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Islamic Empires
The Historical Origins of
Today’s Islamic World
Ottoman Empire
 Begun by Osman Bey in 1289
 Osman and his followers above
all sought to become ghazi

“the instrument of the religion of
Allah, a servant of God who
purifies the earth from the filth
of polytheism; the Ghazi is the
sword of God, he is the
protector and the refuge of the
believers. If he becomes a
martyr in the ways of God, do
not believe that he has died–
he lives in beatitude with Allah,
he has eternal life”
 Ahmadi
Ottoman Empire
 The Ottoman’s location on the borders of the Byzantine
Empire gave them ample opportunity for holy war
Mehmed II
 Ruled the Ottoman Empire
from 1451 to 1481
 In 1453, he toppled the
Byzantine Empire,
capturing Constantinople,
renaming it Istanbul, and
making it the new Ottoman
capital
 Expanded the empire to
become the ruler of “two
lands” (Europe and Asia)
and “two seas” (the
Mediterranean and the
Black)
Scene from the battle
defending Constantinople
from a 1499 painting
Ottoman Empire under Mehmed II
Suleyman the Magnificent
 Reigned from 1520 to
1566 and continued the
expansion
 Conquered Baghdad in
1534
 Like the other
Ottomans, Suleyman
was a Sunni
Safavid Empire
 Founded by Shah Ismail in 1501 and
lasted until 1722
 Shah Ismail reigned to 1524 and
proclaimed his realm’s official
religion would be Shiism

Would impose Shiism by
force if necessary over the
formerly Sunni population
 Seized control of the Iranian plateau
and centered his empire around the
capital of Istahan
Selim the Grim
 The Sunni Ottomans
under Selim the Grim
(reigned 1512-1520)
detested the Shiite
Safavids and launched
a full-scale invasion of
Safavid territory
Battle of Chaldiran
 The critical battle in this
campaign was the battle of
Chaldiran in 1514
 The Ottomans won and
temporarily occupied the
Safavid capital of Tabriz
but could not completely
destroy the Safavid state
 The Ottomans and
Safavids continued to fight
intermittingly for the next
two centuries
Back to the Ottomans….
 By the late 17th Century the Ottoman
expansion had reached its limits


The Ottomans had neglected military training
and technological advances and fell behind
the European armies in strategy, tactics,
weapons, and training
They suffered a series of military defeats
Ottoman Decline
 The loss of military power translated to
declining effectiveness of the central
government
 By the early 19th Century, semi-independent
governors and local notables became
increasingly autonomous
Ottoman Decline
 The Ottoman government maintained its
authority in Anatolia and Iraq, but it lost
territory elsewhere



Russia gained territory in the Caucasus and
central Asia
Austria gained territory on the western frontier
After an unsuccessful invasion by the French,
Egypt became an essentially autonomous
region within the Ottoman Empire under the
rule of Muhammad Ali
Ottoman Decline
 In addition to military and territorial losses, the
Ottomans suffered economically as merchants began
to circumvent Ottoman intermediaries and trade
directly with their counterparts in India and China
 The Ottoman Empire had little to export and became
heavily dependent on foreign loans
 “Capitulation”– agreements exempting European
visitors from Ottoman law and providing European
powers the right to exercise jurisdiction over their
own citizens in Ottoman territory– threatened
Ottoman sovereignty
“The Sick Man of Europe”
 “We have on
our hands a
sick man, a
very sick man.”

Tsar
Nicholas I
of Russia,
1853
Mahmud II
 Reigned from 1808 to 1839 and
launched a reform program designed to
restore the traditional Ottoman military
 The elite and powerful Janissaries
opposed the reforms, but Mahmud
massacred them
 He remodeled his institutions, especially
his military, along European lines



European-style uniforms
European tactics and weaponry
European education
Janissaries
Other Reforms of Mahmud
 Created a system of secondary education for boys to
facilitate the transition from mosque schools to newly
established scientific, technical, and military
academies
 Established European style ministries, built new
roads and telegraph lines, and started a postal
service
 Transferred authority to the sultan from traditional
elites by



Taxing rural landlords
Abolishing the system of military land grants
Undermining the ulama (the Islamic leadership)
Ottoman Empire under Mahmud II
 The empire was
smaller, but it was
more
consolidated and
powerful than it
had been since
the early 17th
Century
Tanzimat
 The tempo of reform increased after Mahmud
during the Tanzimat (“reorganization”) era
from 1839-1876
 Reformers drew inspiration from the
Enlightenment thought and the constitutional
foundations of western European states
 Principal target was the army, but other
reforms involved law and education
Tanzimat
 The legal reforms were designed to make Ottoman law
acceptable to Europeans so the Ottomans could have the
capitulations lifted and recover sovereignty
 Safeguarded the rights of subjects through guaranteed public
trials, rights of privacy, and equality before the law
 Educational reforms resulted in a complete system of primary,
secondary, and university education under the supervision of
the state ministry of education
 Legal and educational reforms both undermined the ulama and
there was opposition from religious conservatives and others
Abd al-Hamid II
 An opposition group of
radical dissidents from
the Ottoman
bureaucracy staged a
coup in 1876 and
installed Abd al-Hamid
II as sultan
 Abd al-Hamid imposed
a despotic regime and
generated much
opposition
Young Turks
 The Ottoman Society for Union and Progress
(better known as the Young Turks) was
founded in 1889 by exiled Ottomans
 In 1908 they inspired an army coup and in
1909 they dethroned Abd al-Hamid and
established a puppet sultan

Ottoman sultans would now reign but not rule
Agenda of the Young Turks
 Universal suffrage
 Equality before the law
 Freedom of religion
 Free public education
 Secularization of the state
 Emancipation of women
Enver Pasha, one of
the army leaders of
the Young Turks
Still the Sick Man
 The Young Turks sought to maintain Turkish
hegemony within the larger Ottoman Empire
which caused opposition from subject
peoples outside the Anatolian heartland such
as in Syria and Iraq
 The Ottoman Empire was crumbling and
survived principally because the European
powers could not decide how to dispose of it
without upsetting the European balance of
power
World War I
 In 1914, the Ottomans
became aligned with the
Central Powers (Germany
and Austria-Hungary)
 Successfully fended off
the Allied landing at
Gallipoli in 1915 and
Mesopotamia in 1916, but
then began retreating on
all fronts
 Mustafa Kemal
emerges as great war
hero
World War I
 Arabs, assisted by the
British and T. E.
Lawrence (“Lawrence of
Arabia”), revolted against
Turkish rule in Syria,
Palestine, and Arabia
 The Central Powers sued
for peace in November
1918
Treaty of Sevres (1920) and Treaty of
Lausanne (1923)
 The Treaty of Sevres effectively dissolved the
Ottoman Empire, calling for the surrender of
Ottoman Balkan and Arab provinces and the
occupation of eastern and southern Anatolia by
foreign powers
 Turks led by wartime hero Mustafa Kemal
successfully resisted the occupation
 The Republic of Turkey was officially recognized
by the Treaty of Lausanne
Mustafa Kemal
 Mustafa Kemal
served as president
of Turkey for 15
years until his death
in 1938
 Known as Ataturk or
“Father Turk”
 “Westernized”
Turkey
Turkey under Ataturk
 New ideology of Kemalism stressed
 the republican form of government
representing the power of the electorate,
 secular administration,
 nationalism,
 mixed economy with state participation in
many of the vital sectors,
 the process of parliamentary and participatory
democracy,
 modernization.
Legacy of Ataturk
 Turkey became the first Moslem nation to
become a republic
 Left Turkey with a divided identity —
Europeanized but not quite European,
alienated from the Islamic world but still a
Muslim country
 The Turkish military still sees itself as the
guardian of Turkish independence,
nationalism, and secularism