Kanun | Ottoman Empire, Sultan Suleiman, Sharia Law | Britannica (original) (raw)

kanun, (kanun from Greek kanōn, “rule”), the tabulation of administrative regulations in the Ottoman Empire that supplemented the Sharīʿah (Islamic law) and the discretionary authority of the sultan.

In Islamic judicial theory there was no law other than the Sharīʿah. In the early Islamic states, however, practical concessions had to be made to custom, to the exigencies of time and place, and to the will of the ruler and applied in separate administrative courts. Under the Ottomans, who devised an elaborate administrative system, the distinctions disappeared between the Sharīʿah and administrative law codified as _kanun_s and _kanunname_s (collection of _kanun_s). In theory, _kanun_s were to harmonize with the prescription of the Sharīʿah, giving the ulama (men of religious learning) the right to invalidate any regulation that contradicted Islamic law. In practice, however, the ulama, organized in a hierarchy under the authority of the sultan, rarely repudiated his _kanun_s, thus giving the sultan freedom to legislate.

The first _kanunname_s were issued under Sultan Mehmed II (reigned 1444–46, 1451–81), though his predecessors had promulgated individual _kanun_s. The _kanun_s of Selim I (reigned 1512–20) and Süleyman I (reigned 1520–66), called Kanuni (“Law Giver”), were known for their political wisdom.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Amy Tikkanen.