Abstract
Palace Protocol in the Crimean Khanate
The edicts and letters belonging to the Crimean Khanate contain important information about the political, socio-cultural and economic structure of the state. Since these documents are diplomatic correspondences, they have a source value of the first-hand, illuminating especially the international relations of the Khanate. As it is understood from the correspondences, the state structure of the Crimean Khanate is based on the Genghis laws, but it is also in a special position where the Ottoman influence is observed. All the procedures and ceremonies that contain traces from these two different state structures constitute the palace protocol of the Crimean Khanate. The diplomatic correspondences of the Crimean Khanate period particularly reveal the ceremonies against foreign ambassadors in the Crimean palace, procedures during the delivery of taxes and gifts received from foreign states annually, and the tradition of signing peace negotiations and specifications. At the same time, international practices related to captive and slave trade also exist in this correspondences.
Undoubtedly, the most important sources to be used in determining the practices of the ancient state tradition of the Crimean Khanate are the edicts and letters sent to foreign states. The publication of Zernov forms the most volume of these correspondences with 378 documents. In this study, all of these documents have been examined in the philological and historical perspective based on the original text. At this point, in addition to introducing the practices related to the Crimean palace protocol, it gives information about the origins of the terms used.
Keywords
Crimean Khanate, diplomatic correspondences, yarlik, the palace organization of The Crimean Khanate,