View source for Bashi-bazouk

{{short description|Irregular soldier of the Ottoman army}}
{{other uses}}
{{Infobox criminal organization
| name = Bashi-bazouks
| image = File:Basibozukchief.jpg
| image_size = 
| caption = ''Albanian Bashi-Bazouk Chieftain'' by [[Jean-Léon Gérôme]], 1881.
| founded = 17th century
| named after = [[Turkish language|Turk]]ish word for ''crazy-head''
| founding_location = [[Istanbul]], [[Ottoman Empire]]
| years_active = Unknown
| territory = [[Balkans]], [[Eastern Europe]]
| membership = 
| activities = 
| allies = {{ubl|[[Ottoman Empire]]|[[Khedivate of Egypt]]|[[Crimean Khanate]]}}
| rivals = {{ubl|[[Russian Empire]]|[[Austro-Hungarian Empire]]|[[British Empire]]|[[Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth]]|[[Greece]]|[[Serbia]]|[[Romania]]|[[Bulgaria]]}}
}}

[[File:Bashi-bazouk Ottoman Postcard.jpg|thumb|A group of bashi-bazouks, Ottoman postcard]]
[[File:Gérôme-Black Bashi-Bazouk-c. 1869.jpg|thumb|An African bashi-bazouk by [[Jean-Léon Gérôme]]]]
A '''bashi-bazouk''' ({{langx|ota|باشی بوزوق}} {{Transliteration|ota|başıbozuk}}, {{IPA|tr|baʃɯboˈzuk|IPA}}, {{lit.|one whose head is turned, damaged head, crazy-head}}, roughly "leaderless" or "disorderly") was an [[irregular military|irregular]] soldier of the [[Ottoman army]], raised in times of war. The army primarily enlisted [[Albanians]] and sometimes [[Circassians]] as bashi-bazouks,{{sfn|Houtsma|1993|p= 670}} but recruits came from all ethnic groups of the [[Ottoman Empire]], including slaves from Europe or Africa.{{sfn|Vizetelly|1897|p=83}} Bashi-bazouks had a reputation for being undisciplined and brutal, notorious for looting and preying on civilians as a result of a lack of regulation and of the expectation that they would support themselves off the land.{{sfn|Houtsma|1993|p= 670}}<ref name="Brittanica">
{{Cite EB1911|wstitle= Bashi-Bazouk}}
</ref>

==Origin and history==
Although the Ottoman armies always contained irregular troops such as mercenaries as well as regular soldiers, the strain on the [[Government of the classical Ottoman Empire|Ottoman feudal system]], caused mainly by [[Classical Age of the Ottoman Empire|the Empire's wide expanse]], required a heavier reliance on irregular soldiers. They were armed and maintained by the government, but did not receive pay and did not wear uniforms or distinctive badges. They were motivated to fight mostly by expectations of [[plunder]].<ref>Montgomery 1968, p. 246</ref> Though the majority of troops fought on foot, some troops (called ''[[akinji|aḳıncı]]'') rode on horseback. Because of their lack of discipline, they were not capable of undertaking major military operations, but were useful for other tasks such as reconnaissance and outpost duty. However, their uncertain temper occasionally made it necessary for the Ottoman regular troops to disarm them by force.<ref name="Brittanica" />

The Ottoman army consisted of the following:
* The Sultan's household troops, called ''[[Kapikulu|Kapıkulu]]'', which were salaried, most notable being [[Janissary]] corps.
* Provincial soldiers, which were fiefed (Turkish ''[[Timariot|Tımarlı]]''), the most important being ''Timarli [[Sipahi]]'' (lit. "fiefed cavalry") and their retainers (called ''cebelu'' lit. armed, man-at-arms), but other kinds were also present
* Soldiers of subject, protectorate, or allied states (the most important being the [[Crimean Peninsula|Crimea]]n Khans)
* Bashi-bazouks, who usually did not receive regular salaries and lived off loot
Many [[Afro-Turks]], [[Albanians]], [[Crimean Tatars]], [[Muslim Roma]], and [[Pomaks]] were bashi-bazouks in [[Rumelia]].

An attempt by [[Koca Hüsrev Mehmed Pasha]] to disband his [[Albanians|Albanian]] bashi-bazouks in favor of his regular forces began [[Muhammad Ali's seizure of power|the rioting]] which led to the establishment of [[Muhammad Ali of Egypt|Muhammad Ali]]'s [[Khedivate of Egypt]].<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |last=Inalcık |first=Halil |translator-last=Gibb |translator-first=H. A. R. |encyclopedia=The Encyclopaedia of Islam |edition=new |volume=V, fascicules 79–80 |pages=35ff |title=Khosrew Pasha |publisher=E. J. Brill |location=Leiden |year=1979<!-- meaningless without URL: |access-date=13 September 2011 -->}}</ref> The use of bashi-bazouks was abandoned by the end of the 19th century. However, self-organized bashi-bazouk troops still appeared later.

The term "bashibozouk" has also been used for a mounted force, existing in peacetime in various provinces of the Ottoman Empire, which performed the duties of [[gendarmerie]].{{citation needed|date=April 2018}}

==Reputation and atrocities==

The bashi-bazouks were notorious for being violently brutal and undisciplined,<ref>{{cite book |quote=[T]he faintest stirrings would unloose a whirling of janissaries and spahis and later on, and perhaps the worst, bashi-bazouks. They adorned the towns with avenues of gibbets, the burnt villages with pyramids of heads and the roadsides with impaled corpses. |last=Fermor |first=Patrick Leigh |title=The Broken Road |page=21 |publisher=John Murray |year=2013 |isbn=9781590177549}}</ref> thus giving the term its second, colloquial meaning of "undisciplined bandit" in many languages. The term was popularised in the 20th century by the comic series ''[[The Adventures of Tintin]]'', where the word is frequently used as an insult by [[Captain Haddock]].<ref name="Clare2008">{{cite book|author=Horatio Clare|title=Running for the Hills: A Memoir|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7OmVGeekp0kC&pg=PA168|date=11 March 2008|publisher=Simon and Schuster|isbn=978-0-7432-7428-9|pages=168–}}</ref>

The [[Batak massacre]] (1876) was carried out by thousands of bashi-bazouks sent to quell a local [[April Uprising of 1876|rebellion]]. Likewise, bashi-bazouks perpetrated the massacres of [[Candia massacre|Candia]] in 1898 and [[massacre of Phocaea|Phocaea]] in 1914. During the 1903 [[Ilinden–Preobrazhenie Uprising|Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising]] in Ottoman Macedonia, these troops burned 119 villages and destroyed 8400 houses, and over 50,000 Bulgarian refugees had to flee into the mountains.<ref>{{cite book |first=Misha |last=Glenny |date=2012 |title=The Balkans |location=USA |publisher=Penguin Books |page=205|isbn=978-0-14-242256-4}}</ref>

<gallery>
File:Пиотровский. батакская резня. 1889 год.jpeg|Bashi-bazouks carrying out the [[Batak massacre]]. [[Antoni Piotrowski]], (1889).
File:Basibozuk-1877.jpg|Bashi-bazouks' atrocities in [[Ottoman Bulgaria]]. Unknown author, (1877).
File:Konstantin Makovsky - The Bulgarian martyresses.jpg|''The Bulgarian Martyresses'' (1877), painting by [[Konstantin Makovsky]] depicting the [[rape]] of two Bulgarian women in a church by one African-looking and two Turkish-looking bashi-bazouks, during the [[April Uprising]].<ref>{{cite book|author1=Alexis Heraclides|author2=Ada Dialla|title=Humanitarian Intervention in the Long Nineteenth Century: Setting the Precedent|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=d7oSDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA185|year=2015|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-7190-8990-9|pages=185–}}</ref>
</gallery>

==Depictions in art==
<gallery mode="packed" heights="180px">
File:Chef arnaute by Jean-Léon Gérôme.jpg|An Albanian bashi-bazouk in Egypt. Painting by [[Jean-Léon Gérôme]], 1870.
File:A Bashi-Bazouk, drawn by Francis Davis Millet.jpg|Drawing of a bashi-bazouk by [[Francis Davis Millet]], 1889.
File:Jean-Léon Gérôme – Bachi-bouzouk Arnaoute.jpg|An Albanian bashi-bazouk painted by Jean-Léon Gérôme in the 1860s.
File:Vernet-Lecomte 7.jpg|A bashi-bazouk contemplating his loot. Painting by [[Émile Vernet-Lecomte]], 1862.
File:Jean-Léon Gérôme - A Bashi-Bazouk.jpg|An African bashi-bazouk, painted by Jean-Léon Gérôme, 1860s.
File:Два ястреба (Башибузуки).jpg|Two captured bashi-bazouks, painted by [[Vasily Vereshchagin]], 1878. 
</gallery>

==See also==
* [[Mercenary]]
* [[Pindari]], irregular horsemen in [[History of India|18th-century India]]
* [[Military of the Ottoman Empire]] 
* [[Military history of Turkey]]

==References==
{{Reflist|1}}

==Sources==
{{Commons category|Bashi-bazouk}}
*{{cite book |editor1-last=Houtsma |editor1-first=Martijn Theodoor |title=E.J. Brill's First Encyclopaedia of Islam 1913-1936 |date=1993 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-90-04-08265-6 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GEl6N2tQeawC |language=en}}
*{{cite book |first=Edward |last=Vizetelly |title=The Remininiscences of a Bashi-bazouk|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bkY4AQAAMAAJ |year=1897 |publisher=J.W. Arrowsmith}}
*''Ottoman warfare'', 1500–1700 by Rhoads Murphey. London : UCL Press, 1999.
*[[Özhan Öztürk]] (2005). ''Karadeniz'' ([[Black Sea]]): Ansiklopedik Sözlük. 2 Cilt. Heyamola Yayıncılık. İstanbul. {{ISBN|975-6121-00-9}}.
*Montgomery, Viscount Bernard (1968). ''A History of Warfare'', The World Publishing Company. {{ISBN|978-0-688-01645-6}}.

{{Albanians under the Ottoman Empire}}

[[Category:Turkish words and phrases]]
[[Category:Military units and formations of the Ottoman Empire]]
[[Category:Mercenary units and formations]]
[[Category:19th century in the Ottoman Empire]]
[[Category:Robbers]]
[[Category:Outlaws]]
[[Category:Ottoman period in the Balkans]]
[[Category:Persecution of Christians in the Ottoman Empire]]
[[Category:Ottoman war crimes]]
[[Category:Military history of the Ottoman Empire]]