A raiyah or reaya (from , a plural of "countryman, animal, sheep pasturing,
subjects,
nationals, flock", also spelled ''raiya'', ''raja'', ''raiah'', ''re'aya'';
Ottoman Turkish
Ottoman Turkish ( ota, لِسانِ عُثمانى, Lisân-ı Osmânî, ; tr, Osmanlı Türkçesi) was the standardized register of the Turkish language used by the citizens of the Ottoman Empire (14th to 20th centuries CE). It borrowed extens ...
رعايا ;
Modern Turkish râiya or reaya; related to the Arabic word rā'ī راعي which means "shepherd, herdsman, patron") was a member of the tax-paying lower class of
Ottoman society, in contrast to the
askeri and
kul Kul or KUL may refer to:
Airports
* KUL, current IATA code for Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Malaysia
* KUL, former IATA code for Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport (Subang Airport), Malaysia
Populated places
* Kul, Iran, a village in Kurdistan ...
. The raiyah made up over 90% of the general population in the
millet
Millets () are a highly varied group of small-seeded grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for fodder and human food. Most species generally referred to as millets belong to the tribe Paniceae, but some millets al ...
communities. In the
Muslim
Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...
world, raiyah is literally ''subject'' of a government or sovereign. The raiyah (literally 'members of the flock') included Christians, Muslims, and Jews who were 'shorn' (''i.e.'' taxed) to support the state and the associated 'professional Ottoman' class.
However, both in contemporaneous and in modern usage, it refers to non-Muslim subjects in particular, also called
zimmi.
In the early Ottoman Empire, raiyah were not eligible for military service, but from the late 16th century, Muslim raiyah became eligible, to the distress of some of the ruling class.
[Greene, p. 41, quoting Halil Inalcık]
See also
*
Dhimmi
' ( ar, ذمي ', , collectively ''/'' "the people of the covenant") or () is a historical term for non-Muslims living in an Islamic state with legal protection. The word literally means "protected person", referring to the state's obligatio ...
*
Giaour
Giaour or Gawur (; tr, gâvur, ; from fa, گور ''gâvor'' an obsolete variant of modern گبر ''gaur'', originally derived from arc, 𐡂𐡁𐡓𐡀, ''gaḇrā'', man; person; ro, ghiaur; al, kaur; gr, γκιαούρης, gkiaoúris, ...
*
Ottoman Millet system
*
Second-class citizen
*
Qara bodun Qara may refer to:
Places
*Al Qara, a governorate in Al Bahah Region, Saudi Arabia
*Qara, Syria, a Syrian city
*Qara Oasis, Egypt
Persons
*Qara Iskander, ruled the Kara Koyunlu or Black Sheep Turcoman tribe from 1420 to 1436
*Qara Mahammad Töremi ...
References
Sources
* Molly Greene, ''A Shared World: Christians and Muslims in the Early Modern Mediterranean'', Princeton, 2000.
* Peter F. Sugar, ''Southeastern Europe under Ottoman Rule, 1354-1804'', series title ''A History of East Central Europe'', volume V, University of Washington Press, 1983. .
{{Religious slurs
Social classes in the Ottoman Empire
Taxation in the Ottoman Empire