This paper traces the professional career of Janbulad Bek b. Qasim (d. ca. 1575), member of a Kurdish chiefly lineage active in northern Syria and grandfather of the more famous ‘Ali Pasha Janbulad (d. 1611), the leader of a major rebellion against the Ottoman Empire. Using both Ottoman Turkish and Arabic sources, the paper will seek to demonstrate that as a state functionary Janbulad occupied an unusual middle ground in the Ottoman political domain, between the relatively centralized timar (land assignment) system, and the more permissive and discretionary arrangements, such as hereditary privileges (ocaklik and hukumet), that were struck with tribal leaders along the empire’s frontiers. Janbulad’s first encounter with Ottoman power typifies the wrenching experience of many local political families coming under Ottoman rule: His father Qasim was executed, probably the result of inter-tribal intrigue, and the young man Janbulad was pardoned and taken into the imperial palace school in Istanbul, where he attained the rank of muteferrika, also common for the sons of vassal lords or high state ministers. In his initial postings, he was absorbed into a centralized administrative system, occupying positions as a timar-holding cavalryman around the town of Shughur, southwest of Aleppo. Janbulad stood out for the zeal and effectiveness with which he reduced brigandage in his area, and he was subsequently favored with major military command positions in the suppression of the 'Ulyanoglu Rebellion of southern Iraq (1567-71), and the Ottoman conquest of Cyprus (1571). Istanbul recognized this outstanding service with a hereditary governorship (ocaklik) of the Kilis district, west of Aleppo, an appointment which had the effect of deepening Janbulad’s local influence. Janbulad subsequently secured timar assignments in the same district for his sons and embarked on an ambitious program of building religious and commercial complexes in the area. As a whole, the political career of Janbulad reflects an Ottoman policy of elite recruitment, characterized by variable set of inducements, whereby chiefly lineages were incorporated into Ottoman state service but not wholly integrated into a system of regular, rotating appointments. This paper thus contributes to an ongoing scholarly reassessment of the sixteenth-century Ottoman state-building that downplays the once-dominant theme of centralization of power and stresses the flexibility and contingency of state political practices. By making use of the law court records of Aleppo, the paper also offers significant new information on the social networks and commercial strategies of Janbulad and his adult sons.