christian leaders wanted to ensure that offenders would be rehabilitated and possibly directed toward a more religious lifestyle.
Upon the request of the Patriarchate, an individual who was deemed a harm to society was arrested and sent to a monastery. One such request, from a decree in 1788, detailed that a certain “Priest Prokopyus” had committed some type of fraud and increased the debts of his monastery. He was investigated and imprisoned in the Lavra Monastery on Mount Athos, Greece.
10. Parading
Personal reputation and honor defined the lives of Ottoman subjects. The criminal justice system also considered how punishment would affect an individual’s honor and standing in society. “Parading” was one such punishment that threatened a person’s reputation, rather than their health or wealth. For this punishment, the accused was made to sit backward on a donkey. A large cap, usually conical in shape, was placed on their head as they were paraded around town.
Counterfeiting currency and giving false testimonies could land you backward on a donkey in Ottoman Turkey. Although prostitution was largely ignored by the state, there were cases when women involved in prostitution were paraded and had mud thrown at them. Likewise, Christians and Jews who committed adultery were punished in this way.
