Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T20:44:14.288Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Intergenerational wealth accumulation and dispersion in the Ottoman Empire: observations from eighteenth-century Kastamonu

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 February 2011

METIN COŞGEL  and
BOĞAÇ A. ERGENE
METIN COŞGEL
Affiliation:
Department of Economics Unit 1063, University of Connecticut, 341 Mansfield Road, Room 316, Monteith, Storrs, CT 06269-1063, [email protected]
BOĞAÇ A. ERGENE
Affiliation:
History Department, University of Vermont, 133 South Prospect Street, Burlington, VT 05405, [email protected]
Get access

Abstract

This article examines intergenerational wealth accumulation and transmission patterns in eighteenth-century Ottoman Kastamonu (located in north-central Anatolia), by utilizing the quantitative information as found in probate estate inventories. Specifically, it explores how sons' wealth levels were determined by a number of factors. Our results indicate that the father's wealth and the duration of wealth accumulation were positively related to the son's wealth. But the number of inheritors and, for the most part, honorary titles did not influence wealth accumulation. In addition to providing valuable insights into wealth accumulation patterns in eighteenth-century Anatolia, our findings allow us to make comparisons with Britain and comment on the process of economic development in the Middle East.

Type
Research Article
Information
European Review of Economic History , Volume 15 , Issue 2 , August 2011 , pp. 255 - 276
Copyright
Copyright © European Historical Economics Society 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Allen, R. C. (2009). Engels’ pause: technical change, capital accumulation, and inequality in the British Industrial Revolution. Explorations in Economic History 46, pp. 418–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arrondel, L. and Grange, C. (2003). The accumulation and transmission of wealth over a long period: example of a rural family from Loire-Atlantique in the 19th and 20th centuries. History of the Family: An International Quarterly 8, pp. 103–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arrondel, L. and Grange, C. (2006). Transmission and inequality of wealth: an empirical study of wealth mobility from 1800 to 1939 in France. Journal of Economic Inequality 4, pp. 209–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barkan, Ö. L. (1968). Edirne askeri kassamı’na ait tereke defterleri (1545–1659). Belgeler 3, pp. 1–479.Google Scholar
Barkan, Ö. L. (1980). Türk toprak hukuku tarihinde Tanzimat ve 1274 (1858) tarihli Arazi Kanunnamesi. In Türkiye'de Toprak Meselesi. Istanbul: Gözlem Yayınları.Google Scholar
Brittain, J. A. (1973). Research on the transmission of material wealth. American Economic Review 63, pp. 335–45.Google Scholar
Brittain, J. A. (1978). Inheritance and the Inequality of Material Wealth. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Charles, K and Hurst, E. (2003).The correlation of wealth across generations. Journal of Political Economy 111, pp. 1155–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, G. and Cummins, N. (2009). The origins of modern growth: fertility and human capital in England, 1500–1914. Working paper.Google Scholar
Ergene, B. A. (2003). Local Court, Provincial Society and Justice in the Ottoman Empire: Legal Practice and Dispute Resolution in Çankırı and Kastamonu (1652–1744). Leiden: Brill.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ergene, B. A. and Berker, A. (2008). Wealth and inequality in 18th-century Kastamonu: estimations for the Muslim majority. International Journal of Middle East Studies 40, pp. 23–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ergene, B. A. and Berker, A. (2009). Inheritance and intergenerational wealth transmission in eighteenth-century Ottoman Kastamonu: an empirical investigation. Journal of Family History 34, pp. 25–47.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Establet, C., Pascual, J. P. and Raymond, A. (1994). La mesure de l'inégalité dans la société ottomane: utilisation de l'indice de Gini pour Le Caire et Damas vers 1700. Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 37, pp. 171–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galor, O. and Moav, O. (2004). From physical to human capital accumulation: inequality and the process of development. Review of Economic Studies 71, pp. 1001–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gerber, H. (1988). Economy and Society in an Ottoman City: Bursa, 1600–1700. Jerusalem: Hebrew University of Jerusalem.Google Scholar
Gradeva, R. (2005). Towards a portrait of ‘the rich’ in Ottoman provincial society: Sofia in the 1670s. In Anastasopoulos, A. (ed.), Provincial Elite in the Ottoman Empire. Rethymno, Crete: Crete University Press.Google Scholar
Harbury, C. D. and Hitchens, D. M. W. N. (1976). The inheritances of top wealth leavers: some further evidence. Economic Journal 86, pp. 321–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harbury, C. D. and Hitchens, D. M. W. N. (1979). Inheritance and Wealth Inequality in Britain. London: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Harbury, C. D. and McMahon, P. C. (1973). Inheritance and the characteristics of top wealth leavers in Britain. Economic Journal 83, pp. 810–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
James, J. (1988). Personal wealth distribution in late eighteenth-century Britain. Economic History Review 41, pp. 543–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, A. H. (1980). Wealth of a Nation to Be: The American Colonies on the Eve of the Revolution. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Jones, A. H. (1982). Estimating wealth of the living from a probate sample. Journal Interdisciplinary History 13, pp. 273–300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jorgenson, D. and Griliches, Z. (1967). The explanation of productivity change. Review of Economic Studies 34, pp. 249–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kearl, J. and Pope, C. (1981). Intergenerational effects on the distribution of income and wealth. NBER Working Papers 754.Google Scholar
Kearl, J. and Pope, C. (1986). Unobservable family and individual contributions to the distributions of income and wealth. Journal of Labor Economics 4, S48–S79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuran, T. (2003). The Islamic commercial crisis: institutional roots of economic underdevelopment in the Middle East. Journal of Economic History 63, pp. 414–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuran, T. (2004). Why the Middle East is economically underdeveloped: historical mechanisms of institutional stagnation. Journal of Economic Perspectives 18, pp. 71–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuran, T. (2010). The Long Divergence: How Islamic Law Held Back the Middle East. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Long, J. and Ferrie, J. (2007). The path to convergence: intergenerational occupational mobility in Britain and the US in three eras. Economic Journal 117, c1–c11.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Main, G. L. (1975). Probate records as a source for early American history. William and Mary Quarterly 32, pp. 89–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Menchik, P. (1979). Intergenerational transmission of inequality: an empirical study of wealth inequality. Economica 46, pp. 349–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moors, A. (1995). Women, Property and Islam: Palestinian Experiences, 1920–1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mulligan, C. (1997). Parental Priorities and Economic Inequality. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Özmucur, S. and Pamuk, Ş. (2002). Real wages and the standards of living in the Ottoman Empire, 1469–1914. Journal of Economic History 62, pp. 293–321.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pascual, J. P. and Establet, C. (1994). Familles et fortunes à Damas: 450 foyers damascains en 1700. Damascus: Institut français de Damas.Google Scholar
Solow, R. (1956). A contribution to the theory of economic growth. Quarterly Journal of Economics 70, pp. 65–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tülüveli, G. (2005). Honorific titles in Ottoman parlance: a reevaluation. International Journal of Turkish Studies 11, pp. 17–28.Google Scholar
Zhang, W. B. (2005). Economic Growth Theory: Capital, Knowledge and Economic Structures. Burlington, VT: Ashgate.Google Scholar