Resm-i çift (also known as Çift Akçesi or Çift resmi) was a tax in the Ottoman Empire. It was a tax on farmland, assessed at a fixed annual rate per çift (a unit of land area), and paid by land-owning Muslims. Some imams and certain civil servants were exempted from the tax.
The tax was collected annually on 1 March, from the holder of the timar (a land grant) or their tax-farmer. Exemptions from resm-i çift were granted in some cases, though this was less common than exemptions from extraordinary taxes. Some of the sadat (descendants of the Prophet Muhammad) were initially considered exempt, but this exemption ended in the 17th century. Exemptions also existed for those involved in salt-making and mining.
The çift is a measure of land area, derived from the word for "pair"; it refers to an area of farmland that could be ploughed by a pair of oxen — the equivalent of the Byzantine zeugarion. It has been argued that the basic land tax in Asia Minor and the Balkans was directly copied from earlier Byzantine tax methods. A nim çift was half of that area (or half a yoke of oxen); a çiftli bennak was an area less than half. These terms correspond to the Byzantine zeugarion, boidaton, and aktemon, and the initial tax rates were similar.
In the 15th and 16th centuries, most taxpayers in the Ottoman Empire paid resm-i çift at a rate somewhere between 22 and 70 akçe. This could be collected by a sipahi (cavalryman), either as a tax in kind or as a cash tax. However, later centralized tax reforms led to cash payments of avâriz and nüzül replacing resm-i çift; this transition had begun by 1640. Rates could vary for Muslims and non-Muslims, and there are instances of Muslim converts continuing to pay their "old" rate of tax. Landless peasants might pay Resm-i bennâk instead.
