The Kaloway Treaty not only means the end of the expansion of the Ottoman Empire, but also means that the Ottoman Empire began to decline. According to the treaty, Hungary no longer belongs to the Ottoman Empire, so the Ottoman Empire lost a lot of territory.
But this is really just the beginning. More than 200 years later, the Ottoman Empire suffered repeated wars and defeats, and its territory shrank until it finally collapsed. /kloc-At the beginning of the 9th century, Napoleon called it "the sick man of Europe".
Before the Ottoman Empire almost hanged European countries, just before the second defeat of Vienna, Habsburg still needed to pay tribute to the Ottoman Empire. The Black Sea is the inner lake of the Ottoman Empire, and most of the Mediterranean Sea is also owned by the Ottoman Empire. Even Aceh on Sumatra Island in Southeast Asia recognized the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire.
Why did the Ottoman Empire go from peak to loss of teachers and land after only two years? Why didn't the Ottoman Empire last for more than 200 years, but lingered until it collapsed?
Simply knowing a war or a certain period of history obviously cannot answer the above questions. Only by knowing the whole history of the Ottoman Empire can we understand what happened in it.
However, under the discourse of western centralism, the history of the Ottoman Empire is full of various stereotypes. Professor Caroline Finkel tried to break the stereotype and describe this history in a more neutral way. She published her own book The Ottoman Empire: 1299- 1923. This is the first Ottoman general history of the English-speaking world written with a large number of Ottoman Turkish original materials, which is very popular in Turkey.
Caroline Finkel is a doctor of Ottoman history and an expert in Ottoman studies at the School of Asian and African Studies, University of London. She has lived in Istanbul for 15 years and has a deep understanding of Turkey.
Ottoman Empire: 1299- 1923 tells the long history of the Ottoman Empire from the founding of the country at the end of 13 to the great speech delivered by Mustafa Kemal, the father of the Turkish nation in 1927. It shows us the historical context in which the Ottoman Empire ascended to the hegemony, gradually became the sick man of Europe, and finally collapsed.
Throughout the history of the Ottoman Empire for more than 600 years, we will find that the military system, tax system and sense of identity are closely related to the rise and fall of the Ottoman Empire, which almost affects the rise and fall of the Empire.
First of all, from the pillars of the empire to the guards at the source of the rebellion
Guard is a characteristic service of the Ottoman Empire, which played a vital role in the rise of the Empire.
At first, the Ottoman army was just a predatory alliance with mixed members and light religious color, among which there were a large number of Christians.
With the expansion of the conquered territory, Osman began to adopt the juvenile conscription system and established the Guards.
The Ottomans recruited young people, gave them military training and cultural education, and instilled the belief of loyalty to Sudan. Most of these teenagers come from Christian families, mainly in the Balkans. Teenagers who enter the Guards will be forced to convert.
The Guards were regarded as "slaves of Sudan" and became the main force of the Ottoman Empire, which made great contributions to the expansion of the Empire. Officials in charge of the empire are basically guards.
However, the guardian is a double-edged sword. After the death of a Sultan, his successor had to please the Guards in order to consolidate his power. The usual practice is to give rewards, such as giving money before going out to war and sharing the spoils after conquering new areas.
As a result, the power of the praetorian guard is expanding more and more, and it can even abolish Sudan.
/kloc-in the 0 th and 8 th centuries, the praetorian guard was very strong, but its fighting capacity was already very weak, and it completely became a rabble. A large number of idlers infiltrated the guard and got paid, but little training. However, rebellions are becoming more and more frequent. As long as they don't like it, they will launch a mutiny, and the guards have become the gangrene of the empire.
At this time, the Ottoman Empire had no resistance to Russia, a new powerful enemy in the north. Sultan Salim III tried to reform, but was killed by guards.
/kloc-in the first half of the 9th century, Mahmud II finally abolished the praetorian guard, established a new army and carried out reforms, but it was too late.
For a long time, in order to maintain the loyalty of the guards, the imperial finance has been stretched, and the chaos caused by the frequent mutiny of the guards has destroyed the unity of the economy and the country.
/kloc-At the end of 0/7, in order to cope with the crisis at home and abroad and obtain more financial revenue, the Ottoman Empire had to quench its thirst by drinking poison and reforming its tax system, which led to more serious consequences.
Second, the imperfection of the tax system and the emergence of local strongmen
1683, the Ottoman Empire went to war with the Habsburg Dynasty. After the failure of the siege of Vienna, Osman suffered a series of failures.
At this time, the Ottoman empire's finance has dried up, and there are many reasons for the financial drying up, such as war expenditure, royal luxury expenditure, and the sharp decline in trade monopoly income caused by changes in global trade routes.
In response to the crisis, the empire carried out tax reform. The so-called reform is to change the three-year tax system into a lifelong system.
The so-called tax package is to auction the tax rights of a region to individuals. This man paid the imperial government first, and then he taxed the region to get the difference and make profits for himself.
This kind of tax system itself is very backward, and the original three-year period can also slightly prevent local forces from getting bigger. However, in order to cope with the crisis, after the tax package became lifelong, some local forces expanded rapidly and became local strongmen, with the strength to challenge the central government.
After a long time, local strongmen could withhold taxes, and the Ottoman Empire had to send troops to suppress them. Using troops means consuming more fiscal revenue, and it is necessary to change the tax-included period in more areas to life-long system, thus falling into a vicious circle.
The expansion of local powerful forces not only consumed the strength of the empire, but also led to a separatist regime.
/kloc-in the 0/9th century, some areas became independent, which was closely related to the strength expansion of local strongmen. Such as Egypt, Syria, Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece and other places.
The lack of fiscal revenue and the failure of foreign wars have also led to another serious consequence. The empire had to borrow foreign debts from western powers, which gave the powers reasons to interfere in internal affairs.
/kloc-In the late 20th century, the Ottoman Empire actually became a semi-colony. The imperial government owed a lot of foreign debts, and a large number of domestic industries were also controlled by western powers. Local strongmen became the tools used by the great powers to deal with the imperial government. For example, behind the independence of many countries in the Balkans, there are manipulations by western powers.
The survival of the Ottoman Empire is entirely due to the contradiction between the great powers, who need to maintain the balance of power here.
Third, the identity crisis
Caroline Finkel emphasized the identity crisis when describing the Ottoman Empire in the19th century. In fact, from the whole narrative, the identity crisis has existed since the establishment of the Ottoman Empire.
The start time of the Ottoman Empire was set at 1299, which was set by the Ottomans themselves. Nothing important happened this year, purely because of Geely. According to the Islamic calendar, this year is 700 years, the beginning of a new era. Setting the founding time in this year is to enhance the sense of identity.
In fact, the Ottomans first appeared in the history books in 130 1 year, and the Ottoman army defeated the Byzantine army in a battle.
In order to prove the legitimacy of the founding of People's Republic of China (PRC), Ottoman historians fabricated a dream in the15th century: when the first sultan stayed in a holy house, he dreamed that a big tree grew on his navel, and the shade covered the whole world. The sage explained that this means that God will give you and your descendants the throne of the emperor.
/kloc-In the 4th century, Osman was just one of many Turkmen tribes in West Asia. They continued to annex other small countries around them, and by the end of 14, they became the most threatening force. In order to improve the nobility of their ancestry, the Ottomans claimed that their ancestors came from the Oguz tribe in Turkmenistan, but this is actually impossible to verify.
After the capture of Constantinople, the Ottoman Empire claimed to be the successor of the Roman Empire, which was temporarily recognized by Christians under its rule, but was completely rejected by western countries.
From 65438 to 0478, the Crimean Khanate became a vassal of the Ottoman Empire, bringing a political asset, that is, the Crimean Khanate was a descendant of Genghis Khan.
But in the Islamic world, the Ottoman Empire still had many competitors, such as the Safavid dynasty in Iran and Mamluk in Egypt.
/kloc-in the 6th century, after the Ottoman Empire destroyed the Mamluk dynasty, it was awarded the title of protector of holy land, which was recognized by half of Muslims. On the other hand, the Safavid dynasty, the other half of Muslims, still disagreed with Osman's leadership, and the two sides fought for hundreds of years.
But with the development of the times, this feudal kingship is no longer recognized.
/kloc-in the 0 th and 9 th centuries, nationalism was rampant. There were many nationalities living in the Ottoman Empire, but there was no main nationality. Due to the religious tolerance policy before the empire, although Islam was regarded as the state religion, Muslims did not occupy a dominant position. Under the control of western powers and the encouragement of local strongmen, the separatism of the Ottoman Empire intensified.
In order to cope with the identity crisis, the Ottoman Empire successively put forward Ottoman, Islamic, Pan-Turkmen and other identities, hoping to gain wide recognition from the people, but all ended in failure.
After the end of World War I, there were few imperial territories left, and the population structure also changed greatly. At this time, Kemal's Turkish identity was generally recognized and a modern Turkish country was created.
However, the Ottoman Empire, which once spanned Asia, Europe and Africa, no longer exists.
4. What are the reasons for the decline of the Ottoman Empire?
In Caroline Finkel's The Ottoman Empire: 1299- 1923, the military system, tax system and sense of identity are the troika driving the expansion of the Ottoman Empire. When the imperial expansion ended, the troika failed to maintain the sustainable development of the empire.
When the Ottoman Empire went into decline, Sudan tried to reform, trying to keep up with the trend of world development and maintain the glory of the empire. All three cars have become obstacles.
However, the backwardness of military system, tax system and sense of identity is not the cause of the decline of the Ottoman Empire, but actually the performance of the decline of the Ottoman Empire. The decline of the empire has deeper reasons.
Compared with China in the East, the Ottoman Empire has always been in contact with the West, and began to learn from the West very early, but it finally fell into a position of being trampled upon by others. China in the East, on the other hand, began to learn from the West in the late19th century, and eventually became a semi-colony, with very similar results.
The two countries are similar, with agriculture as the main body in economic structure and autocratic dynasty in political system. Both countries failed to touch the most fundamental economic level in time, that is, they failed to keep up with the pace of industrialization. This is the fundamental reason for the backwardness of the two countries.
The reform was limited to military technology and completely copied the western political system in the later period. However, the backward agricultural economy could not support this reform at all, which eventually led to the two countries becoming semi-colonial countries.
It's just that China is lucky, and there is not much problem in its sense of identity, thus avoiding the end of the Ottoman Empire being divided into more than 40 countries.