Reviews of Books

摘要

The Ottoman term sikayet defterleri describes special registers dating from the mid-seventeenth century onwards, in which the Imperial Divan in Istanbul divan-i hümayun, recorded its imperial orders in response to complaints and petitions from all over the Empire. These complaints were mostly in relation to administrative matters and against functionaries at the lower level of the Ottoman administrative apparatus as well as members of the general public. As registers of the Imperial Divan's outgoing correspondence, sikayet defterleri are being considered as a sub-series of the so-called mühimme defterleri, with copies or summaries of the Divan's letters and orders to provincial governors and judges. Because they provide the responses to complaints and petitions rather than the charge or the request itself one should be aware that referring to sikayet defterleri as 'record books of complaints', as is done here and as is common practice within research, is actually slightly misleading.