A'yan Ibn Harthamah Ibn A'yan
The Ayan (Arabic plural: ''a‘yan'' ; singular: ''‘ayn'' ) was the class of local notables or dynasts in the 16th to the early 19th century Ottoman Empire who held varying degrees of authority in provincial towns and districts.Agoston, Gabor. ''Encyclopedia of the Ottoman Empire''. New York: Gabor Agoston and Bruce Masters, 2008p. 64/ref> The ''ayan'' had significant autonomy, and even armed force, but did not challenge the central Ottoman government. Though the title was awarded only to Islam, Muslims, its function was secular. The ''ayan'' included "wealthy merchants, heads of Janissary garrisons, leaders of important craft guilds, those who had bought the right to collect taxes for the government in Istanbul, and those who supervised the distributions of wealth generated by, and the maintenance of, pious endowments." The rise of the ''ayan'' class was part of the decentralizing trend in the Ottoman Empire which began in the 16th century, and came to define the Empire's struct ...
[...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  

Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic languages, Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/Boston, 2011. Having emerged in the 1st century, it is named after the Arabs, Arab people; the term "Arab" was initially used to describe those living in the Arabian Peninsula, as perceived by geographers from ancient Greece. Since the 7th century, Arabic has been characterized by diglossia, with an opposition between a standard Prestige (sociolinguistics), prestige language—i.e., Literary Arabic: Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Classical Arabic—and diverse vernacular varieties, which serve as First language, mother tongues. Colloquial dialects vary significantly from MSA, impeding mutual intelligibility. MSA is only acquired through formal education and is not spoken natively. It is ...
[...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]