Seljuk Turks and the Ottoman Empire

Seljuk Turks
 The Seljuk Turks were the Turkish Muslim rulers between the 11th to the 13th centuries.
 They became soldiers in the service of the Abbasid caliphs in Baghdad.
 Who only started as the bodyguard of the caliphs, later revolted and overflow the
Abbasids of Iraq in 1055.
 Tughrik and his successor expanded the Seljuk Turkish Empire throughout Asia Minor –
Iraq, Syria, Persia, Palestine, and Egypt.
The Seljuk in History
The Seljuk Turks will be remembered in history mainly for the following reasons:
1. They united the Muslims in the 11th-13th centuries after the break-up of the Arab
caliphates.
2. They provoked the crusades, the wars between Muslims and Christians in the Holy land
(1096-1291). In 1085, Seljuk Turks captured Palestine. They vandalized Christians
churches, massacred Christians residents, desecrated Christians relics, and closed the
Holy land to Christian pilgrims.
3. The assassins, a secret sect of Muslims, arose in Persia and troubled the Seljuk Turkish
rulers in the 12th century.
4. The Seljuk Turks were conquered by the Ottoman Turks, who founded an even greater
empire.
Rise of the ottoman Empire
 As the power of the Seljuk Turks waned, that of the Ottoman Turks waxed. The first
great Ottoman Turk leader was Ottoman (Osman), a dashing warrior and organizer
(1290-1326).
 At about 1300 he proclaimed Turkish independence from the Seljuks and began the
conquest of the Middle East (Asia Minor). He founded a new empire named after him.
 Ottoman’s rise was as rapid as that of the Arabs and the Seljuk.
 From Asia, the Ottoman went to conquer Europe.
 In the 14th century, they captured Gallipoli, Thrace, Macedonia, the Balkans, Serbia and
Bulgaria, Adrianople became their new capital.
The Fall of Constantinople (1453)
 The most spectacular victory of the Ottomans was their siege and capture of the
Byzantine capital of Constantinople in 1453.
 Led by Muhammad II, the greatest Ottoman sultan, the Turks comprised an army of 150,
000 men, 300 ships and powerful artillery cannons.
 With Constantinople as his new capital he turned the Church of St. Sophia into a mosque.
 The fall Constantinople on May 29, 1453 was significant in world history for two
reasons. First, it ended the Byzantine Empire which had been Christendom’s bulwark in
Asia for a thousand years. Second, it signaled the rise of Islam as a world power.
Golden Age of the Ottoman Empire
 The years 1453 to 1566 saw the Golden Age Of the Ottoman Empire, the flowering and
splendor of its power.
 Muhammad II and his successors conquered more lands in Europe, Asia and North
Africa.
 The Ottoman went to the very gates of Vienna. They transformed both the Black Sea and
the Mediterranean Sea into “Ottoman Lakes”.
 Sulieman (1520-66), who ruled the Ottoman Empire at the height of its power, was
recognized by Christian kings in Europe who gladly made treaties with him.
The Janissaries
 The pride of the sultan’s army was a group of fanatical warriors called “the janissaries.”
 The janissaries were terrors of the Western world. When thrown into combat – at the
battles of Constantinople, Malta, and other places – they often outfought the best
Christian knights. They were as suicidal as the Japanese Kamikaze pilots in the Second
World War.
Decline of the Ottoman Empire
 After the reign of Sulieman, the Ottoman Empire began to fall. The causes of its downfall
were as follows:
1) Weak and incompetent rulers;
2) Rampant graft and corruption in government;
3) Moral decadence of the Ottoman peoples and military, and
4) Defeat and loss of territories to European powers.
 In 1571, the Ottoman navy, which had dominated the Mediterranean, was destroyed in
the Battle of Lepanto by Christian naval forces led by Don Juan of Austria. This naval
battle ended the Ottoman control of the seas.
 In the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78, the Ottomans lost more possessions.
 Turkey (ruled by the Ottoman sultan) became known as the “sick man of Europe”
because it was a crumbling Empire.
 The Russian Czar, Nicholas I, suggested that Egypt and Russia divice Turkey. However,
England refused.
 This led to the Crimean War (1854-56), where England, France and Sardinia fought
Russia to save the Ottoman Empire from Russian aggression.
 It was at this war that Alfred Tennyson, wrote his famous poem, ”the charge of the light
Brigade,” to commemorate a famous English attack which ended disastrously.
 The Ottoman Empire was saved, and the Crimean War was ended by the Congress of
Berlin (1878)
Downfall of the Ottoman Empire
 The immediate downfall of the Ottoman Empire was caused by the Turkish Revolution of
1908 and the first World War (1914-18).
 As the empire crumpled to pieces, young Turkish patriots, called “Young Turks,”
appeared on the scene.
 They were young army officers, intellectuals and critics of the corrupt Ottoman rulers.
 In July 1908, the Young Turks, led by Enver Bey, began the Turkish Revolution. They
deposed the weak sultan and made several reforms to nationalize the country.
 Turkey (not Arabic) became the new national language.
 But these reforms did not save the empire. During World War I, Turkey sided with
Gemmy against the Allied Powers and lost the war.
 It was not until 1923 that turkey found a new champion in the person of Mustafa Kemal
Ataturk, an army general and ex-Young Turk (1880-1938)
 Kemal Ataturk became president in1924 and, because of his reforms, was known as “the
Father of Modern Turkey.” He moved the capital to Ankara.
 However, the powerful Ottoman Turkish Empire of the 14th to the 20th centuries, which
was born in war, also perish in war.

Prepared by: Stephanie Villegas BSED II- Social Studies