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Turk Kulturu ve Haci Bektas Veli - Arastirma Dergisi, vol.76, pp.79-107, 2015 (SCI-Expanded)
This study, in the light of sources, aims to partly investigate and analyse the enterance of Dersim region into the domination of Ottoman Empire, its position in the Ottoman administrative system and the status of Turkmen tribes which were called Kizilbash, since they support Safavids in Anatolia. Dersim entered into the domination of Ottoman Empire with the Battle of Chaldiran. After establishment of State of Diyarbekir, Çemişgezek Sanjak, which today encloses the whole province of Tunceli and certain parts of Erzincan and Malatya, was connected to Diyarbekir. Sultan Selim conferred the Sanjak of Çemişgezek to Pir Hussein. After the death of Pir Hussein, the Sanjak was allocated among his sons. It can be learned who Beys of Çemişgezek were, from the archival documents and from Sharafname of Sharafeddin Khan, the Bey of Bitlis. During the reign of Sultan Selim, an incident whose consequences have not been agreed on even today occured. That is related to the number of murdered Kizilbas Turkmens. Idris-i Bitlis-i is the only person who gave information about this topic among historians who lived in that period. According to Idris-i Bitlisi, before Sultan Selim attacked Safavids, he had commanded to kill all Turkmens who supported Shah Ismail in Anatolia and were called Kizilbash. In his work, Bitlisi said that more than forty thousand people were killed. However, he did not regard Padishah as responsible for this much of death. According to him, Sultan commanded that the oppressed should not to be touched, and that the scribes should be careful. However, the beadle spilled blood with desire of having more assets and a lot of innocent people were murdered. After this incident some tribes moved to mountained regions including Dersim. By this way Turkmen population in Dersim increased.