In the pre-modern Ottoman Empire, any individual, regardless of social status, gender, religious affiliation, and citizenship enjoyed the right to petition the sultan to forward grievances against state officials and commoners alike. The central institution dealing with the petitions of Ottoman subjects as well as foreigners was the Imperial Council (divan-ı hümayun). It operated as both a “cabinet” of state, dealing with major political, military, and economic issues, and as high court of justice. It was presided by the Grand Vizier (sadrazam), the sultan’s deputy, who took decisions in accordance with Hanafi Islamic law (Sharia) and sultanic legislation (kanun) in collaboration with Ottoman judicial authorities, provincial governors, and financial officials. Despite the expanding scholarly literature on the Ottoman legal system since the 1990s, the Imperial Council remains an understudied legal institution and we still know little about its functioning as a court of justice. Scholars of the Ottoman legal system focus on Qadi courts (ordinary Ottoman tribunals) as the main Islamic judicial institution of the Ottoman Empire or on fatwa production (non-binding legal opinions issued by muftis). The neglect of the Imperial Council stems from the widely shared belief that this institution operated as mostly an ombudsman institution and it played a little role in the resolution of legal suits among private individuals. In particular, we still do not know the types of legal suits handled by the Imperial Council, court procedures, and the relations between this institution and other Ottoman forums of justice. This paper expands our current knowledge of the Imperial Council by focusing on the appeals made to this court by Venetian merchants in the years between 1600s and 1630s. The largest European mercantile group in the Ottoman Empire, the Venetians turned to this institution in large numbers to both complain against Ottoman officials and to solve commercial and criminal disputes with Ottoman subjects. It was actually the most used Ottoman court by Venetians and other Western Europeans alike. By employing both Ottoman and Venetian sources, I examine the procedures of petitioning and dispute resolutions, the types of grievances brought to this court by Venetian merchants, and the role of international diplomacy in solving disputes there. In this way, I show the important judicial function of this institution in regards with the legal suits of Western Europeans and its overall contribution to the regulation of international trade and Ottoman/European relations.