OTTOWAQF will investigate how pious endowments shaped state-building in the Ottoman Empire during a critical period between 1450 and 1650. Pious endowments controlled vast tracts of land and property across the empire in support of mosques, schools, hospitals, and many other charitable activities. As a result, they constituted the most widespread and powerful social institutions within the empire and across Islamic lands. Even so, their role in state formation has been overlooked. OTTOWAQF will examine the political and economic impact of endowments on the state to produce a new model of state power in the Ottoman Empire that accounts for the participation of a diverse range of social actors from across the empire in the development of the early modern Ottoman state.