This article examines the Ottoman extension of rule and jurisdiction to the Beersheba frontier of southern Palestine. As part of its Tanzimat reform policies, the Ottoman administration founded the new town and sub-district of Beersheba in 1900, and sought to implement a legal reform. Deviating from the formal law that requires the founding of a civil-nizamiye court, the Ottoman instituted a form of legal exception and authorized the local administrative council to sit as a judicial forum and for its Bedouin Shaykh members to serve as judges. Studies of Ottoman Beersheba have typically focused on Bedouin autonomy and tribal law. The few studies that discussed the judicial order, have mistakenly assumed the Ottoman institution of a “tribal court,” and its persistence thereafter. Interestingly, what began as a simple grant of legal exception, justified by civilizational discourses of ignorance and savagery, grew into a judicial complexity. Very soon jurisdictional tensions arose, integrating questions across various webs of legal orders, jurisdictions, and political networks that shaped the reform in Beersheba and beyond. In following various legal disputes from Beersheba to Gaza, Jerusalem, and Istanbul, the article challenges some of the prevailing research categories, dichotomies, and approaches in the study of Ottoman legal history and tribal societies, including the concept of ‘legal pluralism.’