In 1288, when Osman I became Emir of Sogut, Ottoman social life was very simplistic.  Most Ottoman Turks continued to live, as their ancestors ha, as pastoral nomads.  The early Ottoman government discouraged such behavior because it needed revenue from cultivated lands to function effectively.  As the Ottomans abandoned their nomadic traditions, their lives began to resemble those of their European counterparts.  The Ottoman social hierarchy was divided into three productive classes: farmers, merchants, and craftsmen.  Outside of this system were the opener echelons of power: the military, nobility, and clergy, as well as the lowest of the classes, the slaves.  Unlike the European class system, which had similar divisions, mobility between the classes occurred often.  In fact, many slaves who proved their abilities achieved great power.  Unfortunately, as time went by, social mobility became increasing difficult within the empire.
        The vast majority of the Ottoman population was farmers.  The Cifthane system of family farming was the most predominant.  The average farm size was five to fifteen hectares, then tended to be large enough for subsistence farming only.  Especially, considering that a portion of each farmer's crops was sold to pay taxes to the Ottoman central government.  Often times farmers or their wives would supplement their incomes by selling handicrafts they produced.  Most farms were not isolated units, instead they tended to be located near villages where the farmers resided.  This allowed for more social interaction between different farming families.
        The other two classes within the Ottoman social system, merchants and craftsmen resided almost exclusively in towns or cities.  Merchants, even more than craftsmen, tended to live in cities.  Ottoman cities tended to be organized around a central square or citadel where the governmental buildings, bazaar, and main mosque were located.  Larger cities, like Bursa or Istanbul, had entire quarters devoted to such buildings.  Besides this central area there were usually several different housing quarters that branched out from the center like spokes of a wheel.  Housing quarters tended to be divided on the basis of class and ethnicity.  Merchants specializing in international trade tended to live in Istanbul.  However, domestic trading centers existed throughout the empire, in cities like Bursa, Salonica, Aleppo, Konya, etc.  Craftsmen tended to be more dispersed throughout the empire.  Although craftsmen involved with certain products often lived in only a few cities known for their particular product.  (For example ceramic makers tended to live almost exclusively in Iznik or Kutahya, while those involved with weaving silk lived in silk centers like Bursa or Bilecik).  Also, a large part of a craftsman's life revolved around his professional relationship with his peers.  In the Ottoman Empire, like in Medieval Europe, craftsmen were organized into different guilds representative of their different products.  Guilds were so wide spread in the empire that even small towns usually had at least one or two active guilds.  The decline of Ottoman guilds mirrored the decline of their European counterparts and began during the late Medieval period, although some Ottoman guilds existed into the 1920's.
        No matter what your social class or ethnicity, one aspect of Ottoman home life was almost universal throughout the empire,  women dominated home affairs.  Men tended, of course, to be the major bread winners of the household.  However, women controlled domestic affairs, even those women who also worked outside of the home.  Surprisingly, a relatively large proportion of women did so as domestic servants, silk spinners, carpet weavers, etc.  Despite this fact and women's noticeable role in society, the Ottoman Empire was clearly a patriarchal society.  Ottoman religious beliefs (whether Muslim or Orthodox Christian) were themselves patriarchal and they were only reinforced by social norms and actual laws.  A clear illustration of this was the ability for Muslim men within the empire to have more than one wife, although it is important to note that the majority of Muslim Ottomans were monogamous.
        As mentioned above, Ottoman social history was not drastically different from the social history of contemporaneous European society.  Whenever one studies social history, one is struck by the continuities inherent in the daily lives of people throughout the world and throughout time.  Ottoman farmers lived lives strikingly similar to Modern Turkish farmers.  They even use some of the same farming techniques, although farming is know more mechanized and farmers own larger parcels of land.  Ottoman craftsmen and almost all craftsmen were replaced by factory workers following industrialization.  Their guilds were then replaced by trade unions, which began to develop even in the late Ottoman period.  Finally, Ottoman merchants have business practices that are oddly similar to those of business people today, although they clearly lack the technology of today.  In fact, many Ottoman business people still deal in the same products that their Ottoman predecessors did: textiles, silks, carpets, ceramics, etc.  The study of social history is meant to accentuate the different experiences of individuals.  At the same time, however, it provides a picture of continuity that traditional political history does not.