Sectarianism and Social Conflict in Damascus: The 1860 Events Reconsidered

Abstract

1 For an enduring example of the Tan Ωì m à t explanation see Moshe Ma ' oz, Ottoman Reform in Syria and Palestine, 1840-1861: The Impact of the Tanzimat on Politics and Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1968). Among more recent interpretations see Linda Schatkowski Schilcher, Families in Politics: Damascene Factions and Estates of the 18th and 19th Centuries (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1985) and Leila Fawaz, An Occasion for War: Civil Con fl ict in Lebanon and Damascus in 1860 (London: I.B. Tauris, 1994); Bruce Masters, “The 1850 Events in Aleppo: An Aftershock of Syria’s Incorporation into the