ERC Starting Grant · 2022
Islamic Endowments (Waqf) and State Formation in the Ottoman Empire (1450-1650)
This project investigates how pious endowments shaped state-building in the Ottoman Empire between 1450 and 1650. Pious endowments (waqf, singular) were trusts of property devoted to charitable activities that constituted the most widespread and powerful social institutions within the empire and across Islamic societies, yet their significance for state formation has been overlooked. Previous scholarship in the field focuses on the development of institutions directed by Ottoman sultans to produce models of the state that emphasize unfettered sultanic authority. This project overturns that view by focusing on how social institutions in the form of pious endowments limited, enhanced, and…
From the public funding record at EU CORDIS. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.