TRENDEFRAtlas of the Sultans · Glossary
Term · Sovereignty and central government
Also known as: law code
A sultan's decree bringing together the legal provisions on a particular subject.
Kanunnames could apply to the whole empire, to a region or to a community; there were also kanunnames setting out the tax regime of individual sanjaks. Mehmed II the Conqueror put into force an organisational kanunname binding on the generations after him. Under Süleyman I, known in Turkish as “Kanuni” (the Lawgiver), the kanunnames were revised again.
Source: TDV Encyclopedia of Islam, article “KANUNNÂME” (in Turkish); text condensed for the atlas.