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The Foundation of the Ottoman Empire

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The Foundation of the Ottoman Empire THE FOUNDATION OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE OXFOED UNIVERSITY PRESS LONDON EDINBURGH GLASGOW NEW YORK TORONTO MELBOURNE BOMBAY HUMPHREY MILFORD PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY 1736 vTHE FOUNDATION OF THE Ottoman empire A h i s t o r y o f t h e OSMAN LIS UP TO THE DEATH OF BAYEZID I (1300- 1403) BY HERBERT ADAMS GIBBONS, Ph.D. SOMETIME FELLOW OF rWNCETON UNIVERSITY 35790 e C ' TT- -Z- ^ ^ OXFORD A T T H E c l a r e n d o n P R E S S 1 9 1 6 ( u ''J ( i - .. qdfQ^ 6 G>) PREFACE F our years of residence in the Ottoman Empire, chiefly* in Constantinople, during the most disastrous period of its decline, have led me to investigate ils origin. This book is written because I feel that the result of my research brings a ne\^ point of view to the student of the twentieth-century problems of the Near East, as well as to those who are interested in fourteenth- century Europe. If we study the past, it is to under­ stand the present and to prepare for the future. I plead guilty to many footnotes. Much of my text is controversial in character, and the subject-matter is so little known that the general reader would hardly be able to form judgements without a constant— but I trust not wearisome—^reference to authorities. The risk that I run of incurring criticism from Oriental philologists on the ground of nomenclature is very great. I ask their indulgence. Will they not take into con­ sideration the fact that there is no accepted standard among English-speaking scholars for the transliteration of Turkish and Slavic names ? Wherever possible, I have adopted the spelling in general usage in the Near East, and in English standard lexicons and encyclo­ paedias. When a general usage cannot.be determined, I have frequently been at a loss. There was the effort to be as consistent in spelling as sources and authorities would permit. But where 6 THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE consistency was lacking in originals, a consistent trans­ literation sometimes presented difficulties with which I was incompetent to cope. Even a philologist, with a system, would be puzzled when he founS his sources conflicting with each other in spelling, and—as is often the case—with themselves.. And if a philologist thinks that he can establish his system by transliterating the spoken word, let him travel from Constantinople to Cairo overland, and he will have a bewildering collection of variants before he reaches his journey’s end. I was not long in Turkey before I learned that Osman and Othman were both correct. It depended merely upon whether you were in Constantinople or Konia! After you had decided to accept the pronunciation of the capital, you were told that Konia is the Tours of Turkey. My acknowledgements to kind friends are many. I am grateful for the year-in and year-out patience and willingness of the officials of the Bibliotheque Nationale during long periods of constanit demand upon their time, and attention. Professors John De Witt, D.D., LL.D., of Princeton Theological Seminary, Duncan B. Macdonald, Ph.D., of Hartford Theological Seminary, and Edward P. Cheyney, Ph.D., LL.D., of the Univer­ sity of Pennsylvania, have read portions of the manu­ script, and have made important and helpful suggestions. The whole manuscript has been read by Professors Talcott Williams, LL.D., of Columbia University, and R. M. McElroy, Ph.D., of Princeton University, who have not hesitated to give many hours to discussion and criticism of the theory that the book presents. Above aU, I am indebted for practical aid and PREFACE 7 encouragement in research and in writing, from the inception of the idea of the book until the manuscript went to press, to my wife, with her Bryn Mawr insistence upon accuracy of detail and care for form of narrative, and to Alexander Souter, D.Litt., Regius Professor of Humanity in Aberdeen University, my two comrades in research through a succession of happy years in the rue de Richelieu, rue Servandoni, and rue' du Montparnasse of the queen city of the world. H. A. G. Pabis, September 1, 1915. CONTENTS CHAPTER I PAGE OSMAN : A N ew R ace appears in History 11 CHAPTER II ORKHAN : A N e w N ation is F orm ed an d comes into Con tact w it h th e W estern W orld . <64 CHAPTER III MURAD : T he Osmanlis lay the F oundations of an Empire in Eu r o p e ...................................................110 CHAPTER IV BAYEZID : T h e Osm anlis I n h er it th e B yzan tin e E m pir e ........ 180 APPENDIX A T r a d itio n a l M isconceptions of th e Origin of th e Osmanlis and their Empire .... 263 APPENDIX B The Emirates of Asia Minor during the F ourteenth Ce n t u r y ..............................................................................277 Chronological t a b l e s . 303 BIBLIOGRAPHY . 319 INDEX .... 369 MAPS PAGE 1. Conquests op Mu r a d and B a y e z id in th e B alkan P e n in su la an d op B a y e zid in A s ia Min o r Frontispiece 2. T h e E m irate op Osman ...... 31 3. T h e E m irates op O sman an d Orkh an . 67 4. T h e E m irate o p Mu rad . .113 5. T im u r ’s I n vasion op A sia Min o r .... 247 6. T h e E m irates op A sia M in o r in th e F o u rteenth Ce n t u r y ........ 278 . CHAPTER I OSMAN A NEW RACE APPEARS IN HISTORY The traveller who desires to penetrate Asia Minor by railway may start either from Snajn-na or from Constanti­ nople. The Constantinople terminus of the Anatolian Rail­ way is at Haidar Pasha, on the Asiatic shore, where the Bosphorus opens into the Sea of Marmora. Three hours along the Gulf of Ismidt, past the Princes’ Islands, brings one to Ismidt, the ancient Nicomedia, eastern capital of the Roman Empire under Diocletian. It is at the very end of the gulf. From Ismidt, the railway crosses a fertile plain, coasts the western shore of Lake Sabandja, and enters the valley of the Sangarius as far as Lefke. Here it turns southward, and mounts rapidly the course of the Kara Sii, a tributary of the Sangarius, through the picturesque town of Biledjik, to a plateau, at the north-western end of which is Eski Sheir, seven hours distant from Ismidt. Esld Sheir is the ancient Dorylaeum. It was here that Godfrey de Bouillon in 1097 won from the Turks the victory that opened for his Crusaders the way through Asia Minor. - From Eski ShcTr there are two railway lines. One, running eastward, has its terminus at Angora, the ancient Ancyra, after thirteen hours of rather slow running. The other, the main line, runs south to Afion Kara Hissar, where the line from Smyrna joins it, and then south-west to Konia, the ancient Iconium, which is the western terminus of the new Bagdad Railway. The time fi-om Eski Sheir to Konia is fifteen hours. 12 THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE From Lefke or from Mekedje, near the junction of the Kara Su and the Sangarius, one can drive in four hours west to Isnik (ancient Nicaea), or in twelve hours to Brusa, which lies at the foot of Keshish Dagh (Mount Olympus). Between Lefke and Eski Sheir, where the railway begins to mount above the river-bed of the Kara Su, is Biledjik. Between Eski Sheir and Biledjik is Sugut. West from Eski Sheir, six hours on horse across one low mountain range, lies Inoenu. South from Eski Sheir, a day by carriage, is Kutayia. There is a short branch line of the Anatolian. Railway to Kutayia from Alayund, two and a half hours beyond Eski Sheir pn the way to Konia. If one win read the above paragraphs with a map before him, he will readily see that this country, the extreme north-western corner of Asia Minor, corresponds roughly to the borderland between the Roman provinces of Phrygia Epictetus and Bithynia, and is near to Constantinople. Eski Sheir, Sugut, and Biledjik are close to Brusa, Nipaea, and Nicomedia. Owing to the convenient waterways furnished by the Gulfs of Mudania and Ismidt, Brusa, Nicaea, and Nicomedia have always been within a day’s sail of Constantinople, even in the periods of primitive navigation. From the hills behind Eski Sheir, Mount Olympus is the commanding landmark of the western horizon. From Constantinople, Mount Olympus is easily distinguishable even in dull weather. It was this country, adjacent to Constantinople, and separated from the rest of Asia Minor by rugged mountain ranges and the dreary, treeless plateau stretching eastward towards the Salt Desert, which gave birth to the people who, a century after their appearance, were to inherit the Byzantine Empire and to place their sovereigns upon the throne of the Caesars. OSIilAN 13 II At the end of the thirteenth century, Asia Minor, so long the battleground between the Khalifs and the Byzantines, almost entirely abandoned by the latter for a brief time to the Seljuk emperors of Rum, who had their seat at Konia, then again disturbed by the invasion of the Crusaders from the west aad the Mongols from the east, was left to itself.
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