88 chapter 2
An interesting point here is Kınalızade’s account of the rise of states
(K479–80):
Let it be known that civilized societies (temeddün) are, in general, a com-
position and arrangement of various classes and communities. Every
class has its appropriate degree [of power] and place, and professes its
special activities ... The constitution of the world is based on the balance
between these components ... For it is known that at the beginning of a
state [or dynasty] a [certain] class comes to a unanimous agreement and
its members support and help each other, like the members of a single
body; because every person has a limited degree of power, but the power
of many gathered together in one place is greater than the power of each
individual. A small group [of people], when is united, prevails over a
larger but fractured one. Is it not clear that any ruling class is not even
one-tenth [in numbers] of its subjects? But they are united, and they pre-
vail over the subjects because the latter are not ... Experience has shown
that whenever such a ruling class has unity and mutual assistance it is
safe from difficulties and deficiencies; but when, later, fractures and dis-
agreements appear among this class, it starts to weaken and finally ends
in ruins.This passage comes, as usual, from Davvani’s work, but Kınalızade has intro-
duced a crucial difference: whereas Davvani had the traditional eulogy of unity
and harmony among the various classes (enforced by the ruler’s justice), our
author stresses the unity of the ruling class (her tayife ki bir devletin ashabıdır),
noting specifically that their numbers are very small in comparison to those
of its subjects (re’ayasına).51 Apart from the clear allusion to the Ottoman
example, it is tempting to see here an echo of Ibn Khaldun’s asabiyya or “esprit
de corps”, the solidarity that allows small nomadic tribes to prevail over large
settled populations, only to fall in their turn when their members become too
accustomed to luxury; all the more so since Kınalızade stresses that this soli-
darity characterizes “the beginning of a state” (or rather dynasty: her devletin
ibtidası). Here, therefore, we might have the earliest recorded influence of Ibn
Khaldun in Ottoman writings.52
51 Cf. Dawwani – Thompson 1839, 384–386; Dawwani – Deen 1939, 199–200.
52 Sariyannis (forthcoming). The similarity was also recently noticed by Doğan 2013, 205.
Fleischer 1983, 201 showed that Kınalızade’s formulation of the “circle of justice”, a little
later in the text, was not taken by Ibn Khaldun as Na ’ima claimed more than a century
after. Ibn Khaldun indeed cites the circle in the same way that Kınalızade did (Ibn
Khaldun – Rosenthal 1958, 1:81 and 2:105; Ibn Khaldun – Rosenthal – Dawood 1969, 41),