Jordan OTTOMAN RULE
Columns and temple ruins at Jarash, second century A.D.
Greco-Roman city north of Amman
Mamluk Egypt and its possessions fell to the Ottoman sultan,
Selim I, in 1517. The Jordan region, however, stagnated under
Ottoman rule. Although the pilgrim caravans to Mecca continued to
be an important source of income, the East Bank was largely
forgotten by the outside world for more than 300 years until
European travelers "rediscovered" it in the nineteenth century.
For administrative purposes Ottoman domains were divided into
provinces (vilayets) that were presided over by governors
(pashas). The governors ruled with absolute authority, but at the
pleasure of the sultan in Constantinople. Palestine was part of the
vilayet of Beirut, and Jerusalem was administered as a
separate district (sanjak) that reported directly to the
sultan. The East Bank comprised parts of the vilayets of Beirut and
Damascus. The latter was subdivided into four sanjaks: Hama,
Damascus, Hawran, and Al Karak. Hawran included Ajlun and As Salt
and Al Karak comprised the area mostly south of Amman. The
territory south of the Az Zarqa River down to Wadi al Mawjib was
under the control of the pasha of Nabulus, who was under the
vilayet of Beirut.
From 1831 until 1839, Ottoman rule was displaced by that of
Muhammad Ali--pasha of Egypt and nominally subject to the sultan--
when his troops occupied the region during a revolt against the
Sublime Porte, as the Ottoman government came to be known. Britain
and Russia compelled Muhammad Ali to withdraw and they restored the
Ottoman governors.
The Ottomans enforced sharia in the towns and settled
countryside, but in the desert customary tribal law also was
recognized. Because of the unitary nature of Islamic law--
encompassing religious, social, civil, and economic life--it was
inconceivable that it could be applied to non-Muslims. The Ottoman
regime used the millet system, which accorded non-Muslim
communities the right to manage their personal affairs according to
their own religious laws. The European powers also concluded
separate treaties (capitulations) with the Porte whereby their
consuls received extraterritorial legal jurisdiction over their
citizens and clients in the Ottoman Empire. In addition, France
claimed the special right to protect the sultan's Roman Catholic
subjects, and Russia to protect the sultan's more numerous Orthodox
subjects.
At every level of the Ottoman system, administration was
essentially military in character. On the East Bank, however,
Ottoman rule was lax and garrisons were small. Ottoman officials
were satisfied as long as order was preserved, military levies were
provided when called for, and taxes were paid. These goals,
however, were not easily achieved. To stabilize the population, in
the late 1800s the Ottomans established several small colonies of
Circassians--Sunni Muslims who had fled from the Caucasus region of
Russia in the 1860s and 1870s
(see Jordan - Ethnicity and Language
, ch. 2).
Although the Ottoman sultan in Constantinople was the caliph,
Ottoman officials and soldiers were despised by the Arabs, who
viewed them as foreign oppressors. Truculent shaykhs regularly
disrupted the peace, and the fiercely independent beduins revolted
frequently. In 1905 and again in 1910, serious uprisings were
suppressed only with considerable difficulty.
In 1900 the Porte, with German assistance, began construction
of the Hijaz Railway. By 1908 the railroad linked Damascus with the
holy city of Medina. Its purpose was to transport Muslim pilgrims
to Mecca and to facilitate military control of the strategic
Arabian Peninsula. To protect the railroad, the Porte increased its
Ottoman military presence along the route and, as it had done
earlier to safeguard caravan traffic, subsidized rival Arab tribal
shaykhs in the region.
Data as of December 1989
|