Ottoman Ayan
The Ottoman ayan (singlular: ayn) were local notables or dynasts that maintained different extents of administrative control over swaths of land in the Ottoman Empire from the 16th to the early 19th centuries. These dynasts held significant autonomy from the central Ottoman government but did not challenge the state. Though the title could only be earned by Muslims, their leadership was secular. This elite class consisted of, “Wealthy merchants, heads of Janissary garrisons, leaders of important craft guilds, those who had bought the right to collect taxes for the government in Istanbul, and those who supervised the distributions of wealth generated by, and the maintenance of, pious endowments.” Ultimately, their presence was a part of a greater decentralizing trend experienced in the Ottoman Empire beginning in the 16th century, one which would come to define the Empire’s structure until its fall in the early 20th century.
Culture of Turkey
With the establishment of the Ottoman Empire, the years 1300–1453 constitute the early or first Ottoman period in architecture, when Ottoman art was in search of new ideas. This period witnessed three types of mosques: tiered, single-domed and subline-angled mosques. The Hacı Özbek Mosque (1333) in İznik, the first important center of Ottoman art, is the first example of an Ottoman single-domed mosque.