Trade, coin & craft
Economy
Caravan routes and the spice trade, guild workshops and grand bazaars, the coinage and land system that financed a continental state.
The Ottoman Economy: Trade, Agriculture, and Craft ProductionOverview
The Ottoman economy from the timar system and Bursa silk to the 1838 Balta Liman free-trade agreement, the 1881 Public Debt Administration, and the long crisis of the seventeenth century.
Ottoman Crafts, Guilds, and Manufacturing
The esnaf guilds, the imperial workshops of Ehl-i Hiref, the İznik and Kütahya ceramic industries, Damascus steel, and the great manufacturing centres of Bursa, Edirne, and Istanbul.
Ottoman Trade Routes and the Silk Road
Ottoman caravan and maritime trade routes — the revived silk road through Bursa, the Hajj, the Black Sea, the Levant emporia of Aleppo and Smyrna, and caravan finance.
Ottoman Carpet Weaving
Ottoman carpet production in Uşak, Ghiordes, and Kula, the Holbein and Lotto types, the Hereke court factory, the Anatolian knot, and the European Turkey-carpet market.
Ottoman Coinage and Currency
The akçe, para, kuruş, and sultani: silver and gold coinage in the Ottoman Empire, the long debasement, the imperial darphane, and the 19th-century monetary reform.
Ottoman Silk Textiles: The Silk Industry of Bursa and the Aegean
Bursa as the silk-weaving capital of the Ottoman Empire, raw silk from Gilan and Mazandaran, the named court textiles (seraser, kemha, çatma, atlas), and the great brocades and kaftans of the Topkapı wardrobe.
The Capitulations and Their Consequences
The early commercial treaties (imtiyazat) granted by the Ottoman sultans to Venice, France, England, the Dutch Republic, and Russia, and their long-term economic effects on the empire.
The Ottoman Coffee Trade
The arrival of coffee from Yemen in the sixteenth century, the Mocha–Suez route, the rise of the Istanbul coffeehouse, Murad IV's 1633 ban, and the 1659 Köprülü Mehmed Pasha ban.
The Spice Trade Under the Ottomans
The Ottoman role in the Indian Ocean spice trade after Selim I conquered Mamluk Egypt in 1517, the 1538 Hadim Suleiman Pasha expedition, the Piri Reis campaigns of 1552–54, and the two-tier Red Sea market.
The Timar System: The Prebendal Cavalry of the Ottoman Empire
The prebendal timar and zeamet system that tied Ottoman sipahi cavalry service to land grants, the 1695 esham and malikâne reforms, and the long-term consequences for the empire.