Bashi-bazouk
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A bashi-bazouk (in Turkish başıbozuk, meaning disorganized, leaderless) was an irregular soldier of the Ottoman army.
Although turkish armies always contained bashi-bazouk adventurers as well as regular soldiers, the strain on Ottoman feudal system caused mainly by the Empire's wide expanse required heavier reliance on irreqular soldiers. Ottoman army consisted of :
- Sultan's household troops, called Kapıkulu, which are salaried, most notable being janissary corps.
- Provincial soldiers, which were fiefed (turkish Tımarlı), comparable to knights, most important being Timarli Sipahis(lit. fiefed cavalry) and their retainers(called cebelu lit. armed, man-at-arms), but other kinds were also present.
- Soldiers of subject, protectorate, allied states.(Most important being Crimean Khan's)
Everything being perfect Ottoman Commander-in-Chief would muster hundreds of thousands of soldiers and lead an excursion into Austria or Iran, whichever posed most threat, capturing/extorting enough land/cash to cover the expenses of the next campaign in the process. In reality the actual amount of soldiers making it to the battle field were one order of magnitude less. On the eve of battle an Ottoman commander would tap any source of manpower he saw fit. Hiring mercenaries was one of them. Hiring process was one of a free market, prices determined by negotiation between the mercenary troop leader and an ottoman commander. Prices were affected, expectedly, by the quality and quantity of mercenary troop as well as commanders necessity. Bargain was later turned into a written contract. Some of these documents survive today, showing small mercenary leaders obtaining very high requitals.
The bashi-bazouk were notorious for being brutal and undisciplined, thus giving the term its second, colloquial meaning of "undisciplined bandit". Hergé's "Captain Haddock" from "The Adventures of Tintin" was fond of this word, commonly using it as an expletive.
see also
Ottoman warfare, 1500-1700 by Rhoads Murphey. London : UCL Press, 1999.