Abstract
According to Yıldız, the first serious incident in which the janissaries became determined to express their opposition to the reforms took place in spring 1805, in what became known as the Selimiye Mosque Incident. According to the author, this incident suggests that the Janissaries were not opposed to reform itself, but they rejected any inroads against their prestige and interests. [...]a quick look at Stanford Shaw's Between Old and New, [Harvard University Press, 1971], cited in the bibliography, shows eight chapters covering some 140 out of about 400 pages of text that deal directly with the "Eastern Question.") [...]in the eighteenth century neither the reformers nor the conservatives constituted well-defined parties representing a particular school of thought or ideology.