| Abstract |
The present dissertation studies the Christian and Muslim women who lived in the first decades after the Ottoman conquest of Crete (1669) until the end of the 17th century in the three neighbouring provinces of Kandiye (today’s Heraklion), in particular Malevizi, Temenos and Pediada. The main archive sources that were used are the published Ottoman codes No. 3, 4 and 5 that were kept by the Ottoman judge (kadi) of Kandiye. In addition, cases from the 2nd Ottoman kadi code were used, published and unpublished ones. The dissertation includes the Introduction, six chapters and the Conclusions. In the Introduction of the thesis there is a brief reference to women and the social gender in historiography. The methodological problems of the studied archive sources as well as the presence of the non-Muslims in the court of Kandiye is the subject of the two subchapters that follow. The villages included in each of the three provinces are mentioned in the next subchapter, which is completed with the summary of the thesis.
In the first chapter the family and gendered relations in Islam and Muslim society are studied. The second chapter studies the marriage contracts recorded in the codes studied. In particular the marriages between Muslims, among Christians, as well as mixed marriages, that is, between a Muslim man and a Christian woman are being studied. At the same time reference is made to the necessary conditions for a valid marriage contract (absence of marriage obstacles, wedding donations, dowry and other gifts).
The third chapter deals with the three types of divorce cases recorded in the codes, that is the talak, hul and tefrik divorces. The specific conditions for a divorce, as well as the obligations and rights of each spouse, depending on the type of divorce, are stated.
Transitions of the real estate are being studied in the next chapter, such as sales, donations, inventories of the property of a deceased person and its distribution to his/her legal heirs (tereke), as well as the real estate disputes. For the best use of the archival material, the purchase of houses, fields, vineyards, gardens and mills was studied separately.
Conversions to Islam is the subject of the fifth chapter of the dissertation. Reference is made to the motives of conversion, at least when they are clearly mentioned in the cases. In addition, marriages, divorces, buying and selling, disputes and guardianship cases are being studied from the point of view of conversion to Islam.
In the sixth and final chapter of the dissertation the criminal cases are studied. According to Islamic criminal law, the penalty imposed depends on the type of the criminal act. There is a distinction in criminal acts punishable by hadd and ta'zir penalties. The first category concludes punishable acts that violate the rights of Allah and for this reason their punishments are defined by the holy Islamic law and are particularly severe. As far as the ta'zir penalties are concerned, they are mostly financial penalties imposed by the Ottoman court in cases of criminal acts that do not fall within those punishable by hadd penalties.
In the next chapter of the dissertation, the conclusions for each chapter are mentioned as well as the final conclusions for the Christian and Muslim women who lived in Malevizi, Temenos and Pediada provinces during the first decades after the Ottoman conquest of Crete.
After the Conclusions follows the Glossary of Ottoman terms, as well as the Bibliography and the maps with the villages of each studied province.
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