Family and tax registers in the Aegean Islands during the Ottoman period

Abstract

This article examines types of tax registers that provide a picture of families in the Aegean Islands during the Ottoman occupation. Numerical data from the islands of Andros, Myconos, Syros, Serifos, and Patmos are emphasized. Accounts by travelers and Roman Catholic priests and other documentation of that time are also examined. The article attempts to verify the reliability of data from the registers regarding family size, number of households, the possibility of household sharing by more than one family, and number of household heads. Records of personal taxes (ispence, or poll tax) indicate that the families on the islands during the 17th and 18th centuries had only a few members. Exact data cannot be derived because the communities attempted to redistribute taxes according to their own needs rather than following official Ottoman orders. Similar indirect information is derived from another kind of register that recorded the transfer of taxpayers' properties. The number of houses for some islands seems to have steadily increased although the number of family shares did not. This phenomenon may be linked to the status of ownership of immovable property, the horizontal property that was applied, and the nonexistence of cohabitation of extended families. Another issue concerns the number of widows in the tax registers. This large number does not correspond to the family status of these women but rather to tax practices exercised by the communities and participation of these women in the economic and social life of the islands.

Keywords:

• Tax registers
• Aegean Islands
• Ottoman period

Acknowledgements

This article summarizes a presentation made at the Hellenic–Austrian conference “Recent Studies about the Structure and Composition of the Family,” July 4–5, 1997. The conference was sponsored by the Institute of Neohellenic Research and the University of Athens and organized by B. Panagiotopoulos and Olga Katsiardi. It was part of the Ermoupolis Seminars. The proceedings were published in Greek in the journal Ta Istorika (1997), volume 27, pp. 335–352. I would like to thank Mrs. V. Varsami for her help in the translation of this article.

Notes

1 A report on the community of Patmos can be found in Asdrachas (1998b, pp. 131–135).

2 Because of reported cases of bribery of the Sultan's officials, the actual assets of taxpayers remained secret. When referring to the census of 1670, the Bishop of Milo stated: “I did suborn the surveyors so that my landed property appeared less extensive, and I was charged only 10 realia per year” (Slot, 1975, p. 168).

3 For the meaning of hanes and its significance for calculating the population of the islands, see Asdrachas (1988a, pp. 4–10) and Todorova (1993, pp. 105–109).

4 Balta (1997, pp. 97–109) reported an interesting case of tax distribution on the island of Santorin.

5 Equivalent to Muslims' resm-i cift (couple's rights), the ispence was required of Christian adult males and their widows. It was relatively constant: 25 akce for men and 6 akce for widows. In 1490, the poll tax and the ispence in Limnos fell into four categories: 25, 20, 15, and 5 akce. In 1519, the tax obligation for harac and ispence in Imbros was divided into three categories: (1) harac 40 akce, ispence 25; (2) harac 36, ispence 15; and (3) harac 30, ispence 15, and for celibates—harac 15, ispence 10. See Asdrachas (1978, pp. 33, 278–279), Bojanic-Lucac (1976, pp. 9–30), and Alexander (1985, pp. 414–426).

6 Polemis (1995, p. 94) claimed that in total 756 names were registered. Next to the taxpayers' names, however, the numbers go up to 757 (p. 188). With tax distributions according to the number of harac, the number decreased to 743 people, 13 of whom were not included although their existence has been verified. Neither their full names nor the amount of taxes they were assessed has been preserved (pp. 97, 177).

7 An official Ottoman order contained three classes of poll tax. Each class paid twice as much as the preceding one, although the amount varied at times. Women, children up to the age of 14, clergymen working for the civil service, the poor, mentally handicapped, and disabled were exempted from tax payment (see Gibb & Bowen, 1967, pp. 251–256, and for the Peloponnese case, Kirkini-Koutoula, 1996, pp. 34–39). The term harac superseded the term cizye and was treated as the poll tax (Gibb & Bowen, 1967, p. 252). For this tax rate according to registers of Patmos, see Asdrachas (1988a, pp. 26–27).

8 See the Myconos' registers, Genika Archeia tou Kratous: General State Archives (hereafter, GAK), Myconos' Archive Collection (K.60), manuscript (MS) 133 of 1717 and MS 113. For Serifos, see Liata (1987, pp. 19).

9 Myconos' marriage settlements and wills dating from the 17th century can be found in GAK, K.60, Files 7 and 1, respectively.

10 Based on the census of 1700, mean family size for the 26 regions of the Peloponnese ranged from 3.5 to 4.8, with an average of 4.04 children (Panagiotopoulos, 1983, pp. 6–8; Panagiotopoulos, 1987, pp. 203–204). Research about other areas of Greece derived similar averages (Komis, 1995, pp. 60–61, 131–133; Komis, 1997, p. 152; Karavas, 1996, pp. xiv–xvi). The mean family size of 5, or even higher, proposed in travelers' accounts seems inaccurate because it was not verified by any census evidence (Anogiatis, 1985, pp. 6–7, 16). High mean family sizes have been given by Stoianovich (1992, pp. 133–146) and in studies of the Balkans and Bulgaria in the 19th century (Todorova, 1993, pp. 117–124).

11 The Neoteriki Geographia account is insignificant (Koumarianou, 1988, pp. 38*–44*).

12 The Patmos land register for 1659, St. John's Theologos Monastery Archive, Institute of Neohellenic Research, National Hellenic Research Foundation (hereafter, INR/NHRF) on microfilm no.1963/125–127 (according to the classification by Panagiotopoulos, 1965, p. 154).

13 Of great interest is the table of the Aegean Islands that consists of statistics obtained from the reports of local authorities and committees addressed to the government in 1828, 1829, and 1830. According to this table, the number of households on islands such as Santorin, Anafi, Kaso, and Skiatho was greater than the number of families; the opposite was true for the islands of Astypalea, Karpatho, Skopelo, Alloniso, and Skyro, where households were smaller. In all cases (except Allonisos) the ratio was close to 1 (Kostis, 1987, pp. 304–305).

14 The type of houses was adapted to the small number of families (Panagiotopoulos, 1983, p. 18).

15 For Myconos the ratio reported in the 17th century was reproduced in studies by Spon (1724, p. 114), Piacenza (1688, p. 331), and Dapper (1703, p. 354). Eighteenth-century travelers' accounts come to the same conclusion (Pitton de Tournefort, 1718, p. 108; Sandwich, 1799, p. 99; di Krienen, 1773, pp. 85–86).

16 The amount of taxes that widows were assessed varied in different kanounames (Alexander, 1985, pp. 414–418).

17 St. John's Theologos Monastery Archive, in microfilm at INR/NHRF numbered 1962/46–47, 1962/53–54, and 1962/76–77; Panagiotopoulo's classification (1965, p. 154).

18 According to the [Prize?] of the Monastery, the priests Neofitos Lias, Germanos Kanakis, and Iakovos Sifantos, who were included under the “widows” category in the Patmos tax registers (1677, 1681, 1689), died on August 1, 1698, September 28, 1706, and October 27, 1719, respectively (Florentis, 1980, pp. 43, 46, 50).

19 For types of family names on Patmos, see Asdrachas (1988c, pp. 211–234).