Throughout the 19th century, the Ottoman Empire adhered to the use of three different codes of criminal law. The first was introduced in 1840, directly following the Edict of Gülhane, an event which started the period of the Tanzimat reforms. In 1851, a second code was introduced. In this one, the laws were nearly the same as the ones in the first code of laws, but included the rulings of the previous eleven years. In 1859, the Ottoman Empire promulgated a last code of law inspired by the 1810 Napoleonic criminal code. Each of these variations of code and legislations represented a new phase in Ottoman legal ideology.
