TURKOMANS BETWEEN TWO EMPIRES: THE ... - Bilkent University

Although not directly dealing with the Qizilbash Movement, Rudi Paul Lindner’s
two works must be mentioned for they have significantly contributed to the theoretical
background of the present study. 32 Lindner, for the first time among Ottoman historians,
attempted to use modern anthropological findings in understanding the Ottoman history.
His efforts to bring new notions to the concept of tribe, thus to the nature of early
Ottoman state and society, remarkably expanded the avenue of discussion. Some of
Lindner’s conceptualizations regarding the definition of tribe and the transformation
from ‘tribe’ to ‘state’ during the formative period of the Ottoman state are partly utilized
and further developed by the present author.
In the meantime, Lindner’s approach and analyses have certain shortcomings.
First of all, his unproductive insistence on the rejection of ‘gazā’ as an ideological tool
and stimulating factor in mobilizing the contemporary society, especially fighting
elements, limits the ‘inclusiveness’ of his approach. A more serious problem, from the
point of view of a historian, is perhaps his improper – in many occasions even non –
usage of existing sources. Lindner derives most of his information from the secondary
literature. And lastly, his careless method of adopting the findings and concept of
modern anthropology into the early Ottoman history seriously weakens some of his
analyses. 33
32 Rudi Paul Lindner, “What was a Nomadic Tribe?”, Comparative Studies in Society and History, vol. 24,
no. 4, 1982, 689-711; Nomads and Ottomans in Medieval Anatolia, Bloomington: Indiana University
Press, 1983.
33 This point is already criticized by Richard Tapper. See Richard Tapper, “Anthropologists, Historians,
and Tribespeople on Tribe and State Formation in the Middle East”, in Philip S. Khoury and Joseph
Kostiner, eds., Tribes and State Formation in the Middle East, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Oxford: University
of California Press, 1990, pp. 58-60.
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