Karstification at Beşkonak dam site and reservoir area, southern Turkey

1993 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 111-120 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Degirmenci
Author(s):  
Stefan Winter

This chapter follows the rise to power of the Shamsins, the Bayt al-Shillif, and associated ʻAlawi families as Ottoman tax concessionaries. It shows that their position of local autonomy, rather than having evolved out of some domestic or “tribal” leadership structure, resulted from a paradigm shift in Ottoman provincial administration as well as from a very favorable economic context, in particular the development of commercial tobacco farming in the northern highlands around Latakia. If the eighteenth century witnessed the emergence of a veritable Ottoman–ʻAlawi landed gentry, it also saw increasing social disparities lead to large-scale emigration away from the highlands toward the coastal and inland plains as well as toward the Hatay district of what is today southern Turkey.


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