Ottoman Empire

“ The Ottoman empire was not so called from Othman, the third khalif, but from Ottoman, the successful chief, who conquered a small part of the Grecian empire in Asia, and thus laid the foundation for the Turkish. ”

“ The decline of the spirit of conquest in the Mogul princes of Persia gave a free scope to the rise and progress of the Ottoman Empire which was soon to strike fear into the heart of the Emperor of Constantinople, and finally establish itself in Europe where it remains to this day a blot on Western civilization and a curse to all the people over which it rules. ”

“ The history of the Ottoman Empire is filled with mystery, romance and stories of intrigue, cruelty and barbarities, involving internal wars, uprisings, almost continuous struggles with practically all of the European countries and massacres that aroused the whole world. ”

“ Now, when we consider the geographical position of the Ottoman empire, the fertility of the soil, the aptitude and intelligence of the inhabitants, we are convinced that by applying ourselves to discover suitable means, the result, which by the aid of God we hope to attain, may be obtained in the space of a few years. Thus, then, full of confidence in the Most High, and relying upon the intercession of our Prophet, we have judged proper to seek by new institutions to procure for the provinces composing the Ottoman empire the benefit of a good administration. ”

“ The belief in the imminent collapse of the Ottoman dominion was weakened almost to extinction; so was the belief, which inspired the treaty of 1856, in the capacity of Turkey to reform and develop itself on European lines. But the Ottoman empire remained, the mistress of vast undeveloped wealth. The remaining phase of the Eastern Question, if we except the concerted efforts to impose good government on Macedonia in the interests of European peace, or the side issues in Egypt and Arabia, was the rivalry of the progressive nations for the right to exploit this wealth. ”

“ If there be an empire which does not at all feel the pressure of this natural law, but lasts continuously, repairs its losses, renews its vigour, and with every successive age emulates its antecedent fame, such a power must be more than human, and has no place in our present inquiry. We are concerned, not with any supernatural power, to which is promised perpetuity, but with the Ottoman empire, famous in history, vigorous in constitution, but, after all, human, and nothing more. ”

“ This people, still nomad, has taken nothing from the West but a misunderstood, misapplied idea of representative Government which failed at its inception and has hastened the downfall of the Ottoman Empire in Europe. ”

“ Of course, the Ottoman empire has long been suffering from intolerable 124oppression, but its Christian inhabitants have not been the only sufferers; on the other hand, many of them have allowed themselves to be the cause of oppression, and have even acted as the right-hand men of the oppressors. ”

“ Kaleidoscopic indeed have been the changes in the Near East since the outbreak of the Great War in 1914. The economic and political power of Germany in Anatolia, Syria, and Mesopotamia has been completely destroyed. The Ottoman Empire has disappeared, and in its place has risen a republican Nationalist Turkey. ”

“ The Ottoman Empire could only have gained effectual political influence in these remote regions of the East when it was roused from its slumbering Oriental existence before the time of Peter the Great. ”

“ Turkey and Egypt in particular have long been favourite themes; and indeed the Ottoman empire in every point of view, whether topographical, historical, ivadministrative, religious, moral, political, military, or commercial, offers an inexhaustible subject for investigation, and an endless excitement to curiosity. ”

“ Our religion bids us to be resigned to the decrees of fate, but only cowards will be content to sit with their hands in their laps because the predestined fate of the Ottoman Empire is written in Heaven. If the prophecy says that a time must come when the Ottoman Empire must fall to pieces because of the cowardice of the Ottoman nation, does it not depend upon us and our children whether the prophecy be accomplished, or whether its fulfilment be far removed from us? ”

“ But, fortunately for those who are able to read the signs of the times, there are well-grounded hopes for a change for the better—for a return to the position among nations which the Ottoman Empire occupied when its schools and scholars were as famed as were its achievements on land and sea—when the followers of Osman shall be as far in the van of civilization as they are now in the rear. ”

“ Mohammed the Conqueror had established the Ottoman Empire in Europe by means of a well-trained, Koran-disciplined army, his successor Bajazet II increased and strengthened it. Great attention was paid to all matters of artillery and military engineering, in which the Turks of those days outshone all other nations, and which made the hastily levied undisciplined armies of the West, the bands of hired condottieri, or enthusiastic swarms of Christian knights, go under before the sword of Othman. The conquered provinces provided recruits for the corps of Janissaries. ”

“ This resulted in the establishment of various Turkish dynasties in that country. At the close of the thirteenth century the paramount power over these was exercised by Osman (or Othman, whence the name Ottoman) , who seized all that remained of the ancient Roman world in Asia, and thus practically founded the Ottoman Empire. In the middle of the fourteenth century the way was opened for the Ottomans to advance into Europe. They were invited by one of the rival factions at Constantinople to undertake their cause. ”

“ We here turn aside for a brief hour from the stream of historical narrative to consider some of the results of Ottoman misrule which has for more than four centuries controlled an empire in Eastern Europe almost as large as France, in one of the most delightful and beautifully varied regions on the continent and which yet holds its peoples in the relentless grip of the Dark Ages. ”

“ The Ottoman Empire is named after the Osmanli, but you might search long before you found one among its inhabitants. These Osmanlis are a governing class, indigenous only in Constantinople and a few neighbouring towns, but planted here and there, as officers and officials, over the Ottoman territories. They come of a clan of Turkish nomads, recruited since the thirteenth century by converts, forced or voluntary, from most of Christendom, and crossed with the blood of slave-women from all the world. They are hardly a race. ”

“ The Ottoman Empire is made up of Turkey in Europe—the strip of territory stretching across from the Black Sea to the Adriatic—Turkey in Asia, which includes Arabia, Syria, and Palestine, and provinces in the isles of Samos and Cyprus are also under the sultan’s rule. ”

“ When Turkey has finally jettisoned those encumbrances, the European vilayets, and withdrawn to Asia Minor, the Ottoman Empire will probably gain considerably in strength by consolidation, and by carrying out many social and economical reforms which have been kept in abeyance during the constant trouble caused by the war-clouds that hung over Eastern Europe. A strong Turkish Empire in Asia Minor, real control over the tribes in Syria, strict surveillance of the eastern and north-eastern frontiers, will mean some prospect of peace in those very unsettled regions. ”

“ Yet many still think that the Ottoman Empire is a great one, a powerful government. They look at the Sultan and his dominion through a magnifying glass. This shows ignorance. The Turks are decayed and are decaying. The sick man of Turkey is the dead man of Turkey, and ought to be buried, but the European powers do not bury him because there are precious stones and jewelry in the coffin; no matter how bad the corpse smells, they will endure it. And the bad smell of the Sultan is killing hundreds of thousands of Christians ”

“ History may well be told at many different lengths and from different points of view. That of the Ottoman Empire, from the accession of Othman in 1288 to the treaty of Kainardji in 1774, which secured to Russia a virtual protectorate in favour of the Christian subjects of Turkey, has been told at its greatest length by the German professor, Von Hammer, in eighteen volumes. He is the only historian who has explored for this long period both Greek and Turkish annals. ”

“ The population of the Ottoman Empire is of a most heterogeneous character, embracing Turks, Greeks, Slavs, Albanians, Armenians, Syrians, Arabs, Tartars, &c. The government is a pure despotism, and the Sultan is regarded as the Caliph or head of Islam; military service is compulsory, and the army on a war footing numbers not less than 750,000, but the navy is small ”

“ The beaten remnant of Ottoman power in Europe, huddling behind the lines of Chatalja, was to emerge from hiding, march over the Bulgarians up the Valley of the Maritza, relieve famine-stricken Adrianople, and enter Sofia in triumph. Yet another Ottoman army was to march south through Thessaly, retake Saloniki, cross into Epirus, and dictate the Sultan’s terms to Greece in Athens. This has been told me seriously by several Turks, those who are interested in the war. What is more, they are firmly persuaded that this can and will happen. ”

“ The establishments of various Arab states is a testimony to the many forces at work in the Arab world. The victory of the Allies in World War 1 brought about the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. Modern Turkey was established in 1920, ruled initially by a Sultan, becoming a republic in 1923 under the presidency of Kamal Atatürk. ”

“ While it is evident that a large part of these volumes can only interest those directly connected with the Ottoman Empire, they will nevertheless be found to contain much that bears on international affairs in the near East, and it is hoped that the chapters treating, for instance, on such matters as the rights of the autonomous provinces, the privileges of the religious communities, domestic slavery, the passage of the Straits, &c., will contribute new material to the study of some questions of general importance. ”

“ In Turkey, the Young Turks, who only maintained their power with the help of the Germans, counted on them to resist the Russian pretensions to Constantinople and to check all the English and Italian claims and demands, which would cause the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire. ”

“ One may examine the different elements of the Ottoman Empire, and measure them by the tests of civilization. From the intellectual standpoint, from the business standpoint, from the administrative standpoint, the Turk is hardly able to sustain his claim to continue to be, in a twentieth-century empire, the element which can {200} hope to assimilate Greek, Armenian, Albanian, Slav, and Arab. ”

“ Take it from someone who's read the Wikipedia entry: this is how the Ottoman Empire was won: maddened horsemen fueled by lethal jet-black coffee-mud. ”

“ The officials pass their lives in proposing, and his Majesty very generally spends his time in opposing, all manner of schemes, good, bad, and indifferent. The contradictory nature of the system produces the anomalous position occupied by the Ottoman Empire in Europe. ”

“ The Hedjaz was declared to be an independent Arab state. The Ottoman Empire was no more.
Even the Turkey that remained—a portion of Anatolia—enjoyed sovereignty in name only. The Capitulations, which the Sultan had terminated in the autumn of 1914, were reëstablished and extended. Concessions to Allied nationals were confirmed in all the rights which they enjoyed before Ottoman entry into the Great War. ”

“ The rapid disappearance of his own empire in a hundred years, the creation out of the Ottoman Empire of new states like Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Rumania, and the wonderful improvement which had followed the destruction of the Turkish yoke in these benighted lands, may have increased the Ottoman hatred for the unbeliever, but at least they had a certain influence in opening his eyes to his importance. Many Turks also now received their education in European universities ”

“ The Ottoman Empire may be said to derive the very breath of its existence from the jealousy of the great Powers. The States of the West had an instinctive dread of the great Empire of the North, besides a mutual mistrust of each other; and, therefore, the fairest plains of Europe were allowed to remain in possession of those who had no ambitious instincts to 284 gratify, and no foreign predilections to indulge. ”

“ The Ottoman Empire from then onwards has owed its existence to its enemies.
Its weakness lay in itself, for it was very loosely knit together, and no bond, whether of blood or religion or tongue, bound to it the assembly of Christian and Jewish and non-Moslem races of which it was so largely composed. The Empire never grew (as, for instance, the British Empire grew) by the emigration and settlement of the Osmanli stock in the territories it absorbed: it never gave, it only took. ”

“ We heard everywhere from them that the Christian Powers—above all, Great Britain were going to hand over that portion of the 'decaying' Ottoman empire to them, as they had handed over Ottoman territories before to other Christian races of the East They were simply awaiting the prophesied moment of the partition of Turkey to establish their independence on their share of the divided territory. I myself heard Armenians talking about who were to be the future rulers among their own people. ”