When was the Transformation of the Ottoman Empire?
Ottoman decline thesis
Having dispensed with the notion of decline, today's historians of the Ottoman Empire most commonly refer to the post-Suleimanic Period, or more widely the period from 1550 to 1700, as one of transformation. The role of economic and political crises in defining this period is crucial, but so too is their temporary nature, as the Ottoman state was ultimately able to survive and adapt to a changing world. Also of increasing emphasis is the place of the Ottoman Empire in comparative perspective, particularly with the states of Europe. While the Ottomans struggled with a severe economic and fiscal downturn, so too did their European contemporaries. This period is frequently referred to as that of The General Crisis of the Seventeenth Century, and thus the difficulties faced by the Ottoman Empire have been reframed not as unique to them, but as part of a general trend impacting the entire European and Mediterranean region. In the words of Ehud Toledano, "In both Europe and the Ottoman empire, these changes transformed states and the ways in which military-administrative elites waged and funded wars. Coping with these enormous challenges and finding the appropriate responses through a sea of socio-economic and political changes is, in fact, the story of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Ottoman history. A remarkable adaptation to new realities, rather than decline and disintegration, was its main feature; it reflects the resourcefulness, pragmatism and flexibility in thought and action of the Ottoman military-administrative elite, rather than their ineptitude or incompetence. Thus, per Dana Sajdi: "Regardless of what one may think of an individual revisionist work, or a particular method or framework, the cumulative effect of the scholarship has demonstrated the empirical and theoretical invalidity of the decline thesis, and offered a portrayal of an internally dynamic Ottoman state and society. It has also established the comparability of the Ottoman empire to other - mainly European - societies and polities, and concomitantly revised the existing scheme of periodization." The 21st-century scholarly consensus on the post-Suleimanic period can thus be summarized as follows:
The following is a list of several works which have been particularly influential in overturning the decline thesis.
Ottoman wars in Asia
Ottoman wars in Asia refers to the wars involving the Ottoman Empire in Asia. Ottoman Empire was founded at the beginning of the 14th century. Its original settlement was in the north west Anatolia (Asiatic part of the modern Turkey) where it was a small beylik (principality). Its main rival was Byzantine Empire. In 1350s Ottomans were able to cross the Dardanelles strait and eventually they conquered whole south east Europe. Although they mainly concentrated on Europe, they also fought in Asia.
Imperialism
The Ottoman Empire was an imperial state that lasted from 1299 to 1922. In 1453, Mehmed the Conqueror besieged the capital of the Byzantine Empire, resulting in the Fall of Constantinople after 1,500 years of Roman rule. Thereafter, making it the capital of the empire. During the 16th and 17th centuries, in particular at the height of its power under the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent, the Ottoman Empire was a powerful multinational, multilingual empire, which invaded and colonized much of Southeast Europe, Western Asia, the Caucasus, North Africa, and the Horn of Africa. Its repeated invasions, and brutal treatment of Slavs led to the great migration of the Serbs to escape persecution. At the beginning of the 17th century the empire contained 32 provinces and numerous vassal states. Some of these were later absorbed into the empire, while others were granted various types of autonomy during the course of centuries.
Accession of Turkey to the European Union
After the Ottoman Empire's collapse following World War I, Turkish revolutionaries led by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk emerged victorious in the Turkish War of Independence, establishing the modern Turkish Republic as it exists today. Atatürk, President of Turkey, implemented a series of reforms, including secularisation and industrialisation, intended to "Europeanise" or Westernise the country. During World War II, Turkey remained neutral until February 1945, when it joined the Allies. The country took part in the Marshall Plan of 1947, became a member of the Council of Europe in 1949, and a member of NATO in 1952. During the Cold War, Turkey allied itself with the United States and Western Europe. The Turkish expert Meltem Ahıska outlines the Turkish position vis-à-vis Europe, explaining how “Europe has been an object of desire as well as a source of frustration for Turkish national identity in a long and strained history”.
Ottoman Empire
During the Tanzimat period (1839–1876), the government's series of constitutional reforms led to a fairly modern conscripted army, banking system reforms, the decriminalization of homosexuality, the replacement of religious law with secular law and guilds with modern factories. The Ottoman Ministry of Post was established in Istanbul on 23 October 1840.
Ottoman Empire
The Arab Revolt began in 1916 and turned the tide against the Ottomans on the Middle Eastern front, where they seemed to have the upper hand during the first two years of the war. The Armistice of Mudros was signed on 30 October 1918, setting the partition of the Ottoman Empire under the terms of the Treaty of Sèvres. This treaty, as designed in the conference of London, allowed the Sultan to retain his position and title. The occupation of Constantinople and İzmir led to the establishment of a Turkish national movement, which won the Turkish War of Independence (1919–23) under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal (later given the surname "Atatürk"). The sultanate was abolished on 1 November 1922, and the last sultan, Mehmed VI (reigned 1918–22), left the country on 17 November 1922. The caliphate was abolished on 3 March 1924.
History of the Ottoman Empire
The Second Constitutional Era began after the Young Turk Revolution (3 July 1908) with the sultan's announcement of the restoration of the and the reconvening of the Ottoman Parliament. It marked the beginning of the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. This era is dominated by the politics of the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), and the movement that would become known as the Young Turks. Although it began as a uniting progressive party, the CUP splintered in 1911 with the founding of the opposition Freedom and Accord Party (Liberal Union or Entente), which poached many of the more liberal Deputies from the CUP. The remaining CUP members, who now took a more dominantly nationalist tone in the face of the enmity of the Balkan Wars, dueled Freedom and Accord in a series of power reversals, which ultimately led to the CUP (specifically its leadership, the "Three Pashas") seizing power from the Freedom and Accord in the 1913 Ottoman coup d'état and establishing total dominance over Ottoman politics until the end of World War I.
Second Constitutional Era
The Second Constitutional Era (; ) of the Ottoman Empire established shortly after the 1908 Young Turk Revolution which forced Sultan Abdul Hamid II to restore the constitutional monarchy by the revival of the Ottoman Parliament, the General Assembly of the Ottoman Empire and the restoration of the constitution of 1876. The parliament and the constitution of the First Constitutional Era (1876–1878) had been suspended by Abdul Hamid in 1878 after only two years of functioning. Whereas the First Constitutional Era had not allowed for political parties, the Young Turks amended the constitution to strengthen the popularly elected Chamber of Deputies at the expense of the unelected Senate and the Sultan's personal powers, and formed and joined many political parties and groups for the first time in the Empire's history.
Westernization
In Turkey, the process of Westernization dates back to the 19th century, known as the Tanzimat "(reorganization)" period. The Ottoman Empire began to change itself according to western science, practice and culture. The Empire took some innovations from the West. Also, by the contribution of foreign engineers the Empire repaired its old arm systems. Newly-found schools, permanent ambassadors, and privy councils were essential improvement for the Empire. All these reformations had good impact at the point of collapse. Also, the innovation brought from European countries shaped the Empire as a nation run along modern lines. The Westernization efforts continued under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, with the adaptation of the Latin-script alphabet and the French concept of secularism. As a result, Turkey is one of the most Westernized majority-Muslim nations.
Iraqi Turkmen
The Iraqi Turkmens are the descendants of various waves of Turkic migration to Mesopotamia beginning from the 7th century until the end of Ottoman rule (1919). The first wave of migration dates back to the 7th century, followed by migrations during the Seljuk Empire (1037–1194), the fleeing Oghuz during the Mongol destruction of the Khwarazmian dynasty (see Kara Koyunlu and Ag Qoyunlu), and the largest migration, during the Ottoman Empire (1535–1919). With the conquest of Iraq by Suleiman the Magnificent in 1534, followed by Sultan Murad IV's capture of Baghdad in 1638, a large influx of Turks—predominately from Anatolia—settled down in Iraq. Thus, most of today's Iraqi Turkmen are the descendants of the Ottoman soldiers, traders and civil servants who were brought into Iraq during the rule of the Ottoman Empire.
Young Ottomans
In 1876, the Young Ottomans had their defining moment when Sultan Abdul Hamid II reluctantly promulgated the Ottoman constitution of 1876 (), the first attempt at a constitution in the Ottoman Empire, ushering in the First Constitutional Era. Although this period was short-lived, with Abdul Hamid II ultimately suspending the constitution and parliament in 1878 in favor of a return to absolute monarchy with himself in power, the influence of the Young Ottomans continued until the collapse of the empire. Several decades later, another group of reform-minded Ottomans, the Young Turks, repeated the Young Ottomans' efforts, leading to the Young Turk Revolution in 1908 and the beginning of the Second Constitutional Era.
Decline and modernization of the Ottoman Empire
Establishment of the Ministry of Healthcare ("Tıbbiye Nezareti", 1850); the Commerce and Trade Code (1850); establishment of the Academy of Sciences ("Encümen-i Daniş", 1851); establishment of the "Şirket-i Hayriye" which operated the first steam-powered commuter ferries (1851); the first European style courts ("Meclis-i Ahkam-ı Adliye", 1853) and supreme judiciary council ("Meclis-i Ali-yi Tanzimat", 1853); establishment of the modern Municipality of Istanbul ("Şehremaneti", 1854) and the City Planning Council ("İntizam-ı Şehir Komisyonu", 1855); the abolition of the capitation (Jizya) tax on non-Muslims, with a regular method of establishing and collecting taxes (1856); non-Muslims were allowed to become soldiers (1856); various provisions for the better administration of the public service and advancement of commerce; the establishment of the first telegraph networks (1847–1855) and railways (1856); the replacement of guilds with factories; the establishment of the Ottoman Central Bank (originally established as the "Bank-ı Osmanî" in 1856, and later reorganised as the "Bank-ı Osmanî-i Şahane" in 1863) and the Ottoman Stock Exchange ("Dersaadet Tahvilat Borsası", established in 1866); the Land Code ("Arazi Kanunnamesi", 1857); permission for private sector publishers and printing firms with the "Serbesti-i Kürşad Nizamnamesi" (1857); establishment of the School of Economical and Political Sciences ("Mekteb-i Mülkiye", 1859);
History of the Middle East
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Middle Eastern rulers tried to modernize their states to compete more effectively with Europe. In the Ottoman Empire, the Tanzimat reforms re-invigorated Ottoman rule and were furthered by the Young Ottomans in the late 19th century, leading to the First Constitutional Era in the Empire that included the writing of the 1876 constitution and the establishment of the Ottoman Parliament. The authors of the 1906 revolution in Persia all sought to import versions of the western model of constitutional government, civil law, secular education, and industrial development into their countries. Throughout the region, railways and telegraph lines were constructed, schools and universities were opened, and a new class of army officers, lawyers, teachers, and administrators emerged, challenging the traditional leadership of Islamic scholars.
Ottoman Caliphate
In the nineteenth century the Ottoman Empire initiated a period of modernization known as the Tanzimat, which transformed the nature of the Ottoman state, greatly increasing its power despite the empire's territorial losses. Despite the success of its self-strengthening reforms, the empire was largely unable to match the military strength of its main rival, the Russian Empire, and suffered several defeats in the Russo-Turkish Wars. The Ottoman state defaulted on its loans in 1875–76, part of a wider financial crisis affecting much of the globe.
Turkey
From the second half of the 18th century onwards, the Ottoman Empire began to decline. The Tanzimat reforms of the 19th century, which had been instituted by Mahmud II, were aimed to modernise the Ottoman state in line with the progress that had been made in Western Europe. The efforts of Midhat Pasha during the late Tanzimat era led the Ottoman constitutional movement of 1876, which introduced the First Constitutional Era, but these efforts proved to be inadequate in most fields, and failed to stop the dissolution of the empire. As the empire gradually shrank in size, military power and wealth, especially after the Ottoman economic crisis and default in 1875 which led to uprisings in the Balkan provinces that culminated into the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78, many Balkan Muslims migrated to the Empire's heartland in Anatolia, along with the Circassians fleeing the Russian conquest of the Caucasus. The decline of the Ottoman Empire led to a rise in nationalist sentiment among its various subject peoples, leading to increased ethnic tensions which occasionally burst into violence, such as the Hamidian massacres of Armenians.
Territorial evolution of the Ottoman Empire
The , signed at Jassy (Iaşi) in Moldavia (presently in Romania), was a pact between the Russian and Ottoman Empires ending the Russo-Turkish War of 1787–92 and confirming Russia's increasing dominance in the Black Sea. The treaty was signed on January 9, 1792 by Grand Vizier Yusuf-Pasha and Prince Bezborodko (who had succeeded Prince Potemkin as the head of the Russian delegation when Potemkin died). The treaty recognized Russia's 1783 annexation of the Crimean Khanate and transferred to Russia making the Dniester the Russo-Turkish frontier in Europe, and leaving the Asiatic frontier (Kuban River) to the East.
Taxation in the Ottoman Empire
The restructuring of the tax system was a central goal of the Tanzimat ("ordering") reforms, even though practical implementation remained limited. The reform policies were proclaimed in the 1839 Edict of Gülhane and the Ottoman Reform Edict of 1856 that lead up to the Ottoman constitution of 1876. Faced with the economic, military, and technological superiority of the Western European powers and Russia, the Sublime Porte aimed to centralize and strengthen the administration, while granting formal legal equality and self-administration rights to the members of the Millet confessional communities. In this context, a central goal of the reforms was to expand the tax base and reorganize tax collection, in order to increase government revenue and cover the growing military costs.
Abdulmejid I
Abdülmecid I ( "Abdülmecîd-i evvel"; 23/25 April 182325 June 1861) or Tanzimatçı Sultan Abdülmecid (Sultan Abdülmecid the Reorganizer) due to the Tanzimat reforms he conducted, he is also known as Abdulmejid and similar spellings, was the 31st Sultan of the Ottoman Empire and succeeded his father Mahmud II on 2 July 1839. His reign was notable for the rise of nationalist movements within the empire's territories. Abdulmejid wanted to encourage Ottomanism among the secessionist subject nations and stop the rise of nationalist movements within the empire, but failed to succeed despite trying to integrate non-Muslims and non-Turks more thoroughly into Ottoman society with new laws and reforms. He tried to forge alliances with the major powers of Western Europe, namely the United Kingdom and France, who fought alongside the Ottoman Empire in the Crimean War against Russia. In the following Congress of Paris on 30 March 1856, the Ottoman Empire was officially included among the European family of nations. Abdulmejid's biggest achievement was the announcement and application of the Tanzimat "(reorganization)" reforms which were prepared by his father and effectively started the modernization of the Ottoman Empire in 1839. For this achievement, one of the Imperial anthems of the Ottoman Empire, the March of Abdulmejid, was named after him.
Ottoman dynasty
During much of the Empire's history, the sultan was the absolute regent, head of state, and head of government, though much of the power often shifted to other officials such as the Grand Vizier. During the First (1876–78) and Second Constitutional Eras (1908–20) of the late Empire, a shift to constitutional monarchy was enacted, with the Grand Vizier taking on a prime ministerial role as head of government and heading an elected General Assembly.
Secularism in Turkey
Sultan Selim III founded the first secular military schools by establishing the new military unit, Nizam-ı Cedid, as early as 1792. However the last century (19th century) of the Ottoman Empire had many far reaching reforms. These reforms peaked with the Tanzimat which was the initial reform era of the Ottoman Empire. After the Tanzimat, rules, such as those relating to the equalized status of non-Muslim citizens, the establishment of a parliament, the abandonment of medieval punishments for apostasy, as well as the codification of the constitution of the empire and the rights of Ottoman subjects were established. The First World War brought about the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the subsequent partitioning of the Ottoman Empire by the victorious Allies. Therefore, the Republic of Turkey was actually a nation-state built as a result of an empire lost.
Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire
Europe became dominated by nation states with the rise of nationalism in Europe. The Ottoman Empire was a religious empire. The 19th century saw the rise of nationalism under the Ottoman Empire which resulted in the establishment of an independent Greece in 1821, Serbia in 1835, and Bulgaria in 1877-8. Many of the local Muslims in these countries died during the conflicts and massacres while others fled. Unlike the European nations, the Ottoman Empire made no attempt to integrate conquered peoples through cultural assimilation. The Porte had no official policy of converting the non-Muslims of the Balkans or Anatolia into Islam. Instead, Ottoman policy was to rule through the millet system, constituting of confessional communities for each religion..
Anatolian rug
Around 1300 AD, a group of Turkmen tribes under Suleiman and Ertugrul moved westward. Under Osman I, they founded the Ottoman Empire in northwestern Anatolia; in 1326, the Ottomans conquered Bursa, which became the first capital of the Ottoman state. By the late 15th century, the Ottoman state had become a major power. In 1517, the Egyptian Sultanate of the Mamluks was overthrown in the Ottoman–Mamluk war.
Abdul Hamid II
In any event, like many other would-be reforms of the Ottoman Empire change, it proved to be nearly impossible. Russia continued to mobilize for war. However, everything changed when the British fleet approached the capital from the Sea of Marmara. Early in 1877 the Ottoman Empire went to war with the Russian Empire.
Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire
In July 1908, the Young Turk Revolution changed the political structure of the Empire. The Young Turks rebelled against the absolute rule of Sultan Abdul Hamid II to establish the Second Constitutional Era. On 24 July 1908, Sultan Abdul Hamid II capitulated from his post and restored the Ottoman constitution of 1876.
Ottoman Turkish language
Historically, Ottoman Turkish was transformed in three eras:In 1928, following the fall of the Ottoman Empire after World War I and the establishment of the Republic of Turkey, widespread language reforms (a part in the greater framework of Atatürk's Reforms) instituted by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk saw the replacement of many Persian and Arabic origin loanwords in the language with their Turkish equivalents. It also saw the replacement of the Perso-Arabic script with the extended Latin alphabet. The changes were meant to encourage the growth of a new variety of written Turkish that more closely reflected the spoken vernacular and to foster a new variety of spoken Turkish that reinforced Turkey's new national identity as being a post-Ottoman state.
Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire
In the end, military losses destroyed the empire. The end came just as Ottoman reforms were having their greatest success. The Young Turk revolution of 1908 had taken real power out of the hands of the Sultan (although the sultanate remained) and put it in the hands of the Committee of Union and Progress.
Rise of the Ottoman Empire
The foundation and rise of the Ottoman Empire is a period of history that started with the emergence of the Ottoman principality in , and ended with the conquest of Constantinople on May 29, 1453. This period witnessed the foundation of a political entity ruled by the Ottoman Dynasty in the northwestern Anatolian region of Bithynia, and its transformation from a small principality on the Byzantine frontier into an empire spanning the Balkans and Anatolia. For this reason, this period in the empire's history has been described as the Proto-Imperial Era. Throughout most of this period, the Ottomans were merely one of many competing states in the region, and relied upon the support of local warlords and vassals to maintain control over their realm. By the middle of the fifteenth century the Ottoman sultans were able to accumulate enough personal power and authority to establish a centralized imperial state, a process which was brought to fruition by Sultan Mehmed II (r. 1451-1481). The conquest of Constantinople in 1453 is seen as the symbolic moment when the emerging Ottoman state shifted from a mere principality into an empire, marking a major turning point in its history.
Ziamet
The Ottoman Empire came into disarray due to problems asserting "central government control" during the 16th and 17th centuries. They needed a way to reassert their military might. Ziamets of Ottoman cavalry were enlarged and turned over to a smaller number of owners, with a longer tenure. Thus, authority in provincial areas turned to police authority as local administrations dissolved, and ziamets were converted into tax-farms or iqta. This conversion of ziamets into tax-farms proved to be the first step to growing provincial control in the Ottoman Empire, as economic decline in the empire gave these stronger provincial governors the chance to assert power.[3]
Socioeconomics of the Ottoman reformation era
Then on Friday, May 9, 1873 disaster struck. The Vienna stock market crashed, triggering the Long Depression. The money and loans from abroad stopped pouring into Istanbul and the government entered a financial crisis. Unable to deal with this, Sultan Abd-ul-Aziz began to rapidly switch Grand Viziers. Unable to repay foreign loans, the empire was forced to default on them, and ask for assistance from Europe. Finally, the Sultan was deposed. Eventually, Abd-ul-Hamid II was girded with the Sword of Osman.
The Ottoman Empire's geopolitical power had always lain in its European territories, but with the rise of European nationalism in the Balkans, this power began to fade somewhat. Europe saw this fading as a sign of decline, and in the 19th and 20th centuries, it became common to describe the Empire as the "sick man of Europe". This term does not, however, necessarily reflect historical reality. The Europeans viewed the empire as a terminally sick person needing to perish, and yet this parallel was largely a misconception. The empire's actual weakness was the cultural gap, which separated it from the European powers.
Armenians in the Ottoman Empire
The Second Constitutional Era of the Empire began shortly after Sultan Abdülhamid II restored the constitutional monarchy after the 1908 Young Turk Revolution. The period established many political groups. A series of elections during this period resulted in the gradual ascendance of the Committee of Union and Progress's ("CUP") domination in politics. This period also marked the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
Ahmed I's death in 1617 brought his brother to the throne as Mustafa I, the first instance of a sultan succeeding through seniority. However, before long it became apparent that Mustafa was not mentally sound, and he was deposed the following year in favor of Sultan Ahmed's son Osman II, then aged 13. Osman II was an exceptionally energetic ruler, and sought to restore the authority of the Ottoman sultanate over the other factional groups within the empire. This aroused the anger of both the religious establishment as well as the Janissaries and Imperial Cavalry, and relations became particularly strained after the sultan's failed Polish campaign, in which the army felt it had been mistreated. After their return to Istanbul, Osman II announced his desire to perform the pilgrimage to Mecca; in fact this was a plan to recruit a new and more loyal army in Anatolia, out of the bandit-mercenary forces which had taken part in the Celali Rebellions and the Ottomans' wars with the Habsburgs and Safavids. To prevent him from carrying out this plan, the imperial army launched a revolt on May 18, 1622 and two days later, with the approval of the Şeyhülislâm, executed Sultan Osman II. This event, the legally approved regicide of a reigning Ottoman monarch, cemented the empire's transformation from a patrimonial empire into one in which power was shared between various loci of authority.
Ottoman Empire
Throughout Ottoman history, there were many instances in which local governors acted independently, and even in opposition to the ruler. After the Young Turk Revolution of 1908, the Ottoman state became a constitutional monarchy. The sultan no longer had executive powers. A parliament was formed, with representatives chosen from the provinces. The representatives formed the Imperial Government of the Ottoman Empire.
Council of Ministers (Ottoman Empire)
After his death in 1839, the Ottoman Empire entered a period of blatant reformation. With the proclamation of the Hatt-I Serfi of Gulhane and the entrance into what is called the Tanzimat period of the Ottoman history, his son and successor Abdülmecid I followed the reformation path his father set forth.
Decline and modernization of the Ottoman Empire
The military of the Ottoman Empire remained an effective fighting force until the second half of the eighteenth century, when it suffered a catastrophic defeat against Russia in the 1768-74 war. Selim III came to the throne with an ambitious effort in military reforms in 1789. He failed. Selim III was replaced by Mahmud II in 1808 who established martial law of Alemdar Mustafa Pasha. His first task was to ally with the Janissaries in order to break the power of the provincial governors. He then turned on the Janissaries and removed them from power during Auspicious Incident in 1826. Efforts for a new system (1826–1858) began following the Auspicious incident.
History of the Ottoman Empire
In return for British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli's advocacy for restoring the Ottoman territories on the Balkan Peninsula during the Congress of Berlin, Britain assumed the administration of Cyprus in 1878 and later sent troops to Egypt in 1882 with the pretext of helping the Ottoman government to put down the Urabi Revolt; effectively gaining control in both territories (Britain formally annexed the still nominally Ottoman territories of Cyprus and Egypt on 5 November 1914, in response to the Ottoman Empire's decision to enter World War I on the side of the Central Powers.) France, on its part, occupied Tunisia in 1881.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
Murad IV died in 1640, only 29 years old. He was succeeded by his brother Ibrahim, the only remaining male member of the Ottoman dynasty. Like Mustafa I before him, Ibrahim was mentally unstable, and was initially content to leave the government in the hands of Murad IV's last grand vizier, Kemankeş Mustafa Pasha. This lasted only until 1644, when Ibrahim had him executed and replaced by a rival. The following year war between the Ottoman Empire and Venice was sparked by an incident in which Maltese pirates docked on Venetian Crete after attacking an Ottoman ship carrying pilgrims, including the Chief Black Eunuch, to Mecca. The Ottomans quickly overran most of Crete, but were unable to evict the Venetians from the fortress of Heraklion. At sea, the Venetians managed to achieve the upper hand and blockade the Dardanelles, strangling Istanbul's trade and food supply. The subsequent disorder in the capital prompted Ibrahim's deposition in 1648, which was sanctioned by the Janissaries, the "şeyhülislâm," and even Kösem Sultan, his mother. Ibrahim's replacement was his seven-year-old son, who was enthroned as Mehmed IV. The new government in Istanbul thus consisted of the young ruler's grandmother and regent Kösem Sultan and her allies in the Janissary Corps, one of whom was made grand vizier. Despite continued unrest both in Istanbul and the provinces, the blockade of the Dardanelles was successfully broken the following year. Kösem's position was nevertheless under threat from Mehmed IV's mother Turhan Hatice. Upon learning of a plot by Kösem to poison Mehmed IV, Turhan's faction leapt into action and assassinated her in 1651.
Middle Eastern theatre of World War I
On 13 November 1918, the Occupation of Constantinople (present day Istanbul), the capital of the Ottoman Empire, occurred when French troops arrived, followed by British troops the next day. The occupation had two stages: the "de facto" stage from 13 November 1918 to 20 March 1920, and the "de jure" stage from de facto to the days following the Treaty of Lausanne. The occupation of Istanbul, along with the occupation of İzmir, contributed to the establishment of the Turkish national movement and led to the Turkish War of Independence.
Decline and modernization of the Ottoman Empire
In return for British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli's advocacy for restoring the Ottoman territories on the Balkan Peninsula during the Congress of Berlin, Britain assumed the administration of Cyprus in 1878 and later sent troops to Egypt in 1882 with the pretext of helping the Ottoman government to put down the Urabi Revolt; effectively gaining control in both territories (Britain formally annexed the still nominally Ottoman territories of Cyprus and Egypt on 5 November 1914, in response to the Ottoman Empire's decision to enter World War I on the side of the Central Powers.) France, on its part, occupied Tunisia in 1881.
Historiography of the fall of the Ottoman Empire
Many twentieth-century scholars argued that power of the Ottoman Empire began waning after the death of Suleiman the Magnificent in 1566, and without the acquisition of significant new wealth the empire went into decline, a concept known as the Ottoman Decline Thesis. Since the late 1970's, however, historians increasingly came to question the idea of Ottoman decline, and now there is a consensus among academic historians that the Ottoman Empire did not decline.
Young Turk Revolution
The Ottoman general election, 1908 took place during November and December 1908. On 17 December the Committee of Union and Progress, a unionist organization, won a majority in the parliament. The Senate of the Ottoman Empire reconvened for the first time in over 30 years on 17 December 1908 with the living members from the First Constitutional Era. The Chamber of Deputies' first session was on 30 January 1909. These developments caused the gradual creation of a new governing elite. In some communities, such as the Jewish (cf. and Jews in Turkey), reformist groups emulating the Young Turks ousted the conservative ruling elite and replaced them with a new reformist one.
General Assembly of the Ottoman Empire
It was revived 30 years later, on 23 July 1908, with the Second Constitutional Era (as a result of the Young Turk Revolution) which brought substantial reforms and larger participation by political parties. The Second Constitutional Era ended on 11 April 1920, when the General Assembly (Ottoman Parliament) was dissolved by the Allies during the occupation of Constantinople in the aftermath of World War I.
Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire
The Occupation of Constantinople took place in accordance with the Armistice of Mudros, ending the Ottoman participation in World War I. The occupation had two stages: the initial occupation took place from 13 November 1918 to 16 March 1920; from 16 March 1920 – Treaty of Sèvres. 1918 saw the first time Constantinople had changed hands since the Ottoman Turks conquered the Byzantine capital in 1453. An Allied military administration was set up early in December 1918. Hagia Sophia was converted back into a cathedral by the Allied administration, and the building was returned temporarily to the Greek Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch.
Reception of Islam in Early Modern Europe
The history of the Ottoman Empire is intimately connected to the history of Renaissance and Early Modern Europe.
The European Renaissance was significantly triggered by the Fall of Constantinople in 1453 (resulting in a wave of Byzantine scholars fleeing to Italy). The Ottoman Empire reached its historical apogee in 1566, coinciding with the beginning of the scientific revolution in Europe, which would lead to the political dominance of emerging modern Europe over the course of the following century.
Postage stamps and postal history of Turkey
The Ottoman Empire signed the secret Ottoman-German Alliance on August 2, 1914, and entered hostilities on the side of the Central Powers in October 1914. The war and its disruptions are reflected in Ottoman's stamps issued during the war, which included stamps depicting soldiers and battle scenes, a number of provisional stamp issues in which available stocks of older issues were overprinted due to paper shortages, and stamps issued to collect a tax for war orphans. Remainders of stamps as old as 1865 were overprinted, some of which already had overprints, and sometimes multiple new overprints were added, resulting in a complex variety of configurations of interest to philatelists. The Allied Forces were victorious and occupied Constantinople, after which the Ottoman government collapsed. The Treaty of Sèvres, August 10, 1920 confirmed the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire.
Military of the Ottoman Empire
The shift from Classical Army (1451–1606) took more than a century beginning from failed attempts of Selim III (1789) to a period of Ottoman military reforms (1826–1858) and finally Abdulhamid II. Abdulhamid II, as early as 1880 sought, and two years later secured, German assistance, which culminated in the appointment of Lt. Col. Kohler. However. Although the consensus that Abdulhamid favored the modernization of the Ottoman army and the professionalization of the officer corps was fairly general, it seems that he neglected the military during the last fifteen years of his reign, and he also cut down the military budget. The formation of Ottoman Modern Army was a slow process with ups and downs.
Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire
The Empire lost territory in the Balkans, where many of its Christian voters were based before the 1914 elections. The CUP made efforts to win support in the Arab provinces by making conciliatory gestures to Arab leaders. Weakened Arab support for the LU and enabled the CUP to call elections with unionists holding the upper hand. After 1914 elections, the democratic structure had a better representation in the parliament; the parliament that emerged from the elections in 1914 reflected better ethnic composition of the Ottoman population There were more Arab deputies, which were under-represented in previous parliaments. The CUP had a majority government. The Ottoman imperial government was established in January 1914. Ismail Enver became a Pasha and was assigned as the Minister of War; Ahmet Cemal who was the military governor of Istanbul became Minister for the Navy; and once a postal official Talaat became the Minister of the Interior. These Three Pashas would maintain "de facto" control of the Empire as a military regime and almost as a personal dictatorship under Enver Pasha during the World War I. Until the Ottoman general election, 1919, any other input into the political process was restricted with the outbreak of the World War I. The 1914 Burdur earthquake occurred on 4 October 1914.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
This period also witnessed the flowering of the literary genre known as "Advice for Kings" ("nasihatname"). Literary works of this nature were written to address the struggles which the state was experiencing, and to advise the ruler on how to properly solve them. Advice writers frequently alluded to the reign of Sultan Suleiman I (1520–1566) as the ideal model which contemporary rulers should seek to emulate. Writers who portrayed the empire as being in decline from a previous golden age were often motivated to do so by class or factional interests, as they often came from or were influenced by groups who had been disenfranchised by the empire's reforms, such as the timariots, or otherwise felt personal indignation toward the state as a result of failing to achieve career advancement, indicating a clear bias in their writings. Historians had once accepted these writers' description of Ottoman decline as fact, and thus portrayed the Ottoman Empire as entering a period of decline after the death of Suleiman the Magnificent, a view which has come to be known as the Ottoman Decline Thesis. However, since the 1980s, due to a reexamination of the "nasihatname" literature as well as countless other facets of Ottoman civilization, historians have achieved a consensus that in fact no such decline occurred, and thus the notion of the "Decline of the Ottoman Empire" was a myth.
Ottoman coups of 1807–08
The Ottoman Empire was in decline by the early 19th century, and had lost much of the territory it had ruled over only a century earlier. However, the threat of the conservative, traditionalist Janissaries, the sultan's elite troops, prevented reforms from being enacted by more liberal rulers. In 1789, Sultan Abdulhamid I died, and his nephew Selim III, the son of Abdulhamid's predecessor, ascended to the throne. Selim, a composer of some talent as well as an advocate of modernization, was inspired to a certain degree by the French Revolution, his efforts at Westernization culminating with a levy for new regular troops in 1805. The reforms, particularly the levy, angered the Janissaries and other conservative elements, who rose up and killed leading reform advocates.
Atatürk's Reforms
Historically, Atatürk's reforms follow the Ottoman Empire's Tanzimât period, meaning "reorganization", that began in 1839 and ended with the First Constitutional Era in 1876, as well as the various efforts of secularization, democratization, and modernization during the Second Constitutional Era from 1908 to 1913.
Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire
Instead, this period became the story of the twilight struggle of the Empire. Ottoman military reforms resulted in the Ottoman Army engaging in the Italo-Turkish War (1911–12), the Balkan Wars (1912–13), and the continuous unrest caused by the Ottoman counter-coup of 1909, which preceded the 31 March Incident (Restoration, 1909) and 1912 Ottoman coup d'état ("Saviours") and the 1913 Ottoman coup d'état in the Empire up to World War I. The Ottoman entry into World War I in the Middle Eastern theatre ended with the partition of the Ottoman Empire under the terms of the Treaty of Sèvres. This treaty, as designed in the conference of London, gave a nominal land and permitted the title Ottoman Caliphate (compared with Vatican; a sacerdotal-monarchical state ruled by the Catholic Pope), not to be a further threat but just powerful enough to protect Britain from the Khilafat Movement.
Imperial Government (Ottoman Empire)
The Imperial Government of the Ottoman Empire was the government structure added to the Ottoman governing structure during the Second Constitutional Era. The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) was in power between 1908 and 1918. In this period, most of the ministers were also from the CUP.
Sandžak
The Serbian Despotate was conquered by the Ottoman Empire in 1455. During the Ottoman rule, many inhabitants converted to Islam. The conversions were caused by number of factors, mainly economic as Muslims paid lower taxes. The Muslims were also privileged compared to Christians, who were unable to work in the administration or testify in court against Muslims. The second factor that contributed to the Islamisation were migrations. A large demographic shift occurred as Serbs fought several wars against the Ottoman Empire. The Turks drove the Christian population northwards, while Muslims were driven to the Ottoman territory. The land abandoned by the Serbs was settled by Muslims, mainly ethnic Serbs who confessed Islam and Turks, but also significant population from the Caucasus, the Middle East and the Asia Minor. Large migrations occurred throughout the 18th and 19th century. The third factor of Islamisation was the geographical location of Sandžak, which allowed it to become a trade centre, facilitating conversions amongst merchants.
Territorial state
The Ottoman Empire was one of the most dangerous military forces in the 16th and 17th century, this Islamic empire who's roots are traced back to small Anatolian provinces, became an empire spanning Europe and the Arabic world. The Ottoman Empire in 1453 conquered Constantinople making the city their new capital and renaming it Istanbul. The Ottoman Empire developed and extensively used artillery, handheld cannons/firearms, and gun carriages to aid their horsemen in conquering most of Southeastern Europe and most Arabic states throughout the Middle East, and North Africa.
Territorial evolution of the Ottoman Empire
The Italo-Turkish or (also known in Italy as "guerra di Libia", "the Libyan war", and in Turkey as "Trablusgarp Savaşı") was fought between the Ottoman Empire and Italy from September 29, 1911 to October 18, 1912. Italy seized the Ottoman provinces of and , together forming what became known as Libya. Following the First Balkan War, the Autonomous Principality of Samos, an Ottoman tributary state, was annexed to Greece in November 1912. Bulgaria was lost to the Ottomans after more than 500 years of continuous rule. See figure, right.
Territorial evolution of the Ottoman Empire
Selim I (Ottoman Turkish: سليم اوّل, Modern Turkish: "I. Selim") also known as "the Grim" or "the Brave", or the best translation "the Stern", "Yavuz" in Turkish, the long name is "Yavuz Sultan Selim"; (1470/1 – September 22, 1520) was the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1512 to 1520.
List of modern great powers
The Ottoman Empire was a Turkic state, which at the height of its power (16th–17th centuries) spanned three continents (see: extent of Ottoman territories) controlling much of Southeastern Europe, the Middle East and most of North Africa. The empire has been called by historians a "Universal Empire" due to both Roman and Islamic traditions.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman bureaucracy ("mālīye") expanded dramatically both with regard to size and range of activity. While only 38 salaried scribes were serving in 1549, by 1593 this number had increased to 183. As the Timar System was phased out of use, tax revenues which had once been distributed locally to the empire's army of feudal cavalry were now remitted to Istanbul, either through direct collection ("emānet") or through tax farming ("iltizām"). A larger bureaucracy was thus needed in order to cope with the empire's increasingly centralized fiscal system. Bureaucratic organization was diversified, with new branches being formed and scribal duties increasingly specialized. The high quality of the Ottoman bureaucracy was underpinned by stringent standards of scribal recruitment. By the early seventeenth century the bureaucracy was moved out of its original location in Topkapı Palace, indicating that it was becoming independent of the sultan's household. It thus became a stabilizing influence for the empire; while sultans and viziers rose and fell, the bureaucracy remained in place, providing cohesion and continuity to imperial administration.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
While in 1550 the Ottoman Empire was a patrimonial state in which all power was held exclusively by the sultan, by 1700 it had experienced a political transformation whereby the sultan's monopoly on power was replaced with a multi-polar system in which political power was informally shared among many different individuals and factions. This process came about gradually, and was not unopposed. Certain rulers, such as Osman II and Murad IV, sought to reverse this trend and reestablish absolute power for themselves. For his efforts, Osman II became the victim of regicide in 1622, the significance of which one historian has compared to the 1649 regicide of Charles I of England.
Ottoman Empire
Turkic peoples practiced a variety of shamanism before adopting Islam. Abbasid influence in Central Asia was ensured through a process that was greatly facilitated by the Muslim conquest of Transoxiana. Many of the various Turkic tribes—including the Oghuz Turks, who were the ancestors of both the Seljuks and the Ottomans—gradually converted to Islam, and brought the religion with them to Anatolia beginning in the 11th century.
History of Istanbul
The city, known alternatively in Ottoman Turkish as "Ḳosṭanṭīnīye" ( after the Arabic form ) or Istanbul (while its Christian minorities continued to name it Constantinople), was the capital of the Ottoman Empire from its conquest in 1453 until the empire's collapse in 1922.
History of liberalism
In the Ottoman Empire, to secure its territorial integrity against internal nationalist movements and external aggressive powers, the Empire launched a series of reforms. This period is called Tanzimat (reorganization). Although liberal ministers and intellectuals tried to influence the reforms, the motives for the implementation of Tanzimât were bureaucratic. These changes were made to improve civil liberties. However, the reformist ideas and trends of the Nahda and Tanzimat didn't reach the common population successfully, as the books, periodicals, and newspapers were accessible primarily to intellectuals and segments of an emerging middle class, while many Muslims saw them as foreign influences on the world of Islam. That perception complicated reformist efforts made by Middle Eastern states. A policy called Ottomanism was meant to unite all the different peoples living in Ottoman territories, "Muslim and non-Muslim, Turkish and Greek, Armenian and Jewish, Kurd and Arab". The policy officially began with the Edict of Gülhane of 1839, declaring equality before the law for both Muslim and non-Muslim Ottomans.
In 1865, a group of Ottoman Turkish intellectuals, who were dissatisfied with the Tanzimat reforms in the Ottoman Empire, established a secret society called the Young Ottomans. They believed the reforms did not go far enough and wanted to end the autocracy in the empire. They sought to transform Ottoman society by preserving the empire and modernizing it along European lines, adopting a constitutional government. Though the Young Ottomans were frequently in disagreement ideologically, they all agreed that the new constitutional government should continue to be somewhat rooted in Islam to emphasize "the continuing and essential validity of Islam as the basis of Ottoman political culture." However, they syncretize Islamic idealism with modern liberalism and parliamentary democracy; to them the European parliamentary liberalism was a model to follow, in accordance with the tenets of Islam. They "attempted to reconcile Islamic concepts of government with the ideas of Montesquieu, Danton, Rousseau, and contemporary European Scholars and statesmen."
Decline and modernization of the Ottoman Empire
The Congress of Berlin (13 June – 13 July 1878) was a meeting of the leading statesmen of Europe's Great Powers and the Ottoman Empire. In the wake of the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878) that ended with a decisive victory for Russia and her Orthodox Christian allies (subjects of the Ottoman Empire before the war) in the Balkan Peninsula, the urgent need was to stabilise and reorganise the Balkans, and set up new nations. German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, who led the Congress, undertook to adjust boundaries to minimise the risks of major war, while recognising the reduced power of the Ottomans, and balance the distinct interests of the great powers.
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire, or as a dynastic institution, the House of Osman, was unprecedented and unequaled in the Islamic world for its size and duration. In Europe, only the House of Habsburg had a similarly unbroken line of sovereigns (kings/emperors) from the same family who ruled for so long, and during the same period, between the late 13th and early 20th centuries. The Ottoman dynasty was Turkish in origin. On eleven occasions, the sultan was deposed (replaced by another sultan of the Ottoman dynasty, who were either the former sultan's brother, son or nephew) because he was perceived by his enemies as a threat to the state. There were only two attempts in Ottoman history to unseat the ruling Ottoman dynasty, both failures, which suggests a political system that for an extended period was able to manage its revolutions without unnecessary instability. As such, the last Ottoman sultan Mehmed VI (r. 1918–1922) was a direct patrilineal (male-line) descendant of the first Ottoman sultan Osman I (d. 1323/4), which was unparallelled in both Europe (e.g. the male line of the House of Habsburg became extinct in 1740) and in the Islamic world. The primary purpose of the Imperial Harem was to ensure the birth of male heirs to the Ottoman throne and secure the continuation of the direct patrilineal (male-line) descendance of the Ottoman sultans.
Forced conversion
A form of forced conversion became institutionalized during the Ottoman Empire in the practice of devşirme, a human levy in which Christian boys were seized and collected from their families (usually in the Balkans), enslaved, converted to Islam, and then trained as elite military unit within the Ottoman army or for high-ranking service to the sultan. From the mid to late 14th, through early 18th centuries, the devşirme–janissary system enslaved an estimated 500,000 to one million non–Muslim adolescent males. These boys would attain a great education and high social standing after their training and conversion.
Economic history of the Ottoman Empire
The Economic history of the Ottoman Empire covers the period 1299–1923. Trade, agriculture, transportation, and religion make up the Ottoman Empire's economy. The economy is explained in this Wikipedia page.
Abolition of the Ottoman sultanate
The abolition of the Ottoman Sultanate by the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (GNAT) on 1 November 1922 ended the Ottoman Empire, which had lasted since 1299. On 11 November 1922, at the Conference of Lausanne, the sovereignty of the GNAT exercised by the Government in Ankara over Turkey was recognized. The last sultan, Mehmed VI, departed the Ottoman capital, Constantinople, on 17 November 1922. The legal position was solidified with the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne on 24 July 1923.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
In 1656 the Venetians seized control over the islands of Lemnos and Tenedos, and established another blockade of the Dardanelles. This action led to panic in Istanbul and prompted a renewed political crisis. In need of a change of policy, Turhan Hatice appointed the highly experienced Köprülü Mehmed Pasha as grand vizier, who immediately set forth on a drastic process of reform. This involved the dismissal or execution of all officials deemed corrupt, and their replacement with men loyal to the vizier. While wintering in Edirne after leading a successful campaign to reconquer the islands, Köprülü extended his purge to the imperial cavalry, executing thousands of soldiers who showed any sign of disloyalty. This move prompted a serious reaction, and as Köprülü led the army in a campaign against Transylvania, many of the empire's eastern governors first refused to join him, then launched an open revolt under the leadership of Abaza Hasan Pasha, demanding from the sultan that Köprülü be executed. Mehmed IV, now no longer a minor, chose to side with his vizier and dispatched an army to defeat the rebels. Despite initial rebel victories, the revolt was suddenly brought to an end in February 1659 with the assassination of Abaza Hasan.
Ottoman Iraq
Ottoman Iraq refers to the period of the history of Iraq when the region was ruled by the Ottoman Empire (1534–1704 and 1831–1920).
Before reforms (1534–1704), Iraq was divided into four eyalets (provinces):
Istanbul
Sultan Abdul Hamid II was deposed with the Young Turk Revolution in 1908 and the Ottoman Parliament, closed since 14 February 1878, was reopened 30 years later on 23 July 1908, which marked the beginning of the Second Constitutional Era. A series of wars in the early 20th century, such as the Italo-Turkish War (1911–1912) and the Balkan Wars (1912–1913), plagued the ailing empire's capital and resulted in the 1913 Ottoman coup d'état, which brought the regime of the Three Pashas.
Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire
The Turkish War of Independence ended with the Turkish nationalists in control of much of Anatolia. On 1 November 1922 the Turkish provisional government formally declared the Ottoman Sultanate and, with it, the Ottoman Empire to be abolished. Mehmed VI departed Constantinople and into exile on 17 November 1922. The Allies and Turks met in Lausanne, Switzerland to discuss a replacement for the unratified Treaty of Sèvres.
Ottoman wars in Europe
World War I (1914–1918) became the ultimate cause of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, which formally ended in 1922. However, during wartime operations the Empire prevented the British Royal Navy from reaching Constantinople, stopping an Entente invasion in the Battle of Gallipoli (1915–1916). Nevertheless, under the provisions of the Treaty of Lausanne (1923) the Empire ultimately fell.
Ottoman decline thesis
The Ottoman decline thesis or Ottoman decline paradigm () refers to a now-obsolete historical narrative which once played a dominant role in the study of the history of the Ottoman Empire. According to the decline thesis, following a golden age associated with the reign of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent (r. 1520–1566), the empire gradually entered into a period of all-encompassing stagnation and decline from which it was never able to recover, lasting until the empire's dissolution in 1923. This thesis was used throughout most of the twentieth century as the basis of both Western and Republican Turkish understanding of Ottoman history. However, by 1978, historians had begun to reexamine the fundamental assumptions of the decline thesis. After the publication of numerous new studies throughout the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, and the reexamination of Ottoman history through the use of previously untapped sources and methodologies, academic historians of the Ottoman Empire achieved a consensus that the entire notion of Ottoman decline was a myth – that in fact, the Ottoman Empire did not stagnate or decline at all, but rather continued to be a vigorous and dynamic state long after the death of Suleiman the Magnificent. The decline thesis has been criticized as "teleological", "regressive", "Orientalist", "simplistic", and "one-dimensional", and described as "a concept which has no place in historical analysis". Scholars have thus "learned better than to discuss [it]."
Landing at Cape Helles
At the beginning of the 20th century, the Ottoman Empire was called the sick man of Europe; weakened by political instability, military defeat and civil strife following a century of decline. Power had been seized in 1908 by a group of young officers, known as the Young Turks, who installed Mehmed V as a figurehead Sultan. The new regime implemented a program of reform to modernise the political and economic system and redefine the national character of the empire. Germany provided significant investment and its diplomats gained more influence at British expense, previously the predominant power in the region and German officers assisted in training and re-equipping the army. Despite this support, the economic resources of the empire were depleted by the cost of the First and Second Balkan Wars and the French, British and Germans offered financial aid. A pro-German faction influenced by Enver Pasha, the former Ottoman military attaché in Berlin, opposed the pro-British majority in the Ottoman cabinet and tried to secure closer relations with Germany. In December 1913, the Germans sent a military mission to Constantinople, headed by General Otto Liman von Sanders. The geographic position of the Ottoman Empire meant that its neutrality in the event of a European war was of significant interest to Russia, France and Britain.
History of the Ottoman Empire
In the century after the death of Osman I, Ottoman rule began to extend over the Eastern Mediterranean and the Balkans. Osman's son, Orhan, captured the city of Bursa in 1326 and made it the new capital of the Ottoman state. The fall of Bursa meant the loss of Byzantine control over Northwestern Anatolia. The important city of Thessaloniki was captured from the Venetians in 1387. The Ottoman victory at Kosovo in 1389 effectively marked the end of Serbian power in the region, paving the way for Ottoman expansion into Europe. The Battle of Nicopolis in 1396, widely regarded as the last large-scale crusade of the Middle Ages, failed to stop the advance of the victorious Ottoman Turks. With the extension of Turkish dominion into the Balkans, the strategic conquest of Constantinople became a crucial objective. The Empire controlled nearly all former Byzantine lands surrounding the city, but the Byzantines were temporarily relieved when Timur invaded Anatolia in the Battle of Ankara in 1402. He took Sultan Bayezid I as a prisoner. The capture of Bayezid I threw the Turks into disorder. The state fell into a civil war that lasted from 1402 to 1413, as Bayezid's sons fought over succession. It ended when Mehmed I emerged as the sultan and restored Ottoman power, bringing an end to the Interregnum.
Territorial evolution of the Ottoman Empire
Mehmet II (Ottoman Turkish: محمد الثانى Meḥmed-i sānī, ), (also known as "el-Fatih" (الفاتح), "the Conqueror", in Ottoman Turkish), or, in modern Turkish, "Fatih Sultan Mehmet") (March 30, 1432, Edirne  – May 3, 1481, Hünkârcayırı, near Gebze) was Sultan of the Ottoman Empire (Rûm until the conquest) for a short time from 1444 to September 1446, and later from February 1451 to 1481. At the age of 21, he conquered Constantinople (on Tuesday, 29 May 1453), bringing an end to the Byzantine Empire.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
Köprülü Mehmed died in 1661, leaving the empire in a much better military and financial position than he had found it. He was succeeded in office by his son Fazıl Ahmed Pasha (1661–1676), the first time in history that a grand vizier passed on the office to his son. Fazıl Ahmed was himself succeeded by his adopted brother Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Pasha (1676–1683), and it is due to this unbroken control of the Köprülü family over the office of grand vizier that this period is referred to as the Köprülü era.
Ottoman Turks
The Ottoman Turks (or Osmanlı Turks, ) were the Turkish-speaking population of the Ottoman Empire who formed the base of the state's military and ruling classes. Reliable information about the early history of Ottoman Turks is scarce, but they take their Turkish name, "Osmanlı" ("Osman" being corrupted in some European languages as "Ottoman"), from the house of Osman I (reigned ca. 1299–1326), the founder of the dynasty that ruled the Ottoman Empire for its entire 624 years. After the expansion from its home in Bithynia, the Ottoman principality began incorporating other Turkish-speaking Muslims and non-Turkish Christians, becoming the Ottoman Turks and ultimately the Turks of the present. The Ottoman Turks blocked all land routes to Europe by conquering the city of Constantinople, the capital city of the Byzantine–East Roman Empire, and Europeans had to find other ways to trade with Eastern countries.
Decline and modernization of the Ottoman Empire
In 1856, the "Hatt-ı Hümayun" promised equality for all Ottoman citizens regardless of their ethnicity and religious confession; which thus widened the scope of the 1839 "Hatt-ı Şerif" of Gülhane. Overall, the Tanzimat reforms had far-reaching effects. Those educated in the schools established during the Tanzimat period included Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and other progressive leaders and thinkers of the Republic of Turkey and of many other former Ottoman states in the Balkans, the Middle East and North Africa. These reforms included guarantees to ensure the Ottoman subjects perfect security for their lives, honour and property;
European Union–Turkey relations
After the Ottoman Empire's collapse following World War I, Turkish revolutionaries led by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk emerged victorious in the Turkish War of Independence, establishing the modern Turkish Republic as it exists today. Atatürk, President of Turkey, implemented a series of reforms, including secularisation and industrialisation, intended to "Europeanise" or Westernise the country. During World War II, Turkey remained neutral until February 1945, when it joined the Allies. The country took part in the Marshall Plan of 1947, became a member of the Council of Europe in 1949, and a member of NATO in 1952. During the Cold War, Turkey allied itself with the United States and Western Europe. The Turkish expert Meltem Ahıska outlines the Turkish position vis-à-vis Europe, explaining how “Europe has been an object of desire as well as a source of frustration for Turkish national identity in a long and strained history”.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
At the end of each year the Ottoman government produced a comprehensive balance-sheet depicting its revenues and expenses, giving historians a window through which to view their finances. Ottoman government income grew from 183 million akçe in 1560 to 581 million in 1660, an increase of 217%. However, this growth did not keep pace with inflation, and consequently the Ottomans experienced budgetary deficits throughout most of the seventeenth century, by an average of 14% but with much wider margins during wartime. The province of Egypt played a major role in making up the difference. Each year, after covering local expenses, that province submitted its surplus revenue directly to Istanbul. Egypt was particularly rich, and it provided approximately 72 million akçe annually, allowing the central government to meet its financial obligations. By the end of the seventeenth century, and largely a result of reforms carried out during the War of the Holy League, the central government's income had grown to 1 billion akçe, and continued to grow at an even more dramatic pace during the following period, now far outstripping inflation.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
Subsequently, the Ottomans resumed warfare with the Safavids in the Ottoman–Safavid War of 1578–90, conquering Georgia, Azerbaijan, and western Iran. In 1593 a frontier incident led to the renewal of warfare with Habsburg Austria in the Long War (1593–1606), in which neither side was able to achieve decisive victory. The Ottomans briefly held Győr (Yanık, 1594-8), but lost control of Novigrad (1594), exposing Buda to attacks from the north. By the end of the war the Ottomans had conquered the strategic fortresses of Eger (Eğri, 1596) and Nagykanizsa (Kanije, 1600). The Safavids took advantage of Ottoman distraction in the west to reverse all of their recent gains in the east in the Ottoman–Safavid War of 1603–18. After the turmoil of Osman II's regicide, the Safavids also seized Baghdad and much of Iraq in 1623, holding it until 1638, after which the border of the 1555 Treaty of Amasya was re-established. While they were occupied with the Safavid wars, an ongoing revolt of the local Zaydi Shi'ites of Yemen finally forced the Ottomans to abandon that province in 1636. The province of Lahsa in eastern Arabia also suffered from perpetual rebellion and tribal resistance to Ottoman rule, and was abandoned in 1670.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
Significant in this process of transformation were several changes in the nature of succession to the throne. At the outset of this period, Ottoman princes took up posts in the Anatolian provincial government upon reaching the age of maturity. However, Mehmed III (r. 1595–1603) died before any of his sons came of age. Ahmed I was thus enthroned as a minor, and subsequently princes were no longer sent to the provinces to govern. While the motivation behind this change cannot be known for certain, it may have been a method of preventing the type of fratricidal civil war experienced in the last years of the reign of Suleiman I. Just as princely government was abandoned, so too did the practice of royal fratricide, which had been enforced since the time of Mehmed II, fall out of use. This seems to have been a reaction to the unusually gruesome fratricides occasioned by the enthronements of Murad III and Mehmed III, in which dozens of infants and young boys were killed. The result was that the whole imperial family collectively remained in Istanbul, and sultans allowed their brothers to live in the harem undisturbed. The ultimate consequence of this was a change in the order of succession; upon his death in 1617 Ahmed I was succeeded not by one of his sons, but by his brother Mustafa I. Henceforth the general principle of Ottoman succession would be that of seniority rather than patrilineality. However, in practice this meant that sovereignty came to be viewed as something vested in the Ottoman dynasty as a whole rather than in a particular member, making the individual sultan replaceable.
History of the Ottoman Empire
The reformist period peaked with the Constitution, called the "Kanûn-u Esâsî" (meaning "Basic Law" in Ottoman Turkish), written by members of the Young Ottomans, which was promulgated on 23 November 1876. It established the freedom of belief and equality of all citizens before the law. The empire's First Constitutional era, was short-lived. But the idea of Ottomanism proved influential. A group of reformers known as the Young Ottomans, primarily educated in Western universities, believed that a constitutional monarchy would give an answer to the empire's growing social unrest. Through a military coup in 1876, they forced Sultan Abdülaziz (1861–1876) to abdicate in favour of Murad V. However, Murad V was mentally ill and was deposed within a few months. His heir-apparent, Abdülhamid II (1876–1909), was invited to assume power on the condition that he would declare a constitutional monarchy, which he did on 23 November 1876. The parliament survived for only two years before the sultan suspended it. When forced to reconvene it, he abolished the representative body instead. This ended the effectiveness of the "Kanûn-ı Esâsî".
Classical Age of the Ottoman Empire
The Classical Age of the Ottoman Empire () concerns the history of the Ottoman Empire from the Conquest of Constantinople in 1453 until the second half of the sixteenth century, roughly the end of the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent (r. 1520-1566). During this period a system of patrimonial rule based on the absolute authority of the sultan reached its apex, and the empire developed the institutional foundations which it would maintain, in modified form, for several centuries. The territory of the Ottoman Empire greatly expanded, and led to what some historians have called the "Pax Ottomana". The process of centralization undergone by the empire prior to 1453 was brought to completion in the reign of Mehmed II.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
In Ottoman Europe this period witnessed a major shift in religious demographics. Many of the cities and towns of the Balkans and Hungary became majority Muslim, including Buda, the former capital of the Kingdom of Hungary. In the Balkan countryside the rate of conversion to Islam gradually increased until reaching a peak in the late seventeenth century, particularly affecting regions such as Albania and eastern Bulgaria.
Ottomanism
The major precursors to Ottomanism were the Reformation Edict of 1856, which promised full equality regardless of religion, and the Ottoman Nationality Law of 1869, which created a common Ottoman citizenship irrespective of religious or ethnic affiliation. Ottomanism was rejected by many in the non-Muslim "millets" and by many Muslims. To the former, it was perceived as a step towards dismantling their traditional privileges. Meanwhile, the Muslims saw it as the elimination of their own superior position. There were claims that Ottomanism was a reaction to the "Tanzimat", the era of intensive restructuring of the Ottoman Empire by the bureaucratic elite. The inauguration of the Ottoman Parliament contributed to the spirit of reform as all millets were represented in this bicameral assembly.
Mehmet Fuat Köprülü
In 1933, Fuat Köprülü became a professor ordinarius, a title denoting a professor of the highest rank in Turkey. In 1935, he delivered a series of influential lectures at the University of Paris (Sorbonne) on the origins of the Ottoman Empire. Fuat Köprülü argued that ethnic Turks formed the Ottoman Empire using Seljuk and Ilhanid administrative traditions, and he discredited the prevailing view among Western scholars that the Ottoman Empire was formed by a race of predominantly Greek and Slavic converts to Islam.
Abolition of the Ottoman sultanate
Greek, Bulgarian and Serb subjects left the empire during the decline and modernization of the Ottoman Empire (1828–1908), while the Albanian and Armenian (Armenian national movement and First Republic of Armenia) subjects left or were killed during Defeat and dissolution of the Ottoman Empire (1908–1922). By 1922 most of the remaining inhabitants of Turkey were Muslims of either Turkish or Kurdish ethnicity. The Grand National Assembly of Turkey declared itself the Republic of Turkey on 29 October 1923.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
In comparison with earlier periods of Ottoman history, the empire's territory remained relatively stable, stretching from Algeria in the west to Iraq in the east, and from Arabia in the south to Hungary in the north. The pace of expansion slowed during the second half of the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent (1520–66), as the Ottomans sought to consolidate the vast conquests carried out between 1514 and 1541, but did not come to an end. After making peace with Austria in 1568, the Ottomans launched the 1570–73 Ottoman-Venetian War, conquering Cyprus and most of Dalmatia. A naval campaign led to the capture of Tunis from the Spanish in 1574, and a truce was signed in 1580.
British Turks
Ottoman Turkish migration continued after the Anglo-Ottoman Treaty of 1799. In the years 1820-22, the Ottoman Empire exported goods worth £650,000 to the United Kingdom. By 1836-38, that figure had reached £1,729,000 with many Ottoman merchants entering the country. In 1839, the Ottoman Tanzimat reform movement began. This period saw rapid changes in Ottoman administration including numerous high-ranking officials receiving their higher education and postings in the Western nations. Rashid Pasha (1800–1858) served as the Ottoman ambassador to Paris and London in the 1830s. One of his disciples and future grand vizier of the Ottoman Empire, Ali Pasha (1815–1871), also served as ambassador to London in the 1840s. Fuad Pasha (1815–1869), also received appointment at the Ottoman London embassy before rising in public office in his own nation.
Territorial evolution of the Ottoman Empire
Selim carried the empire to the leadership of the Sunni branch of Islam by his conquest of the Middle East. He represents a sudden change in the expansion policy of the empire, which was working mostly against the West and the Beyliks before his reign. On the eve of his death in 1520, the Ottoman empire spanned almost (trebling during Selim's reign). These included few dependent, vassal states as like Walachia from 1396, Crimea Khanate from 1475, Moldavia from 1501
and Algeria from 1520.
Armenian nationalism
The situation of the non-Muslim minorities within the Ottoman Empire changed substantially as a result of reforms introduced during the Tanzimat era. The early reforms were generally addressed at changing the organisation of, and systems within, the Ottoman Empire as a whole. However, as a result of diplomatic pressures exerted by the Great Powers that had supported the Ottoman Empire against Russia during the Crimean War, in 1856 reforms were made that sought to give non-Muslims citizens of the Ottoman Empire the same rights as Muslim citizens. The capitation tax on non-Muslims was abolished, non-Muslims were allowed to become soldiers, and schools for the non-Muslim communities were allowed to open.
Ottoman entry into World War I
Myriad Ottoman military reforms paved the way for the transformation of the Ottoman Classical Army into the Ottoman Modern Army that would see the combat of the First World War. During this period the Ottoman Army faced many challenges including the Italo-Turkish War (1911), the Balkan Wars (1912–13), unrest on the periphery (such as in the Yemen Vilayet and the Hauran Druze Rebellion), and continuous political unrest in the empire: the 1909 counter coup had been followed by a restoration, and then another coup d'état in 1912, which was followed by a raid on the Sublime Porte in 1913. Thus, at the onset of the First World War, the Ottoman Army had already been involved in continuous fighting for the previous three years.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
Trade along the maritime routs of the Black Sea was severely disrupted from the late sixteenth century by the extensive raiding activity of the Zaporozhian Cossacks, who attacked towns along the Anatolian and Bulgarian coasts, and even established bases in the mouth of the Danube in order to plunder its shipping. Likewise, merchant vessels at sea frequently became targets for the Cossacks. After the outbreak of the Khmelnytsky Rebellion in 1648 Cossack activity reduced in intensity, but remained an issue of critical importance for the Ottoman government.
European merchants active in the Ottoman Empire are by far the most highly studied aspect of Ottoman commerce, a fact which has frequently caused their importance to be exaggerated. European merchants were by no means dominant in the empire during this period, and far from imposing their will upon the Ottomans, they were required to accommodate themselves to the terms which the Ottomans set for them. These terms were defined in a series of trade agreements known as the "capitulations" (), which granted Europeans the right to establish mercantile communities in specified Ottoman ports and to pay a lower rate of tariff on their goods. European communities were except from regular taxation and were given judicial autonomy with regard to personal and family issues. All commercial disputes were to be settled in the empire's Sharia courts, until the 1670s when they were granted the right to appeal major cases directly to Istanbul, where they could be argued by their resident ambassadors. Capitulations were granted first to the French (1569), then the English (1580), and finally to the Dutch (1612). The arrival of Western European traders in the Levant, dubbed the "Northern Invasion", did not result in their takeover or domination of Mediterranean commerce, but it did usher in certain changes. Venice in particular suffered from heavy competition, and its commercial presence declined significantly, particularly after 1645, when the Ottomans and Venetians went to war over Crete. The English were by far the most successful European merchants in the empire during the seventeenth century, and they benefited from friendly relations between the two states. The Ottomans exported raw silk and imported cheap woolen cloth, as well as tin necessary for the production of military armaments.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
While territorial losses to the Habsburgs have at times been cited as evidence of military weakness, more recently historians have challenged this notion, arguing that Ottoman defeats were primarily a result of the sheer size of the coalition arrayed against them, and the logistical burden of fighting a war on multiple fronts. To this may be added political instability, for the empire's greatest losses took place from 1684–8, when its political leadership was paralyzed first by the execution of Kara Mustafa Pasha and then the deposition of Mehmed IV. Subsequently, the Ottomans were able to stabilize their position and reverse Habsburg gains south of the Danube.
Transformation of the Ottoman Empire
Perhaps the most significant economic transformation of this period was the monetization of the economy and subsequent transformation of the feudal Timar System. Over the course of the sixteenth century, coinage came to play a much larger role in the Ottoman rural economy, with tax payments in cash coming to replace payments in kind. As the Ottoman population expanded, the volume of trade grew and new regional markets appeared across the empire. The Timar System, which had been designed to take advantage of the smaller scale of the economy in previous centuries, was thus rendered obsolete. Timar fiefs, which were once used to support provincial cavalry forces, were increasingly confiscated by the central government to serve other purposes, a process which has been described as "modernization."
Ottoman Empire
In the century after the death of Osman I, Ottoman rule began to extend over Anatolia and the Balkans. Osman's son, Orhan, captured the northwestern Anatolian city of Bursa in 1326, making it the new capital of the Ottoman state and supplanting Byzantine control in the region. The important port city of Thessaloniki was captured from the Venetians in 1387 and sacked. The Ottoman victory at Kosovo in 1389 effectively marked the end of Serbian power in the region, paving the way for Ottoman expansion into Europe. The Battle of Nicopolis in 1396, widely regarded as the last large-scale crusade of the Middle Ages, failed to stop the advance of the victorious Ottoman Turks.
List of sultans of the Ottoman Empire
The sultans of the Ottoman Empire (), who were all members of the Ottoman dynasty (House of Osman), ruled over the transcontinental empire from its perceived inception in 1299 to its dissolution in 1922. At its height, the Ottoman Empire spanned an area from Hungary in the north to Yemen in the south, and from Algeria in the west to Iraq in the east. Administered at first from the city of Bursa, the empire's capital was moved to Edirne in 1363 following its conquest by Murad I, and then to Constantinople (present-day Istanbul) in 1453 following its conquest by Mehmed II.
Ottoman Interregnum
The Ottoman Interregnum, or the Ottoman Civil War (20 July 1402 – 5 July 1413; , "Interregnum Period"), was a civil war in the Ottoman Empire between the sons of Sultan Bayezid I following the defeat of their father at the Battle of Ankara on 20 July 1402. Although Mehmed Çelebi was confirmed as sultan by Timur, his brothers İsa Çelebi, Musa Çelebi, Süleyman Çelebi, and later, Mustafa Çelebi, refused to recognize his authority, each claiming the throne for himself. Civil war was the result. The Interregnum lasted a little under 11 years until the Battle of Çamurlu on 5 July 1413, when Mehmed Çelebi emerged as victor, crowned himself Sultan Mehmed I, and restored the empire.
Reform movement
The Tanzimat, meaning "reorganization" of the Ottoman Empire, was a period of reformation that began in 1839 and ended with the First Constitutional Era in 1876. The Tanzimat reform era was characterized by various attempts to modernize the Ottoman Empire, to secure its territorial integrity against nationalist movements and aggressive powers. The reforms encouraged Ottomanism among the diverse ethnic groups of the Empire, attempting to stem the tide of nationalist movements within the Ottoman Empire. The reforms attempted to integrate non-Muslims and non-Turks more thoroughly into Ottoman society by enhancing their civil liberties and granting them equality throughout the Empire. Peasants often opposed the reforms because they upset traditional relationships.
List of sultans of the Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire's early years have been the subject of varying narratives due to the difficulty of discerning fact from legend. The empire came into existence at the end of the thirteenth century, and its first ruler (and the namesake of the Empire) was Osman I. According to later, often unreliable Ottoman tradition, Osman was a descendant of the Kayı tribe of the Oghuz Turks. The eponymous Ottoman dynasty he founded endured for six centuries through the reigns of 36 sultans. The Ottoman Empire disappeared as a result of the defeat of the Central Powers with whom it had allied itself during World War I. The partitioning of the Empire by the victorious Allies and the ensuing Turkish War of Independence led to the abolition of the sultanate in 1922 and the birth of the modern Republic of Turkey in 1922.