In the Ottoman Empire, many members of the ruling elite were legally
slaves of the sultan and therefore could, technically, be ordered to
surrender their labor, their property, or their lives at any moment.
Nevertheless, slavery provided a means of social mobility, conferring
status and political power within the military, the bureaucracy, or the
domestic household and formed an essential part of patronage networks.
Ehud R. Toledano's exploration of slavery from the Ottoman viewpoint is
based on extensive research in British, French, and Turkish archives and
offers rich, original, and important insights into Ottoman life and
thought.