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Hadji Ali Haseki

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Hadji Ali Haseki (Template:Lang-el) was an 18th-century Ottoman Turk and for twenty years (1772–1792) on-and-off ruler of Athens, where he is remembered for his cruel and tyrannical rule.

Biography

Hadji Ali was born in Anatolia, and became a personal bodyguard (haseki) to the Sultan Abdülhamid I (r. 1773–1789), as well as reputedly the lover of one of his sisters, Esma Sultan. In 1772, she acquired the malikhane of Athens at a price of 750,000 piastres, and gave it to Haseki. The malikhane entitled Haseki to all the proceeds of the city, with the exception of the kharaj, the customs duties, and the court revenues, which went to the Janissaries, the imperial treasury, and the Seyhulislam respectively. Athens had been a malikhane—a special landed estate that belonged to the Sultan but was rented to high officials as a usufruct estate, usually for life—since 1760, but while the first owner (malikhane sahib), Ismail Agha, a local Turk from Livadeia, had been humane and popular, Haseki was cruel and tyrannical, and his rule represented "the worst years in the history of Athens under Ottoman rule".

At first, Haseki astutely presented himself as a protector of the local Greeks, both against the Turks, as well as against the interventions of the local Ottoman governor of Negroponte. He also made friends among the most important Athenian primates, so that when he began oppressing the lower classes, the primates refused to act against him. Thereupon the 24 middle-ranking households and the lower classes, supported by the Metropolitan of Athens and the clergy, sent a petition (arz-i hal) denouncing Haseki to the Porte. He was recalled for a while, with a voevoda from Chios appointed to govern the city in his stead. Haseki managed to use his connections at court to secure his return in 1777, with the support this time of the Athenian Vlastos family, and of the Metropolitan, who hoped to use his influence with the Sultan to be elected Patriarch of Constantinople. On his return, he forced the Athenians to recompense him for the financial losses incurred due to his temporary removal.

Map of late Ottoman Athens, with the Wall of Haseki

The same period saw devastating raids by Albanian warbands into Attica. In 1778, Haseki defeated the first invasion at Chalandri, and killed some 600 Albanians. To secure the city of Athens, he immediately began construction of a new city wall, the "Wall of Haseki", around the city. Work had not progressed far when a second and far larger force of 6,000 Albanians approached, on their way to the Morea. The Turks then abandoned the city and found refuge in the Acropolis of Athens, while Haseki allowed the Greeks to move to Salamis Island for safety. There they remained for 13 days, until the Albanians departed after receiving a substantial sum as a "reward" for their services. Construction on the wall resumed with increased vigour: Haseki not only enlisted the entire population of the city without distinction, but himself participated in the work, so that the 10 km long wall was completed in 108 days, or, according to other reports, in only 70 days. Many ancient and medieval monuments were demolished and reused as building material in the process. Haseki then promptly presented the Athenians with a bill for 42,500 piastres, ostensibly for the supervisors he had brought from outside. Not only that, but he placed guards at the gates, so that the wall served to virtually imprison the population in their own city. His exactions again led to his deposition, with the aid of the Kapudan Pasha Cezayirli Gazi Hasan Pasha, the Grand Dragoman of the Ottoman Fleet Nicholas Mavrogenes, and the Metropolitan.

Once again, his removal did not last long. The Metropolitan died, and his successor, Benedict, allied with many of the Turks and Haseki's allies, and petitioned for his restoration. Haseki returned in late 1782, and his rule became even more tyrannical: even one of his leading Turkish supporters found himself in prison. This time a large delegation of Athenians went to Constantinople, including a number of peasants who reportedly " took their ploughshares with them and dramatically threw them down before the Grand Vizier, asking him to give them another place in which to live, for Athens was unbearable". As a result, while Haseki was allowed to remain as malikhane sahib, he was removed from the position of voevoda and the day-to-day government of the city. Haseki and his supporters had managed to unite Greeks and Turks against them. Upon his removal in 1785, the populace turned against his allies and supporters among the primates of the city: they were publicly anathematized before the gate of the Holy Apostles, the oligarchic system was condemned, the new council of elders was for the first time composed of members of the middle classes, and one of the leading Turks was even chosen as one of the two epitropoi, the agents of the Christian community of the city.

For the next two years, while Haseki remained safely ensconced in the palace of Esma Sultan, both sides fought a diplomatic war in the Porte through bribery and intrigue. In Athens, two local leaders, Belos and Bekir, had emerged, and had through force of arms managed to prevent Haseki's emissary from even entering the city and installing his own voevoda. Haseki for a time managed to obtain the removal of Metropolitan Benedict, but the Athenians sought the help of the British consul, Prokopios Menas. Benedict also bribed the dragoman of the British ambassador to Constantinople, who then secured Benedict's restoration. The Athenians even managed to secure the annulment of Haseki's grant of the malikhane, and its bestowal on the darphane emini (the imperial mint-master); the silahdar (aide-de-camp) of the Kapudan Pasha Cezayirli Hasan, who was considered as friendly disposed, was appointed as voevoda.

Haseki's fortunes took a new blow in 1788, when Esma Sultan died, but he soon managed to turn the situation around through judicious bribery of Cezayirli Hasan Pasha, so that the malikhane was restored to him. As soon as the news reached Athens, the oligarchic party seized control. Belos and Bekir were thrown into prison, and the Metropolitan himself placed under house arrest. When Haseki returned in 1789, a veritable reign of terror began. Belos and Bekir were hanged, as was a leading Turkish opponent of Haseki, whose body was left to hang from the Frankish Tower of the Acropolis. The 24 mid-ranking notables were brought before a row of stakes and threatened with immediate impalement unless they could ransom themselves, and the entire Christian populace was forced to sign a collective promissory note for 400,000 piastres in money and olive oil. The latter proved particularly onerous, forcing many of the poorer citizens to sell their houses and olive yards to provide the money. Some found refuge in flight, but then his share burdened his fellow parishioners who remained behind. Only the three Greek primates, and their followers, who supported Haseki, were exempted from his oppression, and even benefited from it, by buying up the properties of their less fortunate fellow citizens, as did speculators from other parts of the empire.

Haseki himself sought to seize property wherever he could. He would either send his own assessors to give a very low estimate of the property's value, or, if the owner were a Christian, simply confiscate it in return for a receipt that he had paid his share of the public promissory note. The Kaisariani Monastery saved itself from expropriation only by arranging to be sold to the Metropolitan of Athens, while the Monastery of the Angels resorted to becoming a vakıf, a protected property of a mosque. Haseki was able to profit both from the Porte's preoccupation with the ongoing war with Russia, as well as the support of the primates, who dismissed the complaints lodged against him in Constantinople as "the malicious gossip of mischief-makers". It so happened, however, that Cezayirli Hasan Pasha's silahdar, whom Haseki had displaced, was appointed as the new governor of Negroponte. The holders of that office had always endeavoured to interfere in the affairs of Athens, and the new governor already had reasons to resent Haseki. Thus, when the Athenians petitioned for his aid in recovering money owed, he intervened. The resulting armed clash between two Ottoman governors irked the Sultan, who in 1792 banished both from their provinces. Nevertheless Haseki remained malikhane sahib, and his agent (kethüda) continued to extract revenue from Athens and send it to him in Constantinople.

His downfall came about because of his intrigues in the Sultan's court, where he tried unsuccessfully to undermine the position of the head of the imperial bodyguard, leading to a banishment to Chios. He returned briefly to Athens, but his position was weakened, and in 1795 the Athenians living in the Ottoman capital encouraged their compatriots to send another deputation to the Porte. This was headed by the notable Petrakis, and by the abbot of the Monastery of the Angels. An attempt was made to assassinate the latter by poisoning his coffee, but failed. The three elders of that year were summoned to Constantinople, but although they tried to defend Haseki, judicious bribes to high Ottoman officials inclined them to the side of the plaintiffs. Haseki was finally banished to Kos, his fortune confiscated by the Sultan, and his properties put up for auction—the Athenians acquired his mansion for use as the governor's residence. Soon after he was executed on the Sultan's orders, and his head sent to be publicly displayed in front of the Topkapi Palace in Constantinople.

References

  1. ^ Freely 2004, p. 23.
  2. ^ Miller 1921, p. 31.
  3. ^ Artan 1996, p. 41.
  4. Miller 1921, p. 9.
  5. Miller 1921, pp. 9, 23–25.
  6. Miller 1921, pp. 31–32.
  7. Miller 1921, p. 32.
  8. Miller 1921, pp. 32–34.
  9. Miller 1921, pp. 34–35.
  10. ^ Miller 1921, p. 35.
  11. Miller 1921, pp. 35–36.
  12. Miller 1921, p. 36.
  13. Miller 1921, pp. 36–37.
  14. ^ Miller 1921, p. 37.
  15. ^ Miller 1921, p. 38.
  16. Miller 1921, pp. 37–38.
  17. ^ Miller 1921, p. 39.
  18. Miller 1921, pp. 39–40.
  19. Miller 1921, p. 40.
  20. Freely 2004, p. 24.

Sources

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