page_title: Alevi history
section_title: The consequences of Qizilbash-Sunni division in Anatolia
hierarchical_section_title: Alevi history / Ottoman Empire period / Suleyman I period / The consequences of Qizilbash-Sunni division in Anatolia
caption_attribution_description: English: Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the first president of the Republic of Turkey at the first parliament building.Türkçe: Mustafa Kemal Atatürk Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi'nin Dördüncü Büyük Kurultay'ında.
context_page_description: The History of the Shī‘ah Imāmī Alevī Ṭarīqah or The History of the Alevism is that of a community of Shia Muslims of Anatolia and neighbouring regions.
context_section_description: The Kizilbash in Anatolia were now militarily, politically and religiously separated from their source in Iran, retreated to isolated rural areas and turned inward, developing their unique structures and doctrines. Following the severe persecution and massacres by the Ottomans which went on into the 18th century, Alevis went underground using taqiya, religious dissimulation permitted by all Shi`a groups, to conceal their faith (pretending to be Sunnis) and survive in a hostile environment.
  Kizilbash and Bektashis shared common religious beliefs and practices becoming intermingled as Alevis in spite of many local variations. Isolated from both the Sunni Ottomans and the Twelver Shi`a Safavids, Alevis developed traditions, practices, and doctrines by the early 17th century which marked them as a closed autonomous religious community. As a result of the immense pressures to conform to Sunni Islam, Alevis developed a tradition of opposition to all forms of external religion.
  Meanwhile, the rulers of the Ottoman Empire gradually distanced themselves from their nomadic Turkic heritage, ultimately (during the thirteenth century) adopting the Sunni Islam of their Mediterranean subjects. During the long rivalry with Safavid Qizilbash tribes fought for local control of the Anatolian highlands, and were responsible for several 15th and 16th century uprisings against the Ottomans. The 1555 Peace of Amasya found them on the "wrong" side of the Ottoman / Iranian border, as subjects of an Ottoman court which viewed them with suspicion. Massacres of Qizilbash occurred.
  The career of Pir Sultan Abdal takes place in this context. Apparently a 16th-century folk musician from Sivas, Pir Sultan Abdal was known for playing a stringed instrument called the bağlama and singing songs critical of his Ottoman governors, in defense of the rights of the Anatolian peasantry. Hanged for fomenting rebellion, he became another beloved figure in Alevi folklore and is now often invoked as a symbol of Alevism's leftist aspect. He is also preferred by Alevi Kurds, who appreciate his protest against the Turkish establishment, over Haji Bektash Veli (whom they identify with the Turks).
caption: Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi, May 1935.
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