Selim III and the Nizam-i Cedid: Ottoman Military Reform

Selim III was the Ottoman sultan from 1789 to 1807 and the first to attempt a broad, European-inspired reform of the army and state. His centrepiece was the Nizam-i Cedid, or “New Order”, a corps of infantry drilled and equipped on European lines. The project ended in his overthrow by Janissary-backed rebels, but it laid the foundations for the sweeping reforms of the 19th century.

Background: an empire in retreat

Selim was born in Istanbul on 24 December 1761, the son of Sultan Mustafa III. He grew up during a series of military disasters. In the war of 1768–1774 Russia destroyed the Ottoman fleet at Chesma and imposed the Treaty of Kucuk Kaynarca, which ended Ottoman control of Crimea. Russia annexed the peninsula outright in 1783.

Selim came to the throne on 7 April 1789, in the middle of another war against both Russia and Austria. Ottoman armies were again defeated, and the war ended with the Treaty of Sistova with Austria in 1791 and the Treaty of Jassy with Russia in January 1792. The empire kept most of its Balkan lands but lost further territory on the Black Sea.

The weakness was widely recognised. The Janissaries, once the empire’s elite infantry, had become a large, poorly disciplined body. Many members held the right to pay without serving, and the corps was closely tied to the shopkeepers and guilds of Istanbul. Earlier sultans, including those of the Tulip Period, had borrowed European styles in culture and printing, but military change had been limited.

Planning the New Order

Even before the war ended, Selim asked leading officials to write reports on the causes of decline and possible remedies. More than twenty of these memoranda, known as layihas, were submitted around 1791–1792. Most agreed that the army needed new discipline, training and weapons, though they differed on how far to copy Europe.

From 1792 Selim launched a programme that came to be known as the Nizam-i Cedid. It included a new treasury, the Irad-i Cedid, funded by taxes on goods such as spirits and tobacco and by the revenues of lapsed military fiefs. This allowed the new army to be paid without passing through the old financial system.

The new army

The first units of the new infantry were formed in 1792–1793, and the corps was given its own barracks at Levend Ciftligi near Istanbul and later at Selimiye in Uskudar. Recruits were mainly young Anatolian Turks. They wore European-style uniforms, used modern muskets and were drilled by instructors, some of them European, in line tactics and volley fire.

The corps grew steadily. By 1806–1807 it numbered roughly 22,000–25,000 men, with additional units raised in parts of Anatolia. Nizam-i Cedid troops fought well in 1799 at Acre, where they helped defend the city against Napoleon Bonaparte’s army during the French invasion of Egypt and Syria.

Selim’s reforms went beyond the army. The artillery and navy were reorganised, a school of military engineering opened in 1795, and new shipyards produced modern warships. In the 1790s the Ottomans opened their first permanent embassies in European capitals, beginning with London in 1793, and then Vienna, Berlin and Paris. Selim was also a gifted composer of classical Ottoman music.

Selim’s interest in Europe began before his accession. As a prince he corresponded with King Louis XVI of France through a trusted envoy, and in the 1790s French officers and engineers were among the advisers who helped train his troops and design fortifications. Relations with France broke down after Napoleon invaded Egypt, an Ottoman province, in 1798, but recovered by the early 1800s.

Opposition and fall

The reforms threatened powerful groups. The Janissaries feared for their pay and status, many members of the ulema, the religious establishment, saw European methods as un-Islamic innovation, and provincial notables, the ayan, resisted new taxes and recruitment. In 1806 an attempt to extend recruitment into the Balkans met armed resistance near Edirne, and Selim backed down.

The empire was also at war again with Russia from 1806 and briefly faced a British fleet off Istanbul in early 1807. On 25 May 1807 the yamaks, auxiliary troops guarding the Bosphorus forts, mutinied after being ordered to adopt the new uniforms. Led by Kabakci Mustafa and joined by the Janissaries, the rebels marched on the capital and demanded the heads of reformist officials.

Selim abolished the Nizam-i Cedid in an attempt to save his throne, but on 29 May 1807 he was deposed in favour of his cousin Mustafa IV. He was confined in the palace.

Why the reforms failed

Historians usually point to several weaknesses. The Nizam-i Cedid was created alongside the Janissaries rather than replacing them, so the old corps remained armed, numerous and hostile in the capital. The new army was too small and was often stationed away from Istanbul when it was most needed.

Selim himself was often described as hesitant in a crisis. When the revolt broke out in 1807, he did not order the new troops to suppress it and instead tried to calm the rebels with concessions. The reformers also had little support from the provinces, where local notables had grown powerful and resented central demands for money and men.

Key people

• Selim III (1761–1808): Ottoman sultan from 1789 to 1807 and founder of the Nizam-i Cedid.
• Kabakci Mustafa (died 1808): leader of the yamak auxiliaries whose revolt in May 1807 brought down Selim.
• Mustafa IV (1779–1808): Selim’s cousin, sultan from 1807 to 1808, who ordered his killing.
• Alemdar Mustafa Pasha (1765–1808): provincial commander based at Ruse who tried to restore Selim and became grand vizier under Mahmud II.
• Mahmud II (1785–1839): sultan from 1808, who completed the military reforms and abolished the Janissaries.

Death and legacy

In July 1808 Alemdar (Bayraktar) Mustafa Pasha, a powerful provincial commander sympathetic to reform, marched on Istanbul to restore Selim. As his troops forced their way into Topkapi Palace on 28 July 1808, Mustafa IV ordered Selim and Mahmud, the last other male members of the dynasty, to be killed. Selim was murdered, but Mahmud escaped and became Sultan Mahmud II.

Mahmud learned from Selim’s fate. He moved slowly for nearly two decades, then in June 1826 destroyed the Janissary corps in what Ottoman writers called the Auspicious Incident. His new army and the Tanzimat reforms that followed carried forward the ideas first tried under Selim III.

Timeline

• 1761, 24 December: Selim is born in Istanbul.
• 1789, 7 April: Selim III succeeds his uncle Abdulhamid I.
• 1792, January: The Treaty of Jassy ends the war with Russia.
• 1792–1793: The Nizam-i Cedid corps and its treasury are created.
• 1799: Nizam-i Cedid troops help defend Acre against Napoleon.
• 1806: Resistance near Edirne halts the extension of the reforms.
• 1807, 25–29 May: The Kabakci Mustafa revolt; Selim is deposed.
• 1808, 28 July: Selim III is killed; Mahmud II becomes sultan.
• 1826, June: Mahmud II abolishes the Janissaries.

Why it matters

Selim III was the first Ottoman ruler to accept that the empire’s survival depended on deep reform along European lines. His New Order failed because it threatened entrenched interests without first securing power over them. Yet its army, schools and embassies set the pattern for later Ottoman modernisation, which shaped both the late empire and modern Turkey.