Slave Soldiers and Islam_ The Genesis of a Military System - Daniel Pipes

xx Introduction

Weknow

manyfactsaboutmilitaryslavesbutalmost

nothing

about

military slavery. Although military slaves

appeared

in

nearlyeverypremodern

Muslim

dynastybetween

Spain

and

Bengal,

the

system

that

prepared

and

employed

themisknown

to

existinonlyafewcases.Thiscuriousstateof

knowledge

re-

flectsinformationinthe

contemporary

sources;

thoughhighly

awareofthe

military

slavesasindividuals,thewritersseemnot

tonoticethat

a

system

made

militaryslaveryoperate.

Inthesub-

stantialand

varied

corpus

of

premodern

Islamicateliterature,

onlyahandfulof

writers--most

notably

Ni.zm

al-Mulk

andIbn

KhaldfinlS--recognized

this

system

anddescribedit.Theblind-

nessof

contemporaries

tothe

military

slave

system

constitutes

the foremost

difficulty

confronting

amodern historian who

wishesto

studyit;

but

although

nothing

canremedy

gaps

inthe

sources,extensive

reading

andcareful

hypothesis

can

bring

this

elusiveinstitutionbacktolife.

19

Despite

the

unawarenessof

contemporaries,

a

system

toac-

quire,

train,and

employmilitary

slavesdid

exist;

painstaking

re-

constructionsfromscatteredevidencehaveestablishedthis

sys-

temin

several

dynasties,

most

notably

forseveralinthe7th/13th

or

latercenturies.TheMamlukandOttoman

organizations

are

by

farthe

bestknown,

2

butwealsohavesomeideaofthe

sys-

temsinotherareasofIslamdom.

Howeverdifferent

in

detail

oneisfromtheother,a

comparativereading

showsthat

they

all

sharedthese

crucialfeatures:

systematicacquisition,organized

training,

and

employment

of

slavesas

professional

soldiers.

Informationon

militaryslaverybeforethe

7th/13th

century

is

meager;David

Ayalon,

theforemostscholarof

militaryslavery,

18.

Ni.zm

al-Mulk,Siysatnmeh121-23/102-4;

qbar

5:371-72.Both

are

translatedin

Appendix2.

19.onthe

significance

ofthisblindness,

seep.69.

20.Onthe

Mamluks,

seetheworks

by

D.

Ayalon,spreadovermany

years

and

in

manyjournals.

Severalarticleshave been

recentlyreprinted

inStudiesin

the

Maml(tks

of

Egypt(1250-1517)(London, 1977).OntheOttomans,see:I.H.

Uzunarili,OsmanliDevleti

TekiltindanKapukulu

Ocaklari

[The

slave

corpsin

the

organization

oftheOttoman

state];B.Miller,ThePalaceSchool

of

Muhammad

the
Conqueror(Cambridge,

Mass.,

1941);

andB.

Papoulia,Ursprung

undWesender

"Knabenlese"inosmanischenReich.