Hamidiye (cavalry)

For the Ottoman warship, see Ottoman cruiser Hamidiye.
Hamidiye
A major in the Hamidiye
Active1890-1908
CountryOttoman Empire
BranchOttoman Army
TypeCavalry
Size16,500+ in 1892.[1]
Commanders
Notable
commanders		Zeki Pasha
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The Hamidiye regiments (literally meaning "belonging to Hamid",[2] full official name Hamidiye Hafif Süvari Alayları, Hamidiye Light Cavalry Regiments) were well-armed, irregular, mainly Sunni Kurdish[3] but also Turkish, Circassian,[4][5][6] Turkmen,[7] Yörük,[8][9] and Arab cavalry formations that operated in the south eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire.[10] Established by and named after Sultan Abdul Hamid II in 1891, they were intended to be modeled after the Cossacks and were supposedly tasked to patrol the Russo-Ottoman frontier. However, the Hamidiye were more often used by the Ottoman authorities to harass and assault Armenians living in Eastern Provinces of the Ottoman Empire (Western Armenia in some sources).[11]

A major role in the Armenian massacres of 1894-96 had been often ascribed to the Hamidiye regiments, particularly during the bloody suppression of the revolt of the Armenians of Sasun (1894).[12][13]

After Sultan Abdul Hamid II's reign, the cavalry was not dissolved but given a new name, the Tribal Light Cavalry Regiments.[14]

  1. ^ Balakian, Peter (2003). The Burning Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America's Response. New York: HarperCollins. p. 51. ISBN 0-06-055870-9.
  2. ^ Balakian. Burning Tigris, p. 44.
  3. ^ Eppel, Michael (13 September 2016). A People Without a State: The Kurds from the Rise of Islam to the Dawn of Nationalism, page 81. University of Texas Press. ISBN 9781477311073.
  4. ^ Eppel, Michael (2016-09-13). A People Without a State: The Kurds from the Rise of Islam to the Dawn of Nationalism. University of Texas Press. ISBN 9781477311073.
  5. ^ Palmer, Alan, Verfall und Untergang des Osmanischen Reiches, Heyne, München 1994 (engl. Original: London 1992), pp. 249, 258, 389. ISBN 3-453-11768-9.
  6. ^ Van Bruinessen, Martin. Agha, Shaikh and State - The Social and Political Structures of Kurdistan. London: Zed Books, 1992, p. 185. Van Bruinessen mentions the "occasional" recruiting of a Turkish tribe (the Qarapapakh)
  7. ^ Shaw, Stanford J. and Ezel Kural Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977, vol. 2, p. 246.
  8. ^ Öhrig, Bruno, Meinungen und Materialien zur Geschichte der Karakeçili Anatoliens, in: Matthias S. Laubscher (Ed.), Münchener Ethnologische Abhandlungen, 20, Akademischer Verlag, München 1998 (Edition Anacon), zugleich Inaugural-Dissertation zur Erlangung des Doktorgrades der Philosophie an der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität zu München, München 1996, p. 36, ISBN 3-932965-10-8. U. a. mit Verweis auf Ş. Beysanoğlu, Ziya Gökalp´in İlk Yazı Hayatı - 1894-1909 [Ziya Gökalp's First Writing Life, 1894-1909], Istanbul 1956, pp. 164-168.
  9. ^ Vgl. deutschsprachige Wikipedia, Artikel "Yörük", Abschnitt "Herkunft und Einwanderung nach Kleinasien", Versions-ID 31139363
  10. ^ Jongerden, Joost (2012). Jorngerden, Joost; Verheij, Jelle (eds.). Social Relations in Ottoman Diyarbekir, 1870-1915. Brill. p. 61. ISBN 9789004225183.
  11. ^ Hovannisian, Richard G. "The Armenian Question in the Ottoman Empire, 1876-1914" in The Armenian People From Ancient to Modern Times, Volume II: Foreign Dominion to Statehood: The Fifteenth Century to the Twentieth Century. Richard G. Hovannisian (ed.) New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997, p. 217. ISBN 0-312-10168-6.
  12. ^ Verheij, Jelle (1998). Les Frères de terre et d'eau: sur le role des Kurdes dans les massacres arméniens de 1894-1896, in: Bruinessen, M. van & Blau, Joyce, eds., Islam des Kurdes special issue of Cahiers de l'Autre Islam
  13. ^ Jongerden, Joost; Verheij, Jelle, eds. (2012-08-03). "Social Relations in Ottoman Diyarbekir, 1870-1915": p. 94
  14. ^ *Klein, Janet. The Margins of Empire: Kurdish Militias in the Ottoman Tribal Zone. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011.