Janissaries and the Ottoman Devsirme (1363 – 1826 AD)
Pretend you’re a young Christian boy or teenager, perhaps 6 to 14 years of age, living in medieval Eastern Europe. Your days are dark and troubling. Now imagine the horror of being kidnapped from your home and taken to a faraway land. Next, you’re forced, under penalty of death, to renounce your family name, convert to Islam, and take up arms for a foreign power. This was the Ottoman devsirme—a blood tax involving the forcible abduction and recruitment of tens of thousands of Balkan children into one of the most elite military units in history, the Turkish Janissaries.
Roughly meaning “new soldier” in English, the Janissaries were a professional corps of highly-trained Turkish troops exclusively loyal to the Ottoman Sultan. Widely regarded as Europe’s first professional army, the Janissaries were originally intended to be nothing more than elite bodyguards for Murad I (r. 1362-89). Over the centuries, however, the Janissaries developed into a fearsome fighting force, with individual soldiers mastering many soldiery arts, such as horsemanship, archery, swordplay, and eventually marksmanship. Initially numbering no more than 1,000 men, the Janissary’s ranks swelled to over 40,000 troops during the early 18th century.
Janissaries were involved in some of the most influential battles in European history including the capturing of Constantinople (1453), the conquering of Egypt’s elite Mamluks, the Siege of Vienna (1529), and the three-month-long Great Siege of Malta (1565). Despite their many successes, a string of sociopolitical developments eventually eroded the Janissaries’ battlefield prowess; especially after gaining significant political power and influence. While it might seem counterintuitive for the Janissaries to have lost strength from a position of authority, that’s precisely what happened. Biased troop selections and leadership appointments resulted in the “civilianization” of the force and their eventual demise.