How were petitions successfully submitted for consideration by the Ottoman Imperial Divan in the capital city Istanbul whose population was often illiterate or only conversant in a tongue other than Ottoman Turkish, the official language used by the Ottoman bureaucracy? In the mazalim tradition of classical and medieval Islam the ruler was expected to be easily accessible to his subjects to hear complaints about all forms of injustice that they have suffered, particularly through the wrongdoings of officials. In this immediate form of justice any subject could report wrongs in person to an ever-present ruler who would then usually decide on the spot. The absence of set legal procedures in the hearings before the ruler made the help of legal professionals such as lawyers unnecessary and the ruler’s decision was based on considerations of equity. Following the general tendency towards institutionalisation and bureaucratization in the Ottoman realm the ruler’s court –together with its function of hearing petitions– was replaced early on by the Imperial Council as the highest administrative and judicial body in the Empire. The hearings of the Imperial Council operated according to a strict legal procedure that practically abolished the possibility of a subject filing his or her petition impromptu and directly to the ruler in person. Instead, bureaucrats of the chancery took the initial –and crucial– decision about which cases ought to be even considered for deliberation at the Divan. In my paper, I attempt to shed light on the thus far neglected initial phase of the petitioning process. What were the mechanisms by which subjects who were often far from fluent in Ottoman Turkish, or not even literate at all, produced a petition text that would pass the scrutiny of the Divan clerks in order to be dealt with by the Imperial Council? What ways of submitting a petition proved most effective? This paper will draw particular attention to the instrumental –and often indispensible– role that professional petition scribes played in the successful consideration of one’s supplication.