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  STANHOPE PRIZE ESSAY--1859.




  THE

  CAUSES OF THE SUCCESSES

  OF THE

  OTTOMAN TURKS.


  BY

  JAMES SURTEES PHILLPOTTS,

  SCHOLAR OF NEW COLLEGE.

[Illustration]

  OXFORD:

  T. and G. SHRIMPTON.

  M DCCC LIX.




THE CAUSES OF THE SUCCESSES OF THE OTTOMAN TURKS.


By the fall of the Seljukian dynasty in Asia Minor, a vast number of
Turks, scattered over the fertile tracts of Western Asia, were left
without any organized government. The Emirs of the Seljouks in their
different districts tried to set up separate kingdoms for themselves,
but their power was successfully exercised only in making depredations
upon each other. For some time they were under the sway of the Khans of
Persia, but the decline of the Mogul Empire after the death of Cazan,
freed them from this control[1]. During this time of general anarchy,
a clan of Oghouz Turks, under Ertogruhl, settled in the dominions of
Alaeddin, the chief of Iconium. These Turks were of the same family as
the Huns and Avars, and the other Barbarian hordes, whose invasions
had continually devastated Europe for nearly ten centuries[2]; nor had
the energy and restless activity of their race yet begun to fail. They
were all united by the affinity of race, as well as by their language,
and by the common bond of the Sunnite