An Example of Political Marriages in Turkish History: Atabey Marriages

Atabeys were civil servants who were responsible primarily for raising the children of the ruler. At first, it was a duty regarding the education of the prince, after some time, it became an institution, and then became politicized. The most obvious aspect of this politicization was the atabeys giving their daughters to the princes or marrying the widowed mothers of the princes. In this way, the atabeys enabled these duties to become an important position in the state administration, in which they also became more effective over time. We see that atabeys played important roles in the fights for sultanate, especially among the Seljukian princes, and as long as the power of the state continued in the central administration, they did not enter into a struggle for independence on their own behalf, but they began to use all the power of princes on their own behalf at the point where the state center weakened.\rEstablishing family ties through political marriages and forming a policy based on them is a path followed by statesmen. In line with this path, sultans, melikes, atabeys made marriages. The main purpose of marriages is to consolidate the authority of the state, to take the allegiance of the principalities, to prevent rebellions and to play an active role in the relations between the dynasties.\rIn the present study, the effects of atabey marriages, which is among the marriages made for political purposes in Turkish history, on Turkish political history were evaluated by giving examples from fifteen atabey marriages made in the historical process.