Social and economic life during the Hajji Giray Han II period according to 25 and 26 numbered Crimean Qadi court registers

The geography and climate influences many factors of communities ranging from their basic means of livelihood to lifestyles, and even their cultural codes. An individual is a part of the community in which they are born and cannot maintain a life isolated from the community. When we consider the Crimean society from this perspective, we see that the geography and climate influenced their lives significantly. In Crimea, that boasts the appearance of a peninsula, the vast stepped moorlands allow the people here to engage in livestock farming. However, agriculture on these fertile lands is restricted to the small-scale cultivation of orchards and vineyards. The main reason for this is the Crimean Tatars maintaining their semi-nomadic lifestyle even in the 17th century. This thesis aims to shed light on the social life of the Crimean Tatars based on the No 25 and 26 Sharia court records. This study focuses particularly on the nine month term (30 September 1683-28 June 1684) of Hajji Giray Khan II ascending the Crimean throne. Attempting to understand the extent of the influence both positive and negative, of the short-term change in rule on social and economic life constitutes the main problem of this study. In this context, in the first chapter of the thesis the primary and secondary sources that form the framework of the study are assessed, what kind of gaps need to be filled in literature and answers to certain issues must be pursued. The second chapter of the study focuses on the administrative structure of Crimea, the khan and ruling powers; its justice and law and order mechanisms. The towns, neighborhoods and villages in the two registers that were researched were identified. The third chapter concentrates on the most important factor of social life, humans. An attempt was made to analyze the ethnic structure of the Crimean society; the family structure of the Crimean Tatars, nature of their material culture, their settlement typologies and the social relationships in the scope of incidents that were brought to the courts. The last chapter is dedicated to the Crimean economy. This chapter examines livestock farming, agriculture, trade and slavery. This was assessed taking into consideration the records determining the factors underlying the continuous change in the prices of basic food provisions within a nine month period.