Moush and Sassoun - Military Exemption Tax (Bedel-i-Askeri)

Author: Robert A. Tatoyan, 03/04/25 (Last modified 03/04/25) - Translator: Simon Beugekian

In the Ottoman Empire, like in other Muslim countries, Armenians and members of other non-Muslim nationalities were not conscripted into the army. Instead of performing military service, and as an affirmation of their right to practice their religion and to maintain a certain degree of communal autonomy, they paid the cizye tax (poll tax), as a token of their loyalty to the Islamic state and its laws. [1]

After the Crimean War (1853-1856), on May 14, 1855, under pressure from the European allies, (namely Britain and France), the Ottoman Empire repealed the cizye tax, [2] proclaiming that thenceforth, non-Muslims were also subject to obligatory military service. Simultaneously, the government introduced the bedel-i-askeri, [3] which translates into “instead of conscription” or “price of conscription.” [4]

The military exemption tax was no different from the cizye tax, except that the religious/Islamic basis of the cizye tax was replaced with the secular basis of the military exemption tax. [5] Theoretically, the obligation to serve in the armed forces remained in effect, but practically, it was silently disregarded. [6]

The law stipulated that the bedel-i-askeri could be collected from men between the ages of 15 and 60 who were healthy and were capable of working, which meant they were physically capable of serving in the armed forces. Women, children, men unable to work due to mental or physical illnesses, the infirm, and clergymen were exempt from the tax. [7] However, to ensure that that tax was paid by as many people as possible and was collected in full, in practice, all non-Muslim males, from the age of one to their death, were obliged to pay it. [8]

Initially, the amount of tax owed by each individual was 28 kuruş, approximately equivalent to the amount of cizye tax paid up to 1856. After 1878, the tax was raised to 37 kuruş, and beginning in 1904, to 50 kuruş. [9]

Notably, in 1885, at the request of Archbishop Haroutyun Vehabedian, Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople (1885-1888), Sultan Abdul Hamid II increased the military exemption tax charged to Armenians by three kuruş to 40 kuruş. The additional amount collected would be used to repay the debts owed by the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem [10]. This surcharge was supposed to be collected for only three years. However, according to some sources, it was not discontinued even after the conclusion of this three-year period. [11]

How was the amount of the tax determined? According to law, only a portion of the adult male population of the empire was subject to conscription. Between 1856 and 1878, one out of 180 individuals was conscripted. Later, this number rose by 25 percent, and one out of 135 eligible individuals was conscripted. The cost of supporting a single soldier was 50 pounds or 5,000 kuruş per year. Correspondingly, the amount of military exemption tax paid by each eligible individual equaled 1/180th of that amount, or 28 kuruş; and later, 1/135th of that amount, or 37 kuruş. [12]

The cizye, and later the bedel-i-askeri, as distinct forms of taxation, were the second most important source of income for the Ottoman state (after the aşar (tithe) tax collected on agricultural products). [13] Between 1888 and 1909, the military exemption tax alone accounted for 5 percent of the revenue in the Ottoman budget. [14]

Hovhannes Der-Mardirosian (A-To), who traveled across Western Armenia in 1909, divided the taxes imposed on Western Armenians into two categories – taxes collected in the form of produce/harvest (aşar or tithe); and taxes collected in the form of currency. Aside from the bedel-i-askeri, the other taxes collected in the form of currency were: property taxes, including emlak (tax on structures) and arazi (tax on land), in their various forms; the military tax (techizat askeriye), which was earmarked for procuring supplies for the Ottoman army; the education tax (maari̇f hi̇sse-i i̇ânesi); the road tax; the leisure tax (temettüat); and sheep tax (khamchour in Armenian; adet-i ağnam in Turkish). [15] Among these taxes, the bedel-i-askeri was considered the most important in terms of its size. According to Krikor Zohrab, in the early 1880s, 508,000 male Armenians across the country paid bedel-i-askeri. [16]

In 1888-1889 (year 1304 of the Ottoman Rumi calendar), a total of 2,389,860 kuruş was collected in Bitlis in the form of bedel-i-askeri. [17] As the amount owed by each eligible individual was 37 kuruş, we can conclude that the total registered male non-Muslim (i.e. Armenian) population of Bitlis was 64,590.

The process of collecting the bedel-i-askeri was formulated in the late 1850s-early 1860s [18], and this same process was used, without significant changes, until the abolition of the tax in 1909.

Each year, the local government authority, the Kaza Meclis (District Council), would calculate the total male population of a given village, community, or neighborhood, based on the figures of official censuses and registries. The meclis would also determine the total amount of tax to be collected from each locale. Collecting these amounts would become the responsibility of the executive authorities of each village or neighborhood. [19]

The leaders of Christian settlements or neighborhoods (called mukhtar or kochabashi), after receiving the formal notice detailing the amount to be collected, would make a list of the local households and families. Then, the priest would convene a meeting with local elders and dignitaries to establish the amount to be collected from each family, based on its financial capabilities. [20]

The Ottoman authorities treated each village, neighborhood, and community as one whole entity that was required to pay a set amount of bedel-i-askeri tax. At the same time, in accordance with internal regulations, each community had the right, while determining the amount owed by each person, to apply a 25 percent discount for children up to the age of 15 and the elderly; and to entirely exempt the infirm and those with mental or physical illnesses from paying the tax. [21] From those who had much, more was asked; from those who had little, less was asked. The destitute and needy were exempted from paying altogether, with the wealthy covering their share. [22]

The list of households and the allotment of taxes was then submitted to the Kaza Meclis, where it was reviewed and ratified. After its ratification, one copy of it was sent to the local mukhtar, who was ordered to begin collecting the tax. [23] As remuneration, the mukhtar would receive 4 percent of the total amount he collected. [24]

The mukhtar would either collect the taxes personally, or he would send tax collectors to collect them. The mukhtar would also have access to several zaptiyes (policemen) to assist him throughout the process. The mukhtar had the authority to imprison anyone who refused to pay the tax, and could even requisition non-payers’ furniture. [25]

Pursuant to reforms in the tax collection process introduced in the 1880s-1890s, officials of the tax offices (vergi dairesi) began playing a more prominent role. Specifically, they were tasked with traveling to Armenian settlements each year and determining the exact number of registered births and deaths from the local priests and mukhtars. [26] To collect bedel-i-askeri and other taxes more efficiently, the authorities created special tax-collecting entities (tahsilat heyeti), staffed with tax-collecting officials (tahsildar in Turkish), who fulfilled the duties that were previously assigned to zaptiyes/police officers. [27] The laws stipulated that each nahie (cluster of villages) would have one tahsildar, each kaza (subdistrict) would have three to four, each sanjak (district) would have four, and the administrative center of each vilayet (province) would have a “chief tahsildar.” [28] Thus, in each sanjak, there were an average of 15 tahsildars. [29] In the six provinces of Western Armenia, in 1896, the total number of tahsildars and other tax-collecting officials was 567, including 81 in the vilayet of Bitlis. [30]

Across Western Armenia, and specifically in Moush-Sassoun, the collection of the tax was often accompanied by abuses and violence. There were many instances of mukhtars, taking advantage of the illiteracy of the villagers, collecting more than the apportioned amount of tax, then providing a receipt for a lower amount. Sometimes, tax receipts were lost, and the mukhtar would collect the same amount twice or three times from the same individual. Those who complained or protested were imprisoned by order of the mukhtar. To free them, their relatives often had to pay five times the initial amount of tax owed. [31]

Sometimes, those who had been jailed for such protests were falsely accused of being komitadjis, meaning members of Armenian revolutionary parties or other Armenian political parties. This was a means of extorting even more bribes. [32]

Often, the mukhtar would collect the taxes according to the approved lists, but would then pocket some of the money, falsely attributing the missing amounts as debts owed by absent local migrants. When these migrants returned home, the authorities would arrest them and force them to pay the amounts the mukhtar had recorded as their debts. IIn fact, they would force them to pay even more, in exchange for not torturing them or “turning a blind eye to the komitadji activities” they had undertaken in Constantinople, Bulgaria, Russia, or elsewhere. [33]

Even after the appointment of the tahsildars, zaptiyes continued to participate in the tax collection process. Moreover, as tahsildars were considered to be employees of the police force, zaptiyes/police officers often also served as tahsildars. Disregarding the established rules, they would visit communities escorted by other police officers, and sometimes even soldiers of the regular army. Consequently, extortion, violence, and abuses continued to characterize the process of tax collection, arguably becoming even worse. The reforms had simply added an additional link to the chain of extortion – the tahsildar.

Official reports by the diplomatic representatives of Great Britain in Western Armenia are full of descriptions of tax collectors’ abuses, including instances where, as a result of beatings they administered, people died. These reports note that often, the presence of the tax collector was a greater burden on the local population than the taxes themselves, as they not only lived at the people’s expense, but also treated them wantonly, forcing them to pay bribes and behaving shamefully with the young women. [34]

To wit, Charles Hampson, Deputy Consul of Great Britain in Bitlis, wrote the following in his report dated August 25, 1895: “I visited five or six of the village in the Mush plain, covering about 30 miles of road, with a view to personally learning whether all the stories of misconduct in the collection of taxes (‘tahsilat’) were true. The result of my inquiries was that these stories were absolutely confirmed. In every village I was surrounded by crowds of men, women, and children; their cry was always the same, ‘Save us from the brutality of the zaptiyes!’ Never has this brutality been carried to such a pitch as now; men are beaten, imprisoned, human excrement rubbed in their faces; women and girls are insulted and dishonored, dragged naked from their beds at night; children are not spared, and these outrages are merely the amusements of the zaptiyes while engaged in selling the little remaining property of the villages at a quarter of its value.” [35]

Each tahsildar would travel to the villages of Moush with four-five police officers, who, in their saddlebags, carried money from Kurdish chieftains. To those villagers who did not have the means to pay their taxes, the policemen would propose a loan, or salaf, at an exceedingly high interest rate, as high as those demanded by loan sharks. The loans would be secured by the following year’s harvest or the borrower’s land. [36] “The hapless people knew by experience how dangerous and exorbitant these loans were, often involving the payment of 500 kuruş for each 100 kuruş borrowed,” stated one source, “but if they hesitated and asked for more time to secure the money from elsewhere, the police officers would attack them, strip them of their clothes, drench them in cold water, and beat them within an inch of death with freshly cut branches.” [37]

Protests against the abuses and violence of the tax collectors were ignored by local and central government authorities. In more serious cases, when violence led to death, purely perfunctory investigations were launched, which ended with the exoneration of the perpetrators. For example, in 1902, in the village of Koms in Moush, a woman named Elmas died after being beaten by tax collectors. After a protest lodged by the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople, the central authorities arranged for the local authorities to form an investigative committee, which concluded that Elmas’s cause of death was pneumonia. [38]

Given the reality that we have described, the Armenians of Moush-Sassoun, and of Western Armenia in general, strived to evade the bedel-i-askeri. The main method used in the countryside to ease the burden of this tax was to hide the number of male children. This practice was widespread, especially in Sassoun, where the mountainous terrain precluded complete surveillance of the population by local or central government authorities.

Both before and after 1878, it was customary to bribe tax collectors to falsify records. As Krikor Ardzruni wrote: “… The Christians, unwilling to pay even more than the already-heavy taxes required of them, use every available method to reduce their own numbers as much as possible, and officials even help them in doing this. It is well-known that they accept bribes … Which are the life and livelihood of Turkish officials.” [39]

Misak Pteyan, who held various low-level positions within the administrative entities in the district of Moush, remembered in his memoirs that it was customary for the people of Moush “to delay paying the military exemption tax, or to avoid paying it altogether,” by not disclosing the birth of male children for 5, 10, 15, or 20 years. “Whenever they decided to register these births with the census office, they would work with Armenian mukhtars and village chiefs to register the births as having occurred in that same year, and the identity cards they received would reflect this. In reality, among these ‘newborns’ were many men who were already married and had children.” [40]

The Ottoman authorities were well-aware of this underreporting, and frequently issued orders to provincial authorities, demanding that the mukhtars “inform the relevant authorities of the birth of male children no later than 48 hours later,” threatening punishment for those mukhtars who failed to do so. [41] Such orders were often ignored by officials who preferred bribes.

The Ottoman authorities took additional measures against those who avoided census registration, but such efforts bore no fruit. For example, in 1878, to make the process of tax collection more efficient, via the census laws, the government introduced a system of issuing birth certificates or “census documents” (nufus tezkeresi) or “hamidiyehs.” [42] Every male citizen of the empire above the age of one was required to have a hamidiyeh. This was a unique document. A man’s hamidiyeh proved that he was registered with the census office, meaning he was subject to taxation. Hamidiyehs were issued to all males who were counted as part of the census, beginning in 1881. To make sure that all citizens obtained their hamidiyehs as required, the government made this document a requirement for buying or selling property, traveling within or outside the country, initiating court proceedings, or having dealings with the police or other official bodies. [43] Families that did not obtain the required hamidiyehs were also fined. [44] However, this system did not deliver the expected results, as it met with fierce resistance among the Armenian population.

According to Armenian reporter and journalist Seylan (writer and educator Arshag Kevorki Matoyan, 1861-1934), a contemporary observer of these events, “the mountain-dwelling Armenians, as well as many peasants, who constituted one-third of all those registered,” refrained from obtaining these hamidiyehs. “Only some of the Armenians of Sassoun, Keyavar, Zeytun, and other Armenian bastions obtained their hamidiyeh tezkerie,” Selyan continued, “and they did so only to ensure that they could obtain the pass to travel to the city.” [45]

The Armenian population also did its utmost to circumvent the Armenian Patriarchate’s attempts at censuses. To avoid being included in the Patriarchate’s lists, it was usually enough to pay a 10-kuruş bribe as a “gift to the visiting priest.” [46] In the villages, baptisms were often not recorded in the registries, “to conceal them from Turkish officials, who could suddenly appear at any time to check the registries and make unwanted revelations.” [47]

One source reported that applicants to the Kevorkian Seminary, many of them students from Van, Bitlis, and Erzurum, instead of providing their birth certificates upon enrollment, would only present an identity document from the Armenian prelacy, issued to them retrospectively. [48]

Contemporary observers noted that the Armenian prelacies did not allow everyone to use their archives, and usually only issued identity documents that did not contradict official Ottoman government records. To wit, Henry Lynch, a British traveler to Bitlis and Moush, mentioned that the ecclesiastic authorities were extremely careful not to record any information that belied the number of Armenians included in the government’s lists. [49]

The following account is an illustrative example of the importance among Western Armenians of not being included in the Ottoman government’s censuses and statistics. In early 1908, by decision of the “Caucasus Assassination Committee” of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), Mkhitar Pavoyan, a resident of the village of Gop in the subdistrict of Bulanukh of Moush, was assassinated, for “his activities as an informant, the rapes he committed, and for plundering his fellow villagers.” Of the ten specific accusations against him, the first three concerned collaborating with the Ottoman authorities to ascertain the actual number of Armenians and determining the tax to be collected from them. Specifically, the accusations were as follows: “Pavoyan Mkhitar, from the village of Gop, via correspondence that lasted for many years … 1) Informed the government of new births, to ensure that these children were included in the tax registries; and registered the names of pregnant women as mothers to male children, with the same purpose; 2) Listed as living people who had died long ago, forcing their relatives to pay additional taxes; 3) Registered many migrants who had found shelter in the village of Gop as local residents, in order to ensure that taxes were collected from them. Even after these refugees’ departure from Gop, due to his actions, the village continued to pay taxes in their names.” [50]

Another method used to avoid paying the bedel-i-askeri was conversion to Islam. These conversions were discussed by the Armenian National General Assembly, which operated under the auspices of the Constantinople Armenian Patriarchate, as early as 1871: “In general, they complain that there is no accuracy in the censuses; that the living and present were being forces to pay taxes owed by the dead, migrants, and those who had disappeared. For this reason, they are resorting to conversion, so that they can gain the right to pay only what they owe, rather than paying for those who are absent.” [51]

In the mid-1890s, during the Hamidian massacres, conversions became a more widespread phenomenon. Robert Windham Graves, Consul of Great Britain in Erzurum, in a letter to Ambassador Philip Currie dated January 17, 1895, wrote that especially in the vilayet of Bitlis, conversions motivated by financial considerations had become commonplace in recent times; but that he also knew of cases where officials had rejected petitions by Armenians to convert to Islam, arguing that if all Armenians converted, there would be nobody to pay taxes. [52]

In some cases, the Ottoman authorities exploited the fact that Armenians had avoided census registration to evade military taxes to ensure that their conversions were permanent. Alexander Telford Waugh, the British vice-consul in Diyarbakir, in a report dated March 16, 1897, wrote that in Kench and Djabaghchur, in the province of Bitlis, some Armenians who had converted were reluctant to revert to Christianity as they would then have to pay the bedel-i-askeri tax again. “Since converting to Islam, they have been exempted from the tax, and live in fear that if they are once again recognized as Christians, they would be forced to pay back taxes. If this issue is not resolved, the majority of Armenians will opt to remain Muslim,” the vice-consul wrote. [53]

Another British vice-consul, Francis Crow, provided additional details on this phenomenon in a report dated July 14, 1897. On the eve of the Hamidian massacres, one of the census officials in the subdistrict of Kench, through deception, was able to register many Armenians across the district who had previously evaded census registration (he told these Armenians that the government would forgive one Ottoman pound of back-owed bedel-i-askeri per individual). During the massacres, the entire Armenian population of Kench was forcibly converted to Islam, and thus stopped paying the bedel-i-askeri. In early 1897, under pressure from the great powers, the Sultan’s government issued orders to the provinces to allow converted Armenians to revert to their faith. Six Armenian families in the village of Valer of the subdistrict announced that they were reverting to Christianity. The governor of Kench, in response to this decision, produced the past census registration documents of the members of these families and demanded that they pay the entire amount owed for the bedel-i-askeri tax, including for the years in which they avoided paying the tax as Muslims. The families appealed to the mudir (governor of a cluster of villages), who urged them to amend their decision and remain Muslims to avoid paying the tax. The kaymakam’s (provincial governor) response was identical. [54]

The British ambassador, Philip Currie, sent official correspondence to the Ottoman authorities regarding Armenians who had been forcibly converted to Islam in the subdistrict of Kench. In response, the government ordered the vali of Bitlis to allow Chrisitan Armenians to revert to Christianity if they so wished, but also ordered the collection of all back-owed bedel-i-askeri taxes from such Armenians, regardless of their professed religion. By the end of 1897, official Ottoman records indicate that in the subdistrict of Kench, 900 Armenians who had been forcibly converted had reverted to Christianity. [55]

In January 1897, yielding to pressure from European powers, the Ottoman authorities delayed by two years the collection of bedel-i-askeri from the Armenians of Western Armenia and other Armenian-populated areas that had been affected by the Hamidian massacres. However, in many places, this directive was disregarded. According to the report of Archbishop Maghakia Ormanian, presented to the Sublime Porte on March 9, 1897, authorities in Western Armenia were still insisting on the payment of the tax, arguing that the decision issued by the central authorities pertained only to taxes owed from previous years. The tax collectors had not even removed the dead or the missing from their lists, demanding that survivors cover their share. [56]

Francis Crow, the British vice-consul who traveled from Erzurum to Bitlis in May 1897, stated that despite the orders issued from Constantinople, the military exemption tax was being collected as usual. [57] “Under the present system, in which zaptiyes are sent to collect taxes, it is difficult to prevent abuses of this kind, and I fear that many villages are made to pay the tax in spite of the remission order.” [58]

When this two-year remission period ended, the authorities began pursuing the payment of accumulated tax arrears even more eagerly. In 1900, the government decided that since the population of Sassoun was destitute, its military exemption and aşar taxes had to be paid by the Armenians of the city of Moush and the villages of the Moush Valley. [59] The village and neighborhood chiefs of the area were summoned to the government house, where they were asked to review the ledgers relating to the collection of bedel-i-askeri and its payers in previous years, in order to determine “who was rich, and who was poor.” A committee called Pash Tahsildar Shupesi (Chief Taxation Division) was created to oversee this process. [60]

The tax surcharges collected from the wealthy Armenians of the villages of Moush were used to pay their communities’ military exemption tax arrears; while half the surcharges collected from the wealthy Armenians of the city were used to pay the taxes owed by the poor, and the second half to cover the tax debt owed by the Armenians of Sassoun. [61]

The protests of the Moush Prelacy against this illegal order were ignored. Moreover, Prelate of Moush, Senior Priest Papken Guleserian, was one day summoned to the government house, accused of being an agitator, and ordered to leave Moush. [62]

This new system of collecting the bedel-i-askeri in Moush-Sassoun remained in effect until the 1908 Young Turk Revolution.

After limiting the absolute power of Sultan Abdul-Hamid in July 1908 and crushing the counter-revolutionary uprising in Constantinople in April 1909, the Young Turks, who had forced the Sultan to reinstate the Ottoman Constitution of 1876 and had reaffirmed the concept of equality and unity among the various nationalities of the empire, also proposed changes to the laws governing military enlistment and conscription.

On June 22, 1909, the Ottoman parliament (Meclis-i-Mebusan) was presented with a bill that would eliminate the military exemption tax and allow the enlistment of non-Muslims into the army. However, this law would only go into effect in 1910, as the authorities argued that they needed time to prepare. [63]

The Armenian members of the Ottoman parliament expressed their opposition to the plan to delay the abolishment of the tax. In his address, Krikor Zohrab stated: “We refuse to pay this tax, because paying it oppresses and belittles us … This is not a fiscal issue; it concerns brotherhood within the Empire. It is a constitutional issue.” [64] Kegham Der-Garabedian (Msho Kegham) spoke of the poverty of Western Armenians, who continued to suffer under the burden of the military exemption tax, providing shocking details: “In Anatolia, especially in Van, Bitlis, and Kharpert, the population lives in a state of extreme poverty and cannot pay this tax, especially as we do not speak of a 50-kuruş tax, as some believe, but of a 200-kuruş tax, since only a quarter of the population is capable of paying anything at all. Moreover, to make the money to pay the tax, many villagers sell sheep, etc. at low prices. Effectively, this means that the tax is costing each person 300 kuruş … We must repeal this tax and let the people decide – whoever wants to pay can pay, and whoever doesn’t want to pay can enlist.” [65]

Under pressure from Armenian members of the parliament, the government eventually relented and agreed to immediately revoke the military exemption tax. The new, reformulated bill was ratified by the parliament on June 29 (July 12), 1909, making military service obligatory for all non-Muslim citizen. [66] Just two months later, in October 1909, the government initiated the first round of conscription that would apply to all citizens, without regard to nationality. [67] This conscription order reached the provinces of Western Armenian in the following year, in 1910. [68]

A contemporary witness, Misak Pteyan, provided this description of the situation in the district of Moush after 1909, although with understandable exaggeration: “The entire Armenian population of the district of Moush took a deep breath. No longer would they face the depredations of the past, the illegal collection of taxes, the transgressions of the policemen, the pillaging of villages by multazimdjis, [69], the khafir [70] tax … The Armenian nation, which had been in the last moments of its death throes, came back to life, and within one or two years, thanks to its capacity for work and diligence, became master of everything.” [71]

Armenians and other non-Muslims also gained the right to be personally exempted from military service by paying the bedel-i-nakdi (“substitute cash” or “cash price” in Turkish), which had previously only been available to Muslims. [72]

After the outbreak of the First World War, when the Ottoman Empire declared general mobilization in August 1914, many Armenian men opted to pay the bedel-i-nakdi, which ranged from 30 to 50 pounds [73]. However, this did not save many from later being pressed into service to meet the various needs of the army, and from eventually being exterminated. [74]

• [1] For more information (in Armenian) on the cizye tax imposed on the Ottoman Armenian population (also known as kharja), see, among other sources, Tatevos Avtalpegian’s “Poll Taxes in Turkey in the 17th-18th Centuries, According to Armenian Historical Records,”Badma-Panasiragan Hantes [Historical-Philological Review], Yerevan, 1959, n. 1, pp. 175-186.
• [2] Ufuk Gülsoy, “Osmanlı Gayrimüslimlerinin Askerlikten Muafiyet Vergisi: Bedel-I Askerî (1855-1909),” Tarih Dergisi, İstanbul Üniversitesi Edebiyat Fakültesi, sayı 37 (Temmuz 2011), p. 93.
• [3] Handan Balkan Tec,Non-Muslims and Military Service in the Late Ottoman Empire (Thesis, Sabanci University, Istanbul, 2015), p. 39. If they wished, Muslims could also pay the tax to receive an exemption from military service. However, the tax of about 50 pounds was collected from them on an individual basis. After paying the tax, Muslims would be enlisted in the reserve forces and could only be called up to the army in case of war (Erik Jan Zürcher, Turkey։ A Modern History, third edition, London-New York, I. B. Tauris, 2004, p. 57).
• [4] Interestingly, the tax was initially called iane-i-askeriye or “military relief” (Erik Jan Zürcher, “The Ottoman Conscription System, 1844-1914,”International Review of Social History, International Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis (Netherlands), v. 43, n. 3 (December 1998), p. 446).
• [5] Mehmet Şükrü Hanioğlu, A Brief History of the Late Ottoman Empire, New Jersey, U. S. A., Princeton University Press, 2008, p. 90.
• [6] Roderic H. Davison, “Turkish Attitudes Concerning Christian-Muslim Equality in the Nineteenth Century,” The American Historical Review, Oxford University Press, v. 59, n. 4 (July 1954), p. 859.
• [7] “The Order of the Grand Vizier, Issued on the 16th of Jumati el-Ahir (June 10, 1876) in the Year 1293, Concerning the Distribution and Collection of the Military Tax,” Avedis Papazian, Turkagan Vaverakragan Nyuter Osmanyan Gaysroutyan Voch-Mahmedagan Joghovourtneri Masin (1839-1915) [Official Turkish Documents on the Non-Muslim Population of the Ottoman Empire (1839-1915)],Yerevan, Zankag-97 Printing House, 2002, pp. 173-175. Also see Kemal H. Karpat, “Ottoman Population Records and the Census of 1881/82-1893,”International Journal of Middle East Studies, Middle East Studies Association of North America, v. 9, 1978, n. 9, p. 241.
• [8] Adenakroutyunk Azkayin Unthanour Joghovo. Patsum 1870 Amin. Nisd 31. 9 Hogdemper 1871 [Minutes of the National General Assembly. Convened in the Year 1870. Thirty-First Session. October 9, 1871], Constantinople, Y. Muhendisian Printing House, 1871, p. 469.
• [9] Ufuk Gülsoy, “Osmanlı Gayrimüslimlerinin Askerlikten Muafiyet Vergisi,” p. 117.
• [10] The Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem had accumulated this debt in the late 1860s-early 1870s, as a result of wasteful expenditures during the term of Patriarch Yesayi IV Talastsi (1864-1885) and the loans borrowed to cover those expenditures. This debt grew over time, reaching 45,000 pounds, and the Patriarchate faced the danger of losing its estates. As at the time, Jerusalem was part of the Ottoman Empire, the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople, as the supreme body governing the affairs of the Apostolic Church, as well as the entity representing the entire Church before the Ottoman authorities, could not ignore the problem (for details, see Archbishop Maghakia Ormanian,Azkabadoum: Masn Yerrort, 1808 Dariyen minchev 1909 [National History: Third Part, from the Year 1808 to 1909],Jerusalem, Srpots Hagopyants Printing House, 1927, pp. 4208-4209 and 4436-4439).
• [11] See “Bedel-i-Askeri or the Military Tax,” Horizon Literary, Social, Economic, and Political Newspaper (Tbilisi), 26 August 1909, p. 1.
• [12] Khajag [Karekin Khajagnian – R. T.], Hargeru Dadjgasdanoum [Taxes in Turkey], Baku, Aror Printing House, 1903, p. 24.
• [13] Erik Jan Zürcher, “The Ottoman Conscription System in Theory and Practice, 1844–1918,”Arming the State: Military Conscription in the Middle East and Central Asia 1775-1925, Erik Jan Zürcher (ed.), London, I. B. Tauris, 1999, p. 88.
• [14] Engin D. Akarli, “Economic Policy and Budgets in Ottoman Turkey, 1876-1909,” Middle Eastern Studies, London, v. 28, n. 3 (July 1992), pp. 466-467.
• [15] A-To, Vani, Bitlisi, yev Erzurumi Vilayetneru. Ousoumnasiroutyan mi Ports ayt Yergri Ashkharhakragan, Vidjagakragan, Iravagan, yev Dndesagan Troutyan [The Provinces of Van, Bitlis, and Erzurum: An Attempt at Studying the Area’s Geographic, Demographic, Legal, and Economic Conditions], Yerevan, Cultura Publishing, 1912, p. 282.
• [16] K. Zohrab, “The Province of Sebastia from the Economic and Ethnographic Perspective; and the Status of Armenians,”Panper Yerevani Hamalsrani [Bulletin of the University of Yerevan] (Yerevan), 1991, n. 1, p. 116; also see “The Province of Sebastia from the Economic and Ethnographic Perspective; and the Status of Armenians,” K. Zohrab, Yergerou Joghovadzu, C Hador, Hotvadzner yev Ousoumnasiroutyunner [Collected Works. Volume C. Articles and Studies],Yerevan, CAT Publishing, 2002, p. 497.
• [17] Vital Cuinet, La Turquie d’Asie [Asiatic Turkey], v. 2, Paris, Ernest Leroux (ed.), 1891, p. 554.
• [18] See, especially, the regulations ratified on January 28, 1861, which were translated into Armenian and published by Avedis Papazian (“Regulations Regarding the Distribution of Taxes Among the Residents ofElayets, Livas, Villages, and Neighborhoods,” Avedis Papazian,Turkagan Vaverakragan Nyuter Osmanian Gaysroutyan Voch-Mahmedagan Joghovourtneri Masin, pp. 35-39).
• [19] Ibid., pp. 35-36.
• [20] Ibid.
• [21] Adenakroutyunk Azkayin Unthanour Joghovo. Patsum 1870 Amin. Nisd 31. 9 Hogdemper 1871, p. 469; Karekin Khajagnian, “Taxes in Turkey,”Mourdj Political, Community, and Literary Monthly, Tbilisi, January 1899, n. 1, p. 77; and Khajag, Hargeru Dadjgasdanoum, pp. 35-36.
• [22] Karekin Khajagnian, “Taxes in Turkey,” p. 79; also see Khajag, Hargeru Dadjgasdanoum, pp. 38-39.
• [23] Karekin Khajagnian, “Taxes in Turkey,” p. 79; also see Khajag, Hargeru Dadjgasdanoum, p. 39.
• [24] Karekin Khajagnian, “Taxes in Turkey,” p. 79; also see Khajag, Hargeru Dadjgasdanoum, p. 38.
• [25] Ibid.
• [26] Vahan Hampartsoumian, Kyughashkharh: Badmagan, Azkakragan Ousoumnasiroutyun [The World of the Countryside: Historical and Ethnographic Study], Paris, 1927, p. 37.
• [27] Mesrob K. Krikorian,Armenians in the Service of the Ottoman Empire, 1860-1908, London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, pp. 13-14; Nadir Özbek, “The Politics of Taxation and the ‘Armenian Question’ during the Late Ottoman Empire, 1876–1908,”Comparative Studies in Society and History, v. 54 (N. Y., Cambridge University Press, 2012), pp. 780-781; Stanford J. Shaw, “The Nineteenth-Century Ottoman Tax Reforms and Revenue System,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, v. 6, n. 4 (October 1975), p. 432; Stanford J. Shaw and Ezel Kural Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, v. 2 (N. Y., Cambridge University Press, 1977), p. 100.
• [28] Turkey, n. 1 (1896). Correspondence Respecting the Introduction of Reforms in the Armenian Provinces of Asiatic Turkey, London, Harrison and Sons, 1896, p. 157.
• [29] Mesrob K. Krikorian, Armenians in the Service of the Ottoman Empire, p. 14.
• [30] Nadir Özbek, “The Politics of Taxation and the “Armenian Question”, p. 781.
• [31] Karekin Khajagnian, “Taxes in Turkey,” p. 80. In another work, Karekin Khajagnian provided the following description of the bribery scheme that operated in provincial prisons: “From the common prison gate guard, the papouchdji, and from the chavoush to the highest-ranked official, all would extract bribes from the prisoners and their loved ones. What else could these wretched and pitiful servants of an Asiatic autocracy do? They either never received their salaries, or received them once or twice a year, frombayram to bayram [bayram means ‘holiday’ in Turkish. It is used here to denote the two major Muslim holidays of the year,Ghurban Bayram and Fitr or Ouraza Bayram]. The main source of income of prison officials, even those working in the capital, was bribes.” (Khajag, Hargeru Dadjgasdanum, pp. 41-42).
• [32] Karekin Khajagnian, “Taxes in Turkey,” p. 81; also see Khajag, Hargeru Dadjgasdanum, p. 42.
• [33] Karekin Khajagnian, “Taxes in Turkey,” p. 81; also see Khajag, Hargeru Dadjgasdanum, p. 43.
• [34] Turkey, n. 6 (1896). Correspondence Relating to the Asiatic Provinces of Turkey: 1894-
• 1895, London, Harrison and Sons, 1896, p. 265.
• [35] Turkey, n. 2 (1896). Correspondence Relative to the Armenian Question, and Reports from Her Majesty’s Consular Officers in Asiatic Turkey, London, Harrison and Sons, 1896, p. 17.For additional reports by British diplomats detailing abuses committed by the tahsildars and zaptiyes during the collection of taxes, see Turkey, n. 1 (1898).Further Correspondence Respecting the Asiatic Provinces of Turkey, London, Harrison and Sons, 1898, p. 5 (village of Khaskyugh in the Moush Valley); pp. 19-20 (village of Morenig in the Kharpert Valley); pp. 56-57 (various Armenian-populated settlements in the Kharpert Valley); pp. 69-71 (Armenian-populated settlements in Cilicia); and pp. 83-84 (the Armenian-populated settlements of the subdistrict of Khlat in the vilayet of Bitlis). Also see Turkey, n. 6 (1896). Correspondence Respecting the Asiatic Provinces of Turkey: 1894-1895, London, Harrison and Sons, 1896, pp. 28, 29, 51, 62, 246, 260, etc.
• [36] For details on salaf, see, for example, Kegham Der Garabedian, Hoghayin Hartsu Hayapnag Nahanknerou mech [The Land Issue in the Armenian-Populated Provinces], Constantinople, published by the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, 1911, pp. 28-29.
• [37] Sarkis and Misak Pteyan, Harazad Badmoutyun Darono [True History of Daron], published by the Armenian National Fund, Cairo, 1962, p. 145.
• [38] Nadir Özbek, “The Politics of Taxation and the ‘Armenian Question,’” p. 786.
• [39] Krikor Ardzruni, “Statistical Information on the Population of Armenia,” Meghou Hayasdani [Bee of Armenia]Political, Rhetorical, and Commercial Periodical (Tbilisi), 24 January 1882, pp. 1-2.
• [40] Sarkis and Misak Pteyan, Harazad Badmoutyun Darono, p. 276.
• [41] Khajag, Hargeru Dadjgasdanoum, p. 45.
• [42] Ibid., p. 55.
• [43] Stanford J. Shaw, The Ottoman Census System, p. 331.
• [44] Kemal H. Karpat, Ottoman Population, 1830-1914, p. 32.
• [45] Seylan, “Demography of Turkish Armenia,” Mourdj Political, Community, and Literary Monthly (Tbilisi), 1895, n. 7, p. 949.
• [46] K. Vartanian, “On the Occasion of the Censuses of Turkish Armenia,” Horizon (Tbilisi), 29 December 1912, p. 2.
• [47] Yervant Khatanasian, Hayots Tivu [The Number of Armenians], Boston, published by the Central Committee of the 50th Anniversary of the Genocide, 1965, p. 6.
• [48] Altounian K., “A-To, The Vilayets of Van, Bitlis, and Erzurum. An Attempt at Studying the Area’s Geographic, Demographic, Legal, and Economic Conditions, Yerevan, 1912,” Ararad Monthly of Religious, Historical, Philological, and Moral Knowledge (Vagharshapat), January 1913, p. 79.
• [49] Henry F. B. Lynch, Armenia. Travels and Studies, Vol. II: The Turkish Provinces, London,
• Longmans, Green, and Co., 1901, p. 414.
• [50] Troshag, Organ of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), Geneva, year 18, n. 3 (191), March 1908, p. 48.Quote taken from On the Occasion of the 110th Anniversary of the Killing of Arpiar Arpiarian. C) Man Versus Man. Assassination Attempts and Assassinations in the Armenian Style (1890-1908), compiled by Haig Avakian, Chahagir Weekly, supplement 14, Cairo, 2018, p. 157.
• [51] Adenakroutyunk Azkayin Unthanour Joghovo. Patsum 1870 Amin. Nisd 31. 9 Hogdemper 1871, Constantinople, H. Muhendisian Printing House, 1871, p. 469.
• [52] Turkey, n. 6 (1896). Correspondence Relating to the Asiatic Provinces of Turkey: 1894-
• 1895, London, Harrison and Sons, 1896, pp. 216-217.
• [53] Turkey, n. 1 (1898), p. 118.
• [54] Ibid., p. 245.
• [55] Selim Deringil, “‘The Armenian Question Is Finally Closed’: Mass Conversions of Armenians in Anatolia During the Hamidian Massacres of 1895-1897,” Comparative Studies in Society and History, v. 51, n. 2 (N. Y., Cambridge University Press, April 2009), p. 367; Selim Deringil, Conversion and Apostasy in the Late Ottoman Empire, Cambridge University Press, 2012, p. 231-232.
• [56] Turkey, n. 1 (1898), p. 92.
• [57] Ibid., p. 187.
• [58] Ibid., p. 188.
• [59] Sarkis and Misak Pteyan, Harazad Badmoutyun Darono, p. 144.
• [60] Ibid.
• [61] Ibid.
• [62] Ibid., p. 145 (the source states that outside the government house was a saddled horse “waiting” for the prelate of Moush. “Father Papken, by mounting the horse, was ‘exiled’ and sent to Constantinople, where, thanks to the intervention of Patriarch Ormanian, he was rescued from being exiled further afield.”).
• [63] Jamanag Popular Newspaper (Constantinople), 23 June (6 July) 1909, p. 2.
• [64] Ibid.
• [65] Ibid.
• [66] Jamanag, 30 June (13 July) 1909, p. 2. The ratified law stated: “Beginning in the year 1325, the military exemption tax collected from members of non-Muslim Ottoman nationalities is abolished. Therefore, permission is given to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of War to prepare lists of both non-Muslim citizens and residents of Constantinople and other locales who have so far been exempt from military service, as well as to take other preparatory steps to conscript them beginning in 1325.” (Jamanag, 29 June (12 July) 1909, p. 2).
• [67] Erik Jan Zürcher, “The Ottoman Conscription System, 1844-1914,” p. 447.
• [68] Kalousd Surmenian, Yerznga [Erzincan], Cairo, Sahag-Mesrob Press, 1947, p. 258; Vahe Haig, Kharpert yev Anor Vosgeghen Tashdu [Kharpert and Its Golden Valley], New York, 1959, p. 692.
• [69] Excise officers.
• [70] Under the khafir system, Armenian villagers were dependent vassals of Kurdish begs, and were obliged to pay various illegal taxes to them.
• [71] Sarkis and Misak Pteyan, Harazad Badmoutyun Darono, p. 261.
• [72] Ari Şekeryan, The Armenians and the Fall of the Ottoman Empire. After Genocide,
• 1918–1923, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2023, p. 16.
• [73] The amount varied by locality. The Armenians of Erzurum paid 30 pounds (see Vartovtsi, “News from Upper Hayk,” Mshag Literary and Political Weekly (Tbilisi), 2 August 1914, p. 3); the Armenians of Sebastia paid 44 pounds (see Garabed Kapigian,Yeghernabadoum Pokoun Hayots yev Norin Medzi Mayrakaghakin Sebastio, Boston, Hairenik Press, 1924, p. 31);and Armenians elsewhere paid 50 pounds, and in some isolated cases, 90 pounds (see Levon Vartan, Hargeru Osmanyan yev Barsgagan Gaysroutyunneroun mech [Taxes in the Ottoman and Persian Empires], volume 2, Yerevan, CAT Publishing, 2012, p. 265).
• [74] For testimonies by many Armenians who were exempted from military service after paying bedel-i-nakdi, see Verjine Svazlian, Hayots Tseghasbanoutyun. Aganades Verabroghneri Vgayoutyunner [The Armenian Genocide: Testimonies of Witnesses Who Survived],v. 2, extended edition, Yerevan, Kidoutyun Printing House of the National Science Academy of the Republic of Armenia, 2011, pp. 27, 206, 211, 310, 324, and 396.