The Ottoman Empire *final draft

The Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman Empire started in the 13^th century and was one of the strongest and long lasting empires ever. But before it began the Turks were nomadic people searching for grasslands in Asia Minor. The Ottomans started conquests under the lead of Osman Bey who is considered to be the founder of the Ottoman Empire. There conquests were to Africa, Asia and Europe in the hand of the Ghazi. The Ghazis were warriors of faith who fought in the name of Islam to take in Christian and Jewish territories for the Ottomans. The warriors however didn’t go near Muslim territories because the point of their conquests is to spread Islam and didn’t want conflict with their Muslim brothers. The Ottomans finally settled in the city of Bursa and formed a government. This changed their nomadic lifestyle and ended in one of the greatest empires that lasted from the 13^th century to the 19^th century.

There are a lot of key elements that helped the empire to its rise but the most important is religion. Religion is the key element not only to the rise of the empire but also to the small factors that makes any great empire. Islam was important to education, warfare, foreign relations, agriculture and culture. All of the factors listed are important to the success of the empire and are all connected by the religion. Without them the Ottomans wouldn’t have existed or have prevailed.

Education was important to the Ottomans as the Devshirme system gave the empire loyal soldiers for the empire. The Devshirme is when the ottomans bring young boys at the ages of 8-15 from the Balkans to serve in state service of the empire. The boys were brought to be educated in the palace school where they were taught about Islam and its culture and learned Persian, Arabic and Ottoman Turkish also they converted to Islam. At the age of 25 they become part of the military. The whole point of the Devshirme system is that it gave the sultan loyal soldiers in his army.

Warfare was also influenced by religion as stated before Ghazis were really important to the Ottomans. Ghazis were warriors of the Islamic faith who fought against the Mongols to restore land to the Ottomans. Religion was might have been a problem in warfare because it limited the Ghazis conquests because they cannot set out to Muslim controlled areas. Another aspect that helped the warfare of the ottomans is the Timar system, which has a strong resemblance of the European feudal system. The Timar system is a system that is a new and improved version of an old Persian way. They would give the askeri part of the agricultural taxes in return in a guarantee for serving in the military. This was good because it gave the sultan more than a 100,000 cavalrymen in the military and also he’d know the income of the empire.

Their foreign relations were somewhat peaceful with other religions. But it seemed that there was more rivalry with their Muslim brothers than other religions. The reason for their harmony with other religions is the Millet system. The Millet system is where the Muslims granted any community within the Ottoman Empire that had an excepted holy book protection. The protected communities were called dhimmas and the people within the communities dhimmis had to pay in return a poll tax or cizye.

Agriculture was also an important aspect as it was the key element to a strong economy. Agriculture provided the citizens jobs as farmers who farm the produce and merchants who sell the produce. The empire had a lot of fertile land, which made it a lot easier to farm and to have good crops. Some fertile lands were the Nile delta in Egypt and Aydin valley in Anatolia provided great crops from the rich soils.

Their culture was strongly influenced by Islam in all these subjects’ poetry, calligraphy, music and food. Islam powerfully swayed poetry as they used Quran as a base of writing. Calligraphy started of by artists writing the verses of Quran in the holy book.  Islam was also part of the food, as they had to adapt their cooking styles to the limitations given by the religion.

These are all very important factors to the Ottoman Empire and they were all influenced by religion, as religion was the most important aspect in the Ottomans eyes. The Ottoman Empire was a great empire that could of lasted until today but the concepts of nationalism and ethnicity came into play. The decline of the empire started when bribery and corruption started becoming an issue in the government. Wars with other nations started putting pressure and ended up in treaties. The shrinking empire finally fell in the 19^th century even though it ended its still remembered as one of the best Empires that have ever existed.

Bibliography

1. Turzim. “The Ottoman Empire.” Accessed November 27, 2011.
http://www.turizm.net/turkey/history/ottoman3.html.
2. History of the Ottoman Empire. "The Ottoman Empire Timeline". Accessed November 27, 2011. http://www.turizm.net/turkey/history/ottoman3.html  
3. BBC. "Ottoman Empire (1301-1922)". November 28, 2011.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/islam/history/ottomanempire_1.shtml
4. HilalPlaza. “The Fall of the Ottoman Empire.” Accessed 25-November-2011http://www.hilalplaza.com/fall-of-ottoman-empire.html                                                                       5. Quataert, Donald. The Ottoman Empire, 1700-1922: New Approaches to European History.

 Cambridge: Cambridge University Printing Press, 2000.