{{short description|Arabic word; refers to Islamic laws}} {{Italic title}}{{other uses|Qanun (disambiguation)}}<!-- "qanun", "kanun", "Qanun" -->
'''''Qanun''''' or '''''Kanun''''' is an Arabic term{{efn|{{langx|ar|قانون|translit=qānūn}}; {{langx|ota|قانون|translit=kānūn}}, derived from {{langx|grc|κανών|translit=kanōn}}, which is also the root for the modern English word "canon"<ref>{{LSJ|kanw/n|κανών|ref}}.</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Between God and the Sultan: A History of Islamic Law|author=Knut S. Vikør|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hN9M3USKuQgC|page=207|publisher=C. Hurst & Co. Publishers|year=2005|isbn=9781850657385 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Historical Dictionary of Islam|author-first=Ludwig W.|author-last=Adamec|author-link=Ludwig W. Adamec|publisher=The Scarecrow Press, Inc|year=2009|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7_nPfLOj6MUC|page=256|isbn=9780810863033 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=canon|url=http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=canon&allowed_in_frame=0|publisher=Online Etymology Dictionary}}</ref>}} that refers to laws established by Muslim sovereigns, especially the body of administrative, economic and criminal law promulgated by Ottoman sultans. It is used to contrast with sharia, the body of law elaborated by Muslim jurists.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |first=Knut S. |last=Vikør |title=Sharīʿah |encyclopedia=The Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Politics |publisher=Oxford University Press |editor=Emad El-Din Shahin |year=2014 |url=http://bridgingcultures.neh.gov/muslimjourneys/items/show/226 |access-date=2019-01-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170202054116/http://bridgingcultures.neh.gov/muslimjourneys/items/show/226 |archive-date=2017-02-02 |url-status=dead}}</ref> It is thus frequently translated as "dynastic law," and in Ottoman contexts as "sultanic law."
== History == The idea of ''qanun'' entered the Muslim world in the thirteenth century, borrowed from the Mongol Empire following their invasions.<ref>{{cite book |last=Burak |first=Guy |title=The Second Formation of Islamic Law: The Ḥanafī School in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire |place=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=2015 |isbn=978-1-107-09027-9 |pages=17–8}}</ref> The 10th sultan of the Ottoman Empire, Suleiman, was known in the Ottoman Empire as Suleiman Kanuni ("the Lawgiver"), due to the laws he promulgated.
After the fall of the Abbasid Caliphate in 1258, a practice known to the Turks and Mongols transformed itself into Qanun, which gave power to caliphs, governors, and sultans alike to "make their own regulations for activities not addressed by ''sharia''".<ref name="Berg-TerrorLaw">Berg, Herbert. "Islamic Law." ''Berkshire Encyclopedia of World History'' 3 (2005): 1030. In History Reference Center [database online]. Available from Snowden Library. Retrieved February 11, 2008.</ref> This became increasingly important as the Middle East modernized, addressing problems of a modern state, which were not covered by sharia. The Qanun began to unfold as early as Umar I (586–644 CE).<ref name="Berg-TerrorLaw" /> Many of the regulations covered by Qanun were based on financial matters or tax systems adapted through the law and regulations of territories Islam had conquered.<ref name="Berg-TerrorLaw" />
Kanun took on significant importance during the period of modernization in the Ottoman Empire. Kanun and ''sharia'' did not contradict each other concerning administrative matters and so ''kanun'' was assimilated easily into Ottoman regulatory functions. Kanun promulgated by Ottoman sultans was used for financial and penal law. Under Sultan Mehmed II (1451–1481), the kanun continued to be strictly applied for those practices. However, the influence of Abu ʾl-Suʿūd, the grand mufti of Istanbul from 1545 to 1574, kanun was expanded to deal with matters concerning property rights. Previously, property rights had been exclusively under the jurisdiction of ''sharia''. Despite that seeming contradiction, skillful bureaucrats allowed kanun and ''sharia'' to coexist harmoniously. The kanun retained its relevance in the Middle East regarding civil, commercial, administrative and penal laws. It influences the ways that ''sharia'' is reproduced.<ref>Linant de Bellefonds, Y., Cahen, Cl., İnalcık, Halil, and Ed. "Ḳānūn." ''Encyclopaedia of Islam'', Second Edition. Ed. P. Bearman et al. Brill Reference Online. Web. 12 Mar. 2018.</ref>
== Etymology == The term {{transliteration|ota|ḳānūn}} derives itself from the Greek word {{lang|grc|κανών}}. Originally having the less abstract meaning of "any straight rod," it later referred to any "measure or rule" in Greek. It was derived in turn from the Akkadian word Qanûm 𒂵𒉡𒌑𒌝. The word was then translated into and adopted by Arabic after the Ottoman Empire's conquest of Egypt under Sultan Selim I (ca. 1516). In the Ottoman Empire, the term still carried the word's original meanings of a system of tax regulation. However, it later came to also refer to "code of regulations" or "state law," a well-defined secular distinction to "Muslim law," known as ''sharia''.
==See also== * Ottoman law * Palestinian law * Qanun Aceh * ''Qanun'' of Malaysia: ** Hukum Kanun Pahang, an attempt to codify the law in the Pahang Sultanate ** Undang-Undang Melaka, the legal code of the Malacca Sultanate *** Undang-Undang Laut Melaka, the section of the Malaccan legal code which dealt specifically with maritime law
==Notes== {{notelist}} ==References== {{Reflist}}
Category:Arabic words and phrases Category:Islamic jurisprudence Category:Legal systems Category:Legal codes Category:Islamic terminology Category:Law of the Ottoman Empire