The Issue of Ottoman Suzerainty over Cirkassia: The Character of the Vassal Relationship

In the Ottoman imperial system, the principle of vassal connection with the conquered and controlled lands was widely used. The vassal-overlord character of relations with the border states was laid in the early Ottoman period, when the Ottoman sultans gradually conquered the post-Seljuk and Turkmen emirates of Anatolia. The Ottoman regime here was distanced and mediated in nature, since the local Turkic and Muslim dynasties retained a significant part of their former possessions and had the right of almost unchallenged administration in hereditary possessions. Thus, the vassal principle came from the internal organization of the Ottoman state and at the same time reflected the urgent political need to co-opt numerous regional (Turkic, but not Ottoman; non-Turkic) elites. The political and legal connection of the Circassian state-like formations (“principalities”, “possessions”, “societies”, “tribes”) with the Ottoman state dates back to the last third of the XV century.