The letters were written by Sultan Suleyman and Murat. Gog and Magog were not obscure groups in Islamicate history for many. They were identified as the Turkic tribes in many instances. The reference to Gog and Magog refers to the Turkic component of the Qizilbash. It may come as a surprise to some that the Ottoman sultans held a negative opinion of Turkic tribes, not just the Qizilbash. The negative perception of Turkic tribes was used by the Ottoman sultans whenever they were in need of Kurdish support against Turkic foes, because the Turkic tribes were viewed as enemies by many Kurds too.
The letters, 16th-century:
1. Just as God, be He praised and exalted, vouchsafed to Alexander 'the two horned' to build the wall of Gog, so God made Kurdistan act in the pro-tection of my imperial kingdom like a strong barrier and an iron fortress against the sedition of the demon Gog of Persia It is hoped that, through neglect and carelessness, our descendants will never let slip the rope of obedience [binding] the Kurdish commanders [to the Ottoman state] and never be lacking in their attentions to this group.
2. You from grandfather to father for generations have been people of pure characters and members of the Sunni sect falling in at the fore of my victo-rious armies in all the battles against the Iranian 'redheads' with many thousand armed and capable and famous Kurdish soldiers whose business is victory, have fought with body and soul ... and have given rise to many admirable victories. However, while you are thereby deserving of favour-able treatment and requiring protection, it has become truly impressed on my imperial knowledge that through the neglect and negligence of the advisors of the Sultanate, those ministers assigned to Diyarbekir as well as other provincial governors have, some of them through greed for seizure and procurement and others through [fear of] dismissal and appointment or for other reasons, extended the hand of aggression over you and opened the doors of oppression and tyranny thereby reducing your strength and power and your endurance and capacity to a state of complete feebleness and decline. Now, since concerning myself with and taking care of your affairs and reviving and restoring you is a personal duty incumbent on my imperial self, I have decreed that first of all in accordance with the treaty agreements granted to each of you by my great forebears you should inherit the jurisdiction of your governorships (hukumet) generation after generation as is right... whether son or brother... Also, a strong injunction has been sent to the governor-general of Diyarbekir instructing him that henceforth he shall refrain from interfering in your reassignment and replacement and free you from the hand of oppression and transgression of the moneylenders.
No comments:
Post a Comment