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The Ottoman Empire (Ottoman Turkish: دولت عليه عثمانیه Devlet-i ʿAliyye-yi ʿOsmâniyye;[1] Modern Turkish: Osmanlı İmparatorluğu), sometimes referred to as the Turkish Empire or simply Turkey, was a contiguous transcontinental empire founded by Turkish tribes under Osman Bey in north-western Anatolia in 1299.[2] With the conquest of Constantinople by Mehmet II in 1453 the Ottoman state was transformed into an empire.[3][4][5]

Turkey in 1890


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 one of the most powerful states in the world – a multinational, multilingual empire, controlling much of Southeast Europe, Western Asia, North Africa and the Horn of Africa.[6]




In Ottoman Turkish, the empire was referred to as Devlet-i ʿAliyye-yi ʿOsmâniyye (دَوْلَتِ عَلِيّهٔ عُثمَانِیّه),[1] or alternatively Osmanlı Devleti (عثمانلى دولتى).[dn 2] In Modern Turkish, it is known as Osmanlı Devleti or Osmanlı İmparatorluğu. In some Western accounts, the two names "Ottoman" and "Turkey" were often used interchangeably. This dichotomy was officially ended in 1920–23, when the Ankara-based Turkish regime favoured Turkey as a sole official name, which had been one of the European names of the state since Seljuq times.


Rise (1299–1453)Edit

Battle of Nicopolis

Battle of Nicopolis, 1396. Painting from 1523

Upon the demise of the Turkish Seljuk Sultanate of Rum, precursor of Ottomans, in 1300s, Anatolia was divided into a patchwork of independent, mostly Turkish states, the so-called Ghazi emirates. One of the Ghazi emirates was led by Osman I (1258[8] – 1326), from which the name Ottoman is derived. Osman I extended the frontiers of Turkish settlement toward the edge of the Byzantine Empire. It is not well understood how the Osmanli came to dominate their neighbours, as the history of mediaeval Anatolia is still little known.[9]

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 1324 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 the Turkish-Mongolian leader 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 Mehmet I emerged as the sultan and restored Ottoman power, bringing an end to the Interregnum, also known as the Fetret Devri in Ottoman Turkish.

Part of the Ottoman territories in the Balkans (such as Thessaloniki, Macedonia and Kosovo) were temporarily lost after 1402, but were later recovered by Murad II between the 1430s and 1450s. On 10 November 1444, Murad II defeated the Hungarian, Polish and Wallachian armies under Władysław III of Poland (also King of Hungary) and János Hunyadi at the Battle of Varna, which was the final battle of the Crusade of Varna.[10][11][page needed] Four years later, János Hunyadi prepared another army (of Hungarian and Wallachian forces) to attack the Turks, but was again defeated by Murad II at the Second Battle of Kosovo in 1448.

Growth (1453–1683)Edit

Expansion and apogee (1453–1566)Edit

Moldovita murals 2010 41

Ottoman Army before Constantinople in 1453, Moldovița Monastery

The son of Murad II, Mehmed II, reorganized the state and the military, and conquered Constantinople on 29 May 1453. Mehmed allowed the Orthodox Church to maintain its autonomy and land in exchange for accepting Ottoman authority.[12] Because of bad relations between the states of western Europe and the latter Byzantine Empire, the majority of the Orthodox population accepted Ottoman rule as preferable to Venetian rule.[12]


Sultan Selim I (1512–1520) dramatically expanded the Empire's eastern and southern frontiers by defeating Shah Ismail of Safavid Persia, in the Battle of Chaldiran.[14] Selim I established Ottoman rule in Egypt, and created a naval presence on the Red Sea. After this Ottoman expansion, a competition started between the Portuguese Empire and the Ottoman Empire to become the dominant power in the region.[15]

1526 - Battle of Mohács

Battle of Mohács, 1526[16]

Suleiman the Magnificent (1520–1566) captured Belgrade in 1521, conquered the southern and central parts of the Kingdom of Hungary as part of the Ottoman–Hungarian Wars,[17][18][not in citation given] and, after his historical victory in the Battle of Mohács in 1526, he established Turkish rule in the territory of present-day Hungary (except the western part) and other Central European territories. He then laid siege to Vienna in 1529, but failed to take the city.[19] In 1532, he made another attack on Vienna, but was repulsed in the Siege of Güns.[20][21][22] Transylvania, Wallachia and, intermittently, Moldavia, became tributary principalities of the Ottoman Empire. In the east, the Ottoman Turks took Baghdad from the Persians in 1535, gaining control of Mesopotamia and naval access to the Persian Gulf.


In 1559, after the first Ajuuraan-Portuguese war the Ottoman Empire would later absorb the weakened Adal Sultanate into its domain. This expansion fathered Ottoman rule in Somalia and the Horn of Africa. This also increased its influence in the Indian Ocean to compete with the Portuguese.[24]

By the end of Suleiman's reign, the Empire's population totaled about 15,000,000 people extending over three continents. [25] Plus, the Empire became a dominant naval force, controlling much of the Mediterranean Sea.[26] By this time, the Ottoman Empire was a major part of the European political sphere. The success of its political and military establishment has been compared to the Roman Empire, by the likes of Italian scholar Francesco Sansovino and the French political philosopher Jean Bodin.[27]

Revolts and revival (1566–1683)Edit

Szigetvar 1566


The effective military and bureaucratic structures of the previous century came under strain during a protracted period of misrule by weak Sultans. The Ottomans gradually fell behind the Europeans in military technology as the innovation that fed the Empire's forceful expansion became stifled by growing religious and intellectual conservatism.[28] But in spite of these difficulties, the Empire remained a major expansionist power until the Battle of Vienna in 1683, which marked the end of Ottoman expansion into Europe.

The discovery of new maritime trade routes by Western European states allowed them to avoid the Ottoman trade monopoly. The Portuguese discovery of the Cape of Good Hope in 1488 initiated a series of Ottoman-Portuguese naval wars in the Indian Ocean throughout the 16th century. Economically, the huge influx of Spanish silver from the New World caused a sharp devaluation of the Ottoman currency and rampant inflation.[citation needed]

Under Ivan IV (1533–1584), the Tsardom of Russia expanded into the Volga and Caspian region at the expense of the Tatar khanates. In 1571, the Crimean khan Devlet I Giray, supported by the Ottomans, burned Moscow.[29] The next year, the invasion was repeated but repelled at the Battle of Molodi. The Crimean Khanate continued to invade Eastern Europe in a series of slave raids,[30] and remained a significant power in Eastern Europe until the end of the 17th century.[31]

In southern Europe, a Catholic coalition led by Philip II of Spain won a victory over the Ottoman fleet at the Battle of Lepanto (1571). It was a startling, if mostly symbolic,[32]blow to the image of Ottoman invincibility, an image which the victory of the Knights of Malta against the Ottoman invaders in the 1565 Siege of Malta had recently set in motion eroding.[33] The battle was far more damaging to the Ottoman navy in sapping experienced manpower than the loss of ships, which were rapidly replaced.[34] The Ottoman navy recovered quickly, persuading Venice to sign a peace treaty in 1573, allowing the Ottomans to expand and consolidate their position in North Africa.[35]

Battle of Lepanto 1571

Battle of Lepanto in 1571

By contrast, the Habsburg frontier had settled somewhat, a stalemate caused by a stiffening of the Habsburg defences.[36] The Long War against Habsburg Austria (1593–1606) created the need for greater numbers of infantry equipped with firearms, resulting in a relaxation of recruitment policy. This contributed to problems of indiscipline and outright rebelliousness within the corps, which was never fully solved.[37] Irregular sharpshooters (Sekban) were also recruited, and on demobilization turned to brigandage in the Jelali revolts (1595–1610), which engendered widespread anarchy in Anatolia in the late 16th and early 17th centuries.[38] With the Empire's population reaching 30,000,000 people by 1600, the shortage of land placed further pressure on the government.[39]

Vienna Battle 1683

Second Siege of Vienna in 1683.



Stagnation and reform (1683–1827)Edit

Ottoman Sultan Selim III (1789)


During this period Russian expansion presented a large and growing threat.[46] Accordingly, King Charles XII of Sweden was welcomed as an ally in the Ottoman Empire following his defeat by the Russians at the Battle of Poltava in 1709 (part of the Great Northern War of 1700–1721.)[46] Charles XII persuaded the Ottoman Sultan Ahmed III to declare war on Russia, which resulted in the Ottoman victory at the Pruth River Campaign of 1710–1711.[47] After the Austro-Turkish War of 1716–1718 the Treaty of Passarowitz confirmed the loss of the Banat, Serbia and "Little Walachia" (Oltenia) to Austria. The Treaty also revealed that the Ottoman Empire was on the defensive and unlikely to present any further aggression in Europe.[48]

January Suchodolski - Ochakiv siege



Educational and technological reforms were made, including the establishment of higher education institutions such as the Istanbul Technical University.[50] In 1734 an artillery school was established to impart Western-style artillery methods, but the Islamic clergy successfully objected under the grounds of theodicy.[51] In 1754 the artillery school was reopened on a semi-secret basis.[51] In 1726, Ibrahim Muteferrika convinced the Grand Vizier Nevşehirli Damat İbrahim Pasha, the Grand Mufti, and the clergy on the efficiency of the printing press, and Muteferrika was later granted by Sultan Ahmed III permission to publish non-religious books (despite opposition from some calligraphers and religious leaders).[52] Muteferrika's press published its first book in 1729 and, by 1743, issued 17 works in 23 volumes, each having between 500 and 1,000 copies.[52][53]




Decline and modernisation (1828–1908)Edit

During the Tanzimat period (1839–1876), the government's series of constitutional reforms led to a fairly modern conscripted army, banking system reforms, the decriminalisation of homosexuality, the replacement of religious law with secular law[57] and guilds with modern factories. The Ottoman Ministry of Post was established in Istanbul on 23 October 1840.[58][59]

Samuel Morse received his first ever patent for the telegraph in 1847, which was issued by Sultan Abdülmecid who personally tested the new invention.[60] Following this successful test, installation works of the first telegraph line (Istanbul-Adrianople-Şumnu)[61] began on 9 August 1847.[62] The reformist period peaked with the Constitution, called the Kanûn-u Esâsî. The empire's First Constitutional era, was short-lived. The parliament survived for only two years before the sultan suspended it.

The Christian population of the empire, owing to their higher educational levels, started to pull ahead of the Muslim majority, leading to much resentment on the part of the latter.[63] In 1861, there were 571 primary and 94 secondary schools for Ottoman Christians with 140,000 pupils in total, a figure that vastly exceeded the number of Muslim children in school at the same time, who were further hindered by the amount of time spent learning Arabic and Islamic theology.[63] In turn, the higher educational levels of the Christians allowed them to play a large role in the economy.[63] In 1911, of the 654 wholesale companies in Istanbul, 528 were owned by ethnic Greeks.[63]

Turkish troops storming Fort Shefketil (cropped)

Turkish troops storming Fort Shefketil during the Crimean War

The Crimean War (1853–1856) was part of a long-running contest between the major European powers for influence over territories of the declining Ottoman Empire. The financial burden of the war led the Ottoman state to issue foreign loans amounting to 5 million pounds sterling on 4 August 1854.[64][65] The war caused an exodus of the Crimean Tatars, about 200,000 of whom moved to the Ottoman Empire in continuing waves of emigration.[66] Toward the end of the Caucasian Wars, 90% of the Circassians were ethnically cleansed[67] and exiled from their homelands in the Caucasus and fled to the Ottoman Empire,[68] resulting in the settlement of 500,000 to 700,000 Circassians in Turkey.[69][page needed][70][71] Other sources give much higher numbers, totaling 1 million- 1.5 million deported and/or killed.[72]

Opening ceremony of the First Ottoman Parliament at the Dolmabahce Palace in 1876

Opening ceremony of the First Ottoman Parliament at the Dolmabahçe Palace in 1876


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[73] 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.

From 1894–96, between 100,000 to 300,000 Armenians living throughout the empire were killed in what became known as the Hamidian massacres.[74]

As the Ottoman Empire gradually shrank in size, many Balkan Muslims migrated to the empire's remaining territory in Balkans or to the heartland in Anatolia.[75] By 1923, only Anatolia and eastern Thrace remained as the Muslim land.[76]

Defeat and dissolution (1908–1922)Edit

Declaration of the 1908 Revolution in Ottoman Empire

Declaration of the Young Turk Revolution by the leaders of the Ottoman millets.

The Second Constitutional Era began after the Young Turk Revolution (3 July 1908) with the sultan's announcement of the restoration of the 1876 constitution 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, and the movement that would become known as the Young Turks.

Profiting from the civil strife, Austria-Hungary officially annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908, but it pulled its troops out of the Sanjak of Novi Pazar, another contested region between the Austrians and Ottomans, to avoid a war. During the Italo-Turkish War (1911–12) in which the Ottoman Empire lost Libya, the Balkan League declared war against the Ottoman Empire. The Empire lost the Balkan Wars (1912–13). It lost its Balkan territories except East Thrace and the historic Ottoman capital city of Adrianople during the war. Some 400,000 Muslims, out of fear of Greek, Serbian or Bulgarian atrocities, left with the retreating Ottoman army.[77] According to the estimates of Justin McCarthy, during the period from 1821 to 1922 alone, the ethnic cleansing of Ottoman Muslims in the Balkans led to the death of several million individuals and the expulsion of a similar number.[78][79][80] By 1914 the Ottoman Empire had been driven out of nearly all of Europe and North Africa. It still controlled 28 million people, of whom 15.5 million were in modern-day Turkey, 4.5 million in Syria, Lebanon, Palestine and Jordan, and 2.5 million in Iraq. Another 5.5 million people were under nominal Ottoman rule in the Arabian peninsula.[81]


Mehmed VI, the last Sultan of the Ottoman State, 1922


In 1915, as the Russian Caucasus Army continued to advance in eastern Anatolia,[83] aided by some Ottoman Armenians, the Ottoman government started the deportation and massacre of its ethnic Armenian population, resulting in what became known as the Armenian Genocide.[84] Genocidal acts were also committed against the Greek and Assyrian minorities.[85]




Jean Baptiste Vanmour - Dinner at the Palace in Honour of an Ambassador - Google Art Project

Ambassadors at Topkapı Palace


The "Ottoman dynasty" or, as an institution, "House of Osman" was unprecedented and unequaled in the Islamic world for its size and duration.[90] The Ottoman dynasty was Turkish in origin. On eleven occasions, the sultan was deposed 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 Osmanlı dynasty, both failures, which suggests a political system that for an extended period was able to manage its revolutions without unnecessary instability.[89]

Thomas allom, c1840, The Enterance to Divan

Bâb-ı Âlî, the Sublime Porte





The Tughra were calligraphic monograms, or signatures, of the Ottoman Sultans, of which there were 35. Carved on the Sultan's seal, they bore the names of the Sultan and his father. The statement and prayer, “ever victorious,” was also present in most. The earliest belonged to Orhan Gazi. The ornately stylized Tughra spawned a branch of Ottoman-Turkish calligraphy.



An unhappy wife is complaining to the Qadi about her husband's impotence. Ottoman miniature.

The Ottoman legal system accepted the religious law over its subjects. At the same time the Qanun (or Kanun), a secular legal system, co-existed with religious law or Sharia.[96] The Ottoman Empire was always organized around a system of local jurisprudence. Legal administration in the Ottoman Empire was part of a larger scheme of balancing central and local authority.[97] Ottoman power revolved crucially around the administration of the rights to land, which gave a space for the local authority develop the needs of the local millet.[97] The jurisdictional complexity of the Ottoman Empire was aimed to permit the integration of culturally and religiously different groups.[97] The Ottoman system had three court systems: one for Muslims, one for non-Muslims, involving appointed Jews and Christians ruling over their respective religious communities, and the "trade court". The entire system was regulated from above by means of the administrative Qanun, i.e. laws, a system based upon the Turkic Yassa and Töre, which were developed in the pre-Islamic era.[citation needed]


The Ottoman Islamic legal system was set up differently from traditional European courts. Presiding over Islamic courts would be a Qadi, or judge. Since the closing of the itjihad, or Gate of Interpretation, Qadis throughout the Ottoman Empire focused less on legal precedent, and more with local customs and traditions in the areas that they administered.[98] However, the Ottoman court system lacked an appellate structure, leading to jurisdictional case strategies where plaintiffs could take their disputes from one court system to another until they achieved a ruling that was in their favor.

1879-Ottoman Court-from-NYL

An Ottoman trial, 1877 (see image detail for explanation)

In the late 19th century, the Ottoman legal system saw substantial reform. This process of legal modernization began with the Edict of Gülhane of 1839.[99] These reforms included the “fair and public trial[s] of all accused regardless of religion,” the creation of a system of “separate competences, religious and civil,” and the validation of testimony on non-Muslims.[100] Specific land codes (1858), civil codes (1869-1876), and a code of civil procedure also were enacted.[100]



Battle of Vienna.SultanMurads with janissaries

Chamberlain of Sultan Murad IV with janissaries.

Portyazo torokok

Ottoman irregulars in the territory of present-day Hungary, painted in 1568



Ottoman Navy at the Golden Horn

A German postcard depicting the Ottoman Navy, led by Yavuz (ex-Goeben). At top left is a portrait of Sultan Mehmed V.

The Ottoman Navy vastly contributed to the expansion of the Empire's territories on the European continent. It initiated the conquest of North Africa, with the addition of Algeria and Egypt to the Ottoman Empire in 1517. Starting with the loss of Algeria (1830) and Greece (1821), Ottoman naval power and control over the Empire's distant overseas territories began to decline. Sultan Abdülaziz (reigned 1861–1876) attempted to reestablish a strong Ottoman navy, building the largest fleet after those of Britain and France. The shipyard at Barrow, England, built its first submarine in 1886 for the Ottoman Empire.[103]

However, the collapsing Ottoman economy could not sustain the fleet's strength for too long. Sultan Abdülhamid II distrusted the admirals who sided with the reformist Midhat Pasha, and claimed that the large and expensive fleet was of no use against the Russians during the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878). He locked most of the fleet inside the Golden Horn, where the ships decayed for the next 30 years. Following the Young Turk Revolution in 1908, the Committee of Union and Progress sought to develop a strong Ottoman naval force. The Ottoman Navy Foundation was established in 1910 to buy new ships through public donations.

The history of Ottoman military aviation dates back to 1909 between June 1909 and July 1911.[104][105] The Ottoman Empire started preparing its first pilots and planes, and with the founding of the Aviation School (Tayyare Mektebi) in Yeşilköy on 3 July 1912, the Empire began to tutor its own flight officers. The founding of the Aviation School quickened advancement in the military aviation program, increased the number of enlisted persons within it, and gave the new pilots an active role in the Ottoman Army and Navy. In May 1913 the world's first specialized Reconnaissance Training Program was started by the Aviation School and the first separate reconnaissance division was established[citation needed]. In June 1914 a new military academy, the Naval Aviation School (Bahriye Tayyare Mektebi) was founded. With the outbreak of World War I, the modernization process stopped abruptly. The Ottoman aviation squadrons fought on many fronts during World War I, from Galicia in the west to the Caucasus in the east and Yemen in the south.

Administrative divisionsEdit

Ottoman Empire (1609)

Eyalets in 1609


The Eyalet (also pashalic or beglerbeglic) was the territory of office of a beylerbeyi, and was further subdivided in sanjaks.[107]

The Vilayets were introduced with the promulgation of the "Vilayet Law" (Turkish language:Teskil-i Vilayet Nizamnamesi)[108] in 1864, as part of the tanzimat reforms.[109] Unlike the previous eyalet system, the 1864 law established a hierarchy of administrative units: the vilayet, liva/sanjak, kaza and village council, to which the 1871 Vilayet Law added the nabiye.[110]


OTTOMAN EMPIRE Banknotes, 20 Kurush ND(1852)

20 kurush banknote (1852)

Ottoman government deliberately pursued a policy for the development of Bursa, Adrianople and Istanbul, successive Ottoman capitals, into major commercial and industrial centres, considering that merchants and artisans were indispensable in creating a new metropolis.[111] To this end, Mehmed and his successor Bayezid, also encouraged and welcomed migration of the Jews from different parts of Europe, who were settled in Istanbul and other port cities like Salonica. In many places in Europe, Jews were suffering persecution at the hands of their Christian counterparts. The tolerance displayed by the Turks was welcomed by the immigrants.


The organization of the treasury and chancery were developed under the Ottoman Empire more than any other Islamic government and, until the 17th century, they were the leading organization among all their contemporaries.[94] This organization developed a scribal bureaucracy (known as "men of the pen") as a distinct group, partly highly trained ulama, which developed into a professional body.[94] The effectiveness of this professional financial body stands behind the success of many great Ottoman statesmen.[113]





Galata Bridge, Istanbul (Constantinople)

View of Old Istanbul and the Galata Bridge on the Golden Horn, ca. 1880-1893.

Bridge and Galata Area, Istanbul, Turkey by Abdullah Frères, ca. 1880-1893 (LOC)


A population estimate for the empire of 11,692,480 for the 1520-1535 period was obtained by counting the households in Ottoman tithe registers, and multiplying this number by 5.[115] For unclear reasons, the population in the 18th century was lower than that in the 16th century.[116] An estimate of 7,230,660 for the first census held in 1831 is considered a serious undercount, as this census was meant only to register possible conscripts.[115]

Censuses of Ottoman territories only began in the early 19th century. Figures from 1831 onwards are available as official census results, but the censuses did not cover the whole population. For example, the 1831 census only counted men and did not cover the whole empire.[39][115] For earlier periods estimates of size and distribution of the population are based on observed demographic patterns.[117]



The rise of port cities saw the clustering of populations caused by the development of steamships and railroads. Urbanization increased from 1700–1922, with towns and cities growing. Improvements in health and sanitation made them more attractive to live and work in. Port cities like Salonica, in Greece, saw its population rise from 55,000 in 1800 to 160,000 in 1912 and Izmir which had a population of 150,000 in 1800 grew to 300,000 by 1914.[121][122] Some regions conversely had population falls - Belgrade saw its population drop from 25,000 to 8,000 mainly due to political strife.[121]

Economic and political migrations made an impact across the empire. For example the Russian and Austria-Habsburg annexation of the Crimean and Balkan regions respectively saw large influxes of Muslim refugees – 200,000 Crimean Tartars fleeing to Dobruja.[123] Between 1783 and 1913, approximately 5-7 million refugees flooded into the Ottoman Empire, at least 3.8 million of whom were Russians. Some migrations left indelible marks such as political tension between parts of the empire (e.g. Turkey and Bulgaria) whereas centrifugal effects were noticed in other territories, simpler demographics emerging from diverse populations. Economies were also impacted with the loss of artisans, merchants, manufacturers and agriculturists.[124] Since the 19th century, the exodus to present-day Turkey by the large portion of Muslim peoples from the Balkans. These people were called Muhacir under a general definition.[125][page needed] By the time the Ottoman Empire came to an end in 1922, half of the urban population of Turkey was descended from Muslim refugees from Russia.[63]


Ottoman Turkish was the official language of the Empire. It was a Turkic language highly influenced by Persian and Arabic. The Ottomans had three influential languages: Turkish, spoken by the majority of the people in Anatolia and by the majority of Muslims of the Balkans except in Albania and Bosnia; Persian, only spoken by the educated;[126] Arabic, spoken mainly in Arabia, North Africa, Iraq, Kuwait, the Levant and parts of the Horn of Africa; and Somali throughout the Horn of Africa. In the last two centuries, usage of these became limited, though, and specific: Persian served mainly as a literary language for the educated,[126] while Arabic was used for religious rites.


Because of a low literacy rate among the public (about 2–3% until the early 19th century and just about 15% at the end of 19th century),[citation needed] ordinary people had to hire scribes as "special request-writers" (arzuhâlcis) to be able to communicate with the government.[128] The ethnic groups continued to speak within their families and neighborhoods (mahalles) with their own languages (e.g., Jews, Greeks, Armenians, etc.). In villages where two or more populations lived together, the inhabitants would often speak each other's language. In cosmopolitan cities, people often spoke their family languages, many non-ethnic Turks spoke Turkish as a second language.


Türkei Seidenfahne makffm



Until the second half of the 15th century the empire had a Christian majority, under the rule of a Muslim minority.[97] In the late 19th century, the non-Muslim population of the empire began to fall considerably, not only due to secession, but also because of migratory movements.[129] The proportion of Muslims amounted to 60% in the 1820s, gradually increasing to 69% in the 1870s and then to 76% in the 1890s.[129] By 1914, only 19.1% of the empire's population was non-Muslim, mostly made up of Christian Greeks, Assyrians, Armenians, and some Jews.[129]


Tile with Calligraphy


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 Abbasid victory at the 751 Battle of Talas against the Chinese Tang Dynasty. After this battle, 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.

Muslim sects regarded as heretical, such as the Druze, Ismailis and Alawites, ranked below Jews and Christians.[131] In 1514, Sultan Selim I, nicknamed “the Grim” because of his cruelty, ordered the massacre of 40,000 Anatolian Alevis (Qizilbash), whom he considered heretics,[132] reportedly proclaiming that "the killing of one Alevi had as much otherworldly reward as killing 70 Christians."[133][page needed]

Christianity and JudaismEdit

Gennadios II and Mehmed II

Mehmed the Conqueror and Patriarch Gennadius II

In the Ottoman Empire, in accordance with the Muslim dhimmi system, Christians were guaranteed limited freedoms (such as the right to worship), but were treated as second-class citizens. Christians and Jews were not considered equals to Muslims: testimony against Muslims by Christians and Jews was inadmissible in courts of law.[citation needed] They were forbidden to carry weapons or ride atop horses, their houses could not overlook those of Muslims, and their religious practices would have to defer to those of Muslims, in addition to various other legal limitations.[134]



Similar millets were established for the Ottoman Jewish community, who were under the authority of the Haham Başı or Ottoman Chief Rabbi; the Armenian Orthodox community, who were under the authority of a head bishop; and a number of other religious communities as well. The Millet system of Islamic law has been called an early example of pre-modern religious pluralism.[138]


Flickr - …trialsanderrors - Yeni Cami and Eminönü bazaar, Constantinople, Turkey, ca. 1895

Yeni Cami and Eminönü bazaar, Constantinople, circa 1895


Slavery was a part of Ottoman society.[139] Female slaves were still sold in the Empire as late as 1908.[140] During the 19th century the Empire came under pressure from Western European countries to outlaw the practice. Policies developed by various Sultans throughout the 19th century attempted to curtail the slave trade but, since slavery did have centuries of religious backing and sanction, they never directly abolished the institution outright.[citation needed]



File:Evliya Celebi.jpg



Nedim (divan edb.şairi)

Ahmet Nedîm Efendi, one of the most celebrated Ottoman poets





Visegrad Drina Bridge 1





Decorative artsEdit

Levni 16 Young Woman, Sleeping Beauty

Painting by Abdulcelil Levni, early 18th century



The art of carpet weaving was particularly significant in the Ottoman Empire, carpets having an immense importance both as decorative furnishings, rich in religious and other symbolism, and as a practical consideration, as it was customary to remove one's shoes in living quarters.[145] The weaving of such carpets originated in the nomadic cultures of central Asia (carpets being an easily-transportable form of furnishing), and was eventually spread to the settled societies of Anatolia. Turks used carpets, rugs and kilims not just on the floors of a room, but also as a hanging on walls and doorways, where they provided additional insulation. They were also commonly donated to mosques, which often amassed large collections of them.[146]

Performing artsEdit

Karagoz figures

The shadow play Karagöz and Hacivat was widespread throughout the Ottoman Empire

Surname 171b




The traditional shadow play called Karagöz and Hacivat was widespread throughout the Ottoman Empire and featured characters representing all of the major ethnic and social groups in that culture.[147][148] It was performed by a single puppet master, who voiced all of the characters, and accompanied by tambourine (def). Its origins are obscure, deriving perhaps from an older Egyptian tradition, or possibly from an Asian source.

Science and technologyEdit

Istambul observatory in 1577

Istanbul observatory of Taqi al-Din in 1577

Over the course of Ottoman history, the Ottomans managed to build a large collection of libraries complete with translations of books from other cultures, as well as original manuscripts.[22] A large part of this desire for local and foreign manuscripts came from the 15th Century. Sultan Mehmet II ordered Georgios Amirutzes, a Greek scholar from Trabzon, to translate and make available to Ottoman educational institutions the geography book of Ptolemy. Another example is Ali Qushji -an astronomer, mathematician and physicist originally from Samarkand- who became a professor in two madrasas, and influenced Ottoman circles as a result of his writings and the activities of his students, even though he only spent two or three years before his death in Istanbul.[149]

Taqi al-Din built the Istanbul observatory of Taqi al-Din in 1577, where he carried out astronomical observations until 1580. He calculated the eccentricity of the Sun's orbit and the annual motion of the apogee.[150] His observatory was destroyed in 1580[151] due to the rise of a clerical faction which opposed or at least was indifferent to science.[152]





  2. Starting from the 19th century, the name Osmanlı Devleti (Ottoman State) became popular among the Ottoman citizens and officials. Before the 1800s, the name Osmanlı Devleti was not officially used, but records show this name was used informally by Ottoman citizens.


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Further readingEdit

  • Arnold, Arthur (1877). The promises of Turkey. Papers on the Eastern Question. London: Eastern Question Association. 

External linksEdit
