Janissary: Encyclopedia II - Janissary - Janissary training and way of life

Janissary - Janissary training and way of life

The first janissary units comprised war captives and slaves. After the 1380s Sultan Selim I filled their ranks with the results of taxation in human form called devshirmeh. The sultan’s men would conscript a number of non-Muslim, usually Christian, boys – at first at random, later, by strict selection – and take them to be trained. In later centuries they appear to have favored essentially Greeks, Albanians, Romanians, Serbs and Bulgarians. Usually they would select about one in five boys of ages seven to fourteen but the numbers could be changed to correspond with the need for soldiers. Later they would extend the devshirmeh to Hungary. Local residents could hardly be expected to appreciate the custom.

Janissaries trained under strict discipline with hard labour and in practically monastic conditions in acemi oglan schools, where they were expected to remain celibate and were forcibly converted to Islam. All did, as Christians were not allowed to bear arms in the Ottoman Empire until the 19th century. For all practical purposes, janissaries belonged to the sultan. Unlike free Muslims, they were expressly forbidden to wear beards, only a moustache. Janissaries were taught to consider the corps as their home and family and the sultan as their de facto father. Only those who proved strong enough earned the rank of a true janissary at the age of twenty four to twenty five. The regiment inherited the property of dead janissaries.

Janissaries also learned to follow the dictates of the dervish saint Hajji Bektash Wali who had blessed the first troops. Bektashi served as a kind of chaplain for janissaries. In this and in their secluded life, janissaries resembled Christian knightly orders like the Johannites of Rhodes.

In return for their loyalty and their fervour in war Janissaries gained privileges and benefits. Originally they received pay only in wartime, but by the mid-18th century they could work as law-enforcers or as tradesmen in peaceful conditions – although they always lived in barracks. Still, they enjoyed high living standards, exemption from taxes and respected social status. Many of them became administrators and scholars. Retired and invalid janissaries even received pensions.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Janissary training and way of life", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki