Ottoman Empire

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Metadata

Name: Ottoman Empire (Osmanlı İmparatorluğu, c. 1299 – 1922)
Predecessor(s):

  • Karasi Beylik (1345)
  • Emirate of Aydın (1390)
  • Saruhan Beylik (1390)
  • Hamid Beylik (1391)
  • Second Bulgarian Empire (1396)
  • Tsardom of Vidin (1396)
  • Germiyan Beylik (1429)
  • Byzantine Empire (1453)
  • Duchy of Athens (1458)
  • Serbian Despotate (1459)
  • Despotate of the Morea (1460)
  • Isfendiyar Beylik (1461)
  • Empire of Trebizond (1461)
  • Kingdom of Bosnia (1463)
  • Karaman Beylik (1468)
  • Principality of Theodoro (1475)
  • Aq Qoyunlu (1508)
  • Mamluk Sultanate (1517)
  • Hospitaller Tripoli (1551)
  • Kingdom of Tlemcen (1554)
  • Hafsid Sultanate of Tunis (1574)

Successor(s):

  • Kingdom of Greece (1830) → Hellenic Republic (1974–present)
  • Principality of Romania (1878) → Kingdom of Romania (1881) → Socialist Republic of Romania (1947) → Romania (present)
  • Principality of Serbia (1878) → Kingdom of Serbia (1882) → Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (1918) → Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1929) → Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (1945) → Republic of Serbia (2006–present)
  • Principality of Bulgaria (1878) → Kingdom of Bulgaria (1908) → People’s Republic of Bulgaria (1946) → Republic of Bulgaria (present)
  • Provisional Government of Albania (1912) → Principality of Albania (1914) → Kingdom of Albania (1928) → People’s Socialist Republic of Albania (1946) → Republic of Albania (present)
  • Sultanate of Egypt (1922 independence) → Arab Republic of Egypt (1953–present)
  • Republic of Turkey (1923–present)
  • Kingdom of Iraq (1932) → Republic of Iraq (1958–present)
  • Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (1932–present)
  • Lebanese Republic (1943–present)
  • Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan (1946–present)
  • Syrian Republic (1946) → United Arab Republic (1958) → Syrian Arab Republic (1961–present)
  • State of Israel (1948–present)
  • Kingdom of Libya (1951) → Libyan Arab Republic (1969) → State of Libya (2011–present)
  • Kingdom of Tunisia (1956) → Republic of Tunisia (1957–present)

Ottoman Empire in 1337

ORHAN GHAZI — THE BEY WHO BUILDS

The son of Osman is proving to be something more dangerous than a raider: an administrator. From his new capital at Bursa — taken by patient blockade rather than glorious assault — Orhan mints coins in his own name, endows mosques and soup kitchens, and lets his brother Alaeddin organize something no ghazi band has bothered with before: a standing army with regular pay and uniform white caps. This year the prize is Nicomedia, the last Roman stronghold of Bithynia, starved into surrender; with it, the conquest of the old imperial heartland across from Constantinople is complete. Among the beyliks, the Ottomans are still one house among many — Aydin’s corsairs win more fame, Karaman claims more prestige. But the neighbors fight the sea and each other, while Orhan’s frontier faces a dying empire whose princes keep inviting Turks across the straits to settle their quarrels. Can a border emirate become something the world has no name for yet? The Romans call them mercenaries. They will learn other words.

TL;DR

Started as a small frontier beylik1 around 1300, the Ottomans expanded steadily into the Balkans before even fully consolidating Anatolia. The most famous episode is the siege of Constantinople in 1453, after which they tried to remove Constantine the Great from the city’s name. Peak power in the 16-17th was under the famous Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent2. The empire fell hard during industrial age, and eventually dismantled by jealous Europeans. Redditors are still arguing whether a halal New Rome is still the legitimate Roman Empire.
→Republic of Turkey

Trivia

  • In the modern age, a padded footstool is still called “ottoman” in English. Osman I must be shocked that his name lingers not on a glorious empire, but a small furniture in the 21st.
  • One of the very few empires spanning Europe, Asia and Africa. Others in the club are the Roman Empires.
  • In 1718-1730 (Tulip Era), the nobles were so obsessed with tulips making them inflate like NFTs. This was a relatively peaceful era, after Ottoman lost land to the Habsburg monarchy (still Holy Roman Empire then).

Footnotes

  1. Bey means “lord”. Essentially, Anatolia beyliks were principalities. ↩

  2. “The Great” had inflated into nothing since Alfred by then, so he had to get a cooler nickname. Jokes aside, “the Magnificent” is almost the private nickname owned by Suleiman only. ↩