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Title: The Turkish Empire, its Growth and Decay
Author: Eversley, Lord
Language: English
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THE TURKISH EMPIRE
ITS GROWTH AND DECAY
_BY THE SAME AUTHOR_
Demy 8vo, cloth, +7s. 6d.+ net.
WITH 4 MAPS AND 8 ILLUSTRATIONS.
The Partitions of Poland
(Second Edition)
“In this volume Lord Eversley gives us the story of Poland’s tragedy
with his usual precision and compression, but adding the special charm
of a delightfully fresh, sustained, and vivid handling.”
+_Westminster Gazette._+
“Thoroughness, dignity, and a calm, even judgment are the conspicuous
characteristics of Lord Eversley’s study of the sufferings and wrongs
of Poland during the last 150 years.... It was always Lord Eversley’s
way to pursue any theme with complete independence of judgment, and
an assiduous determination to get back to facts, and this volume is a
meritorious example of its author’s industry and intellectual vigour.”
+_Daily Telegraph._+
LONDON: T. FISHER UNWIN LTD.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: MAHOMET THE CONQUEROR
From a medallion in the British Museum attributed to the Italian artist
Gentile Bellini, who was invited by Mahomet to Constantinople, in 1480,
and painted a portrait of him.
The portrait is in the Layard Collection.]
THE TURKISH
EMPIRE
ITS GROWTH AND DECAY
BY
LORD EVERSLEY
Author of “The Partitions of Poland,” “Peel and O’Connell”,
“Gladstone and Ireland”
WITH A FRONTISPIECE
AND THREE MAPS
LONDON
T. FISHER UNWIN LTD.
ADELPHI TERRACE
_First published in 1917_
_Second Impression 1918_
(_All rights reserved_)
PREFACE
THE favour with which, two years ago, my book on _The Partitions
of Poland_ was received by the public has induced me to devote the
interval to a study of the history of another State which, in modern
times, has almost disappeared from the map of Europe—namely Turkey.
The subject is one in which I have for many years past taken great
interest. In the course of a long life, I have witnessed the greater
part of the events which have resulted in the loss to that State of
all its Christian provinces in Europe and all its Moslem provinces in
Africa, leaving to it only its capital and a small part of Thrace in
Europe, and its still wide possessions in Asia.
So long ago, also, as in 1855 and 1857, I spent some time at
Constantinople and travelled in Bulgaria and Greece, and was able
to appreciate the effects of Turkish rule. As a result, I gave a
full support, in 1876, to Mr. Gladstone in his efforts to secure
the independence of Bulgaria, and in 1879 was an active member of a
committee, presided over by Lord Rosebery, which had for its object
the extension of the kingdom of Greece so as to include the provinces
inhabited by Greeks still suffering under Turkish rule.
In 1887 and 1890 I again visited the East and travelled over the same
ground as thirty years earlier, and was able to observe the immense
improvements which had been effected in the provinces that had gained
independence, and how little change had taken place at Constantinople.
In view of these experiences and of the further great changes portended
in Turkey after the conclusion of the present great war, I have
thought it may be of use to tell, in a compact and popular form, the
story of the growth and decay of the Turkish Empire.
History may well be told at many different lengths and from different
points of view. That of the Ottoman Empire, from the accession of
Othman in 1288 to the treaty of Kainardji in 1774, which secured to
Russia a virtual protectorate in favour of the Christian subjects of
Turkey, has been told at its greatest length by the German professor,
Von Hammer, in eighteen volumes. He is the only historian who has
explored for this long period both Greek and Turkish annals.
The British historian, Knolles, writing in 1610, told the story of the
growth of the Turkish Empire in two bulky folio volumes, much admired
by two such different authorities as Dr. Johnson and Lord Byron. The
work is based on a few only of the Greek annals. It is very discursive
and imperfect, but it contains many most terse and striking passages.
Gibbon, the historian of the Roman Empire, and Sir Edwin Pears, in his
most interesting book on the Destruction of the Greek Empire, have also
relied on Greek authorities up to the capture of Constantinople by the
Turks in 1453, before which date there were no Turkish historians. Very
recently, in 1916, Mr. Herbert Gibbons, of the Princeton University,
published a very valuable work on the foundations of the Ottoman
Empire, dealing with its first four great Sultans. He has again
examined with very great care the numerous and conflicting early Greek
authorities, and has thrown much new light on the subject.
Other historians of Turkey, writing in English and French, such as
Creasy, Lane Poole, La Jonquière, and Halil Ganem (a Young Turk), have
drawn their facts mainly from Von Hammer’s great work. Their books are
all of interest and value. But these writers, and especially Sir Edward
Creasy, in his otherwise admirable _History of the Ottoman Empire_,
written at the time of the Crimean War, to which I have been much
indebted, took what would now be considered too favourable a view of
Turkish rule in modern times, and were over sanguine, as events have
shown, as to the maintenance and regeneration of the Empire. I have
followed their example in basing my narrative mainly on Von Hammer’s
work, correcting it in some important respects from the other sources
I have named, compressing it into much smaller compass than they have
done, treating it from a somewhat different point of view, and bringing
it down to the commencement of the present great war in 1914.
It would have been easier to tell the story at double the length, so
as to include much other important and interesting matter, but, in
such a case, the lesson to be drawn from it would have been obscured by
the maze of detail. My book does not aim at a full history of the long
period dealt with. I have proposed only to explain the process by which
the Turkish Empire was aggregated by its first ten great Sultans, and
has since been, in great part, dismembered under their twenty-five
degenerate successors, and to assign causes for these two great
historic movements.
I will only add that I commenced my recent studies under the
impressions derived in part from some of the histories to which I
have referred and with which I was familiar, and in part from the
common tradition in Western Europe—dating probably from the time of
the Crusaders—that the Turkish invasions and conquests in Europe
were impelled by religious zeal and fervour and by the desire to
spread Islam. I have ended them with the conviction that there was no
missionary zeal whatever for Islam in the Turkish armies and their
leaders who invaded Europe, and that their main incentive was the hope
of plunder by the sack of cities, the sale of captives as slaves or
for harems, and the confiscation of land and its distribution among
soldiers as a reward for bravery. I have also concluded that the decay
of the military spirit and the shrinkage of Empire was largely due to
the absence of these motives and rewards when the Turks were on the
defensive.
If I have expressed my views freely on this subject, and on the misrule
of the Turks in modern times, I have endeavoured to state the facts on
which they are based with perfect fairness as between the Crescent and
the Cross.
I have purposely refrained from expressing an opinion as to the future
of Turkey, after the conclusion of the existing great war. The problems
which will then have to be solved are of a different order to those of
the past which have been dealt with in this book. The Turkish Empire,
in the sense of the rule of an alien race over subject races, has
practically ceased to exist in Europe. It survives in Asia and at its
capital, Constantinople, under very different conditions.
With respect to the numerous works I have consulted for the latter part
of my book, I desire specially to acknowledge my indebtedness to Mr.
Lane Poole’s admirable _Life of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe_.
I have to thank Lord Bryce, Lord Fitzmaurice, and Sir Edwin Pears for
their valuable suggestions, and Lady Byles and Mr. Laurence Chubb for
their kind help.
E.
_June 1, 1917._
CONTENTS
_PART I_
THE GROWTH OF EMPIRE
PAGE
I. OTHMAN (1288-1326) 13
II. ORCHAN (1326-59) 20
III. MURAD I (1359-89) 31
IV. BAYEZID I (1389-1403) 44
V. MAHOMET I (1413-21) 59
VI. MURAD II (1421-51) 64
VII. MAHOMET II, ‘THE CONQUEROR’ (1451-81) 73
VIII. BAYEZID II (1481-1512) 98
IX. SELIM I (1512-20) 103
X. SOLYMAN THE MAGNIFICENT (1520-66) 114
XI. GRAND VIZIER SOKOLLI (1566-78) 136
_PART II_
THE DECAY OF EMPIRE
XII. THE RULE OF SULTANAS (1578-1656) 151
XIII. THE KIUPRILI VIZIERS (1656-1702) 168
XIV. TO THE TREATY OF PASSAROWITCH (1702-18) 191
XV. TO THE TREATY OF BELGRADE (1718-39) 203
XVI. TO THE TREATY OF KAINARDJI (1739-74) 211
XVII. TO THE TREATY OF JASSY (1774-92) 223
XVIII. TO THE TREATY OF BUCHAREST (1792-1812) 238
XIX. MAHMOUD II (1808-39) 255
XX. THE RULE OF ELCHIS (1839-76) 287
XXI. ABDUL HAMID II (1876-1909) 316
XXII. THE YOUNG TURKS (1909-14) 352
XXIII. A RETROSPECT 369
APPENDIX—GENEALOGY OF THE OTTOMAN SULTANS 382
INDEX 385
LIST OF MAPS
1. SOUTH-EASTERN EUROPE AT THE TIME OF THE FIRST
ENTRY OF THE OTTOMANS IN 1353 _Facing page_ 31
2. THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE AT THE TIME OF ITS GREATEST
EXTENT _Facing page_ 148
3. SOUTH-EASTERN EUROPE AND ASIA MINOR IN 1914 _Facing page_ 369
_PART I_
THE GROWTH OF EMPIRE
OTHMAN
1288-1326
TOWARDS the middle of the thirteenth century a small band or tribe
of nomad Turks migrated from Khorassan, in Central Asia, into Asia
Minor. They were part of a much larger body, variously estimated at
from two to four thousand horsemen, who, with their families, had fled
from their homes in Khorassan under Solyman Shah. They had been driven
thence by an invading horde of Mongols from farther east. They hoped
to find asylum in Asia Minor. They crossed into Armenia and spent some
years in the neighbourhood of Erzerum, plundering the natives there.
When the wave of Mongols had spent its force, they proposed to return
to Khorassan. On reaching the Euphrates River Solyman, when trying, on
horseback, to find a ford, was carried away by the current and drowned.
This was reckoned as a bad omen by many of his followers. Two of his
sons, with a majority of them, either returned to Central Asia or
dispersed on the way there.
Two other sons, Ertoghrul and Dundar, with four hundred and twenty
families, retraced their course, and after spending some time again
near Erzerum, wandered westward into Asia Minor. They came into a
country inhabited by a kindred race. Successive waves of Turks from
the same district in Central Asia, in the course of the three previous
centuries, had made their way into Asia Minor, and had taken forcible
possession of the greater part of it. They formed there an Empire,
known as that of the Seljukian Turks, with Konia, the ancient Iconium,
as its capital. But this Empire, by the middle of the thirteenth
century, was in a decadent condition. It was eventually broken up,
in part, by assaults of a fresh swarm of invaders from Central Asia;
and in part by internal civil strife, fomented by family disputes of
succession.
When Ertoghrul’s band appeared on the scene, Sultan Alaeddin ruled
at Konia over what remained to him of the Seljukian State. Other
remnants of it survived under independent Emirs at Karamania, Sarukhan,
Mentsche, and numerous other smaller States. Between them they
possessed nearly the whole of Asia Minor, with the exception of a few
cities in its north-west, such as Brusa, Nicæa, and Nicomedia and the
districts round them, and a belt of territory along the Bosphorus, the
Sea of Marmora, and the Hellespont, to which the Byzantine Emperors,
formerly the owners of nearly the whole of Anatolia, were now reduced.
Two small Christian States also still existed there—Trebizond, in the
north-east, and Little Armenia, in Cilicia, in the south-east. Though
divided among many independent Emirs, the people of Asia Minor, with
the exception of the Greeks and Armenians, were fairly welded together.
The invading Turks had intermixed with the native population, imposing
on them the Turkish language, and had themselves adopted the religion
of Islam. Ertoghrul and his nomad tribe, before entering this country,
were not Moslems, but they were not strangers in language. Whatever
their religion, it was held lightly. They were converted to Islam after
a short stay in the country and, as is often the case with neophytes,
became ardent professors of their new faith.
The oft-told story of the first exploit of Ertoghrul and his four
hundred and twenty horsemen, on coming into the country of the Seljuks,
as handed down by tradition, though savouring somewhat of a myth, is
as follows: They came unexpectedly upon a battle in which one side was
much pressed. They knew nothing of the combatants. Ertoghrul spoke to
his followers: “Friends, we come straight on a battle. We carry swords
at our side. To flee like women and resume our journey is not manly. We
must help one of the two. Shall we aid those who are winning or those
who are losing?” Then they said unto him: “It will be difficult to aid
the losers. Our people are weak in number and the victors are strong!”
Ertoghrul replied: “This is not the speech of bold men. The manly part
is to aid the vanquished.” Thereupon the whole body of them fell upon
the Mongols, who were the winning side, and drove them into flight.
The side to which they brought aid and victory proved to be that of
Sultan Alaeddin of Konia. In return for this providential aid, Sultan
Alaeddin made a grant of territory to Ertoghrul to be held as a fief
under the Seljuks. It consisted of a district at Sugut, about sixty
miles south-east of Brusa, and a part of the mountain range to the west
of it.
Ertoghrul and his horsemen were a welcome support to Alaeddin’s waning
fortunes. In a later encounter with a small Byzantine force they
came off victorious, and Alaeddin made a further addition to their
territory on the borders of his own, over which he had a very nominal
sovereignty. Thenceforth Ertoghrul lived an uneventful pastoral life
as the head of his clan or tribe of Turks in the ceded territory, till
his death in 1288, nearly fifty years from the date of his leaving
Khorassan. His son, Othman, who was born at Sugut in 1258, was chosen
by the clan to succeed him, and soon commenced a much more ambitious
career than that of his father. When of the age of only sixteen he had
fallen in love with the beautiful daughter of Sheik Idebali, a holy man
of great repute in Karamania. It is evidence of the small account then
held of Ertoghrul and his son that the Sheik did not think the marriage
good enough for his daughter. It was only after a long and patient
wooing by Othman, and as the result of a dream, which foretold a great
future of empire for his progeny, that Idebali gave consent to the
marriage.
There were no contemporary Turkish histories of the early Ottoman
Sultans. It was not till many years after the capture of Constantinople
in 1453 that Turkish historians wrote about the birth of their State.
They had to rely upon traditions, which must be accepted with much
reserve. This, however, is certain, that Othman, in his thirty-eight
years of leadership, increased his dominion from its very narrow limits
at Sugut and Eski-Sheir to a territory extending thence northward to
the Bosphorus and Black Sea, a distance of about a hundred and twenty
miles by an average breadth of sixty miles, an area of about seven
thousand square miles. There are no means of estimating its population.
It was probably sparse, except on the coast of the Marmora and Black
Sea. It included only one important city, Brusa, which was surrendered
by its garrison and citizens shortly before the death of Othman
in 1326, after being hemmed in and cut off from communication with
Constantinople for many years. Considerable as these additions were,
the nascent State could not even yet be considered as important in
size. It was exceeded by several of the larger Turkish Emirates in Asia
Minor, such as Karamania, Sarukhan, and others.
It is notable that Othman, from the outset of his career, devoted his
efforts, not against the Turkish Moslem States lying to the south and
west of him, but against the territory to the north in possession
of the Byzantine Empire, or which had recently been more or less
emancipated from it, and inhabited chiefly by Christians. It is to be
inferred from this that the motive of Othman was partly a religious
one, to extend Islam. This was not effected by any signal victories
over the armies of the Greek Empire. There was only one recorded battle
against any army of the Emperor, that at Baphœon, near Nicomedia, where
Othman, who by this time reckoned four thousand horsemen among his
followers, defeated the inconsiderable body of two thousand Byzantine
troops. In the following year, 1302, the Greek Emperor, Michael
Palæologus, alarmed at the progress of Othman, crossed in person into
Asia Minor at the head of a small army of mercenary Slavs. But he
brought no money with him to pay his soldiers. They would not fight
without pay. They dispersed, and Michael was obliged to return to his
capital. This was his last attempt to defend his remaining territory in
that district. He was hard pressed in other directions by other Turkish
Emirs in Asia Minor, and in the first decade of the fourteenth century
the Greek Empire lost all its possessions in the islands of the Ægean
Sea.
The extensions of territory by Othman, during his long reign of
thirty-eight years, were effected by a slow process of attrition, by
capturing from time to time petty fortresses and castles and annexing
the districts round them. He acted in this respect, in the earlier
stages, as fief of the Seljuk State; but later, when that Empire came
to an end, Othman declared his independence, and thenceforth his
accretions of territory were on his own behalf. It would seem that, as
these additions were made, their populations, or the greater part of
them who were Christians, adopted Islam, not under compulsion—for there
is no record of the massacre of captives or of the sale of them as
slaves—but because they were abandoned by their natural protectors,
the Greeks of Constantinople. The important fact, clearly shown by
Mr. Gibbons in his recent work, is that the new State thus created by
Othman did not consist purely of Turks. It had a very large mixture of
Greeks and Slavs, who were welded with Turks by the religion of Islam.
They were, from an early period, very distinct from the people of other
Turkish States. They called themselves Osmanlis. The term ‘Turk’ was
used by them rather as a term of contempt for an inferior people, as
compared with themselves. It was only in later years, when the other
Turkish States of Asia Minor were incorporated in the Empire, that
the term ‘Turk’ was applied to its people, in the first instance by
outsiders, and eventually by themselves.
To Othman, therefore, is due the credit of this inception of a new
State and a new and distinct people. He did not, however, assume the
title of Sultan. He was simply an Emir, like so many other rulers of
petty States in Asia Minor. He was not a great general. He had no
opportunity of conducting a great campaign. He was a brave soldier
and a sagacious leader, who inspired confidence and trust in his
followers and subjects. He pursued with great persistency the policy of
enlarging his domain. He was also a wise and capable administrator, and
was assisted in this by his father-in-law, Idebali, who acted as his
Vizier. He meted out equal justice to all his subjects, irrespective
of race and religion. He was simple and unostentatious in his habits.
There is no record of his having more than one wife or more than two
sons. He did not amass wealth. He divided the loot of war equally among
his soldiers, setting apart a portion for the poor and orphans.
Othman had a vein of cruelty in his character, as had so many of his
descendants, the Ottoman Sultans. When, on one occasion, he propounded
to his war council a scheme of further aggression on his neighbours,
his uncle, Dundar, a nonagenarian, who had been companion in arms
to Ertoghrul, ventured to raise objection to the policy of further
extension. Othman, instead of arguing the question with him, took up
his cross-bow and shot his uncle dead on the spot, and in this way
closured the discussion and put down, at the outset, opposition in the
council.
Von Hammer, in relating this story, says:—
This murder of the uncle marks with terror the commencement of the
Ottoman dominion, as the brother’s murder did that of Rome, only
the former rests on better historical evidence. Idris (the Turkish
historian), who, at the beginning of his work, declares that,
passing over in silence all that is reprehensible, he will only hand
down to posterity the glorious deeds of the royal race of Othman,
relates, among the latter, the murder of Dundar. If then such a
murderous slaughter of a relative be reckoned by the panegyrists of
the Osmanlis among their praiseworthy acts, what are we to think of
those which cannot be praised and of which their history therefore is
silent?[1]
We must judge of Othman, however, not by the standard of the present
time, but by that of his contemporaries. By that standard he was
reckoned a humane and merciful sovereign. This view is expressed in the
prayer which has been used in the religious ceremony, on the accession
of every one of his successors to the throne, when he is girt with the
double-edged sword of the founder of the Empire, “May he be as good as
Othman.”
In his old age, when Othman was incapable of taking the field himself,
his son, Orchan, took his place as the leader of the army, and just
before the death of Othman, Brusa surrendered to him. It was then, as
now, one of the most important cities in Asia Minor.
When Othman was on his deathbed, after a reign of thirty-eight years,
his son Orchan, in terms of affection and lamentation, addressed
him: “Oh, Othman! Thou fountain of Emperors, Lord of the World, Thou
conqueror and subduer of Nations.” The dying king replied:—
Lament not, oh my sons: delight! for this my last conflict is the
lot of all human kind, common to young and old, who equally breathe
the air of this malignant world. Whilst I now pass to immortality,
live thou glorious, prosperous, and happy. Since I have thee for
successor, I have no cause to grieve at my departure. I will
give thee my last instructions, to which be attentive. Bury the
cares of life in oblivion. I conjure thee, crowned with felicity,
lean not to tyranny, nor so much as look towards cruelty. On the
contrary, cultivate justice and thereby embellish the earth. Rejoice
my departed soul with a beautiful series of victories, and when
thou art become conqueror of the world, propagate religion by thy
arms. Promote the learned to honour, so the divine law shall be
established, and in what place soever thou hearest a learned man,
let honour, magnificence, and clemency attend him. Glory not in thy
armies, nor pride thyself in thy riches. Keep near thy person the
learned in the law, and, as justice is the support of kingdoms, turn
from everything repugnant thereto. The Divine law is our sole arm,
and our progress is only in the paths of the Lord. Embark not in vain
undertakings or fruitless contentions. For it is not our ambition to
enjoy the empire of the world, but the propagation of the faith was
my peculiar desire, which therefore it becomes thee to accomplish.
Study to be impartially gracious to all, and take care to discharge
the public duties of thy office, for a king not distinguished by
goodness belies the name of a king. Let the protection of thy
subjects be thy constant study, so shalt thou find favour and
protection from God.[2]
It is probable that much of this was the invention of some historian,
writing many years later. It may be taken, however, as a summary, based
on tradition, of the principles which had actuated the dying chief
during his long reign.
Othman died shortly after receiving the welcome news of the surrender
of Brusa, and by his last wish was buried there. He was the progenitor
of a royal race who, for nine more generations, continued the career
of conquest which he inaugurated, till the Empire, in the middle of
the sixteenth century, two hundred and seventy-eight years from the
accession of Othman, under Solyman the Magnificent, the greatest of his
race, reached its zenith. It was only after ten generations of great
Sultans that the race seemed to be exhausted, and thenceforth, with
rare exceptions, produced none but degenerates down to the present
time.
II
ORCHAN
1326-59
OTHMAN, on his deathbed, designated as his successor the younger of his
two sons, Orchan, aged forty-two, who had been brought up as a soldier
under his father’s eye, and had shown capacity in many campaigns, and
especially in that resulting in the surrender of Brusa. Alaeddin, the
elder brother, was not a soldier. He had led a studious life, devoted
to religion and law, both founded on the Koran, under the guidance of
Idebali.
The Turkish historians agree in stating that Orchan was most unwilling
to act on his father’s wishes and take precedence over his elder
brother, and that he proposed to divide the heritage of state between
them, but that Alaeddin declined the offer. Orchan is then reported
to have said: “Since, my brother, thou wilt not take the flocks and
herds which I offer thee, be the shepherd of my people. Be my Vizier.”
Alaeddin agreed to this, and devoted himself to the administration of
the growing State and to the organization of the army, under the rule
of his brother.[3]
Orchan followed closely the example of his father. He pursued the same
method of slow, but sure and persistent, aggrandizement of his State.
It will be seen that he succeeded in adding to it a territory nearly
three times greater than that which he inherited. Two-thirds of this
were in the north-west corner of Asia Minor, along the shore of the
Marmora and the Dardanelles, and the remaining third in Europe, where
he was the first to make a lodgment for the Ottomans. He made Brusa his
capital, and there, after a time, he assumed the title of Sultan. He
coined money with the inscription, “May God cause to endure the Empire
of Orchan, son of Othman.” The phrase must be taken rather as a measure
of his ambition than as a description of his existing State, for it was
then inferior in size to several of the Turkish Emirates in Asia Minor
and to most of the Balkan States. Orchan led a most active and simple
life. He was always on the move. When not in the field with his troops,
he spent his time in visiting his many petty strongholds, seldom
remaining more than a month in any one of them.
The immediate objects of Orchan’s ambition, on his accession, were the
Greek cities of Nicæa and Nicomedia, with their surrounding districts,
the last important possessions of the Byzantine Empire in Asia. Nicæa
was then a great city. It had attained greater importance during the
sixty years when the Latins were in occupation of Constantinople and
the Greek Emperors were relegated to Asia and made it their capital.
It was well fortified. It could only be captured, as Brusa had been,
by cutting off its communications with Constantinople, and depriving
its people of the means of subsistence. The Greek Emperor, Andronicus
III, made an effort to relieve it. He hastily raised an army of
mercenaries, in 1326, and led them across the Bosphorus. He fought a
battle against Orchan at Pelecanon, on the north shore of the Gulf of
Nicomedia. According to the Greek historians, the Ottomans had much
the worst of it, losing a great number of men, while the losses of the
Greeks were trivial. However that may have been, Andronicus decided on
a retreat. But a scrimmage occurred in the night between his bodyguard
and the enemy, in which the Emperor himself was slightly wounded. He
thereupon fled precipitately, and was conveyed in a litter to the
Bosphorus and thence to Constantinople. His army, dispirited by this
abandonment by their Emperor, was defeated and dispersed. As a result,
Nicæa surrendered in the following year, 1327, on favourable terms. The
majority of its garrison and citizens followed the example of those of
Brusa and adopted Islam. Very few availed themselves of the offer to
transfer themselves to Europe. This ill-starred campaign and cowardly
flight of Andronicus was the last effort of the Byzantine Emperors to
save their possessions in Asia. What remained of them, chiefly the city
of Nicomedia, were left to their own resources, without further aid
from Europe. Nicomedia was well fortified and was apparently a tough
job for the Ottomans, for it held out till 1337, or possibly 1338, and
eventually surrendered in the same way, and on the same terms, as Brusa
and Nicæa.
In the interval of ten years between the capture of Nicæa and
Nicomedia, Orchan was further engaged in extending his State
elsewhere in Asia, not towards Angora, in the south, as stated by
some historians, but to the north-west, in the ancient Mysia, by the
conquest of the Emirate of Karasi, which lay immediately to the north
of Sarukhan and with a frontage to the sea opposite to the island of
Mytilene. The Emir of this State died in 1333. His two sons disputed
the succession. The younger one was favoured by the Ottomans, and when
he was put to death by his brother, Orchan sent an army ostensibly to
avenge him. The Emir was driven into exile and his State was promptly
annexed by Orchan. The same fate befell some other petty Emirates
on the southern borders of the Marmora and the Hellespont, rounding
off the boundary of the Ottoman State in the north-west corner of
Anatolia. The population of Karasi and the smaller States was mainly
Turkish, but there must have been many Greeks on the coast who probably
adopted Islam, as had the majority of the Greeks of Brusa and Nicæa.
After these acquisitions, and that of Nicomedia in 1338, there were no
further additions to the Ottoman State in Asia Minor during Orchan’s
reign.
There followed, after the capture of Nicomedia, a few years of peace,
and it may well be that, during this time, Orchan completed the scheme
for the organization of his State and his army. Hitherto, when Othman
and Orchan were involved in disputes with their neighbours, and it was
necessary to use armed force in resistance or attack, an appeal was
made for the voluntary service of all the male members of their petty
State or clan capable of bearing arms; and the appeal was responded to
without question. When the occasion for their service was at an end,
the warriors returned to their homes and to their usual vocations. With
a rapidly expanding territory and with great ambitions for further
conquests, it was evidently thought necessary to constitute a permanent
and well-disciplined force, and Orchan, whether adopting, or not,
the plans of his brother Alaeddin, determined to effect this. On the
one hand, he enrolled a considerable body of infantry for continuous
service. They were subject to strict discipline and were well paid,
and it will be seen that they could be sent beyond the realm to assist
the Greek Emperor or otherwise.[4] On the other hand, a large body
of horsemen was provided, not under continuous service, but under
obligatory service, when occasion arose for calling them out.
For this purpose the country districts were divided into fiefs, the
holders of which were bound to serve in the event of war, and to
come provided with horses and equipment, or to find substitutes in
proportion to the extent of their fiefs. It was, in fact, the adoption
of the feudal system, then almost universal in Europe, with this marked
difference, that the fiefs were small in extent and were not, as a
rule, hereditary. They were given for life as rewards for military
service, and on the death of their holders were granted to other
soldiers, though in some cases hereditary claims were recognized. When
new territories were acquired by conquest from non-Moslems, large parts
of them were divided into new fiefs, and were granted to the soldiers
who had distinguished themselves in the war. Military service, whether
in the new infantry or in the feudal cavalry, was strictly confined to
Moslems. Christians, who were thus exempted from military duty, were
subjected to a heavy capitation tax from which Moslems were free.
This new organization of the army, commenced by Orchan and extended
and perfected by his son Murad, who also, it will be seen, created the
famous corps of Janissaries, converted the nascent Ottoman State into
a most powerful engine for war, and gave an immense impetus to the
conquest of non-Moslem countries. Most splendid rewards were held out
to the Moslem soldiers for victory and bravery. In the event of victory
they benefited not only from the ordinary booty in money and chattels,
on the sack of cities and the pillage of country districts. They also
received as their share four-fifths of the proceeds of the sale of
captives as slaves, the other fifth being reserved as the share of
the Sultan. The captives were not only the enemies’ soldiers taken in
battle, but in many cases the inhabitants of the conquered districts.
The strong and the young of both sexes were carried off and were sold,
the men as slaves, the fairer women for wives or concubines, or for
harems. The soldiers further received, as has been shown above, a large
share of the confiscated lands to be held as military fiefs in reward
for bravery in battle. As these fiefs were granted for life only, there
was a further distribution among the soldiers of the fiefs held by
their comrades who were killed in battle, and often, it is said, the
same fiefs changed hands many times in the course of a campaign.
The Moslem inhabitants of a conquered territory were not sold off as
slaves, nor were their lands confiscated. These measures were reserved
for Christians or non-Moslems. In some cases the Christians were
given the option of embracing Islam in order to avoid slavery and the
confiscation of their land. But these exceptions were rare in the
conquests in Europe, and it is obvious that, to whatever extent they
took place, the rewards obtained by the soldiers were reduced.
It has been shown that hitherto in the Ottoman conquests in Asia Minor
at the expense of the Byzantine Empire a great proportion of the
Christian population embraced Islam; and it may well have been that
the spread of Islam and the conversion of infidels to the true faith
were in part the incentives for the expansion of the Ottoman Empire.
But henceforth, after the organization of the army by Orchan and Murad
and the great rewards held out to the soldiers for the conquest of
non-Moslem territories, it does not appear that the Ottoman armies were
inspired by any missionary zeal for the spread of Islam. The main, if
not the sole motives, were loot and plunder, the sale of captives as
slaves, and the confiscation of land and its distribution among the
soldiers as fiefs; and these objects were attained to a far greater
extent by the invasion of Christian States in Europe than by the
extension of the Empire over Moslem countries in Asia.
In the year 1354 Orchan, after completing the organization of his
army, turned his attention for the first time to Europe. Thenceforth,
till his death in 1359, his restless ambition was directed against the
Byzantine Empire. Advancing age prevented his taking the field himself
at the head of his army. But his eldest son, Solyman, who had all the
great qualities of his race, and who was the idol of the army, took his
place in command of the invading forces.
It may be well to point out here that, at this time, the middle of
the fourteenth century, the Byzantine Empire was already reduced to
very insignificant proportions, compared to its ancient grandeur.
The territories subject to it, which for centuries had extended to
the Danube in Europe, and in Asia over Anatolia and Syria, had been
already greatly diminished when the leaders of the fourth Crusade, in
1204, in one of the most disgraceful episodes in history, turned aside
from their avowed object of attacking the Moslems in Palestine and, in
lieu thereof, attacked and captured Constantinople, and compelled the
Byzantine Emperor to transfer the seat of his government to Nicæa, in
Asia Minor. There followed the brief period of the Latin Empire. But in
1261 the Byzantine Greeks reconquered Constantinople, and the ephemeral
Latin Empire disappeared from history. The Byzantines were then able to
recover a small part only of their old dominions in Europe and Asia. At
the time when Orchan, who had driven them from Asia, decided to attack
them in Europe, they held there no more than Thrace with Adrianople,
a part of Macedonia with Salonika, and the greater part of the Morea
in Greece. To the north of them Serbia, under Stephen Dushan, the most
eminent of its rulers, had asserted supremacy over the greater half
of the Balkan peninsula, was threatening Salonika, and had ambition
to possess himself of Constantinople. Bulgaria, though it had lost
territory to Serbia, still possessed the smaller half of the Balkans.
The Republics of Venice and Genoa owned many commercial ports and
islands in the Ægean Sea and Adriatic, and were madly jealous of one
another. The position was such as to afford a favourable opportunity
to new invaders like the Ottomans, for there was no probability of a
combination among these Christian communities to resist them.
The story of the first entry of the Ottomans into Europe, as told by
the early Turkish historians and adopted by Von Hammer and others,
is shortly this. In the year 1356 Solyman, the son of Orchan, at the
head of a small body of Ottoman troops, variously estimated at from
seventy-five to three hundred, under the inspiration of a dream,
stealthily crept, it is said, across the Hellespont in boats, and
succeeded in surprising and overcoming the Greek garrison of the
small fortress of Tzympe, on the European side of the Straits, and
having thus gained possession of it, increased the invading force to
three thousand. Mr. Gibbons, on the other hand, has unravelled from
the Byzantine historians a much fuller and more reliable story of the
successive entries of Ottoman troops into Europe from 1345 downwards.
It may be briefly epitomized as follows, in explanation of the great
historic event—the first entry of the Ottomans into Europe—a story
which is most discreditable to the Byzantine Greeks:—
On the death, in 1338, of the Greek Emperor Andronicus III, the most
feeble and incompetent of the long line of Palæologi, his Grand
Chancellor, Cantacuzene, was appointed, under his will, guardian of
his son, John Palæologus, and as co-regent with his widow, the Empress
Anna. Cantacuzene, not satisfied with this arrangement, and ambitious
to secure supreme power in the Empire, had himself proclaimed Emperor
at Nicotika in 1343. This was bitterly resented and opposed by the
Empress Anna. Civil war broke out. Both Anna and Cantacuzene appealed
to Orchan, their new and powerful neighbour across the Straits, for aid
against the other. Cantacuzene offered his young daughter, Theodora,
in marriage to Orchan in return for the aid of six thousand Ottoman
troops. Orchan apparently thought this a better offer than that of the
Empress Anna, whatever that may have been. He was perhaps flattered
by the prospect of a family connection with a Byzantine Emperor. He
closed with the offer and sent six thousand soldiers into Europe, in
1345, in support of Cantacuzene, who made use of them by investing
Constantinople, of which the Empress had obtained possession. After a
year’s siege, Cantacuzene effected an entry into the city by the aid
of his partisans there, who treacherously opened its gates to him.
The Empress was thereupon compelled to come to terms. She agreed that
Cantacuzene and his wife should be crowned as Emperor and Empress,
together with herself and her son. This union was further cemented by
the marriage of the young Emperor John, at the age of sixteen, with
another daughter of Cantacuzene. Orchan, in pursuance of his agreement
with the new Emperor, was married in 1346 at the ripe age of sixty-two
to the young Theodora, who was to be allowed to remain a Christian.
It may be assumed that the six thousand soldiers lent to Cantacuzene
returned to Asia. But the loan of them soon became a precedent for
other transactions of the same kind. In 1349 the Serbians, under
Stephen Dushan, were seriously threatening Salonika, and had ultimate
designs on Constantinople itself. Orchan was again appealed to for aid
by the two Emperors, his father-in-law and brother-in-law, and at their
instance he sent twenty thousand soldiers into Europe for the relief of
Salonika. With their aid Cantacuzene was able to defeat the Serbians,
and to extinguish for ever their hope of replacing the Byzantine
Empire at Constantinople. On this occasion, again, it appears that the
Ottoman troops, having effected their purpose, returned to Asia. But
four years later another opportunity befell Orchan of sending troops
across the Straits, and this time of effecting a permanent lodgment in
Europe. Cantacuzene, not satisfied with being only a co-Emperor with
his son-in-law and the Empress Anna, attempted, in 1353, to usurp the
supreme power in the State. His son-in-law, John Palæologus, now of
full age, strongly opposed this. Civil war again broke out. For a third
time Cantacuzene appealed to his son-in-law Orchan for aid. In return
for the loan of twenty thousand soldiers he offered to hand over to
the Ottomans a fortress on the European side of the Hellespont. Orchan
agreed to this. The Ottoman soldiers were sent into Europe, under
Solyman, and were employed by Cantacuzene in fighting against his other
son-in-law, the co-Emperor John. They were successful in this, and
occupied Demotika. Meanwhile the insignificant fortress of Tzympe was
handed over to Orchan and was occupied by Ottoman troops with the full
consent of Cantacuzene.
Shortly after this an earthquake occurred in the Thracian
Chersonese—not an unfrequent event there. It did great damage to many
cities, among others to Gallipoli, the most important fortress on the
European side of the Hellespont, and at no great distance from Tzympe.
Its walls and ramparts were in great part tumbled down and destroyed,
so that entrance to it was made easy. The Ottoman troops at the
neighbouring Tzympe, under Solyman, when this opportunity was afforded
to them of getting possession of such an important fortress, determined
to avail themselves of it. The Greek garrison of Gallipoli, under the
belief that the earthquake and the tumbling down of the walls indicated
the Divine will, made no resistance, and the Ottomans established
themselves there without opposition. Cantacuzene complained of this to
Orchan as a gross breach of their treaty, and demanded that Gallipoli
should be restored to him. He offered also to pay a fair price for
Tzympe. Orchan, though willing enough to take money for Tzympe, refused
point-blank to give up Gallipoli. “God,” he said, “having manifested
His will in my favour by causing the ramparts to fall, my troops have
taken possession of the city, penetrated with thanks to Allah.” It
will be seen that Greeks and Turks took the same view of the Divine
intervention, the one to excuse their failure to defend the fortress,
the other to justify their seizure of it.
This action of Orchan roused great indignation at Constantinople.
Cantacuzene now began to see how grave an error he had committed when
inviting the Turks into Europe. Public opinion compelled him to declare
war against Orchan. He appealed to the Czars of Serbia and Bulgaria to
assist him in driving the Ottomans back to Asia. They flatly refused to
do so. The Czar of Bulgaria replied: “Three years ago I remonstrated
with you for your unholy alliance with the Turks. Now that the storm
has burst, let the Byzantines weather it. If the Turks come against me
we shall know how to defend ourselves”—a very unfortunate prediction as
events ultimately proved! The whole course of history might have been
altered if these two Balkan States had joined with the Byzantines in
preventing this lodgment of the Turks in Europe. Want of union of the
Christian Powers was then, as on many other later occasions, mainly
responsible for the extension of the Ottoman Empire in that continent.
Cantacuzene was soon to reap the just reward for his treachery to his
country. So far everything had gone well with him. He had ousted the
Palæologi from the throne, of which, it must be admitted, they were
quite unworthy. He had proclaimed his son Matthew as co-Emperor with
himself. But when the full effect of his policy of inviting the Turks
into Europe was understood there was a revulsion of feeling against
him at Constantinople. The Greek Patriarch refused to crown Matthew. A
revolution took place in the city. Cantacuzene found himself without
friends. He was everywhere accused of having betrayed the Empire to
the Turks. He was compelled to abdicate. He became a monk and retired
to a monastery in Greece. He spent the remaining thirty years of his
life in seclusion there, and in writing a history of his times, which,
though very unreliable, tells enough of his own misdeeds to justify the
conclusion that, by inviting the Ottomans into Europe, he proved to be
a traitor to his country. The Empress Irene, his wife, became a nun.
John Palæologus was recalled by the people of Constantinople, and,
after defeating Matthew, not without difficulty, was established there
as sole Emperor. His reign lasted for fifty years, a period full of
misfortune for the Empire. He was no more able to compel or induce the
Turks to evacuate Europe and return to Asia than his father-in-law. The
twenty thousand soldiers who had been invited to Europe by Cantacuzene
remained there as enemies of the State they had come to assist.
Under the command of Solyman, they advanced into Thrace and captured
Tchorlu, within a few miles of Constantinople. Though the occupation
of this city and of Demotika was only temporary, the Ottomans firmly
established themselves in the southern part of Thrace. The Emperor John
was eventually compelled to sign a treaty with Orchan, which recognized
these Ottoman conquests in Thrace. Thenceforth the Byzantine Empire
became subservient to, and almost the vassal of, the Ottoman Sultan.
Solyman brought over from Asia many colonies of Turks and settled them
in the Thracian Chersonese and other parts of Thrace.
In 1358 Solyman, who had shown great capacity when in command of
the Ottoman army, met with his death by a fall from his horse when
engaged in his favourite sport of falconry. His father, Orchan, died
in the following year at the age of seventy-two. He had enormously
increased the Ottoman dominions. He had achieved the first great
object of his ambition, that of driving the Byzantines from their
remaining possessions in Asia. He had rounded off his boundaries in
the north-west corner of Anatolia by annexing Mysia. He had invaded
Europe and had extended Ottoman rule over a part of Thrace. He had
reduced the Byzantine Emperor almost to vassalage. These great results
had been achieved not so much by force of arms as a general, for he
is not credited with any great victory in the field, or by successful
assaults on any great fortresses, as by crafty diplomacy and intrigue,
backed up by superior force, and by taking advantage of the feebleness
and treachery of the Byzantines. He also forged the military weapon
by which his son, Murad, was able to effect far greater territorial
conquests, both in Europe and Asia.
[Illustration:
SOUTH EASTERN EUROPE
AND ASIA MINOR
AT THE TIME OF THE ENTRY OF THE OTTOMANS INTO EUROPE
1353.
London. T. Fisher Unwin. Ltd. _Stanford’s Geog.^l Estab.^t London._]
III
MURAD I
1359-89
MURAD succeeded his father, Orchan, at the age of forty. He soon proved
himself to be eminently qualified to rule by his untiring activity and
vigour, his genius for war, and his wise and sane statesmanship. He
was illiterate. He could not even sign his name. There is extant in
the archives of the city of Ragusa a treaty with its petty republic,
which Murad, in 1363, signed by dipping his hand in ink and impressing
it with his finger marks. The ‘tughra’ thus formed became the official
signature of subsequent Sultans of Turkey. Osman and Orchan between
them created the Ottoman dynasty and State, but Murad must be credited
with having founded the Empire in the sense of imposing Ottoman rule on
subject races.
On Murad’s accession his territory, though greatly increased by Orchan,
was less in extent than some other Turkish Emirates in Anatolia. It
consisted of an area on both sides of the Sea of Marmora, two hundred
miles in length by about one hundred in depth. It included both shores
of the Dardanelles, but only one side of the Bosphorus. Constantinople,
on the other side, though nearly hemmed in by the Ottomans, was
nominally independent, and its communications with the Greek province
of Thrace were still open. Deducting the area of the Sea of Marmora,
the territory under Murad’s rule was not of greater area than twenty
thousand square miles. Its population probably did not amount to a
million in number. It is difficult to understand how Murad from this
small territory so enormously increased his Empire in Europe. It may
be surmised that large numbers of Turks from other parts of Anatolia
flocked to his standard in search of adventure and booty in Europe.
The ownership of both sides of the Dardanelles did not, in the days before
the invention of gunpowder, give command of the Straits, and as Murad
was without a navy, the passage of his armies between Asia and Europe
was at the mercy of any naval Power. The Genoese, who had important
commercial settlements on the shores of the Black Sea and on the
Bosphorus at Galata, and who maintained a large naval force in the
Ægean Sea, might easily have barred the way of the Ottomans to Europe,
but they hated the Greeks and were greedy of money, and they could
be relied on to convey Murad’s armies across the Straits for a full
consideration. It will be seen that Murad, during his reign of thirty
years, increased by more than fivefold the Ottoman possessions, and
at one point brought them up to the Danube. He compelled other States
also, including the Greek Empire itself, to accept the position of
tributaries to his Empire. His fame in Ottoman history must be regarded
as on a level with that of Mahomet, the Conqueror of Constantinople,
and of Solyman the Magnificent, who raised the Empire to its zenith.
Murad’s great extensions of his Empire may more conveniently, than in a
chronological order, be treated under three distinct heads:—
1. His conquest of the possessions of the Greek Empire in Thrace and
Bulgaria and the reduction of that decadent Empire to the humiliating
position of vassalage. 2. His great conquests in Bulgaria, Macedonia,
and Serbia. 3. His extensions in Anatolia by the absorption of Turkish
Emirates or parts of them.
1. THE CONQUESTS IN THRACE.
The Greek Empire, under John Palæologus V, the most unfortunate and
incompetent of men, on the accession of Murad, was in a perilous and
decadent condition. We have already shown how small were its remaining
possessions in Europe. It had no friends on whom it could rely to stem
the advance of the Moslems. The old spirit of the early Crusaders in
Europe was almost extinct. There was a bitter feud between the Latin
and Greek Churches. They hated one another more than they feared the
Turks. It was a condition of any assistance of the Latin Christians
that the Greeks should come into the fold of the Pope of Rome. The
Greeks, on their part, flatly refused this, even for the purpose of
saving their Empire from extinction by the Moslem Turks.
It was under these conditions that Murad, in the first year of his
reign, determined to follow up the designs of his father by conquests
in Europe. Leaving Brusa, the then capital of his State, he crossed
the Dardanelles, and at the head of a great army marched into Thrace.
His generals, Evrenos and Lalashahin, commanded the two wings of it.
Evrenos advanced on the left, recaptured the fortress of Tchorlu, five
miles from Constantinople, massacred its garrison, and razed its walls.
Lalashahin, on the right, captured Kirk Kilisse, and thus protected the
army from a possible landing of the enemy from the Black Sea. Murad
then advanced with the centre of his army, formed a junction with the
two wings, and fought a great battle at Eski Baba, in 1363, in which he
completely defeated the Byzantine army opposed to him, with the result
that Adrianople surrendered without a struggle and almost the whole of
Thrace fell into Murad’s hands. Lalashahin then advanced up the Maritza
Valley into Bulgaria and captured Philippopolis, a Byzantine possession
south of the Balkans.
As a result of this successful invasion the Greek Emperor found himself
compelled to enter into a treaty with Murad, by which he bound himself
to refrain from any attempt to recover what he had lost in Thrace, to
abstain from giving aid to the Serbians and Bulgarians in resisting
a further advance of the Ottomans in Europe, and to support Murad
against his Anatolian enemies, the Turkish Emirs. Murad thereupon
returned to Brusa to cogitate over new enterprises and to organize his
forces. He was soon recalled to Europe by most serious events. The
Christian Powers had shown no disposition to help the Greeks against
the Ottoman invasion, while their possessions in Asia and Europe were
being invaded, but the advance into Bulgaria seems to have caused
alarm to them. Pope Urban V stirred up Louis, the King of Hungary, and
the Princes of Serbia, Bosnia, and Wallachia to resist. They combined
together and sent an army of twenty thousand men into Thrace, with the
avowed object of driving the Turks out of Europe. Murad hastened to
confront them, but before he could arrive on the scene of action his
general, Lalashahin, led an army against the allies. The two armies
met on the River Maritza, not far from Adrianople, in 1363. Ilbeki, in
command of the Ottomans, made a sudden night attack, when the Christian
troops were heavy with sleep after a festive revel. A stampede took
place. The Turkish historian says of the allied army: “They were caught
even as wild beasts in their lair. They were driven as flames are
driven before the wind, till, plunging into the Maritza, they perished
in its waters.”
The Christian army was practically exterminated. The King of Hungary
escaped by a miracle. It was the first conflict of the Ottomans with
the Hungarians, who were destined to bar the way into Europe for a
hundred and fifty years. As a result of this battle all the country
south of the Balkan Mountains was incorporated in the Ottoman Empire.
Ilbeki, who devised the night attack, and so successfully carried it
out, was made away with by poison, at the instance of Lalashahin, who
was madly jealous of his great victory.
The battle of the Maritza was a crushing blow to the Christians. One
result of it was that Murad decided in favour of a scheme of conquest
in Europe rather than in Asia. In this view he transferred the seat of
his government from Brusa to Thrace, and made Demotika the capital of
his Empire. Three years later he transferred it to Adrianople, which
for ninety years, till after the capture of Constantinople, held this
position, and from thence he organized his great invasion of the Balkan
States. Another result was that the Greek Emperor, John Palæologus V,
was forced into a further step towards subjection to the Ottomans. He
agreed to become a tributary to the Sultan and to send a contingent to
the Ottoman army in future wars.
After a time the Emperor fretted under this position of vassalage, and
in 1369 he went on a mission to Rome, in the hope of inducing the Pope
to stir up the Christian Powers of Europe to another crusade against
the Ottomans. He left his eldest son, Andronicus, in charge of the
government at Constantinople during his absence. Arriving at Rome, he
submitted to the most humiliating conditions with the object of gaining
the support of the Pope Urban V. He abjured at St. Peter’s, before the
High Altar, the principles of the Greek Church, so far as they differed
from those of Rome. He admitted the ecclesiastical supremacy of the
Pope. He was then permitted to bend his knee, and to kiss the Pope’s
feet and hands. He was privileged also to lead the Pope’s mule by the
bridle. He obtained, however, no return for these abject humiliations.
The Pope was unable to induce the Christian Powers again to take up
arms against the Ottomans.
The Emperor’s concessions to the Pope were also disavowed by the
Hierarchs of the Greek Church at Constantinople. There never was
any prospect of a reunion of the two Churches. The Emperor, John
Palæologus, embarked on his homeward journey having nothing to show
for his pains. On his way back, when passing through Venice, he was
arrested, at the instance of his Venetian creditors, who had lent him
money to defray the cost of his mission. Not having the means to pay,
he could not discharge the legal process. Andronicus had no wish that
his father should ever return to Constantinople. He made no effort to
raise money for the release of the Emperor. He pleaded the poverty of
the Treasury. A younger son, Manuel, however, with more filial piety,
raised the necessary sum, by selling all his property, and obtained
the release of his father. Shortly after his return to Constantinople
the Emperor, as was to be expected, deprived Andronicus of all his
appointments, and replaced him by Manuel, whom he also made co-Emperor
with himself.
The son of Andronicus, of the same name, furious at this treatment of
his father, entered into a mad conspiracy with Saoudji, the youngest
son of Sultan Murad, with the object of dethroning both Emperor and
Sultan and reigning in their place. Saoudji, being in command of the
Sultan’s army in Europe, during the absence of Murad in Asia, was
able to tamper with the loyalty of the Ottoman troops. He assembled a
considerable force in the neighbourhood of Constantinople, where he
was joined by a large number of the sons of Greek nobles and by many
soldiers.
Murad, when he heard, at Brusa, of this mad outbreak, returned with all
haste to Europe, and organized resistance to it, in concert with the
Greek Emperor. They agreed that the two rebels, when captured, should
be deprived of their eyesight. Murad thereupon, taking what soldiers he
could get together, marched to meet Saoudji’s army. When within hearing
of it, he called out to the soldiers by night, urging them to return
to their duty and promising pardon to them. The soldiers, hearing the
voice of the Sultan, who had so often led them to victory, repented
of their treachery and deserted the cause which they had so foolishly
taken up. Saoudji and Andronicus and the band of Greek nobles, thus
deserted by the rank and file of the army, took refuge in the fortress
of Demotika. Murad had no difficulty in capturing this place, and
with it the two rebel princes and the Greek nobles. In pursuance of
his agreement with the Emperor, he then deprived his own son of his
eyesight and, going beyond his promise, had the young man executed.
He caused the Greek nobles to be bound, two and three together, and
thrown into the Maritza, while he stood on the bank and revelled in
the sight of their drowning struggles. In some cases he insisted on
parents themselves putting their sons to death in his presence. When
they refused, the parents were drowned in the river together with their
sons. In this instance Murad showed that he had in him the vein of
cruelty which was conspicuous, more or less, in all the descendants of
Othman. Andronicus was handed over to the Greek Emperor, who partially,
but not completely, carried out his promise of depriving his grandson
of eyesight.
As a result of these events, the Emperor John Palæologus found himself
compelled to enter into another treaty with Murad, by which, in order
“that he might enjoy up to the end of his life in peace his last
possession,” he recognized himself as vassal of the Sultan, promised
to do military service in the Ottoman army, and gave his son Manuel in
charge of Murad as a hostage.
2. THE CONQUESTS IN MACEDONIA, BULGARIA, AND SERBIA.
The conquest of Thrace by the Ottomans and the defeat of the allied
Christians at the Maritza were as great blows to the Bulgarians as to
the Greek Empire, though they had given no assistance to the allies.
The occupation of Adrianople and Philippopolis opened the way to a
further advance into Bulgaria and Macedonia. It was not, however, till
1366 that Murad availed himself of this advantage, and commenced the
series of attacks which ultimately made him master of Macedonia and of
a great part of Bulgaria and Serbia. The position of affairs in the
peninsula at this time was very favourable to him. The Bulgarians,
Serbians, Bosnians, and Greeks were madly jealous of one another; each
of them preferred the extension of the Ottoman rule to that of their
rivals. Bulgaria alone, if united, might have successfully resisted
Murad. But in 1365 its Czar, Alexander, died, and his kingdom was
divided between his three sons. Sisman, the elder, got the largest
share. The other two gave no assistance to their brother when the
Ottomans invaded his country. Between 1366 and 1369, Murad advanced
into Bulgaria, and took possession of the Maritza Valley, as far as the
Rhodope Mountains. In 1371 Lalashahin encountered an army of Bulgarians
and Serbians at Samakof, not far from the city of Sofia, and completely
defeated it, with the result that Bulgaria, up to the Balkan range, was
annexed to the Ottoman Empire. It remained so for over five hundred
years, till its release in our own times.
After this great victory at Samakof, Lalashahin was instructed by Murad
not to pursue his conquest of Bulgaria north of the Balkan range, but
to proceed westward, and, in concert with Evrenos, to invade Macedonia
as far as the River Vardar. This occupied the two generals in the years
1371-2. Kavalla, Druma, and Serres fell into their hands. In 1372 they
crossed the Vardar River and penetrated into Old Serbia, Albania, and
Bosnia. The main part of Serbia, however, remained in the hands of
Lazar, its prince. But he was compelled to acknowledge the suzerainty
of the Sultan. As regards the part of Bulgaria not annexed, its prince,
Sisman, was allowed to retain his independence. His daughter entered
the harem of Murad, with the understanding that she was not to be
compelled to adopt the Moslem religion. It was not till 1381 that a
further advance was made by Murad. He then sent his armies across the
Vardar River and captured Monastir. He also took possession of Sofia,
and in 1386 of Nisch, after a fierce struggle with the Serbians.
3. MURAD’S ACQUISITIONS IN ASIA MINOR.
Between the years 1376 and 1380 Murad found himself able to turn his
attention in the direction of Asia Minor. In the first of these years
he induced the Emir of Kermia, doubtless by threats of war, to give a
daughter in marriage to Bayezid, his eldest son. She brought with her
as dowry a considerable part of Kermia and the fortress of Kutayia, a
position of great strategic importance. In 1377 he followed this up
by inducing the Emir of Hamid to sell a great portion of his Emirate
lying between Tekke, Kermia, and Karamania, including the district
of Ak-Sheir. The effect of this acquisition was to make his frontier
conterminous with that of Karamania. Again, in 1378, he declared war
against the Emir of Tekke, and annexed a part of his territory, leaving
to him Adalia.
Murad made no further effort to extend his dominion in Asia till 1387,
when he led a large army against Alaeddin, the Emir of Karamania. For
this purpose he called upon the Greek Emperor and the Princes of Serbia
and Bulgaria as vassals of the Empire to send their contingents. His
two sons, Bayezid and Yacoub, commanded the wings of this army. With
a view to conciliate the peasantry of the district he passed through,
and to ensure full supplies of food to his army, he gave strict orders
that there was to be no pillage, and that the lives and property of the
country people were to be respected. Among his troops were two thousand
Serbians, whom the Prince of Serbia was bound by his recent treaty
to supply. These men refused to obey Murad’s order, and committed
atrocious depredations on the route of the army. Murad inflicted severe
punishment on them, and directed many of them to be put to death as a
warning to the others. The army then marched to meet the Karamanians.
A battle again took place on the plain of Angora. Bayezid especially
distinguished himself by the fierceness of his cavalry charges and
earned for himself the sobriquet of ‘the Thunderbolt.’
There are different versions as to the issue of this battle. Some
historians describe it as a great victory for Murad, and claim that
he treated the vanquished Emir of Karamania with great generosity,
insisting only on a token of submission. Murad, however, was not in
the habit of neglecting to take full advantage of any successes of
his armies. It is very certain that, in this case, he did not succeed
in extending his Empire. Karamania retained its independence for many
years to come, and did not even submit to a nominal vassalage. It seems
more probable, therefore, that this battle was indecisive, and that
Murad withdrew, without having effected his purpose.
Murad, who was now near the age of seventy, would have been glad to end
his life in repose, but he was recalled to Europe by an outbreak of
the Serbians. It appeared that the Serbian soldiers, on their return
to their homes, after the campaign against the Karamanians, told the
story of the execution of their comrades by order of Murad. It caused
universal indignation among the Serbians. They could not understand
a war conducted without the levy of booty from the enemy’s country.
The whole of Serbia rose in rebellion. An alliance was formed with
Bulgaria, Bosnia, and Albania. Assistance was obtained from Hungary
and Wallachia. Murad again took the field in command of an Ottoman
army, and, crossing the Balkans, captured Schumla and Tirnova, and
then marched towards the Danube. Sisman, the King of Bulgaria, shut
himself up in Nicopolis, on the Danube, but was soon compelled to come
to terms. He agreed to give up Silistria to the Turks, and to pay a
tribute in the future.
Lazar, the King of Serbia, in spite of this defection, continued the
struggle against the Ottomans, and Sisman himself broke the treaty
almost before the ink was dry. He refused to give up Silistria, and
sent a contingent in aid of the Serbians. Murad sent part of his army,
under Ali Pasha, against Sisman, who was again shut up in Nicopolis.
This fortress was captured. Murad was again generous in sparing
Sisman’s life, but this time he deprived the southern part of Bulgaria
of its autonomy, and insisted on its being completely incorporated in
the Turkish Empire.
Lazar, the King of Serbia, continued the war. Murad, in spite of his
seventy years, led his army, supported, as in Asia Minor, by his two
sons. The decisive battle took place on the plain of Kossova, at
the point of junction between Serbia and Bulgaria. It was fiercely
contested. At a critical point of it a Serbian noble, Milosch
Kobilowitch, who on the previous day had been falsely charged in
the Serbian camp with disaffection and treason, gave signal proof of
his patriotism by riding boldly into the Turkish lines, as though he
was a deserter, and claiming that he had a most important message to
deliver to the Sultan. He was allowed to approach Murad, and, while
kneeling before him, plunged a dagger into his heart, causing a mortal
wound. Milosch then made a desperate rush to escape, but in vain. He
was captured and brought to the Sultan’s tent. Meanwhile Murad, in
spite of his approaching death, was able to give orders for the charge
of his reserves, which decided the battle in favour of the Ottomans.
The Serbians and their allies were completely defeated and routed.
Lazar was taken prisoner and was brought to the Sultan’s tent. Murad
lived long enough to direct the execution in his presence of Lazar and
Milosch. He then expired.
To complete the tragedy of the day, Bayezid, on hearing of the death
of his father, and his own consequent accession to the throne, gave
immediate orders for the murder of his brother Yacoub, who had been his
valiant companion in arms in so many battles. This was effected in the
presence of the dead body of the father. The brutal deed was justified
by a verse from the Koran, “Rebellion is worse than execution.” It was
assumed by Bayezid that his brother would claim the throne against
him. This was the first recorded case of fratricide in the Othman
royal race. Thenceforth it became the settled practice for a Sultan of
Turkey, on his accession to the throne, immediately to put to death
his brothers and other collaterals, lest they should dispute the
succession with him. By the law of succession the eldest living male
of the reigning family, and not the eldest son of a defunct Sultan,
was entitled to the throne. This supplied an additional motive for the
practice of fratricide, for the new Sultan, by murdering his brothers
and uncles, ensured the succession, after his own death, to his eldest
son free from competition. In later times, however, when public opinion
would no longer justify fratricide, and when the law of succession of
the oldest male in the family was more fully recognized, the Sultan,
on his accession to the throne, directed the close confinement of his
next heir, generally his brother. It followed from this practice that
the heir to the throne, instead of being employed on State affairs,
or as a general, and gaining experience, was treated as a prisoner,
and was forbidden to take any part in public affairs. It will be seen
that this practice of forced seclusion of the heir to the throne during
the lifetime of the reigning Sultan was one of the main causes of the
degeneracy of the Othman dynasty.
Reverting to Murad, it has been shown how important an epoch his
reign was in the growth of the Ottoman Empire. During the twenty-four
years of war, in which he led his armies in the field, he never met
with a reverse. He extended the Empire for the first time into vast
territories inhabited not by Turks or by Byzantines, but by sturdy
Christian races, such as the Bulgarians, Serbians, and Bosnians. For
the first time also the Turks came into conflict with the Hungarians,
and defeated them. The influence of the Empire was extended practically
to the Danube. Some of the intervening territory was not treated as
conquered country and added to the Empire, but was allowed to retain
the position of tributary or vassal States, as in the case of Serbia.
Other parts, such as Thrace, Macedonia, and Bulgaria, were fully
incorporated in the dominion of the Sultan.
Murad, when not engaged in war, devoted himself to perfecting the
organization of his army on the lines laid down by his father, Orchan.
He also created a new standing corps of soldiers, recruited from the
Christian population of the provinces conquered in Europe. This was
the renowned corps of Janissaries—the new army. Von Hammer and other
historians following him, and more recently Sir Edwin Pears, give very
full details as to the constitution of this corps and the motives of
its founder. They state that one thousand lads, between the ages of ten
and twelve, were in every year conscripted from amongst the children of
Christian parents. The most physically strong and intelligent of them
were taken. They were forcibly converted to Islam, and were trained
with great care for military careers under the immediate direction
of the Sultan. After six years of training they were drafted into a
special corps, which reached, after a few years, a maximum of twelve
thousand men. The discipline of this corps was very severe. It formed
the most efficient and reliable body in the Ottoman army. The men
looked on their regiment as their home. Their lives were devoted to
it. They were not allowed to own property. What they acquired belonged
to the regiment. They were not, till a later period in the history
of the Empire, allowed to marry. They formed the backbone of the
Ottoman armies in war; and in many a hard-fought battle, when disaster
and defeat were imminent, they saved the army by their intrepid and
persistent stand against the enemy. The object which Murad aimed at
is said to have been not merely the strengthening of his army by a
standing force of this kind, but that it should, by its personal
devotion to the Sultan, act as a check on his other turbulent forces.[5]
Sir Edwin Pears says of this force:—
Take a number of children from the most intelligent portion of the
community; choose them for their strength and intelligence; instruct
them carefully in the art of fighting; bring them up under strict
military discipline; teach them to forget their childhood, their
parents, and friends; saturate them with the knowledge that all their
hope in life depends upon their position in the regiment; make peace
irksome and war a delight, with the hope of promotion and relaxation
from the hardship and restraints of the barracks; the result will be
a weapon in the hands of a leader such as the world has rarely seen.
Such a weapon was the army of the Janissaries.[6]
The levy of children was regarded by the Christians as a blood tax of a
terrible kind. The corps thus formed was a most valuable instrument in
the hands of Sultans who were strong enough to control it. But later,
in the times of degenerate Sultans, it became a kind of Prætorian
Guard. It dictated the deposition of Sultans and the nomination of
their successors. It often insisted on a policy of war. In 1648, under
Mahomet IV, the restriction of the force to Christian children was
removed, and the sons of Janissaries and other Moslems were admitted.
Later the levy of Christian children was abandoned, and none but sons
of Moslems were admitted to the corps. After the time of Solyman its
numbers were greatly increased. It became a danger to the State. It
will be seen that in 1826 Mahmoud II took vengeance on it for the
humiliations he and previous Sultans had undergone, and extinguished it
in ruthless scenes of blood.
There cannot be a doubt, however, that Murad, by creating this corps of
Janissaries and recruiting it from the Christian population in Europe,
forged a weapon which for two hundred years to come played a dominant
part in the aggrandizement of the Ottoman Empire.
Knolles, in his graphic history of the Turkish Empire, sums up the
character of Murad in the following sentences, which could not be
improved upon:—
Murad was more zealous than any other of the Turkish kings; a man
of great courage and in all his attempts fortunate; he made greater
slaughter of his enemies than both his father and grandfather; his
kingdom in Asia he greatly enlarged by the sword, marriage, and
purchase; and using the discord and cowardice of the Grecian princes
to his profit, subdued a great part of Thracia, with the territories
adjoining thereto, leaving unto the Emperor of Constantinople little
or nothing more in Thracia than the imperial city itself, with the
bare name of an emperor almost without an empire; he won a great part
of Bulgaria and entered into Serbia, Bosnia, and Macedonia; he was
liberal and withal severe; of his subjects both beloved and feared; a
man of very few words, and one that could dissemble deeply.[7]
IV
BAYEZID I
1389-1403
BAYEZID succeeded his father, Murad, at the age of thirty-four. He
reigned as Sultan for only fourteen years, the last of which was
spent in captivity. No one of the Othman race passed through such
vicissitudes, with such a brilliant career of victory during nearly the
whole of his reign, but ending with overwhelming and crushing defeat.
He had all the courage and military capacity of his three predecessors.
He excelled them greatly in cruelty and brutality. In his private life
he descended to depths of sensuality and unmentionable and degrading
vice which were unknown to them.
Early in his reign he adopted a much bolder attitude toward the
Christian Powers of Europe than Murad had thought prudent. To a
deputation from Italy asking for a renewal of commercial privileges, he
replied that when he had conquered Hungary he intended to ride to Rome,
and there give feed to his horse with oats on the altar of St. Peter’s.
His treatment of his Christian subjects was much harsher than that of
his predecessors.
Bayezid followed up his father’s great victory at Kossova over the
Serbians, and compelled Stephen, the successor of Lazar, to sue for
peace. The terms of the treaty then agreed to were very moderate.
Instead of being incorporated in the Ottoman Empire as Bulgaria had
been, Serbia was to be an autonomous State, under vassalage to the
Ottoman Empire, paying tribute in money, and bound to provide and
maintain a contingent of five thousand soldiers at the disposal of the
Sultan. Stephen, its prince, also gave his sister, Despina, to the
Sultan as an additional wife. He most loyally carried out his promises
to Bayezid. In the great battles of Nicopolis against the Hungarians
and the crusaders from Western Europe, and of Angora against Timur, the
Serbian contingent fought with the utmost bravery, and there were no
more loyal soldiers in the Ottoman ranks.
Having come to terms with Serbia, Bayezid marched southwards with
his army, and took up a menacing position near to Constantinople,
where the aged and feeble John Palæologus still reigned, supported
by his son Manuel as co-Emperor. By threatening to promote the cause
of Andronicus, whose eyesight had not been quite extinguished, after
his mad rebellion against the Emperor, the Sultan compelled the two
Emperors to sign a treaty, under which the remnant of the Greek Empire
became an abject vassal State to that of the Ottomans. The Emperors
promised to pay an annual tribute of thirty thousand pieces of gold
and to supply a contingent of twelve thousand men to the Ottoman army
to be at the disposal of the Sultan for any purpose he might design.
They also undertook to surrender to the Ottomans the stronghold of
Philadelphia, the only remaining possession of the Byzantine Empire
in Asia Minor. When the officer in command of that city refused to
surrender it, Bayezid insisted on the Greek Emperor employing his
contingent in capturing his own city, and on his leading the assault on
it, with the aid of his son Manuel, for the purpose of handing it over
to himself, their nominal ally, but crafty and designing foe. It would
be difficult to imagine a lower depth of humiliation and cowardice
than that to which the Emperor and his son thus descended. These
public humiliations were aggravated by a domestic one. Bayezid, having
captured at sea a vessel bringing a foreign princess as a bride for
Manuel, took a great fancy for the lady, and insisted on her entering
his own harem.
Bayezid next turned his attention to Asia Minor, where he was mainly
ambitious to add to his Empire. His first effort there was directed
against Aidin. After defeating its Emir and annexing the State, he
dealt in the same way with the Emirs of Sarukhan and Mentsche. He
then made an attack on the city of Smyrna, at that time in possession
of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem. The Knights made a vigorous
resistance, and Bayezid, not having command of the sea, was compelled,
after six weeks, to withdraw from the siege. He next, in 1391,
attacked the Emir of Tekke, and took from him what had been left under
his rule by Murad, including the important city of Adalia. The Ottoman
frontier was now conterminous with that of Karamania, whose Emir,
Alaeddin, was brother-in-law to the Sultan. This family connection
was no protection to him. Bayezid invaded and laid siege to Konia.
He withdrew on Alaeddin agreeing to give up a slice of his Emirate,
including the city of Ak-Sheir.
Having achieved these annexations, for which there was no justification
other than mere greed for the extension of his Empire, Bayezid
returned to Adrianople, leaving his general, Timurtash, in command
of the conquered provinces. The Greek Emperor John, meanwhile, had
been engaged in putting his capital into a state of defence, and for
this purpose had demolished three of the most beautiful churches of
Constantinople, intending to use their masonry for the erection of new
forts. The Sultan, when he heard of this, sent word to the Emperors
ordering them to desist from any such work, and threatening to deprive
Manuel of his eyesight. The Emperor had no alternative but to obey.
But this humiliation was the last he had to endure. He died very
shortly afterwards, under the weight of his cares and anxieties, as
some historians say, but according to others of gout and debauchery.
His son, Manuel, who was detained at the Court of the Sultan, acting
as a kind of Groom of the Chamber, on hearing of his father’s death,
secretly fled and reached Constantinople, where he was installed as the
successor to his father. Bayezid by way of reprisal for this directed a
blockade by land of Constantinople. There commenced what was virtually
a siege by land of the city, which lasted for seven years, till the
invasion of Asia Minor by Timur caused a diversion and brought it to an
end.
Leaving a part of his forces to conduct this blockade, and with
instructions to harass the Greek garrison by day and night, Bayezid,
with the larger part of his army, marched through Bulgaria, and
compelled the Prince of Wallachia to submit as a vassal of the Ottoman
Empire. A part of his army then penetrated into Syrmia and engaged
in war with the Hungarians. It was defeated and driven back, and
Sigismund, the Hungarian King, was able to make a counter-attack, and
to capture the important stronghold of Nicopolis. He, in turn, was
forced to abandon the city, mainly by the assistance given to Bayezid
by the Wallachians. It was during his retreat through the Duchy of
Hunyadi that Sigismund met and became enamoured with Elizabeth Moronay.
The offspring of this liaison was the celebrated Hungarian hero Hunyadi
the Great, who later took such an active part against the Turks.
In 1393, Bayezid sent an army, under command of his eldest son,
Solyman, to invade the northern part of Bulgaria, which still enjoyed
an autonomous existence. Tirnova, its capital, was taken by storm after
a siege of three weeks. Its inhabitants were sent into Asia Minor as
slaves. He then decided to incorporate the northern part of Bulgaria in
the Ottoman Empire in the same manner as the southern part had already
been treated. This completed the servitude of the Bulgarian people.
Sisman, their prince, disappeared from the scene, and the ruling
family became extinct. The land was confiscated, except in a few cases
where the owners were allowed to become Moslems. It was parcelled out
to Turks under a feudal system involving military service, while the
cultivators of the soil were reduced to serfdom.
About this time the fortresses of Nicopolis, Widdin, and Silistria fell
into the hands of the Ottomans and opened the way into Hungary. Bayezid
commenced a system of raids into that country, not for the purpose, at
that time, of acquiring its territory, but for plunder. His Turkish
‘akinjis,’ or irregulars, spread terror over wide districts, burning
and destroying villages and carrying off their inhabitants for sale
as slaves. He fitted out ships also with the same object in the newly
acquired ports in Asia Minor, and ravaged the islands of Chios and
Negropont and districts on the coast of Greece.
Bayezid was now compelled by an outbreak in his recent acquisitions in
Asia Minor, fomented by the Emir of Karamania, to suspend operations
on his northern frontier in Europe and to transfer his army to Asia.
He received at Brusa an envoy from his brother-in-law, Alaeddin of
Karamania, suing for peace. Bayezid replied that the sword alone
could determine the issue between them. He sent an army at once,
under Timurtash, against the Karamanians. It encountered Alaeddin on
the plain of Ak-Tchai. The Turkish army was completely successful.
Alaeddin and his two sons were captured, and without waiting for
authority from Bayezid, Timurtash had them hanged. When Bayezid heard
of this treatment of his brother-in-law, he affected to be greatly
distressed and incensed, but he soon consoled himself by a text from
the Koran, “The death of a prince is less regrettable than the loss of
a province,” and he gave practical application of the verse by orders
to his army to occupy and annex the whole of Karamania. There was no
resistance. Konia and other cities in the eastern part of the State
were taken. In spite of this, however, Karamania was not at this time
finally incorporated in the Ottoman Empire. After the invasion of Asia
Minor by Timur it recovered its independence, and it was not till
seventy years later that it was finally subjected and incorporated.
About the same time, 1393-4, Bayezid made further important conquests
in Asia Minor—namely, Samsun, Cæsarea, and Sivas, the last of the most
important fortresses on the frontier of Armenia. These great successes
both in Europe and Asia were followed by a period of repose, during
which Bayezid gave himself up to a life of gross debauchery. He was
recalled from this by threats of war on the part of Sigismund, King of
Hungary, and he soon showed that he had lost none of his vigour and
dash.
Sigismund had fretted under the constant raids on his kingdom, above
referred to, and had for some time past been contemplating war against
the Ottomans for the recovery of the fortresses on the Danube, which
were so great a menace to him. For this purpose he appealed, in 1395,
to the Christian Powers of Europe for assistance. He was backed up by
Pope Boniface IX, who preached another crusade against the infidels.
Through the efforts of the King of France, Charles VI, a large number
of leading nobles of France were induced to band together, under the
Comte de Nevers, son of the Duke of Burgundy, a young man of twenty-two
years, without any military experience. A thousand horsemen, chevaliers
of good birth and position, and six thousand attendants and mercenaries
were enrolled in France for this adventure. Others came from England
and Scotland, and from Flanders, Lombardy, and Savoy. On their march
through Germany to Hungary they were joined by great numbers of German
knights, under Count Frederick of Hohenzollern, the Grand Prior of the
Teutonic Order, and by a large force of Bavarians, under the Elector
Palatine. Later they were reinforced by a number of the Knights of
St. John of Jerusalem, under the command of de Naillac, their Grand
Master. When joined by the Hungarian army, under Sigismund, and by
the contingents from Wallachia and Bosnia, they made up a total force
of about sixty thousand men. The expedition was in the nature of a
crusade, but was more secular than religious in its aims and methods,
and was regarded, it seems, by most of those engaged in it rather
as a kind of picnic than as a serious campaign. The composite force
collected together at Buda, in Hungary, in the summer of 1396, and
thence marched down the Danube to Nicopolis, capturing Widdin and
Sistova on the way. When passing through Serbia they ravaged wide
districts inhabited by innocent Christians, and emulated, if they did
not exceed, the Ottomans in cruel devastation, as though they were in
an enemy’s country. They established their camp before Nicopolis in
September, but for sixteen days they refrained from assaulting the
fortress, which was bravely defended by an Ottoman garrison, thus
giving time to Bayezid to collect his army and to advance against the
allied forces.
The Christian camp was the scene of riotous living and gambling. Large
numbers of courtesans had accompanied the crusaders. The whole army
was in a state of indiscipline and disorder. The French knights were
boastful. They spoke with contempt of the Turkish troops, and could not
believe that there was any danger from them. Bayezid, whose army was
full of confidence in its superiority, was allowed to approach within
striking distance, without any attempt to harass his advance. Even then
the Christians did not believe there was danger. The Turks suddenly
came into contact with them. The knights were compelled to abandon
their gaming tables and their women, and to face the enemy whom they
had so much despised.
The Ottoman army was preceded by large numbers of scouts and
irregulars. The leaders of the chevaliers, knowing nothing of the
numbers of the Ottomans or of their methods in war, and utterly
despising them, most rashly proposed an immediate attack by the whole
force of their splendid cavalry. The King of Hungary, who had had
experience of the Ottomans and who knew their method of masking the
main body of their army by irregulars, was more cautious, and advised
that the foot soldiers of Hungary and Wallachia should be first
employed to meet the attack of the Turkish irregulars, and that the
cavalry should be reserved to meet the main body of the Ottomans. The
chevaliers were furious at this suggestion. They suspected Sigismund
of playing for his own hand, and of wishing to rob them of the glory
of a great victory. They insisted on an immediate attack. Sigismund,
on hearing of this decision, said, “We shall lose the day through the
great pride and folly of these French.” And so it turned out.
The chevaliers advanced in splendid array and had no difficulty in
dispersing and slaughtering the mob of Turkish irregulars. But this
impetuous charge spent their energy and tired their horses. When they
were confronted by the main body of the Ottomans, sixty thousand in
number, they were powerless to resist. They were surrounded and were
compelled to surrender. The main body of Hungarian foot soldiers,
when they came in contact with the Ottomans, were not more fortunate.
The Wallachians, who formed one of the wings of the army, when they
saw how the battle was going, retired from the field without a fight.
The centre of the Hungarian army, under Sigismund, supported by the
Bavarians, made a most gallant fight, and might have been successful
if it had not been that the Serbian army, under Prince Stephen, came
at a critical time, in support of the Ottomans, and turned the scale
in their favour. After a battle of only three hours the Christian
allies were completely defeated with great slaughter on both sides. Ten
thousand of the Christians, including most of the surviving chevaliers,
were taken prisoners. Those who escaped across the Danube suffered
terribly in their retreat through Wallachia. They were beaten and
maltreated by the peasantry, for whom they had shown no consideration
in their advance.
Sigismund and the Grand Prior of Rhodes, at a late stage of the battle,
abandoned the army to its fate. They escaped in a small boat down the
Danube, and were taken on board by a Venetian vessel, which conveyed
them to Germany through the Black Sea, the Dardanelles, and the
Adriatic. On passing the Straits the Turks paraded before their eyes
the knights made captives at Nicopolis. One of these prisoners thus
described what took place:—
The Osmanlis took us out of the towers of Gallipoli and led us to
the sea, and one after the other they abused the King of Hungary as
he passed, and mocked him and called to him to come out of the boat
and deliver his people; and this they did to make fun of him, and
skirmished a long time with each other on the sea. But they did not
do him any harm, and so he went away.[8]
On the morning of the battle of Nicopolis, Bayezid, when told of the
heavy losses of his own army, and that in the early part of the battle
the chevaliers had massacred a number of Turks who had surrendered
on promise of life, was greatly incensed. He gave orders that all
the Christian prisoners to the number of ten thousand were to be put
to death in his presence. He made an exception only in favour of
twenty-four of the knights, including de Nevers, their leader, for
whose release a heavy ransom might be expected. But they were compelled
to witness the execution of their comrades in arms.
On taking leave of them a year later at Brusa, Bayezid addressed de
Nevers in these proud and insolent terms:—
John, I know thee well, and am informed that you are in your own
country a great lord. You are young, and in the future I hope you
will be able to recover with your courage from the shame of the
misfortune which has come to you in your foul knightly enterprise,
and that in the desire of getting rid of the reproach and recovering
your honour you will assemble your power to come against me and
give me battle. If I were afraid of that and wanted to, before your
release, I would make you swear upon your oath and religion that you
would never bear arms against me, nor those who are in your company
here. But no; neither upon you nor any other of those here will I
impose this oath, because I desire, when you have returned to your
home, and will have leisure, that you assemble your power and come
against me. You will find me always ready to meet you and your people
on the field of battle. And what I say to you, you can say in like
manner to those to whom you will have the pleasure of speaking about
it, because for this purpose was I born, to carry arms and always to
conquer what is ahead of me.[9]
Before their final departure, Bayezid treated these knights to a day’s
sport on a regal scale; seven thousand falconers were employed on
the occasion, and five thousand men led dogs to pick up the game. The
historian does not state what was the bag resulting from this great
battle.
Of the twenty-four knights only one, Marshal Boucicaut, took up the
parting challenge of Bayezid and returned to the East to make war
against him. The others showed no desire to wipe out the disgrace of
their defeat.[10]
After this great battle at Nicopolis the Ottoman army made irruptions
into Wallachia, Styria, and Hungary. The city of Peterwardein was
captured and eighteen thousand of its inhabitants were sold into
slavery. Another division invaded Syrmia, and devastated the country
between the Drave and the Danube. The fortresses on the river taken by
the crusaders were recaptured. The raid into Wallachia was a failure.
The Turks engaged in it were defeated and driven back. Bayezid himself
threatened Buda, in Hungary, but his progress was checked by a long
and painful fit of gout. Gibbon moralizes on this in the following
sentence: “The disorders of the moral are sometimes corrected by those
of the physical world; and an acrimonious humour falling on a single
fibre of one man may prevent or suspend the misery of nations.”[11] The
invasion of Hungary on this occasion was a failure.
After this campaign Bayezid returned to Adrianople, and there occupied
himself by inflicting further humiliations on the Greek Empire. He
forced Manuel to resign and imposed John, the son of Andronicus, as
its Emperor. He then issued forth again with his army, in 1397, and
fell like a thunderbolt on Greece, without any warning or cause of
complaint. He marched with his army through Thessaly, capturing on
the way Larissa and Pharsalia. He passed through Thermopylæ. The mere
passage of his army sufficed to subdue Doris and Locris. His two
generals, Yacoub and Evrenos, then invaded the Peloponnesus. The latter
captured and pillaged Argos. Its inhabitants, to the number of thirty
thousand, were sold as slaves and deported to Asia. Colonies of Turks
were planted in the Morea. Theodore Palæologus, who acted as despot
there on behalf of the Greek Empire, agreed to become tributary of the
Sultan.
Returning to Adrianople, Bayezid determined to obtain immediate
possession of Constantinople. The Greek Empire had been already
deprived of nearly all territory outside the walls of its capital. The
Sultan opened proceedings against it by sending an envoy to the Emperor
with this insulting message:—
When I dethroned your predecessor, Manuel, it was not in your
interest but in mine. If, then, you want to remain my friend, you
must surrender your crown. I will give you any other government you
may wish for. If you do not consent, I swear by God and the Prophet I
will not spare a soul in your city; I will exterminate all of them.
The citizens of Constantinople, rather than experience the terrible
fate which they knew would befall them in the event of a successful
assault by the Ottoman army, were willing to come to terms. But the
Emperor, who was buoyed up by hope of assistance from the Christian
Powers, refused to acquiesce in a pusillanimous surrender. He replied
to the ambassador in dignified terms: “Tell your master that, feeble
as we are, we know no other power to whom to address ourselves if it
be not God, Who protects the feeble and humbles the powerful. Let the
Sultan do what he pleases.”
At this stage, and before he could give effect to his threats,
Bayezid was compelled by great events in Asia to raise the siege of
Constantinople. Hitherto, in twelve years of incessant war, Bayezid
had been uniformly successful. He had annexed the greater part of Asia
Minor, Macedonia, Northern Bulgaria, and Thessaly. He had reduced to
vassalage the Greek Empire itself and Serbia, Wallachia, Bosnia, and a
great part of Greece. He had defeated the feudal chivalry of Europe in
the great battle of Nicopolis. He had not met with a single reverse.
The next two years, the last of his reign, were to result in disastrous
and overwhelming defeat to him, in his capture and death, and in the
temporary crumpling up of the Turkish Empire. He came into conflict for
the first time with Timur, a general and a conqueror more resolute,
crafty, able, and cruel than himself.
Timur the Tartar, better known to us as Timurlane—Timur the lame,
for he had met in early life with an accident which lamed him—was the
greatest, the most ruthless, and the most devastating of warriors
recorded in all history. Born in 1333, a descendant through his mother
of the great Gengis Khan, he began life as a petty chief of a Tartar
tribe in the neighbourhood of Samarkand. It was not till he had
reached the age of thirty-five that he achieved eminence over other
neighbouring Tartar States. He then conceived the ambition of universal
conquest. “As there was only one God in heaven,” he said, “so there
should be only one ruler on earth”—that one was to be himself. He went
a long way towards gaining this object of his ambition, for he embarked
on a career which, in rather less than thirty-five years, resulted
in an empire extending from the Great Wall of China to the frontier
of Asia Minor, and from the Sea of Aral to the River Ganges and the
Persian Gulf. He had, by this time, conquered twenty-seven separate
States and extinguished nine dynasties. He effected his purpose, not
only by force of arms, but by a deliberate policy of terrorism. After
victory he was of settled purpose ruthless in cruelties on the greatest
scale.
It was obvious that, sooner or later, he would come into conflict
with what was, at that time, the only other growing military Power in
the world—the Ottoman Empire. The two potentates had already become
neighbours, and causes of dispute and antagonism were often arising
between them. Each had sheltered refugee princes, whose territories
had been absorbed by the other, and who were engaged in intrigues to
stir up war between the two rivals, in the hope of regaining their
possessions. Insolent messages passed between the two potentates.
What is the foundation of thy insolence and folly? [wrote Timur to
Bayezid]. Thou hast fought some battles in the woods of Anatolia;
contemptible trophies! Thou hast obtained some victories over the
Christians of Europe; thy sword was blessed by the Apostle of
God; and thy obedience to the precepts of the Koran in waging war
against the infidel is the sole consideration that prevents us from
destroying thy country, the frontier and bulwark of the Moslem world.
Be wise in time; reflect; repent; and avert the thunder of our
vengeance which is yet suspended over thy head. Thou art no more than
an ant; why wilt thou seek to provoke the elephants? Alas, they will
trample thee under their feet.
Bayezid replied in terms of the greatest indignation. He protested that
Timur had never triumphed unless by his own perfidy and the vices of
his foes.
Thy armies are innumerable: be they so; but what are the arrows
of the flying Tartars against the scimitars and battle-axes of my
firm and invincible Janissaries? I will guard the princes who have
implored my protection; seek them in my tents. The cities of Arzingan
and Erzerum are mine; and unless the tribute be paid I will demand
the arrears under the walls of Tauris and Sultania.
And he added an insult of a yet grosser kind which, by its allusion to
the harem, was the worst that could be devised by a Moslem:—
If I fly from thy arms may my wives be thrice divorced from my bed;
but if thou hast not courage to meet me in the field, mayest thou
again receive thy wives after they have thrice endured the embrace of
a stranger.
After this interchange of abuse Timur determined, in 1400, to attack
and invade Asia Minor from Armenia, at the head of a horde of armed
men, estimated by historians at not less than eight hundred thousand.
He laid siege to Sivas, in Cappadocia, on the Armenian frontier, which
had only been captured by Bayezid about three years previously. It
was now defended by a garrison of Turks, under command of Ertoghrul,
the eldest son of Bayezid. The fortifications were immensely strong,
but Timur was ready to sacrifice any number of men in assaulting and
capturing the city. He employed six thousand miners in undermining its
defences with galleries and propping up the walls temporarily with
timber smeared with pitch. When the mines were completed, fire was
applied to the timber, and the walls gradually sank into the cavities
laid open to them, and afforded entrance to the assaulting columns. The
city was captured. Four thousand of its defenders were buried alive by
order of Timur, and Ertoghrul was executed.
Bayezid, thus challenged, advanced, in 1401, with an army of one
hundred and twenty thousand men to avenge the disaster at Sivas. Timur,
however, after the capture of that city, refrained from advancing
farther into Asia Minor. He passed into Syria and captured Damascus,
and thence into Mesopotamia for the capture of Bagdad. It was not till
the next year, 1402, that he determined to return to Asia Minor and to
humble Bayezid. He retraced his steps to Sivas, and thence, after a
further exchange of insolent messages with the Ottoman Sultan, he went
in search of him towards Angora, taking the route of Cæsarea and Kir
Sheir.
Bayezid had also collected a great army in the east of Asia Minor,
and had finally concentrated it in the neighbourhood of Angora. He
showed none of his previous skill as a general, though all of his
insolence and bravado. His army was discontented by his avarice, and
by his neglect to pay them out of the well-filled treasury. He refused
to follow the advice of his best generals, who warned him against
meeting Timur’s vast hosts on a field where they could deploy their
whole strength. The two armies met at last on the plain of Angora,
the site of many previous famous battles. It is almost inconceivable
that Bayezid, in arrogant contempt of his foe, employed his army, in
the face of the enemy, in a great hunt for game, which led them into
a district devoid of water, where his soldiers suffered terribly, and
five thousand are said to have died of thirst.
On return to their camp they found that Timur had diverted the
stream which supplied it with water. Bayezid was forced to fight at
a disadvantage. The Tartars, who formed a fourth part of the Ottoman
army, were not to be relied on in this battle. Their sympathies were
with their fellow-Tartars under Timur. Bayezid had committed the fatal
error of placing them in the front line, after his usual tactics of
meeting the first encounter of the enemy with inferior troops. But in
this case the Tartars deserted on the field of battle. The Serbian
contingent, under Prince Stephen, and other Christian vassal troops
fought with the utmost gallantry and loyalty. But it was in vain.
The whole Ottoman army was outnumbered, overwhelmed, and routed with
great slaughter. Bayezid with his bodyguard made a last stand. “The
Thunderbolt,” says the Turkish historian, “continued to wield a heavy
battle-axe. As a starving wolf scattering a flock of sheep he scattered
the enemy. Each blow of his redoubtable axe struck in such a way that
there was no need of a second blow.” But in the end he was overpowered
and taken prisoner.
Bayezid for some time after his capture was treated with unwonted
generosity by Timur, who was impressed by his dignified bearing, in
spite of his overwhelming defeat and humiliation. But after an attempt
to escape he was more rigidly guarded, and was put into fetters at
night. The treatment of him became more cruel and contemptuous. He was
carried by day in the train of Timur, when on the march, in a litter,
which was in effect a cage[12] with open bars, exposed to the derision
and contempt of the Tartars. His wife, Despina, the Serbian princess,
was compelled to serve Timur with drink at his meals in a state of
nudity, and with other women of Bayezid’s harem was taken into that
of the conqueror. Timur is also said to have made a footstool of his
conquered foe.
Bayezid died of a broken heart after eight months of humiliation,
at the age of forty-eight. During that time Timur overran the
greater part of Asia Minor, capturing Nicæa and Brusa and many other
strongholds from the Ottomans, and Smyrna from the Knights of St. John
of Jerusalem. The walls of Smyrna were undermined in the same way as
those of Sivas. In two weeks Timur effected a capture which Bayezid
had failed to do in three times that length of time. The Knights, when
they found that the city was no longer tenable, fought their way down
to their galleys against the crowd of despairing inhabitants. Most of
them escaped to Rhodes and effected there another settlement. Those who
failed to escape were put to death by Timur, who built a pyramid of
their heads. Everywhere there was ruthless cruelty. When approaching
the city of Ephesus, children came out to meet him singing songs to
appease his wrath. “What is this noise?” he asked. When told, he
ordered his horsemen to ride over the children. They were trampled to
death.
Timur reinstated in their former territories, as tributaries to his
own Empire, most of the petty princes who had been dispossessed by
the Turks, including the Emir of Karamania. He eventually returned to
Samarkand, where he made preparations for the invasion of China, but
before this could be realized he died, at the age of seventy-one,
two years after the death of Bayezid. As a result of his raid into
Asia Minor the Ottoman Empire there, for the time being, completely
collapsed. But the Tartars disappeared without leaving any trace behind
them.
If Bayezid’s physical downfall was overwhelming and humiliating,
his moral decadence was even worse, and, as it turned out, was more
permanently injurious to the people of his Empire by the evil example
it set. In the brief periods of peace, spent at Brusa and Adrianople,
he gave way to self-indulgence and vice of a deplorable kind. He was
the first of his race to break the laws of the Prophet and to drink too
freely of wine. In company with his Grand Vizier, Ali, he was addicted
to drunken orgies. Still worse, he was tempted by that boon companion
to give way to vice of unmentionable depravity, condemned by all the
world. The Empire was ransacked for good-looking boys, the sons of
Christian parents, who were compelled to embrace Islamism and to enter
the service of the Court, nominally as pages, but really to pander to
the degrading desire of the Sultan. In adopting such practices, Bayezid
set the fashion to others of his entourage. The moral infection then
spread widely among the upper classes of society, especially among the
judges and ulemas. There can be little doubt that immorality infected
the upper society of the Empire and was one of the causes which
ultimately led to decadence and ruin.
It is to be noted of Bayezid that in his short but strenuous career
of conquest he did not show any falling off of vigour and courage as
a result of his excesses. But in his final campaign against Timur his
conduct was so fatuous as to give rise to the belief that his gross
debauchery had resulted in softening of the brain. However that may
have been, he met in Timur a greater man than himself who, even at the
age of seventy, had lost none of his vigour of mind and body, and who,
as master also of bigger battalions, was practically invincible.
V
MAHOMET I
1413-21
ON the death of Sultan Bayezid, in captivity, it seemed as though
the Ottoman Empire was doomed to extinction. Asia Minor had already
passed out of its hands, and was either in possession of the Emirs who
had been reinstated in their territories by Timur, and who had sworn
allegiance to him, or was still in the occupation of the invading
Tartars. It was not to be expected that the Empire in Europe would
survive when it could no longer draw support from Asia. The Christian
populations of Bulgaria, Bosnia, and Wallachia would soon reassert
their independence, and the Greek Empire might be expected to recover
some of its lost provinces. The Turkish Empire, however, showed a most
unexpected vitality. It survived not only the invasion of Timur, but
civil war, which after the death of Bayezid broke out between four of
his sons. An interregnum of ten years occurred, during which there
was internecine war between these claimants to his throne. The Empire
emerged from these stupendous difficulties, under the able rule of the
youngest of them, Mahomet I, as strong as ever, and without the loss of
a single province.
Timur’s hosts, after ravaging the whole of Asia Minor, departed like
a swarm of locusts which has denuded a district of its produce and
then seeks fresh ground. They returned to Central Asia. They left
nothing behind in Asia Minor of Tartar rule, either of an army or of
an administration. The field was left open to the Ottomans to fight
among themselves and their former vassals and neighbours for such a
settlement as could be achieved by the strongest of them.
Of the six sons of Bayezid, five fought with him at Angora in command
of divisions of his army. One of them, Mustapha, was supposed to be
among the slain; another, Musa, was taken prisoner and shared the
captivity of his father. The other three escaped. The eldest of them,
Solyman, accompanied by the Grand Vizier, Ali, and Hassan, the Agha
of the Janissaries, made his way to Adrianople, where, on the death
of Bayezid, he had himself proclaimed Sultan, and exercised power as
such over the European provinces of the Empire. Issa, a younger son,
fled to Brusa, where he also claimed to be successor to his father, and
Mahomet, the youngest son, but by far the ablest, retired to Amasia, a
small principality in the north-east of Asia Minor. He there assumed
authority over the district. After the death of their father these
three claimants for succession to his Empire fought it out between
themselves, and, later on, a fourth claimant was added to the list in
Musa, who had been set free by Timur, in order that he might convey the
dead body of his father for interment at Brusa.
The earliest conflict was between Mahomet and Issa. Mahomet offered to
divide between them the Ottoman possessions in Asia. Issa refused and
claimed the whole of them. He was defeated and fled to Europe, where he
sought the assistance of Solyman, who had firmly established himself in
the Ottoman dominions there, and who was now able to lead an army into
Asia Minor in support of Issa. Mahomet was hard pressed by Solyman. He
sent Musa across the Straits to effect a diversion by raising revolt
against Solyman in Europe. This had the desired effect, and Solyman
was compelled to return to Adrianople. After his departure Mahomet
succeeded in defeating Issa again, and the latter disappeared and was
heard of no more.
In Europe, Solyman and Musa were now in deadly conflict. Solyman was
much the same type of man as his father—of great vigour and courage
in action, but given to orgies of drink and debauchery. The Agha of
the Janissaries in vain tried to rouse him from the apathy to which
he was often reduced after these bouts. He threatened to shave the
Agha’s beard with his sword. He was often severe and even cruel to
his soldiers, and finally the Janissaries, incensed by his brutal
treatment, his dissolute habits, and his inability to rouse himself to
action, rebelled against him, at the instance of Hassan, and put him
to death. They then took service under Musa, who became master of the
position in Europe and assumed the title of Sultan.
After an expedition to Serbia for the purpose of avenging what he
considered their treachery to him in supporting Mahomet, and where he
committed the most revolting cruelties, Musa returned to Adrianople,
and opened a campaign against the Emperor Manuel, who, after the death
of Bayezid, had superseded Andronicus on the Greek throne and who
supported Mahomet.
The Emperor appealed to Mahomet for assistance. Mahomet, with a Turkish
army, supported by the Serbian contingent, crossed the Bosphorus in
answer to this appeal, and the strange sight was witnessed of a Turkish
army, under command of one of the Othman race, defending Constantinople
against another Turkish army.
Musa eventually retreated from his lines in front of Constantinople,
and was pursued by Mahomet. When, later, the two armies came into close
touch on the borders of Serbia, a conflict was avoided by a revolt of
Musa’s troops. The Agha, Hassan, addressed the Janissaries in the very
presence of Musa. “Why,” he said to them, “do you hesitate to go over
to the ranks of the most just and virtuous of the Othman princes? Why
subject yourselves to be outraged by a man who can take care neither of
himself nor of others?”
Musa, on hearing this harangue to his troops, rushed at Hassan and slew
him. The companion of Hassan struck at Musa with his sword and wounded
him in the hand. The troops, when they saw that their general was
seriously wounded, were seized with panic. They deserted and went over
to Mahomet. Musa fled with three attendants, and, later, his dead body
was found in a marsh.
Mahomet was now in undisputed command of the Empire as Sultan. He
reigned as such for only eight years. He showed, during that time,
infinite skill and patience, as a statesman equally as a general, in
restoring, consolidating, and maintaining his Empire. He was ardently
desirous of peace. To the representatives of Serbia, Wallachia, and
Albania he said: “Forget not to tell your masters that I grant peace
to all, and that peace I will accept from all. May God be against the
breakers of peace.”
He kept on the best of terms with the Greek Emperor, with whom he
had made a defensive alliance, and restored to him certain cities on
the coast of the Black Sea and in Thessaly. He had frequent causes,
however, for the use of his army, and for showing his skill as a
general. He compelled the Emirs of Karamania, Kermia, and other
principalities in Asia Minor, who had promised allegiance to Timur,
to renew their vassalage to the Ottoman Empire. Two or three times
the Karamanian prince revolted and endeavoured to assert complete
independence. As often Mahomet defeated him, but contented himself with
asserting supremacy, and did not insist upon the incorporation of his
territory with the Empire. He also defeated an attempt of a Turkish
upstart to create an independent State at Smyrna and Aidin. He put down
a dangerous revolt of Dervishes and extinguished the sect. He came into
conflict at sea with the Republic of Venice, and though he was worsted,
and his fleet of galleys was destroyed, he succeeded in making an
honourable peace.
As a ruler of his Empire he showed many great qualities. He gained
the appellation which is best translated into English as the “Great
Gentleman”—and right well he deserved it. He was magnanimous and
just. He strictly observed his promises. He knew that his Empire
could not be maintained by force alone, but that justice and clemency
were necessary. His Christian subjects were everywhere treated with
consideration. He would not tolerate cruelty to them. He was a liberal
patron of literature, and in his short reign the Ottomans first
showed a bent for poetry. It was a blot on his fame that he caused
his youngest brother to be deprived of his sight, and that he put
to death his nephew, the son of Solyman, lest either of them should
dispute the throne with himself or his son after him. His experience
of his brothers and the history of his family doubtless convinced him
that no member of the Othman race would be content with any position
short of the Sultanate. This may not be a moral justification, but
it is an explanation which, in view of the ethics of the times, must
prevent too severe a judgment. Though Mahomet in his short reign, after
attaining full command of the Empire, made no extension of it, he must
be regarded practically as one of its founders and as among its most
eminent and successful rulers. He owed his success over his brothers
to his moral ascendancy and to the great reputation which he achieved
with his troops for his high qualities as a ruler even more than to
his prowess as a general. The emergence of the Empire from the extreme
difficulties into which it fell from the Mongolian invasion must have
been due to the fact that the Ottomans at that time were much superior
to the Greeks and the other Christian communities in all the qualities
which tend to make a stable government.
Mahomet died of apoplexy in 1421 at the early age of forty-seven. He
was buried at Brusa in a mausoleum near to the splendid building known
as the Green Mosque, which he had himself erected.
VI
MURAD II
1421-51
MURAD succeeded his father in the Sultanate as second of the name. He
reigned for thirty years, including two short periods when he abdicated
and retired into private life. But on each occasion he was compelled by
the exigencies of the State, and the youth and inexperience of his son
and successor, to resume the throne. He much resembled his father in
vigour and capacity as a general and in his desire to act justly.
At the very commencement of Murad’s reign the Greek Emperor Manuel, by
an almost incredible act of folly, hoping to take advantage of Murad’s
youth and inexperience, let loose from confinement a man who claimed,
whether rightly or not was never clearly established, to be Mustapha,
the son of Sultan Bayezid, who had disappeared after the battle of
Angora. Manuel entered into a treaty with this claimant to the Ottoman
throne, by which, in the event of his succeeding in establishing his
succession, the city of Gallipoli and all the cities on the shores of
the Black Sea, taken from the Greek Empire by the Turks, were to be
restored to it.
In spite of this scandalous treachery to Islam, the so-called Mustapha
succeeded in raising a large army in Europe, with which he defeated the
troops who adhered to Murad. He then crossed the Dardanelles into Asia
with his army in vessels supplied by the Emperor Manuel. Murad showed
all the vigour and capacity of his race in dealing with this emergency.
He won over the greater part of Mustapha’s army, who were disaffected.
He defeated what remained. Mustapha was driven across the Straits again
to Gallipoli, where he was besieged, captured, and hanged, as the best
proof, it was said, that he was an impostor.
Murad, having defeated this claimant to his throne, determined to
avenge the perfidy of the Emperor Manuel and to put an end to the Greek
Empire by the capture of Constantinople. For this purpose he collected
an army of veterans. He invested the city, making a long line of great
earthworks from the Golden Horn to the Sea of Marmora. From this he
bombarded the city walls by cannon, then for the first time used by
the Ottoman army, but which were not as yet very effective. He also
used movable towers, from which assaults could be made on the walls
of the city. He proclaimed that the great wealth of the capital would
be the prize of the soldiers if the assault on it were successful. He
made a special promise to a band of five hundred Dervishes, who were
to lead the assault, that all the nuns in the city would be given to
them as concubines. In spite of these great inducements to victory, the
assault was unsuccessful. The Greeks defended the walls of the city
with the utmost heroism, assisted, it was said, by a timely apparition
of the Holy Virgin, which stimulated their efforts and depressed
the assailants. Murad would probably have been successful with the
overwhelming forces at his disposal if he had persisted in the siege,
but he was compelled to raise it by a diversion cleverly contrived by
the Greek Emperor.
A rival to the Sultan was set up in Asia in another Mustapha, a younger
brother of Murad, who had not been put to death in pursuance of the
fratricidal policy of his family. This new claimant was supported by
the Karamanians and Kermians, and with their aid he defeated an Ottoman
army in Asia Minor. Murad found it necessary to abandon the siege of
Constantinople, and to transfer his main army to Asia Minor for the
purpose of dealing with this danger to his throne. He came to close
quarters as quickly as possible with Mustapha’s army, and defeated it.
Mustapha was taken prisoner and was hanged at once by his captors,
without giving an opportunity to Murad to exercise his clemency in
favour of his brother, had he so willed it. Murad then occupied himself
by reducing the Karamanian and other Emirs to complete subjection to
his Empire.
Meanwhile the Emperor Manuel died, and was succeeded by John
Palæologus. Murad, in lieu of renewing the siege of Constantinople, was
content to make another treaty with the new Emperor, imposing on him a
heavy tribute and stripping him of almost every possession beyond the
walls of his capital. The Empire thus obtained a reprieve for a few
brief years.
In the case of Salonika, which had been recently sold by the Greek
Emperor to the Republic of Venice, now desirous of effecting a lodgment
in Macedonia, Murad refused to recognize the right of the Emperor to
transfer to a foreign Power a city which at one time had been under
Ottoman rule. It had three times in the last hundred years been
captured by the Ottomans, and had as often been recaptured by the
Greeks. Murad led an army, in 1430, to attack it, and, after a vigorous
resistance by the Venetians, captured it by assault, and finally
annexed the city and its district to the Turkish Empire. It was thought
that Murad showed great clemency in not allowing his soldiers to
indulge in a wholesale massacre. The Greek inhabitants, however, were
sold into slavery, and their numbers were so great that a good-looking
girl was sold for the price of a pair of boots.
The suppression of rebellion in Asia Minor, the subjection of the
Greek Emperor to the position of a humble vassal, and the capture of
Salonika had occupied Murad for some years. Later he was involved in
long struggles with his neighbours, the Hungarians, on the northern
boundaries of his Empire. The Ottomans were engaged in constant raids
across the Danube, where vast districts were devastated, and thousands
of their population were carried off as captives for sale as slaves.
There arose about this time in Hungary a national hero, the celebrated
Hunyadi, a natural son of the late King Sigismund. He was a born
leader of men, not a great general, but a most valiant fighter. He had
gained great distinction in war in other directions. He now became
the soul of hostility against the Ottomans. He was known as the White
Knight, on account of his silver armour, which always shone in the
van of the impetuous charges of his cavalry. He was rightly regarded
by his countrymen as a patriot and a national hero. None the less, he
was a bloodthirsty ruffian. He made a practice of massacring all the
prisoners taken in battle. He found pleasure in having this effected,
in his presence, at banquets, where the guests were entertained by the
shrieks of the dying men.
Hunyadi for twenty years was a terror to the Ottoman armies. His first
encounter with them was at Hermannstadt, north of the Danube, which
was invested by an army of eighty thousand Ottomans. He led an army of
twenty thousand Hungarians against them, in relief of the fortress,
and inflicted a severe defeat on them, in despite of great disparity
of numbers. Twenty thousand of the Ottomans were killed, including the
general. The others were dispersed. Murad sent another army of eighty
thousand men against him, under another Pasha. Hunyadi again defeated
it with great slaughter at Varsag.
These notable victories roused great enthusiasm in Europe. It was
determined to take the offensive against the Ottomans, and to make
another effort to drive them out of Europe. A coalition was formed
for the purpose between Hungary and Poland, then united under King
Ladislaus, and Wallachia and Bosnia. Serbia, which under its king,
Stephen Lazariwitch, had been the firm ally of the Ottomans, and had
supported them in many campaigns in Asia and Europe, was now induced
to abandon this alliance and, under Stephen’s successor, George
Brancowitch, to join the confederacy against the Ottomans. The Pope,
Eugenius, was most active in support of this combination. His legate,
Cardinal Julian Cesarini, led an armed force in support of it. Money
was raised for the purpose of the war by a great sale of indulgences
to the faithful in every part of Europe. A large contingent of French
and German knights joined the allied army. It was, in fact, another
crusade, prompted by religious zeal on behalf of Christianity against
Islam. The allied army was under the nominal command of Ladislaus, but
Hunyadi was its real leader.
The Republics of Venice and Genoa gave their support, and as, at this
time, the Ottomans had no naval force, it was hoped that these Powers,
by means of their numerous and powerful galleys, would prevent the
transfer to Europe of Murad’s main army, which was again engaged in
conflict with the Karamanians in Asia Minor.
The allied army, under these favourable circumstances, crossed the
Danube in 1443. It defeated an Ottoman army on the banks of the Masova
and again at Nisch. It then crossed the Balkan range in winter—an
operation of extreme difficulty, which has since only twice been
effected, by General Diebitsch and General Gourko—and again defeated
the Turks in a battle at the foot of these mountains. Strange to say,
instead of marching onwards to Adrianople, as Diebitsch did in 1829,
Hunyadi was content with the laurels already achieved, and returned
with his army to Buda, where he displayed his trophies and received a
triumph.
Murad, on hearing of the retreat of the Hungarians across the Balkans,
determined to come to terms with them, and not to pursue them again
across the Danube. With some difficulty, and in spite of the sullen
opposition of Cardinal Julian and the French contingent, a treaty was
agreed to, at Szegeddin, with Ladislaus, by which Serbia was to be
freed from dependence on the Ottoman Empire and Wallachia was to be
ceded to Hungary. The treaty was to be in force for ten years. It was
solemnly sworn to on the Gospel and the Koran by Ladislaus and Murad.
While this treaty was being negotiated Murad, weary of war, and
desirous of spending the remainder of his life in sensual enjoyments
which had so long been denied to him, decided to abdicate his throne.
He was still in the full vigour of life at the age of forty-one,
though he was said to be growing rather fat. He did not propose, like
the Emperor Charles V, to retire to a monastery, but rather, like
Diocletian the Roman Emperor, to a luxurious palace, surrounded by
beautiful gardens, which he had prepared for his retreat at Magnesia.
On the ratification of the treaty of Szegeddin, in 1444, he carried
out this purpose, and his son Mahomet, at the age of fourteen, was
proclaimed Sultan in his place.
When this became known to the Hungarians a revulsion of opinion took
place against the recent treaty with the Turks. The Hungarian Diet
determined, at the instance of Cardinal Julian, backed up by the Pope,
to break the treaty. News had arrived of a fresh outbreak of the
Karamanians. The fleets of Genoa, Venice, and Burgundy were masters of
the Hellespont and would, it was believed, prevent the Ottoman army in
Asia Minor from crossing into Europe. The opportunity for crushing the
Turks and driving them out of Europe seemed to be most favourable.
Is it now [said Cardinal Julian to the Hungarian Diet] that you will
desert expectations and your own fortunes? Is it to your God and
your fellow-Christians that you have pledged your faith? That prior
obligation annihilates a rash and sacrilegious oath to the enemies
of Christ. His vicar on earth is the Roman Pontiff, without whose
sanction you can neither promise nor perform. In his name I absolve
your perjury and sanctify your arms. Follow my footsteps in the path
of glory and salvation; and, if you still have scruples, devolve on
my head the punishment and the sin.
“This mischievous casuistry,” says the historian Gibbon, “was seconded
by his respectable character and the levity of popular assemblies.” The
Hungarian Diet resolved on war, and King Ladislaus, in spite of his
recent oath, determined to break the treaty. Hunyadi was, in the first
instance, strongly opposed to this, but his assent was obtained by the
promise of the throne of Bulgaria, in the event of the defeat of the
Ottomans and the conquest of that province. The Prince of Serbia, who
had regained his independence by the treaty, was persuaded to join with
the allies by the promise of an addition to his kingdom.
It was decided to send an army at once against the Ottomans. But it
was a much reduced one in comparison with that which had so recently
crossed the Balkans. Most of the French and German knights and their
attendants had already gone home. Not more than ten thousand remained
under Hunyadi. They were joined by five thousand Wallachians. They
invaded Bulgaria, and then, instead of crossing the Balkans, descended
the Danube to the coast and thence marched to Varna. Meanwhile the
Ottomans, in great alarm and fearing the incompetence of the young
Mahomet to conduct a great war, induced Murad to emerge again from his
retreat. He hastily gathered together an army in Asia Minor. He bribed
the Genoese, at the rate of a ducat for each man, to convey it across
the Hellespont. He arrived in front of Varna unexpectedly, before the
Christian army knew of his intentions. His army greatly outnumbered
that of King Ladislaus. In spite of this, the two wings of it were
driven back with great slaughter. Murad, in command of the centre of
his army, for the moment and for the only time in his life, lost his
presence of mind and was disposed to fly. But the Beglerbey of Anatolia
laid hold of the bridle of his horse and urged him to fight it out.
The battle was renewed. The Janissaries stood firm and successfully
repulsed the main body of the Christians. Ladislaus was unhorsed and
asked for quarter. But he was put to death on the field. His head was
stuck upon a lance and was held up by the side of another lance which
bore on high a copy of the violated treaty. The Christians, when they
saw the head of their dead king in its soldier’s helmet thus held
aloft, were struck with panic and fled precipitately. Hunyadi escaped
with difficulty. Cardinal Julian expiated by death on the field his
sin in advising the breach of the treaty. Two other bishops shared his
fate. Never was defeat and disaster more richly deserved. Two-thirds of
the Christian army were slain in the battle, and even greater numbers,
though a less proportion, of the Ottomans shared their fate.
Murad, having won this great victory, again, a second time, abdicated
his throne and returned to his retreat at Magnesia, and again the young
Mahomet was invested as Sultan. Though history supplies cases of great
kings seeking retirement from the cares of office, and of some of them
being induced to resume their thrones, it records no other case of a
second abdication and a second resumption. Murad was very soon recalled
from his abode of pleasure. A serious outbreak of the Janissaries
occurred at Adrianople. They ravaged the city and committed great
atrocities. The ministers of the young Sultan were greatly alarmed.
They felt that only a strong hand could keep a check on the unruly
Janissaries. Murad was again summoned from his retreat. The young
Mahomet was induced to go on a hunting expedition. In his absence Murad
again made his appearance at Adrianople and resumed power. Mahomet, on
his return from hunting, found that his father was again in the saddle.
Murad was received by his troops with a great ovation, and even the
unruly Janissaries gave in their submission to him. He did not again
seek retirement at Magnesia. He reigned for seven more years—another
period of almost incessant war. He first made an invasion of the
Morea, which the Greek Emperor’s brothers had divided between them and
governed as petty princes, or despots, as they were called. Murad had
no difficulty in storming and capturing the fortification by which
the isthmus of Corinth was defended. He compelled the two despots to
accept the position of vassals under the Empire.
Murad then again turned his attention to Serbia and Hungary. He
defeated the combined forces of Hungary, Serbia, and Bosnia, under
Hunyadi, on the field of Kossova, where in 1389 Murad I had first
subdued the Serbians. As a result of this great battle Serbia lost its
independence and was finally incorporated as an integral part of the
Ottoman Empire. Bosnia became a tributary State.
Murad was less fortunate in his efforts to subdue the Albanians. These
people were under the leadership of George Castriota—commonly called
Scanderbeg—who had been brought up at Murad’s Court as a Mussulman, and
had learned the art of war from him, but who had abjured Islam, with
a view to leadership of the Albanians. He carried on a guerrilla war
against the Ottoman invaders with great success, and Murad was unable
to complete the conquest of the State. This was practically the only
failure of Murad’s adventurous life. His generals met with many defeats
at the hand of Hunyadi, but Murad retrieved them in the two battles in
which he came in conflict with the great Hungarian hero. He died of
apoplexy in 1451.
Looking back at his career, it does not appear that he made war with
ambitious objects to aggrandize his Empire. War was, in almost every
case, forced upon him. Three times the Prince of Karamania declared war
against him, and three times Murad defeated him, and was content with
insisting on the vassalage of the province and not on its extinction
and incorporation with the Empire. It has been shown how perfidious
was the conduct of the Greek Emperor, and how fully justified Murad
was in reducing his territory to the narrowest limits. Murad’s attack
on Salonika when in the hands of the Venetian Republic was equally
justified, for the Greek Emperor had no right to sell it, and thus
invite a foreign Power to make a lodgment there. The wars on the
northern frontier were forced upon him by the Hungarians and the
Christian Powers in alliance with them. They appealed to arms, and
victory decided against them. It will be seen that as a net result of
Murad’s reign the Ottoman Empire was extended during these thirty years
by the acquisition of many petty principalities in Asia Minor, by the
complete subjection of Serbia and Bosnia, the conquest of Salonika
and its district, and by the conversion of the Morea into a tributary
State. It was, however, reduced by the loss of Wallachia as a vassal
State.
Gibbon, quoting from a Turkish historian, says:—
Murad was a just and valiant prince, of a great soul; patient of
labour, learned, merciful, religious, charitable; a lover and
encourager of the studious and of all who excelled in any art
or science. No man obtained more or greater victories. Belgrade
alone withstood his attacks. Under his reign the soldier was ever
victorious, the citizen rich and secure. If he subdued any country,
his first care was to build mosques and caravansaries, hospitals, and
colleges.
Though, _more suo_, Gibbon suggests doubts whether such praise could be
justified in the case of a Sultan “whose virtues are often the vices
most useful to himself or most agreeable to his subjects,” he admits
that
the justice and moderation of Murad are attested by his conduct and
acknowledged by Christians themselves, who consider a prosperous
reign and a peaceful death as the reward of his singular merits. In
the vigour of his age and military power he seldom engaged in war
till he was justified by a previous and adequate provocation. In the
observance of treaties his word was inviolate and sacred.[13]
VII
MAHOMET II, ‘THE CONQUEROR’
1451-81
IF Mahomet, the eldest son of Murad, at the age of fourteen, had been
reckoned too feeble to cope with the emergencies of the State, it is
very certain that he soon made wonderfully rapid progress. At the age
of twenty-one, when he again mounted the throne on the death of his
father, he was amply, and almost precociously, endowed with many of the
best, and many also of the worst, qualities of an autocrat, and was
quite able alone to take command of the State. He was undoubtedly the
ablest man that the house of Othman had as yet produced, not only as a
general, but as a statesman. He had also great intellectual capacity
and literary attainments. He spoke five languages fluently. He was
the most proud and ambitious of his race and the most persistent in
pursuing his aims. He combined with these high qualities, however,
extreme cruelty and perfidy and sensuality of the grossest and vilest
kind. He differed from his predecessors in his craving for absolute
power, free from control by his ministers, and in his reckless
disregard of human life. Hitherto, from Othman to Murad II, the Sultans
had been in intimate association with their viziers and generals,
and had shared their meals with them. They were accessible to their
subjects, high and low. Mahomet was very different. He was the true
despot after the Oriental fashion. He held himself aloof. He took his
meals alone. He made no confidants. He treated his viziers and pashas
as though they were his slaves. He had no regard for their lives. There
were men in his personal service who were adepts at striking off heads
by single blows of their scimitars. Two at least of Mahomet’s Grand
Viziers were put to death in this way in his presence without warning
or compunction. This levelling process was not apparently objected to
by his subjects.
On hearing at Magnesia of the death of his father, Mahomet, who was
eager to resume power, mounted at once an Arab horse, and exclaiming,
“Let all who love me follow!” he rode to the Hellespont, and thence
crossed to Gallipoli and made his way to Adrianople. He was there again
acclaimed as Sultan, not, however, without having to submit to onerous
presents to the Janissaries, a bad precedent which was later always
followed on the accession of a Sultan. The first act of his reign was
to direct that his brother, an infant son of Murad, by his latest wife,
a Serbian princess, should be put to death. He feared that the child,
when grown up, might dispute the throne with him, on the ground that
its mother was a legitimate wife of royal descent, while he himself
(Mahomet) was only the son of a slave. A high officer of the Court was
directed to drown the child in a bath. This was effected at the very
moment when the mother was engaged in offering her congratulations
to the new Sultan on his accession. The foul deed created a very bad
impression, and Mahomet found it expedient to disown the act. He did
so by directing the execution of the officer who had carried out his
order. He compelled the mother, in spite of her royal rank, to marry a
slave, an outrageous insult to the Serbian prince and to the memory of
his father.
From the earliest moment of his accession it became clear that Mahomet
intended to signalize his reign by the capture of Constantinople. With
this view, he came to terms for a three years’ truce with Hunyadi
and the Hungarians. He chastised and then gave easy terms to the
Karamanians, and accepted as a wife the daughter of their prince. He
sent an army to the Peloponnesus to prevent the two brothers of the
Greek Emperor, who were ruling there, from lending their aid to the
Greeks of Constantinople. He directed the erection of a great fortress
on the European side of the Bosphorus, at its narrowest point opposite
to another, which had been erected by Bayezid, very near to the
capital, so as to command the Straits. When the Greek Emperor sent an
envoy to protest against this, Mahomet replied:—
I make no threats against your city. By assuring the safety of my
country I am not infringing any treaty. Have you forgotten the
extremity to which my father was reduced when your Emperor, in
league with the Hungarians, endeavoured to prevent his crossing to
Europe by closing the Straits against him? Murad was compelled to
ask for the assistance of the Genoese. I was at Adrianople at the
time and was very young. The Mussulmans were in great alarm and you
Greeks insulted them. My father took an oath at the battle of Varna
to erect a fort on the European side. This oath I will fulfil. Have
you the right or the power to prevent my doing what I wish on my own
territory? The two sides of the Straits are mine—that of Asia Minor
because it is peopled by Ottomans, that of Europe because you are
unable to defend it. Tell your master that the Sultan who now reigns
in no way resembles his predecessors. My power goes beyond their
vows. I permit you now to withdraw, but in the future I will have
flayed alive those who bring me such messages.[14]
No more envoys were sent to him after this by the Greeks. Their
Emperor, Constantine—the last of his line—had succeeded his brother
three years before the accession of Mahomet. He was a brave and
conscientious prince, who gave lustre to the last days of the
Empire. But he was most unwise and provocative in his conduct to
the new Sultan, evidently under the belief that he had to deal with
the inexperienced youth who had been displaced by Murad six years
previously. He threatened to let loose, as a rival claimant to the
Ottoman throne, Orkhan, a grandson of Bayezid, who was under his
charge, if a larger allowance was not given for his maintenance.
Mahomet contemptuously rejected the claim. The Grand Vizier, Khalil,
who was suspected of being in the pay of the Greeks, warned the Emperor
of his extreme folly. “Your madness,” he said to the Greek ambassador,
“will put Constantinople in the hands of the Sultan. Proclaim Orkhan
Sultan in Europe, call in the Hungarians to your aid, retake what
provinces you can, and you will speedily see the end of the Greek
Empire.”
The new fortress was completed in the autumn of 1452. It was then seen
that, in combination with the fortress on the opposite shore, it gave
complete command of the Straits to the Ottomans. Venetian vessels which
attempted to pass were captured and their crews were sawn in halves.
Mahomet then declared his intention to attack Constantinople. In an
address to his principal pashas, after describing the conquests made
by his predecessors in Europe and Asia, he pointed out that the great
barrier to further progress was this city and the army of the Emperor.
The opposition [he said] must be ended; these barriers must be
removed. It was for them to complete the work of their fathers. They
had now against them a single city, one which could not resist their
attacks; a city whose population was greatly reduced and whose former
wealth had been diminished by Turkish sieges, and by the continued
incursions made by his ancestors upon its territories; a city which
was now only one in name, for in reality its buildings were useless
and its walls abandoned and for the great part in ruins. Even from
its weakness, however, they knew that from its favourable position,
commanding both land and sea, it had greatly hindered their progress
and could still hinder it, opposing their plans and being always
ready to attack them. Openly or secretly it had done all it could
against them. It was the city which had brought about the attack by
Timerlane and the suffering which followed. It had instigated Hunyadi
to cross the Danube, and on every occasion and in every possible
manner had been their great enemy. The time had now come when, in
his opinion, it should be captured or wiped off the face of the
earth. One of two things: he would either have it within his Empire
or he would lose both. With Constantinople in his possession, the
territories already gained could be safely held and more would be
obtained; without it, no territory that they possessed was safe.[15]
In the ensuing winter (1452) Mahomet made every preparation at
Adrianople for a campaign in the next year. Having no means of casting
cannons, which at that time were coming into use in European armies,
he tempted a Wallachian, who was experienced in such work, and who
was in the service of the Greeks, to come over to his side for higher
pay, and devised with him a cannon of enormous size, firing stone
balls of 2½ feet in diameter, and many other smaller, but still
large, guns throwing balls of 150 lb. weight, for use against the walls
of Constantinople. He also constructed a large fleet of war vessels
propelled by oars, biremes and triremes, to be used in the siege of the
city. He was most active and eager, working day and night in concerting
plans with his generals for his great purpose. Early in the following
year (1453) he collected in front of the walls of Constantinople
an army, estimated at a hundred and fifty thousand men, including
twelve thousand Janissaries, and a vast number of irregulars and camp
followers eager for the sack of the great city.
Constantine, on his part, was equally engaged in making preparations
for the defence of his capital. He collected supplies of every kind.
He did his best to repair and strengthen the walls of the city, which
had been neglected and badly repaired by fraudulent Greek contractors.
He invited the aid of the Christian princes of Western Europe for the
coming struggle. In this view, and in the hope of getting full support
from the Pope, he agreed to a scheme of union between the Greek and
Latin Churches, in which everything was conceded to the latter. A great
service was held at St. Sophia to ratify this union. Cardinal Isidore,
the legate of the Pope, a Greek by birth, presided. It was attended by
the Emperor and all his Court, clergy, and the officers of State. This
gave great offence to the main body of the Greek clergy, and to the
great majority of the people of Constantinople. There was implacable
hatred between the members of the two Churches, and not even the grave
peril of the State could induce them to compose their differences. St.
Sophia was deserted by its congregation. It was thought to be polluted
by the service.[16] The Grand Duke Notaras, the second person in the
State after the Emperor, in command of all the forces, was specially
offended. He even went the length of saying in public that he would
rather see the turban of the Turks at Constantinople than the hat of a
cardinal. It resulted that the Greeks were divided into two parties.
Priests refused to give the sacrament to dying men not of their
party. The Churches refused to contribute out of their vast wealth to
necessities of the State. Constantine was seriously embarrassed and
weakened by the division among his people. Of a total population of the
city, reduced as it was, as compared with the past, and estimated at a
hundred thousand, not more than six thousand took up arms in support of
Constantine against the Turks.
The appeals to the Western Powers resulted in a certain, but very
insufficient, number of volunteers from Southern Europe giving their
services to support the Greek cause in its final struggle with the
Moslems. Seven hundred Genoese came under the command of Giustiniani,
an able soldier of fortune, who proved to be the main support of
Constantine. Others had come with Cardinal Isidore, at the instance of
the Pope, and with some small amount of money from the same quarter.
There were Catalans and Aragonese from Spain, but the number of these
recruits from Western Europe did not exceed three thousand. The total
force under the command of Constantine for the defence of the city
amounted to no more than eight thousand. It is strange that there were
no volunteers from France and Germany, or from Hungary and Poland,
from whence so many crusaders had volunteered in previous years to
drive the Turks out of Europe. Nor was there any valid assistance in
men and money from the numerous Greeks in the Levant. The unfortunate
Constantine was not only very deficient in men, but his resources in
money were very low. He had, however, in his service twenty powerful
galleys well manned, and three galleys had come from Venice.
It would seem that the cause of Constantine did not much interest
Europe, and did not even meet with an effective support among the
Greeks themselves.
The city of Constantinople, as it then existed, was situate between
the Golden Horn, its great harbour, and the sea of Marmora. Its land
frontage, distant about nine miles from the entrance to the harbour,
was four miles in length. It was protected by a triple line of
walls, the two inner of which were very massive, flanked by towers
at distances of 170 feet. There was a space of 60 feet between these
walls. The third and outer wall was a crenelated breastwork on the
other side of a fosse, of a width of 60 feet. This powerful line of
defence had been devised by the Emperor Theodosius II about a thousand
years ago and had protected the city in twenty sieges. Before the
invention of cannon it was practically impregnable.[17] There were also
fortifications extending for about nine miles on the side of the Golden
Horn. The eight thousand men were too few even for effective defence
of the four miles of walls, which were to be attacked directly by the
Ottoman army, to say nothing of the fortifications along the side of
the Golden Horn. The defence, however, with these limited means, was a
spirited one. It showed that if the Greek Emperor had been adequately
supported by the Western Powers Mahomet might not have been able to
capture the city.
The siege was commenced by Mahomet on April 6, 1453. Much time had been
occupied in conveying the cannon from Adrianople. There were two very
interesting incidents in the siege which are worth recording. The one
was the breaking of the close blockade of the port by four powerful
and well-manned Genoese galleys, bringing provisions and stores to the
beleaguered city from Chios. They sailed across the Marmora and up the
Bosphorus with a strong breeze in their favour. The Sultan sent against
them a hundred and forty of his fleet of smaller vessels propelled
by oars. They found great difficulty in stemming the heavy sea. The
four larger Genoese vessels came down on the smaller craft, crashing
against them and shivering their oars. Their crews hurled big stones
on the Turkish galleys and emitted against others the inextinguishable
fire of which the Greeks had the secret. The Turkish boats could make
no headway against the superior weight of the bigger vessels. A large
number of them were sunk with serious loss of life. When near to the
entrance of the harbour the wind died off and the Genoese vessels were
in imminent peril, surrounded as they were by the numerous Turkish
craft. But at the last moment an evening breeze sprang up. The Genoese
vessels were able to force their way through. The chain which prevented
ingress to the harbour was lowered, and the relieving vessels were
admitted.
The Sultan had watched the naval battle from the shore. He spurred his
horse some distance into the shallow sea in the hope of animating his
sailors to greater efforts. He was bitterly disappointed at this first
engagement of his new fleet. The next morning he sent for the admiral,
Balta Oghlou, a sturdy Bulgarian by birth, and bitterly reproached him
for his failure. He directed the admiral to be laid on the ground
and held there by four strong men, while he was bastinadoed. Some
historians state that the Sultan himself belaboured the unfortunate
admiral with his mace.
The other incident, growing out of the naval defeat, was that Mahomet,
on finding that his small craft, propelled only by oars, were of little
effect against the powerful vessels at the disposal of the Greeks,
determined to transfer a large number of them from the Bosphorus to the
upper part of the harbour, where the bigger vessels could not engage
them, owing to the shallow depth of water, and where they would be of
use against the inner defence of the city. For this purpose Mahomet
directed the construction of a broad plank road from Tophane, on the
Bosphorus, across the hill intervening between it and the head of the
Golden Horn. This road was well greased with tallow, and the vessels
were dragged up it with windlasses and oxen. The descent on the other
side of the hill was easy enough. The scheme was not quite a novelty,
as an operation of the same kind, though on a smaller scale, had been
attempted elsewhere. It was carried out with striking success; and in
one night eighty of the Turkish galleys were transferred in this way
to the upper harbour. Mahomet also constructed a pontoon bridge across
the harbour, on which batteries were erected. The two schemes together
enabled him to attack the Greek defences along the line of the harbour,
and compelled Constantine to withdraw many men from the defence of the
landward walls, where the main attack was made.
The young Sultan took a most active part in the siege work. He traced
the lines of fourteen batteries from which the walls were bombarded.
The first great cannon was a failure. It burst at the first shot and
blew to pieces the Wallachian who had cast it. It was recast, however,
and two others of the same size were also cast. About two hundred
smaller guns were used. They threw stone balls[18] against the walls
and towers of the city, and ultimately succeeded in effecting a breach.
There can be no doubt that the capture of the city was mainly due
to the provision of these great guns, which were far above anything
previously used against fortresses. The Greeks also used cannons in
defence, but the parapets of the walls were not wide enough to allow of
the recoil of the guns, and where it was possible to use them the walls
suffered from the concussion. Gunpowder was also deficient.
After seven weeks of siege the bombardment effected breaches in the
walls at three points such as to give Mahomet every hope of success in
a final assault. The principal breach was at St. Romanus, where the
outer of the two main walls was practically levelled for a length of
four hundred yards, and four of the flanking towers were destroyed. The
broad ditch was filled in part by the débris of the wall and in part by
fascines. The Sultan decided that the assault should take place on May
29th. This became known to the Greeks in the city, and both sides made
every preparation for a supreme effort.
On the 28th, Mahomet ordered a proclamation to be made to his troops,
to the effect that when the city was captured it would be given up
to them to sack at their will for three days. The Sultan, it said,
had sworn by the everlasting God, by the four thousand prophets, by
Mahomet, and by his own soul that the whole population of the city,
men, women, and children, should be given over to them. This was
received by the troops with tumultuous expressions of delight.
On the same day the Sultan reviewed his army in three divisions, each
of fifty thousand men, and afterwards received in his tent all the
leaders, military and naval. He made a speech to them in which he
announced his intention to make a final assault on the city on the next
day, explained to them the method of attack, and gave his final orders.
He enlarged on his promise to give to the troops the plunder of the
city.
In the city [he said] there was an infinite amount and variety of
wealth of all kinds—treasure in the palaces and private houses,
churches abounding in furniture of silver, gold, and precious stones.
All were to be theirs. There were men of high rank and in great
numbers who could be captured and sold as slaves; there were great
numbers of ladies of noble families, young and beautiful, and a host
of other women who could either be sold or taken into their harems.
There were boys of good family. There were houses and beautiful
gardens. “I give you to-day a grand and populous city, the capital
of the ancient Romans, the very summit of splendour and of glory,
which has become, so to say, the centre of the world. I give it over
to you to pillage, to seize its incalculable treasure of men, women,
and boys, and everything that adorns it. You will henceforward live
in great happiness and leave great wealth to your children. The
great gain to all the sons of Othman would be the conquest of a city
whose fame was great throughout the world. The greater its renown,
the greater would be the glory of taking it by assault. A great city
which had always been their enemy, which had always looked upon
them with a hostile eye, which in every way had sought to destroy
the Turkish power, would come into their possession. The door would
be open to them by its capture to conquer the whole of the Greek
Empire.”[19]
We have quoted this speech of Mahomet as further proof that plunder and
the capture of men, women, and boys for sale or for their harems, and
not religious fanaticism, was the main incentive to Moslem conquest.
The night before the assault was spent by the Turks in rejoicing. Their
camp was illuminated. Very different was the action of the Greeks
on this last day of their Empire. There was a religious procession
through the city, in which every one whose presence was not required in
defence of the walls took part and joined in prayer, imploring God not
to allow them to fall into the hands of the enemy. Eikons and relics
were paraded. At the close of the procession the Emperor Constantine
addressed a gathering of nobles and military leaders. He called
attention to the impending assault. He said:—
It had always been held the duty of a citizen to be ready to die
either for his faith, his country, his sovereign, or his wife and
children. All these incentives to heroic sacrifice were now combined.
The city was the refuge for all Christians, the pride and joy of
every Greek, and of all who lived in Eastern lands. It was the Queen
of Cities, the city which, in happy times, had subdued nearly all the
lands under the sun. The enemy coveted it as his chief prize. He had
provoked the war. He had violated all his engagements in order to
obtain it. He wished to put the citizens under his yoke, to take them
as slaves, to convert the holy churches, where the divine Trinity
was adored and the most holy Godhead worshipped, into shrines for
his blasphemy, and to put the false prophet in the place of Christ.
As brothers and fellow-soldiers it was their duty to fight bravely
in the defence of all that was dear to them, to remember that they
were the descendants of the heroes of ancient Greece and Rome, and
so conduct themselves that their memory should be as fragrant in the
future as that of their ancestors.... For himself, he was determined
to die in its defence.... He and they should put their trust in God,
and not, as did their enemy, in the multitude of his hordes.
In the evening a solemn service was held at St. Sophia, memorable
as the last Christian service before its conversion into a Turkish
mosque. The Emperor and his followers partook of the Sacrament and bade
farewell to the Greek Patriarch. It was a memorable scene—a requiem
service for the Empire which was about to expire. Later the Emperor
paid a last visit to his palace and bade farewell there to its staff.
It was a most touching occasion. One who was present there wrote of
it: “If a man had been made of wood or stone, he must have wept at the
scene.” It is very certain that the Emperor had no hope of saving the
city from capture by its mortal foes.
Very early in the morning of the next fateful day, the 29th May, 1453,
the final assault was delivered by the Turkish army. The scheme of the
Sultan was to attack the walls of the city at many points, from both
land and sea, but to make the main assault on the part of the wall
which had been so much injured by the cannon in the Lycus Valley, near
the gate of St. Romanus, and then, by successive waves of his vastly
greater army, to overwhelm the defenders, using first his inferior
troops, and reserving his best for the last attack, when the enemy
would be wearied by long fighting. The first assault was made by an
immense horde of irregulars, armed with bows and arrows, and with
slings throwing stones and iron balls. Gunpowder, though already used
for cannon, was not yet applied to muskets. The men advanced with
scaling-ladders for the assault, and a cloud of arrows darkened the
sky. No more than two thousand Greeks could be spared to defend this
part of the long line of fortifications. They were collected in the
_peribolus_ between the two walls. The gates in the inner wall were
closed, so that these men had no opportunity of shirking the defence
and retreating into the city. They had to fight for their very lives
between the two walls.
The Sultan directed the great cannon to be brought to the edge of
the fosse, and a shot from it broke down the stockade which had been
erected in place of the outer wall. Under cover of the dust the Turks
made the assault. They were bravely met by the defenders, and were
driven back with heavy loss. A second assault was then made by the
Anatolian infantry, a very superior force to the irregulars. But they
were no more successful. The Sultan, thinking that the Greeks must be
exhausted by these two assaults, then personally led a third great
body of men to a third assault. It consisted of his Janissaries. He
led them to the edge of the fosse, and thence directed their attack.
The cannon was used again against the stockade, and again under cover
of the dust caused by it the Janissaries made their assault. Some of
them succeeded in getting over the stockade, and a hand-to-hand fight
occurred between them and the Greeks. The defenders seemed to have
the best of it. But at this crisis a grave misfortune occurred to the
Greeks. Giustiniani, who commanded them, was severely wounded. Blood
flowed freely from his wounds. He decided to leave the field of battle
and return to his ship in the harbour, for medical relief. The Emperor
Constantine, who was near by, in vain implored him to remain, pointing
out to him the damaging effect his departure would have on the soldiers
who remained. Others thought that the wounds were not very serious
and that the general was not justified in leaving the field. But he
insisted on doing so, and demanded the key of the gate in the inner
wall. With him departed some of his Genoese soldiers. This defection
caused dismay and depression among the troops. Their resistance to the
Turks slackened.
Some Greek historians accuse Giustiniani of cowardice in deserting the
battle at so critical a moment, and Gibbon lends the weight of his
great authority to this. The reputation, however, of the famous Italian
soldier has been vindicated by later historians, such as Mr. Finlay and
Sir Edwin Pears. They have shown that Giustiniani died of his wounds
within a few days of the capture of Constantinople, the best proof
of their serious and fatal character. All the same, he may not have
sufficiently appreciated the effect of his withdrawal on the soldiers.
It might have been better to have died there rather than on board his
ship. However that might have been, all are agreed that the departure
of the general was the turning-point of the day, and that it had the
worst effect on the soldiers engaged in the defence.
The Emperor did his utmost to retrieve the position. He took upon
himself the charge vacated by Giustiniani, and led the defence.
Mahomet, on his part, had observed from the other side of the fosse
the slackening of the defence. He called out to the Janissaries: “We
have the city! It is ours! The wall is undefended!” He urged them to a
final effort. They rushed the stockade and effected an entry into the
_peribolus_. Soon great swarms of others followed, and overwhelmed the
defenders with their vast numbers. The Emperor, despairing of success,
threw aside his imperial mantle. He called out, “The city is taken and
I am still alive!” Drawing his sword, he threw himself into the mêlée.
He died fighting gloriously for his city and his Empire. His body was
never found, though search was made for it by order of the Sultan.
The Greek and Italian soldiers in the _peribolus_ were now completely
outnumbered. There was no exit through the inner wall by which they
could escape. They were in a trap between the two walls. They were
massacred to a man. The Janissaries, having effected this, found no
difficulty in making their way through the inner wall, which, as we
have explained, was not defended owing to the want of men.
All attacks on other parts of the city were failures. This one alone
succeeded. Victory here was due in part to the good generalship
of Mahomet and to his indomitable persistency, and in part to the
ill-fortune of the Greeks in the withdrawal of Giustiniani at the
critical moment of the defence. The defenders of the city had nobly
performed their duty. Their numbers were quite insufficient. They had
received no adequate support from Western Europe, or even from the
neighbouring Christian States. It is quite certain that a few thousand
more soldiers would have saved the city. Thirty galleys sent by the
Pope with reinforcements were on their way when the city fell. They had
been detained at Scio by adverse wind. “Auxilium deus ipse negavit,”
says the Greek historian.
When the Turks entered the city they began to massacre all the persons
they met in the streets, without distinction of age or sex. But there
was practically no resistance. There were no armed men left in the
city. The population was cowed and panic-stricken, as well they might
be in face of the overwhelming misfortune which now came upon them.
After a short period of massacre the Turks turned their attention to
the more practical business of looting and taking captives for sale.
They effected this in a deliberate and systematic way. One great
band of soldiers devoted themselves to plundering the palaces of the
wealthy, another to the churches, and a third to the shops and smaller
houses. Everything of value was gathered together for subsequent
division among the soldiers. Of the inmates of the palaces and houses
the older people were put to death; the stronger and younger of both
sexes were carried off in bands as prisoners, bound together with
ropes, with a view to ultimate sale as slaves.
The Turkish historian, Seadeddin, in words which seem to smack of
pleasure at the scene, says:—
Having received permission to loot, the soldiers thronged into the
city with joyous hearts, and there, seizing the possessors and their
families, they made the wretched unbelievers weep. They acted in
accordance with the precept, “Slaughter their aged and capture their
youth.”[20]
The gravest misfortunes fell upon the wealthier and more cultured
classes in the city. Their daughters and sons were torn from them to be
sold to harems in Asia Minor, or for other vile purposes. The parents,
if still strong, were sold as slaves. Numbers of them fled from their
houses and crowded into St. Sophia and other churches, hoping that
their foes would respect places of worship, or expecting that a miracle
of some kind would save them. But it was in vain. St. Sophia acted as
a kind of drag-net in which all the best in the city were collected,
and were carried off thence in gangs. Virgins consecrated to God were
dragged from this and other churches by their hair and were ruthlessly
stripped of every ornament they possessed. A horde of savage brutes
committed unnameable barbarities.
The city was cleared of everything of value and was all but denuded of
its population. By the lowest estimate, fifty thousand persons, mostly
the strong and the young of both sexes, were made captives, and later
were sold as slaves and deported to Asia Minor. Some few escaped from
the city into the country districts. Others found refuge in the Greek
and Genoese galleys in the harbour, which were able to get away and
escape because the crews of the Turkish vessels blockading the port
had deserted in order to take part in the sack. Some were able to hide
themselves in the city, and emerged later when the scene of horrors
was at an end. Others, we know not how many, were ruthlessly massacred
because they were of no value for sale. The proceeds of the sack
and of the sale of captives brought wealth to every soldier in the
Turkish army. No such dire misfortune to a city had occurred since the
destruction of Carthage.
After three days and nights of these orgies the Sultan intervened
and proclaimed an end of them. Meanwhile, on the day of the last
assault, when his troops were in possession of the city, the Sultan
rode into it. He went direct to St. Sophia, and, dismounting, entered
the great church. He took pains at once to prevent any destruction of
its contents, and himself struck down a soldier engaged in this work,
telling him that buildings were reserved for himself. He instructed a
mollah to call people to prayer from the pulpit. He thus inaugurated
the conversion of the splendid Christian church into a mosque.
After this he sent for Notaras, who had been in command of the Greek
forces under the Emperor, and affected to treat him with generosity. He
obtained a list of all the leading men in the city and offered a large
reward for their heads.
On the next day the Sultan made an inspection of the city and paid a
visit to the Imperial Palace. On entering it he quoted the lines from a
Persian poet:—
The spider’s web hangs before the portal of Cæsar’s palace,
The owl is the sentinel on the watch-tower.
Later he presided at a great banquet, where he appears to have imbibed
too freely of wine. When half-drunk he directed the chief eunuch to
go to Notaras and demand of him his youngest son, a handsome lad of
fourteen. Notaras refused, preferring death to dishonour for his son.
The Sultan thereupon ordered Notaras and all his family to be put to
death at once. Their heads were struck off and brought to the banquet
and placed before the Sultan as a decoration of his table.
It was said that the Sultan’s ferocity was stimulated by the last
favourite of his harem, with whom he was much enamoured, and that she,
on her part, was instigated by her father, a Greek renegade. Under this
influence the Sultan ordered the execution of all the persons to whom
on the previous day he had promised liberty. The Papal legate, Cardinal
Isidore, escaped recognition and was sold as a slave by a soldier for
a mean price. He was later ransomed. Orkhan, the grandson of Bayezid,
who had been brought up as a Christian at the Imperial Court, committed
suicide rather than be sold as a slave.
Although many cruel deeds were committed by the Sultan and his
soldiers, and a terrible calamity fell upon the whole community of
Greeks, it cannot be said that the capture of Constantinople was the
scene of such infamous orgies as took place in 1204, when it was
captured by the Crusaders. After the first few hours of entry there was
on this occasion no general massacre. There was not much incendiarism.
The Sultan did his best, successfully, to save the churches and other
buildings.
Although the young Sultan was most brutal in some of his actions,
he showed in others remarkable foresight and statesmanship. One of
his earliest acts, after putting an end to the sack of the city, was
to proclaim himself as protector of the Greek Church. A charter was
granted to the Orthodox members of that Church securing to the use of
it some of the churches in the capital, and authority to celebrate in
them religious rites according to their ancient usage. It also gave to
them a certain amount of autonomy in civil matters. It recognized their
laws of marriage and of succession to property and gave jurisdiction to
the Patriarch and to Ecclesiastical Courts to enforce them.
The most eminent survivor of the Greek clergy, Gennadius, was sought
for. He had been sold as a slave after the sack of the city to a pasha
at Adrianople. He was brought back to Constantinople and was invested
by the Sultan with the office of Patriarch of the Greek Church.
Mahomet, in doing so, said: “I appoint you Patriarch. May Heaven
protect you. In all cases and all occasions count on my friendship
and enjoy in peace all the privileges of your predecessors.” This was
a most wise and opportune act of policy. The Sultan had been advised
by fanatics among the Turks to order a general massacre of Greeks and
others who would not embrace Islam. Mahomet’s record shows that he
would have sanctioned this if he had thought it for the interest of the
State, and he would probably have revelled in it. In pursuance of a
deliberate policy of enlightened statecraft he rejected this advice. It
was necessary to repeople his capital and to attract others than Turks
to it. Mahomet was also ambitious of further conquests in Europe. He
recognized that the attempt to force a wholesale change of religion on
the vanquished would stimulate their resistance, while a wise tolerance
might weaken it. When the Prince of Serbia asked Hunyadi, the Hungarian
patriot, what he would do with the Orthodox Greek Church if he made
himself master of that province, the reply was, “I will establish
everywhere Catholic churches.” The reply of Mahomet to a similar
question was, “By the side of every mosque a church shall be erected in
which your people will be able to pray.”
This great act of tolerance of Mahomet was far ahead of the political
ethics of the Christian Powers of Europe at that time. His example was
not followed by the Spaniards, when they drove from their country the
Moslem Moors, who had refused to adopt the religion of their victors.
The action of Mahomet is another proof that the Turkish invasion of
Europe was not actuated by religious fanaticism or the desire to spread
Islam. There seems to have been no attempt to induce or compel the
Greeks and others of the conquered city to embrace Islam.
Mahomet also set to work, at an early date, to repeople Constantinople.
For a long time previous to the conquest its population had been
dwindling. In proportion as the Greek Empire was reduced by the loss
of its territories, so the importance of the capital was diminished.
Mahomet invited all who had fled after the capture to return, promising
protection to their property and religion. He directed the transfer of
families of Greeks, Jews, and Turks from many parts of his Empire. When
he took possession of Trebizond and the Morea, many thousands of Greeks
were forcibly removed to Constantinople. The same was the case with
many islands in the Ægean Sea. At the end of his reign Constantinople
was far more populous and flourishing than it had been under the last
Greek Emperor.
Although the capture of Constantinople was the principal feat in
Mahomet’s long reign, and that on which his fame in history chiefly
rests, it was, in fact, only the first of a long list of conquests
which earned for him from his countrymen the title _par éminence_ of
‘the Conqueror.’ During the thirty years of his reign he was almost
always at war in personal command of his armies, and there were very
few in which he did not add fresh territory to his Empire, either in
Europe or Asia.
Bosnia and the Morea, which had become tributary States under previous
Sultans, were now again invaded and were compelled to become integral
parts of the Empire. Their princes were dethroned and put to death.
Wallachia and the Crimea were forced to become vassal States. In Asia,
Karamania, so long the rival and foe of the Ottomans, and which, after
many wars, had agreed to pay tribute, was now forcibly annexed, and
its Seljukian line of kings was put an end to by death. The great city
of Trebizond and its adjoining province of Cappadocia, which had been
cut off from the parent Empire, after the capture of Constantinople by
the Crusaders, and formed into a miniature Empire, under the Comneni
dynasty, was invaded and annexed by Mahomet, and at his instance its
reigning family was put to death. The possessions of the Genoese on the
coasts of the Black Sea were seized and appropriated.
Many islands in the Greek Archipelago, including Lesbos, Lemnos, and
Cephalonia, were also attacked and annexed. The same fate befell Eubœa.
It belonged to the Republic of Venice, which was also deprived of
others of its possessions on the coast of the Morea. Besides all these
enterprises, Mahomet in several successive years sent armies to ravage
parts of Styria and Transylvania. He even sent an army across the
frontier of Italy to ravage the region of Friuli, and other districts
almost within sight of Venice, whose Republic was compelled to enter
into an ignominious treaty, binding it to assist the Ottomans in
other wars with a naval force. The last achievement of the ambitious
Sultan was to send a force to the South of Italy, where it captured
Otranto. The only captures which Mahomet attempted without success
were those of Belgrade, in 1456, and the island of Rhodes in 1480. The
case of Belgrade was of the greatest importance, for it long barred
the way to the invasion of Hungary and Germany. The Sultan himself
took command of the army of attack with a hundred and fifty thousand
men and three hundred guns. He thought the capture of it would be an
easy task after that of Constantinople. But Western Europe, which had
rendered so little assistance to the Greek Empire in its extremities,
was alarmed at the prospect of the invasion of Germany through the loss
of Belgrade. The Pope preached another crusade, and a large body of
knights volunteered for the defence of this frontier city.
Hunyadi led the Hungarians in this his last campaign. The lower town
was taken by the Turks after great loss of life; but the upper town
made a protracted resistance. The Christian knights in a notable
sortie attacked the batteries of the enemy, captured all the guns, and
wounded the Sultan himself. Mahomet was compelled to raise the siege
after losing fifty thousand men. It was the last feat of the Hungarian
patriot. He died twenty days after this signal success. It was fifty
years before Belgrade was again attacked and captured and the road was
opened for the invasion of Hungary and Vienna.
In all these campaigns Mahomet personally led his armies in the field,
with the exception of those for the invasion of the Crimea, the attack
on Rhodes, and the capture of Otranto, where he delegated the task to
able generals, of whom he appears to have had an abundant supply. But
there never was a great commander who more completely dominated the
generals under him and maintained his supremacy in the State. He made
no confidences as to his intended military operations, or what were his
immediate objects of attack. There were no councils of war. His armies
were collected, year after year, on one side or other of the Bosphorus,
without any one knowing their destination. When, on one occasion, one
of his generals asked him what was his next object, he replied that if
a single hair of his beard knew what his intentions were he would pluck
it out and cast it into the fire. He held secrecy and rapidity to be
the first elements of success in war, and he acted on this principle.
With the exception of the single case of the invasion of Wallachia,
the provocation for war was in every case on the part of the Sultan.
Invasion and attack were preceded by laconic messages calling upon the
State or city aimed at to surrender, and the actual attack was made
with the shortest possible delay.
Having determined on war and invasion, his object was pursued with the
utmost vigour, and wholly regardless of the loss of life. As a rule,
his campaigns were short; but the war with Venice was an exception. It
lasted for many years. It consisted mainly of attacks on strongholds
of the Republic in the islands of the Archipelago and the coasts of
Greece and Albania, where the fleets of the two Powers played a large
part. The conquest of Albania also was only effected after a struggle
spread over many years, in which the patriot hero, Scanderbeg, defeated
successive attacks by Ottoman armies enormously exceeding his native
levies. It was not till after the death of this great chief, in 1467,
that Mahomet was able to wear down opposition in Albania by sheer force
of numbers.
Early in his reign Mahomet recognized the strategic value of
Constantinople. It became the keystone of his Empire. He transferred
the seat of his government to it from Adrianople. He fortified the
Dardanelles by the erection of two castles on either side of it near to
Sestos and Abydos, each with thirty guns, which commanded the Straits.
This secured his capital from attack. It prevented the entrance of
a hostile fleet into the Sea of Marmora and the Black Sea. He added
greatly to his navy, and made it superior to that of any other single
Power in the Mediterranean. It gave him absolute supremacy in the Black
Sea and the Sea of Marmora. The possessions of the Genoese in the Black
Sea were at his mercy. He sent a flotilla of small vessels up the
Danube to assist in the siege of Belgrade.
Throughout all his campaigns Mahomet exhibited perfidy and cruelty on
a scale almost without precedent. Princes, generals, and armies, who
capitulated on the promises of safety of life and respect of property,
were put to death without compunction, in gross breach of faith. The
inhabitants of cities were sold into slavery or transferred forcibly to
Turkish dominions, in total disregard of solemn pledges.
A notable case of this kind was that of Bosnia, where the final victory
was achieved by the Ottoman Grand Vizier, in command of one of the
armies engaged, under the supreme command of the Sultan. The Prince of
Bosnia and his army capitulated on the distinct engagement in writing
that their lives would be spared. Mahomet was full of wrath at this
concession. It was his deliberate policy to extinguish by death the
family of any reigning prince whom he vanquished in war. He consulted
on the point the Mufti, with doubtless a strong hint as to what the
answer should be. The Mufti issued a _fetva_ which declared that no
treaty of this kind with an infidel was binding on the Sultan. The
holy man went so far as to offer himself to act as executioner. When
the Bosnian king was summoned to the presence of the Sultan, and came
before him trembling, with the treaty of capitulation in his hand,
the Mufti himself struck off his head in the presence of the Sultan,
exclaiming that it was a good deed to put an end to an infidel. The
_fetva_ in this case formed a precedent for numerous similar cases. The
whole of the royal family of Comnenus, the Emperor of Trebizond, who,
without a fight, surrendered his kingdom to Mahomet, upon the promise
of life and private property to himself and his family, were put to
death a few weeks later in Constantinople on the most flimsy pretence.
In a similar way, when the island of Eubœa was captured from the
Venetians in 1470 by the Sultan, the Venetian garrison, supported
by the Greek population, made a most gallant defence and inflicted
enormous losses on the Turks. Paul Evizzo, the Venetian general in
command of the island, eventually surrendered on the promise of safety
of life to himself and his army. Mahomet broke his word. He put to
death the whole of the Venetian garrison by the cruel method of
impaling. The gallant Evizzo was, by the Sultan’s order, sawn in two.
His daughter was summoned to Mahomet’s tent, and when she refused to
submit to his lust, was put to death by his order. The island was added
to the Ottoman Empire in 1471.
It must be admitted that in all these conquests the Ottoman armies were
very greatly superior in number and in armaments. In many cases they
were also assisted by the disunion of their opponents. The subjection
of Karamania was due to the death of its last king, Ibrahim, who
left seven sons behind him. Six of them were sons of a wife of royal
descent, the seventh the son of a slave. The father favoured the
youngest, whom he declared his heir. The other six fought for their
patrimony against the youngest and besieged him in Konia, the capital.
Mahomet thought that this was a good opportunity to intervene and to
annex the whole country. Without any cause of quarrel he marched an
army of a hundred thousand men into the country and waged war against
all the sons. The Grand Vizier, Mahmoud Pasha, was sent on in advance,
and defeated Ishak, the youngest son of Ibrahim, in front of Konia.
The terms of capitulation were thought by Mahomet to be too humane. He
determined to punish Mahmoud for his leniency. The cords of his tent
were cut while the Vizier was asleep. The tent fell on the luckless
sleeper. This was a sign of disgrace. Mahmoud, who was a most able
and successful general and statesman, was removed from his post and
was put to death. The Karamanian dynasty, which for so long had been
the rival of that of Othman, was now completely subdued. The country
became a province of the Turkish Empire. Its two principal cities were
depopulated and lost their splendour. It never again gave trouble to
the Ottoman government.
The country which suffered most from the cruelties of Mahomet was
Greece. Here, again, disunion was the main cause of its ruin. Two
brothers of Constantine, the last Greek Emperor at Constantinople,
Demetrius and Thomas, held sway as tributaries of the Sultan, the
one at Argos, the other at Patras. Unmindful of the danger which
threatened them, they fought one another for supremacy, after the death
of Constantine, and were assisted in their internecine war by large
numbers of turbulent Albanians, who transferred their services, now to
one and now to another of these petty despots, and are said to have
changed sides three times in the course of a single Sunday. Mahomet,
in 1458, thinking that the disputes between the two brothers afforded
a good occasion for getting full possession of the Morea, invaded it
with a large force. The two brothers, instead of uniting to defend the
country, continued to fight against one another, and attempted, at the
same time, singly to fight against the Turks. There followed scenes
of massacre and rapine as Mahomet’s army passed through the country,
besieging and capturing successively its many petty strongholds. In
nearly every case, after vigorous resistance, capitulation was offered
and agreed to on promise of life to the garrisons. In no case was
the promise kept. As a rule, the fighting-men were massacred after
surrender, their leaders were sawn in two, and the other inhabitants
were sold into slavery, or were in some cases transferred _en masse_ to
Constantinople as colonists to fill the empty city. The two brothers
were driven from the country. Demetrius appears to have made some kind
of terms with the Sultan, one of which was that his daughter should
enter Mahomet’s harem. This promise was not kept; she was not thought
worthy of it, and she was insulted by being deprived of the only eunuch
who attended her. It is not stated what became of her. Thomas fled from
the country, carrying with him, instead of treasure, a valuable relic,
the head of St. Andrew, with which he disappeared from history. The
Sultan possessed himself of the whole country, with the exception of
two or three seaports in the hands of the Venetians. The memory of this
cruel invasion of the Turks was deeply impressed on the minds of the
people of Greece. But for 471 years, with a short interlude when it was
held by the Venetians, it remained a Turkish province.
On his way back to Constantinople the Sultan passed by Athens, where
one Franco reigned as Duke, but tributary to the Turks. He gave orders
that Franco was to be strangled. As a special favour this operation
was effected, not in the tent of the Turkish general, but in his own
domicile, and thus the last spark of Greek independence passed away.
It is not perhaps fair to judge of Mahomet as regards his cruelties
and perfidies by a high standard. His opponents, the chiefs of the
countries he invaded and conquered, were, in many cases, not inferior
to him in these respects. Scanderbeg, whose patriotic defence of
Albania won for him the reputation of a saint in his own country, and
a high place in history, was most cruel and vindictive whenever he
had the opportunity. He habitually massacred the prisoners taken in
his battles. The two despots of the Morea were not behindhand in this
respect. The Prince, or Voivode as he was called, of Wallachia, Wlad by
name, was one of the most cruel and bloodthirsty ruffians recorded in
history. He was known by the name of “the Impaler.” He revelled in the
dying agonies of the prisoners and other victims whom he subjected to
this cruel death. They were reserved for this purpose to enliven his
banquets. When some guest expressed surprise that he could bear the
odour emanating from the victims of this death, the prince directed the
immediate execution of his guest, on a higher pale than the others, so
that he might not be incommoded by the odour he complained of.
Mahomet invaded Wallachia, in 1462, with an army of two hundred
thousand. In his pursuit of Wlad he came across a field where twenty
thousand Turks and Bulgarians had been put to death, one-half of them
by impalement and the other half by crucifixion. Mahomet defeated and
drove into exile this ruffian, and installed in his place a favourite
named Radul, who had been brought up at his Court as a page. On the
death of this man Wlad turned up again, but was killed by a slave.
Wallachia, which previously had been compelled to pay tribute by
Mahomet, was now made a vassal State. The Sultan appointed its prince.
It was not otherwise treated as a Turkish province.
The failure of the Turkish general to capture the island of Rhodes
was said to be due to the fact that, just before the final assault,
after long resistance by the Knights who held this island, the Turkish
general issued an order to the army that there was to be no pillage
of the city, wishing to reserve for the Sultan and himself the wealth
which might be captured. This dispirited the Turkish soldiers, and they
made no effort for success in the assault. The Knights again repulsed
the attack and the siege was raised. It was not till 1520 that Rhodes
was finally captured.
Great as Mahomet was as a warrior and general, he was not less
conspicuous as an administrator and statesman. The organization and
provisioning of his armies in his numerous campaigns were specially
worthy of notice. His soldiers were always well fed and were amply
equipped with guns and armaments. He was also the sole source of
legislation for his Empire. He had supreme power over life and property
of all his subjects. More than any of his predecessors and successors,
he founded mosques, hospitals, colleges, and schools in Constantinople
and other cities of his Empire. He fully recognized the importance of
science in education. He cultivated the society of learned men and
loved to converse with them. He had some reputation as a poet. With all
this, he was notorious for evil and sensual life in a direction which
is held to be infamous and degrading by all peoples. He was not only
himself guilty of fratricide, but he prescribed it as a family law for
his successors. He died at the age of fifty-one, after thirty years
of reign. He had collected a great army for another campaign, but no
one knew what his aims and intentions were, whether for another attack
on Rhodes, or for the invasion of Candia, or to follow up his success
in Calabria. His secret died with him. He was the first Sultan to be
buried at Constantinople, in the famous mosque which he built there. In
spite of his cruelties and perfidies and of his evil life, he has been
held in honour by successive generations of his countrymen, and has
been rightly designated as ‘the Conqueror.’
VIII
BAYEZID II
1481-1512
MAHOMET left two sons, of whom the eldest, Bayezid, succeeded him as
Sultan at the age of thirty-five. Von Hammer and other historians,
who have founded their narratives on his great work, write of Bayezid
in terms of disparagement because, unlike other early Sultans of the
Othman race, he did not signalize his reign by any great additions to
his Empire. If success as a ruler is only to be measured by territorial
expansion, Bayezid must take rank in history below the other nine
Sultans who created the Ottoman Empire and raised it to its zenith.
A great Empire, however, such as that which the Ottomans had already
achieved, may be better served by peace than by war for further
conquests. It would certainly have been well for the Ottomans if no
attempt had ever been made to extend their Empire northwards beyond
the Danube. Bayezid, so far as we can gather his policy from his
actual deeds, was not favourable to expansion of his Empire. If he was
engaged for some years in war with Hungary, Venice, and Egypt, he was
not the aggressor. He came to terms of peace with these Powers when it
was possible to do so. He did not support the army which, under his
predecessor, had invaded Italy and captured Otranto. He recalled the
very able general, Ahmed Keduk, who commanded it. Khaireddin Pasha,
who succeeded in command, after a most gallant defence, was compelled
to capitulate; and never again was Italy invaded by a Turkish army. It
would seem to have been a wise decision on the part of Bayezid not to
pursue further the Italian adventure.
As it is not our intention to write a complete history of the Ottoman
Sultans, but rather to describe the early expansion of their Empire
and its later dismemberment, it will not be necessary to devote more
than a very few pages to the comparatively uneventful reign of Bayezid.
It may be well, however, briefly to note that he was of philosophic
temperament, very austere in religion, and without his father’s vices.
Like many of his race he was devoted to literary studies, and he had
a reputation as a poet. He was not wanting in energy and valour when
occasion required. He was, however, the first of his race who did not
habitually lead his armies into the field.
His younger brother Djem, who at the death of Mahomet was only
twenty-two years of age, was a much more fiery, valorous, and ambitious
soldier, and of more attractive personality. He was of a romantic
disposition, and had a much greater reputation than Bayezid as a poet.
His poems rank high in Turkish literature. His strange adventures and
sad fate form one of the romances of Turkish history, which might
well fill many chapters. It must suffice to record of him that, like
other brothers of Sultans who were not at once put to death at the
commencement of a new reign, he took up arms and claimed the throne
against Bayezid. The latter fortunately was the first to arrive at
Constantinople after the death of Mahomet. He there obtained the
support of the Janissaries, not without large presents to them. With
the aid of Ahmed Keduk, Bayezid, after vain efforts to come to terms
with his brother, was successful in putting down two rebellions of
a formidable character on behalf of Djem. After the second defeat
Djem fled to Egypt, and thence, after many adventures, found his way
to the island of Rhodes, where he claimed the hospitality of the
Knights of Jerusalem. Their Grand Master, D’Aubusson, who had made
such a gallant defence of the island against Mahomet, and who was
a most brave warrior, was also a crafty and perfidious intriguer.
On the one hand, he induced Prince Djem to enter into a treaty, by
which very important concessions were promised to the knights in the
event of Djem being able to gain the Ottoman throne. On the other
hand, D’Aubusson negotiated a treaty with Bayezid under which he was
to receive an allowance of 45,000 ducats a year, nominally for the
maintenance of Djem, but really as an inducement to prevent the escape
of that prince from Rhodes. On the strength of this, the unfortunate
prince was detained as a virtual prisoner in Rhodes, and later in a
castle at Sasesnage, in France, belonging to the order of the Knights,
for not less than seven years. At the end of this time the King of
France, Charles VIII, intervened in favour of the prince, and got him
transferred into the keeping of the Pope at Rome. The Pope Callixtus
was also not above making a good profit out of Djem. He came to terms
with Sultan Bayezid under which he was to pocket the 45,000 ducats a
year so long as Djem was kept out of mischief. On the death, some years
later, of this Pope, his successor, Pope Alexander Borgia, of infamous
memory, renewed the treaty with Sultan Bayezid, with the addition
of a clause that he was to receive a lump sum of 300,000 ducats if
Prince Djem, instead of being detained as prisoner, was put to death.
After a short interval the Pope, fearing the intervention of the King
of France, on behalf of Djem, and wishing to pocket the lump sum,
contrived the death by poison of the prince. The menace to the Sultan
was thus at last removed, and his Empire was spared another civil war,
at a cost which by the ethics of the day was no doubt fully justified.
Of other incidents in Bayezid’s reign it is only necessary to
state that the most important of his achievements was the complete
subjection, in the second year of his reign, of Herzegovina, which
had been a tributary State under his predecessors, but was now again
invaded. It was finally incorporated as a province of the Empire. There
were also many years of desultory war with Hungary, in which frequent
raids were made by the two Powers upon one another’s territories, and
where each vied with the other in atrocious cruelties. Everywhere
children were impaled, young women were violated in presence of their
parents, wives in presence of their husbands, and thousands of captives
were carried off and sold into slavery. But there were no other
results, and peace was eventually established between the two Powers.
In Asia there was war for five years with the Mameluke government
of Egypt and Syria. The Mamelukes had sent an army in support of
an insurrection in Karamania. The outbreak was put down, and the
Karamanians were finally subjected, but the Mamelukes defeated the
Turkish armies in three great battles. Peace was eventually made, but
only on concession by the Turks of three important fortresses in Asia
Minor.
There was also war with the Republic of Venice, in the course of
which the Turks succeeded in capturing the three remaining Venetian
fortresses in the Morea—Navarino, Modon, and Coron—an important success
which extinguished the influence of Venice on the coasts of Greece.
The success was largely due to a great increase of the Turkish navy,
which in Mahomet’s reign had achieved a supremacy in the Mediterranean
over any other single naval Power. It now defeated the Venetian fleet
in a desperate battle off Lepanto in 1499, and met on equal terms the
combined fleets of Venice, Austria, and the Pope in 1500. It also went
farther afield, and at the entreaty of the Moors of Grenada, who were
severely pressed by the Christian army in Spain, ravaged the coasts of
that country.
The last two years of Bayezid’s fairly prosperous reign were obscured
by another civil war, this time at the instance of his son and
successor, Selim. Selim was the youngest of three surviving sons of
Bayezid. All three had been invested with important posts as governors
of provinces in Asia. Ahmed, the second of them, was the favourite
of his father, who designated him for succession to the throne. But
Selim was by far the ablest and most daring of them. He determined
to anticipate the death of his father, who was ageing and in feeble
health, by securing the throne for himself. Leaving his seat of
government with a large suite, almost amounting to an army, he paid a
visit, uninvited, to his father at Constantinople, and there fomented
intrigues. He was the idol of the Janissaries, who were dissatisfied
with the long inaction of Sultan Bayezid, and hoped for new conquests
and loot under Selim. Bayezid, however, was supported for the time by
a section of his army, and succeeded in defeating his son. Selim then
fled to the Crimea, where he raised a new army and, later, again made
his way to Constantinople by a forced march round the north of the
Black Sea. On arriving there he was supported by the full force of the
Turkish army.
The Janissaries, at the instance of Selim, stormed at the gates of the
imperial palace and insisted on the Sultan receiving them in person.
Bayezid gave way and admitted a deputation of them to an audience.
Seated on his throne, he asked them what they wanted. “Our Padishah,”
they said, “is old and sickly; we will that Selim shall be Sultan.”
Bayezid, finding that he could not rely on any section of his army,
submitted. “I abdicate,” he said, “in favour of my son, Selim. May
God grant him a prosperous reign.” He only asked as a favour that he
might be allowed to retire to the city of Asia Minor where he was
born. His son thereupon conducted his father, the ex-Sultan, to the
outskirts of the city with every mark of respect, and Bayezid departed
on his journey. He died, however, three days later, not without grave
suspicion of foul play. The deposition of Bayezid is interesting and
important as showing the increasing power of the Janissaries. Only the
strongest Sultan could thenceforth cope with them, and they became
eventually one of the main causes of the decay of the Empire which they
had done so much to call into existence.
Bayezid, like others of his race, in spite of his philosophic
temperament and his love of ease, had a vein of cruelty. It has been
shown that he caused his brother Djem to be poisoned. This was in
accord with the family law. A more serious instance was that he put to
death his great general, Ahmed Keduk, to whom he was deeply indebted
for success in putting down the insurrection of Djem. Ahmed had deeply
offended the Sultan by brusquely opposing his peaceful policy, and
Bayezid forcibly removed the incautious critic.
The net result to the Turkish Empire of the thirty-one years of
Bayezid’s reign was, on the one hand, the incorporation of Herzegovina,
and the expulsion of the Venetians from the Morea; on the other, the
loss of three fortresses in Asia Minor to the Mamelukes of Egypt and
the withdrawal from the South of Italy.
An incident worth recording was the first appearance of Russia in the
field of Turkish diplomacy. An ambassador was sent to Bayezid by Czar
Ivan III. He was instructed to refuse to bow his knee to the Sultan or
to concede precedence to any other ambassadors. Bayezid meekly gave
way on these points of etiquette. This was a presage of the attitude
of Russia which two centuries later threatened the existence of the
Turkish Empire.
IX
SELIM I
1512-20
ON the forced abdication of Bayezid, Selim was proclaimed Sultan at
Constantinople, with the full support of the Janissaries. He reigned
for only eight years, but he succeeded in this short time in more
than doubling the extent of the Ottoman Empire. He made no additions
to it in Europe, but he conquered and annexed the great provinces of
Diarbekir and Khurdistan from Persia, and Egypt, Syria, and a great
part of Arabia, including the holy cities, from the Mameluke government
of Egypt. He commenced this career of war and conquest at the ripe age
of forty-seven. He proved to be a ruler and general of indomitable
will and vigour, the exact opposite to his father in his greed for
expansion of his Empire. He was a most able administrator. He cared
little for his harem or other pleasures of life. Sleeping but little,
he spent his nights in literary studies. He delighted in theological
discussions and in the society of learned men, and he appointed them to
high offices in the State. They had no effect, however, in softening
his evil nature. He had no regard for human life, whether in war or
in peace. He was attended by men called mutes, who were ready at any
moment to strangle or decapitate on the spot any person designated by
him. His most trusted counsellors, his oldest friends and associates,
were in constant danger of life. He met argument or protest against
his schemes, or criticism of his past actions, by instant death, not
unfrequently by his own hand. During his short reign seven of his
Grand Viziers were decapitated by his orders. Numerous other officials
and generals shared the same fate. They seldom enjoyed the sweets of
office for more than a few months. One of them, in playful reminder
of this to Selim, asked to be given a short notice of his doom, so
that he might put his private affairs in order. The Sultan replied
to him: “I have been thinking for some time of having thee killed,
but I have at present no one to fill thy place, otherwise I would
willingly oblige thee.” Judges convicted of corruption were dealt with
in the same way. By a malicious irony they were compelled to pass
sentence on themselves, before being handed over to the executioner.
Janissaries who dared to ask for an increase of pay were also condemned
to death. The first recorded act of Selim’s reign was to strike dead
with his own sword a Janissary who was deputed by the corps to ask
for the accustomed presents on his accession. It does not appear that
these events cast gloom on Selim’s Court. They soon lost the sense of
novelty. There were plenty of applicants for the vacant posts, willing
and eager to run the risks of office. Selim was agreeable in his
conversation and life was gay. He did not indulge in refinements of
cruelty like his grandfather Mahomet. He acted from a sense of public
duty. If he spilled much blood, he restored and maintained discipline
in the army and stemmed the course of corruption. He was distinctly
popular with his subjects, with whom, as in most Eastern countries,
affection was in part inspired by terror.
As was to be expected, Selim’s two elder brothers, Khorkand and Ahmed,
whose claims to the Sultanate had been set aside, and who were at the
head of important governments in Asia Minor, took up arms against him.
Selim, without loss of a moment, led an army to Brusa against them.
Khorkand, taken unawares, was quickly defeated. He was allowed an
hour’s respite before being bow-strung. During this short interval he
wrote a poem deprecating his brother’s cruelty. Selim wept over the
poem and ordered a State funeral for his brother. At Brusa a horrible
scene of slaughter took place. Five nephews of Selim—possible claimants
to the throne—were collected there. They were of varying ages, from
five to twenty. They were all strangled by order of the Sultan—the
eldest of them resisting with terrible struggles, the youngest with
plaintive cries for mercy, while Selim from an adjoining room was a
witness of the scene, and urged his mutes to hasten their task. Ahmed,
the second and favourite son of Bayezid, made a longer resistance in
the field, but a few months later he was defeated and put to death.
Selim, now safe on his throne, turned his attention to war with Persia.
The principal cause of conflict arose out of a dispute on religion.
From an early time the Mahommedan world had been divided into two
hostile sects—the Sunnites and the Schiis. The point of difference was
whether authority should be attributed to the writings of the four
immediate descendants of the Prophet, as the Schiis contended, or
whether the words of the Prophet alone should be conclusive on matters
of dogma. It would seem that the smaller the difference in dogma
between two sects of a religious body, the worse they hate one another;
and just as the Christians of the Greek and Latin Churches hated one
another more than they hated the followers of Mahomet, so the Sunnites
and the Schiis hated one another to the point that they were each bent
on exterminating the other—though the difference between them might
seem to outsiders to be no greater than that between Tweedledum and
Tweedledee.
Persia was the headquarters of the Schiis. In the Ottoman Empire the
Sunnites greatly prevailed. But of late years the Schiis had gained
ground in Asia Minor. Selim, who was a bigoted follower of Mahomet,
determined to extirpate this heresy throughout his Empire. With
devilish zeal he employed an army of spies to ferret out the heretics,
and on a given day seventy thousand of them were arrested. Forty
thousand of them were put to death, and the remainder were condemned
to terms of imprisonment. This violent action does not seem to have
aroused any popular indignation against Selim. It earned for him in
Turkey the title of ‘the Just,’ and diplomats of the day and historians
wrote of it in laudatory terms. It was a proof of the possibility of
extirpating a heresy if the means adopted were ruthlessly carried out.
The Schii heresy was extinguished, once for all, in the Ottoman Empire.
This exploit, however, added to the animosity already existing between
the Persians and the Ottomans, and made war between them inevitable.
The immediate clash was hastened by the Persians giving asylum to
Murad, a son of Ahmed, who had not been included in the slaughter of
his cousins at Brusa.
Persia, at this time, was under the rule of Shah Ismail, a most
capable and successful ruler, who had renovated the kingdom, and added
largely to it by the conquest and subjection of many minor adjoining
States. The two potentates were well matched in vigour and ability.
When war with Persia was propounded by Selim in his council, there
was ominous silence. There was evidently fear of the undertaking. The
Janissary guarding the entrance to the chamber broke down the suspense
by throwing himself on his knees before Selim and expressing ardent
support to the war. This precipitated a decision by the council, and
the Janissary was at once promoted to high office.
Early in March, 1514, a hundred and forty thousand men and three
hundred guns were collected on the Asian side of the Bosphorus, under
command of the Sultan. Sixty thousand camels were provided to carry its
baggage and munitions. The army commenced its march on April 20th. Its
aim was Tabriz, then the capital of Persia, distant from Scutari, as
the crow flies, by over one thousand miles of a mountainous country, in
which there were no roads. The main difficulty was the supply of the
army with food for men, horses, and camels. This was partly effected
from Trebizond, to which the command of the Black Sea enabled Selim to
send supplies from Constantinople.
Selim preluded his campaign by an insolent letter to Shah Ismail. In
the course of it he said:—
It is only by the practice of the true religion that a man will
prosper in this world and deserve eternal life in the world to
come. As for thee, Emir Ismail, such a reward will never be thy
lot; for thou hast deserted the path of salvation and of the holy
commandment; thou hast denied the purity of the doctrine of Islam;
thou hast dishonoured and cast down the altars of God; thou hast by
base stratagem alone raised thyself and sprung from the dust—to a
seat of splendour and glory; thou hast opened to Mussulmans the gate
of tyranny and oppression; thou hast forced iniquity, perjury, and
blasphemy to impiety, heresy, and schism; thou hast, under the cloak
of hypocrisy, sown in all parts the seeds of trouble and sedition;
thou hast raised the standard of ungodliness; thou hast given way
to thy shameful passions and abandoned thyself without restraint
to the most disgraceful excesses.... Therefore, as the first duty
of a Mussulman, and above all of a pious prince, is to obey the
commandment, “Oh ye faithful who believe, perform ye the decrees of
the Lord”—the ulemas and our teachers of the law have pronounced
death against thee, perjurer and blasphemer as thou art, and have
laid upon every good Mussulman the sacred duty of taking arms for the
defence of religion and for the destruction of heresy and impiety, in
thy person and the persons of those who follow thee.
On the approach of Selim and his army to the frontier of Persia, Shah
Ismail, instead of going out to meet his foe, laid waste the whole
country and retreated towards his capital. This greatly increased
the difficulty Selim had of supplying his army. The soldiers were
exhausted by the long march. The Janissaries began to murmur. One of
the generals, Hemdar Pasha, who had been brought up with Selim from
his earliest childhood, and might be expected to have great influence
with him, was persuaded by his brother officers to remonstrate with the
Sultan against further prosecution of the invasion of Persia, through a
country where every vestige of food was destroyed. The Sultan met the
suggestion by ordering the instant decapitation of the pasha.
Selim endeavoured to provoke Ismail to meet him in battle by another
insolent letter, written mainly in verse, taunting him with cowardice.
“One who, by perjury,” he wrote, “seizes sceptres, ought not to skulk
from danger.... Dominion is a bride to be wooed and won by him only
whose lip blanches not at the biting kiss of the sabre’s edge.” Ismail
replied in a dignified letter denying the existence of any reason
for war, and expressing willingness to resume peaceful relations.
He suggested that Selim’s letter, written in a style so unfitting
the dignity of the Sultan, must have been the hasty production of a
secretary, who had taken an overdose of opium. The taunt was a bitter
one, for it was well known that Selim was addicted to opium. The letter
was accompanied by the present of a box of opium to the supposed
secretary.
Meanwhile Selim and his army marched on with ever-increasing
difficulties of supplies. The soldiers at last broke out in open revolt
and demanded to be led back to their homes. Selim took the bold course
of riding into the midst of them and addressing them personally.
Is this [he said] your service to your Sultan? Does your loyalty
consist of mere boast and lip worship? Let those among you who wish
to go stand out from the ranks and depart. As for me, I have not
advanced thus far merely to double back on my track. Let the cowards
instantly stand aloof from the brave who have devoted themselves with
sword and quiver, soul and hand to our enterprise.
He gave word of command to form columns and march, and not a single man
dared to leave the ranks.
On the approach of the Ottoman army to Tabriz, Ismail was at last drawn
from his reserve. He determined to give battle. The two armies met
at Calderan, not far from the capital, on August 14th, 116 days from
the commencement of the march, which must have covered nearly twelve
hundred miles. This was a great performance on the part of the Turkish
army. It was by this time reduced to one hundred and twenty thousand
men, of whom eighty thousand were cavalry. The Persian army consisted
of eighty thousand cavalry, splendidly mounted and equipped, and well
trained. But there were no infantry and no guns. The Turkish soldiers
were fatigued by their long march. They were ill-fed and the horses
were stale and out of condition. The issue turned upon the success
of the charges of the Persian cavalry. They attacked the Turks with
great impetuosity in two bodies on either flank. That under command
of Ismail himself was successful and broke and dispersed the opposing
wing of the Turks. The other column was unsuccessful. The Ottomans
fell back behind their guns. The Janissaries formed a solid front. The
cannons opened a destructive fire, which was supported by the fire of
the Janissaries, who were now armed with muskets. The Persians were
shattered and destroyed. The defeat of the other wing of the Turkish
army was retrieved. Twenty-five thousand Persian horsemen lay dead on
the field. Ismail himself was badly wounded and escaped with difficulty.
After this victory Selim entered Tabriz, and remained there eight
days. It was his wish to winter in Persia and to renew his campaign in
the following spring, but his soldiers objected and insisted on being
led home. This time Selim found himself unable to refuse. He turned
homeward with his army. No terms of peace were concluded with Ismail,
and the two countries continued nominally at war during the remainder
of Selim’s life. But the great provinces of Diarbekir and Khurdistan
remained in the hands of the Turks. Selim left them in charge of
the well-known Turkish historian, Idris, who spent the next year in
organizing these two departments and in putting down any attempt at
resistance. He was eminently successful in this, and the two provinces
were permanently annexed to the Ottoman Empire. The whole campaign of
Selim must be considered as a most striking success. To have marched
a hundred and forty thousand men, with eighty thousand horses and
three hundred guns, over twelve hundred miles, and to have defeated a
powerful army, backed by all the resources of a great country, was an
achievement which earned for Selim a place in the first rank of great
generals. Selim does not appear to have been anxious to include Persia
in his Empire. His hatred of the Schii heresy was such that he aimed
rather at isolation than annexation. He issued a firman forbidding any
trade with Persia, and when a number of merchants were reported to
him for having broken the law by entering into illicit trade with the
Persians, he ordered them to be executed. He was only with difficulty
induced to revoke the order by the Mufti Djemali.
On his return to Constantinople Selim, inflamed by his success in
putting down the heresy of the Schiis and his victory over heretical
Persia, determined to extirpate Christianity from his dominion. Again
with the greatest difficulty he was dissuaded from this course by
the courageous Mufti. But he insisted on depriving the Christians in
Constantinople of all their churches, which he turned into mosques.
In the spring of 1516 Selim determined to extend his Empire by the
conquest of Syria and Egypt. These countries had been for many years
past under the rule of the Mamelukes, a body of soldiers recruited from
Circassian slaves, and from whose ranks Sultans were elected for their
lives. The existing Sultan, Kansar Ghowri, was eighty years of age,
but was still able to take command in the field of his Mamelukes. The
immediate pretext for war, as in the case of Persia, was a religious
one. A claim was preferred by Selim for the protection of the holy
cities of Mecca and Medina.
On June 26th Selim arrived at Konia, and thence sent an insolent
missive of defiance to Ghowri, who was at Aleppo. In return, a mission
was sent to the Turkish headquarters. It consisted of an envoy and a
suite of ten Mamelukes in splendid military array and glittering with
armour. Selim was indignant at this warlike demonstration. He directed
the immediate execution of the ten members of the suite, and with
difficulty was persuaded not to deal in the same way with the envoy. As
an alternative the envoy was shorn of his beard and hair, his head was
covered by a nightcap, and he was mounted on a broken-down donkey, and
was returned in this ignominious way to Ghowri.
The two armies met in battle not far from Aleppo. The issue was not in
doubt. The Egyptians had no guns. They also suffered from the defection
of the Djellans, a section of Mamelukes of the second and inferior
rank. An hour sufficed to ensure complete victory to the Turks.
Ghowri fled and died, trampled to death, it was said, by the mass of
fugitives. The victory caused the loss not only of Aleppo but of the
whole of Syria. Selim, after a few days at Aleppo, went to Damascus,
and there organized the invasion of Egypt. This involved the provision
of many thousands of camels to carry water for the troops when crossing
the desert. He sent five thousand men to Gaza, under Sinan Pasha, the
brave general who had led the victorious wing of his army against the
Persians. They met there an Egyptian army of about the same number, and
a fierce battle ensued, which resulted in the defeat of the Mamelukes,
mainly owing to the Ottoman artillery.
Selim left Damascus with his main army on December 16th. On arrival at
Gaza he ordered the immediate slaughter of all its inhabitants. He also
directed the execution of one of his own generals who ventured to point
out to him the danger of an invasion of Egypt. On January 10th the
arrangements for this expedition were complete. Ten days were occupied
in crossing the desert between Syria and Egypt. The army was harassed
by Arabs, but there was no attempt to resist on the part of the main
Egyptian army. When, at one time, the Grand Vizier, thinking that the
cloud of Arabs meant a more serious resistance, persuaded Selim to
mount his war-horse, the Sultan, on finding it was a false alarm and
that it was only an affair with Arabs, directed the execution of the
Vizier.
On the last day of the year 1516 Selim arrived with his army within
a few miles of Cairo. Meanwhile the Mamelukes had elected Tourman Bey
as Sultan to succeed Ghowri. But there was much opposition to this
on the part of those who favoured the claim of the son of Ghowri. As
a result, there was dissension in the Egyptian army. Two of their
leaders, Ghazali Bey and Khair Bey, entered into treasonable relations
with Selim. Ghazali persuaded Tourman to send the guns, with which
the Egyptian army was now provided, by the ordinary route, and then
secretly sent information of this to Selim, who was able to avoid the
guns by taking another route.
The two armies met near Ridania. The battle resulted in the complete
defeat of the Egyptians, with a loss of twenty-five thousand men, owing
to their want of guns. Selim then advanced on Cairo. There was no
resistance at first, but later the Mamelukes reoccupied it and made a
desperate resistance to the Turkish army. The streets were barricaded
and every house was turned into a fortress. Selim spent three days in
getting possession of the city. Eight hundred Mamelukes who surrendered
on promise of their lives were put to death. A general massacre of the
inhabitants then took place, and fifty thousand of them perished by
the sword, or were thrown into the flames of the burning houses. As a
result of this, and further military operations in the Delta, Egypt was
completely subdued. The brave and generous Tourman was taken prisoner
and, after denouncing the two traitors in the presence of Selim, was
put to death.
Some months were then occupied by Selim in organizing the conquered
country. It was not annexed as an integral part of Turkey. The
Mamelukes, or rather the section of them who had been unfaithful
to their Sultan, and who had survived the general slaughter, were
entrusted with the administration of Egypt, subject to the superior
control of a pasha appointed by the Turkish government. Ghazali and
Khair Bey received the reward of their treason—Ghazali was appointed
Governor of Syria and Khair Bey of Egypt. A garrison of five thousand
Ottoman soldiers was left at Cairo. The Turkish army insisted on an
early return to Constantinople. A war against Moslems, where there was
no opportunity of making captives for sale as slaves or for harems, had
no charm for them. Selim had once more to give way.
It was not till September 17th that he was able to commence his
homeward march. Having safely passed the desert, he said to his Grand
Vizier, Younis Pasha, who was riding beside him, “Well, our backs are
now turned on Egypt and we shall soon be at Gaza.” Younis, who had
originally been opposed to the expedition, could not resist the reply:
“And what has been the result of all our trouble and fatigue, if it is
not that half our army has perished in battle, or in the sands of the
desert, and that Egypt is now governed by a gang of traitors?” This
imprudent speech cost the Grand Vizier his life. His head was struck
off as he rode by his master’s side.
The conquest of Egypt entailed the acquisition of the interests of
that country in a great part of Arabia, including the holy cities of
Mecca and Medina. Selim was also able to induce the titular Caliph, who
through many generations had inherited from the early successors of
Mahomet a certain undefined authority in the religious world, and who
held a shadowy Court at Cairo, to make over to him and his successors,
as Sultans of Turkey, the barren office, together with its symbols,
the standard and cloak of the Prophet. These symbols were removed
to Constantinople, and thenceforth the Sultans assumed the title of
Caliphs and Protectors of the Holy Places—and this may have added to
their prestige in the Moslem world, though it may be doubted whether
it contributed much to the strength of the Turkish Empire. Of more
material advantage was the fact that an annual tribute was paid by the
Egyptian government, which a few years later, under Solyman, was fixed
at 80,000 ducats. It also contributed men and ships to wars undertaken
by the Sultan. In the siege of Rhodes, in 1524, Egypt sent three
thousand Mamelukes and twenty vessels of war.
Selim spent some time at Damascus and Aleppo on his way back in
organizing his new acquisitions. Syria was incorporated in the Turkish
Empire, and has remained so to the present time.
The campaign which ended in the conquest of Egypt and Syria was not
less conspicuous in its result than that against Persia, more on
account of the difficulties of organization, than for success on
the field of battle. Treason and the want of artillery were more
responsible for the defeat of the Mamelukes than the valour of the
Ottoman troops. It is not easy for us to understand why Egypt was not
incorporated in the Empire in the same way as Syria. The Mamelukes were
as much strangers to the country as the Turks themselves. The minority
of them, who survived the war and the bloody executions by Selim, had
no claim to recognition as the ruling class in Egypt, other than their
treachery to their fellow-Mamelukes and their Sultan and the aid which
they had given to the invaders. It will be seen that these surviving
Mamelukes soon regained full power in Egypt, and reduced the pashas
appointed from Constantinople to puppets.
Selim returned to his capital in 1518. In the remaining two years
of his life there were no further military exploits. He made great
preparations for another campaign. He added greatly to the strength of
his navy. He built a hundred and fifty ships of war, many of them of
great size for those days. It was generally believed that he intended
an attack on Rhodes to avenge the defeat of his grandfather, the
acquisition of which, lying as it did across the route to Egypt, was of
great importance. Before, however, any decision was arrived at, Selim
died on his way to Adrianople, very near to the spot where his father
had been poisoned by his orders. He left the reputation of being one of
the ablest organizers of victory, but also the most cruel despot of the
Othman line. It was for long a common expression with the Turks, by way
of a curse, “May’st thou be a vizier to Sultan Selim.”
X.
SOLYMAN THE MAGNIFICENT
1520-66
SELIM was succeeded by his only son, Solyman, at the age of twenty-six,
who reigned for forty-six years, a period of unexampled splendour in
the history of the Ottoman Empire—its culminating era. This was mainly
due to the personal qualities of the new Sultan. He surpassed all his
predecessors, and still more his degenerate successors, in dignity
and graciousness. He was not behind the best of them in military
capacity, vigour of action, and personal courage. He combined with
these qualities statesmanship of high order. With rare exceptions
he stood by his engagements and did not follow the precept of the
Koran that faith need not be kept with infidels. He was great as an
administrator and legislator. Before he mounted the throne he had been
employed by his father as governor of three very important provinces,
and had gained a high reputation for his determination to secure
justice to his subjects, whatever their race or creed. His private
life was free from scandal. He was noted for his clemency and kindness
of heart. If massacres took place after victories or after capture of
fortresses when he was in command, it was because he could not restrain
his turbulent and bloodthirsty Janissaries; but the occasions of such
scenes were comparatively rare. He had, however, a blend of cruelty in
his character, as had most of his predecessors. Being an only son, he
had no occasion, on mounting the throne, to carry out the fratricidal
law of Mahomet II. But he was determined that there should be no
possible rival in his family, however remote. After the surrender of
Rhodes, two years later, on the promise of life and property to its
defenders, he singled out, in breach of his promise, a son of Prince
Djem, who was one of those included in the amnesty, and directed
the immediate execution of him and his four sons. Worse also than
fratricide was the murder by Solyman of two of his own sons. The eldest
of them, Mustapha, was a most promising prince. He had already shown
his capacity as governor of a province. He was endowed with all his
father’s best qualities. He was the idol of the army and the hope of
his country.
Solyman was persuaded by his latest favourite concubine, a Russian
lady, Ghowrem by name, who had unbounded influence over him and
retained it till late in life, that Prince Mustapha was intriguing
against him, and aimed at dethroning him, as Selim had done in the case
of Bayezid. She hoped to secure the succession for her own son. Without
a word of warning or any opportunity of defending himself, Mustapha,
in the course of the second Persian campaign in 1553, on entering his
father’s tent, was seized by the mutes and was strangled while Solyman
looked on at the foul deed. There was more excuse for putting to
death another son, Bayezid, who had been goaded by an intrigue in the
Sultan’s harem into taking up arms, in 1561, against his brother Selim.
He was defeated and fled to Persia, where he was at first received
with great honour by Shah Talmasp, the successor to Ismail, with the
distinct promise that he would not be given up. But Solyman obtained
his extradition by threat of war and the promise of 400,000 pieces of
gold. The unfortunate prince was treated with the greatest indignity.
His hair and beard were shorn. He was handed over, together with his
four sons, to an emissary of his brother Selim, who at once put to
death the whole party.
As a result of the murders of these two sons of Solyman, a third one,
the son of Ghowrem, was the only heir to the throne. He succeeded
Solyman and was known as “Selim the Sot.” It will be seen that this
prince had none of the qualities of his race. He was the first of a
long line of degenerates who eventually lost the greater part of the
Empire which had been built up by Solyman and his predecessors.
Though the office of Grand Vizier was not so dangerous to its holders
as under Selim I, it proved to be fatal to two of the nine men who
held it during Solyman’s reign. One of the most remarkable incidents
of Solyman’s life was his infatuation for Ibrahim, the second of his
Grand Viziers. Ibrahim, a renegade Greek by birth, had been captured
as a boy by corsairs and sold as a slave to a widow in Magnesia, who
brought him up as a Mussulman. Recognizing his talents, this lady gave
him an excellent education. Solyman, on a visit to that province, came
across Ibrahim, and, attracted by his musical talent, took him into
service, where he rose to be master of the pages and grand falconer. He
soon acquired immense influence over his master, whose sister was given
to him in marriage. He was rapidly promoted, and in 1523 was appointed
Grand Vizier. The Sultan and his favourite became inseparable. They had
their meals alone together. They concerted between them all the affairs
of State. Ibrahim justified this preference, for he proved to be of
great capacity, not inferior in any respect to his master, and his
superior in education and knowledge of languages and history. He was
appointed Seraskier, or Commander-in-Chief, when the Sultan was unable
personally to command. In the earlier campaigns in Hungary and Persia,
and in the siege of Vienna, he took a most active part, and was the
main adviser to his master.
After thirteen years of implicit confidence in Ibrahim, suspicion arose
in the mind of the Sultan and was fanned by the Sultana Ghowrem, who
coveted the post of Grand Vizier for her son-in-law, Roostem Pasha.
There does not appear to have been any ground for these suspicions,
save that Ibrahim, intoxicated by his elevation, assumed the airs
almost of an equal with the Sultan. A vizier suspected was very near to
his doom. Entering the palace one day in 1536 to dine with the Sultan
as usual, he was never seen alive again. The next morning his body was
found in the palace. His immense wealth was confiscated to the State.
It was said that Solyman in an adjoining room to that where this murder
was perpetrated was smothered with kisses by Ghowrem so as to drown the
cries of the dying Vizier.
In another case, the Grand Vizier Achmet was decapitated in the council
chamber by order of Solyman, solely because he gave advice which
displeased his master. Von Hammer gives a long list of other high
officials who shared the same fate.
During the forty-six years of his reign Solyman added enormously to
the Empire. Belgrade, Rhodes, nearly the whole of Hungary, the Crimea,
the great provinces of Mossul, Bagdad, and Bassorah, and a part of
Armenia taken from Persia, Yemen and Aden in Arabia, Algiers, Oran, and
Tripoli, and an undefined extent of hinterland inhabited by Arabs in
North Africa, and a wide extension of Egypt in the direction of Nubia,
were the contributions which he transmitted to his successors. There
were few years of his long reign in which he was not under arms. War
with Hungary and Austria in the north alternated with war with Persia
in the east and with Spain in the west. Solyman was often in command of
his armies. He conducted personally thirteen campaigns, some of them,
such as those against Persia, extending over two years. For the most
part these wars were embarked on without any just or even plausible
cause. They were stimulated by lust of conquest on the Sultan’s part,
and by craving for active service and for loot on the part of the
Janissaries. Religious fanaticism seems to have had little concern with
the motives or results of them.
Solyman’s first campaign, in 1521, was directed against Belgrade, the
city which had successfully defied Mahomet II. He marched against it at
the head of an army of a hundred thousand men with three hundred guns.
It was bravely defended by the Hungarians. But they had no guns. After
seven days of bombardment the city was assaulted and captured. There
was no massacre of the garrison or the inhabitants. Solyman converted
the principal church into a mosque. The city was thenceforth garrisoned
by a Turkish force. It constituted the principal stronghold of the
Empire on the Danube, and was the gateway for many invasions of Hungary.
In the next year, 1523, Solyman followed up this success by an
attack on the island of Rhodes, where Mahomet had also failed, and
the capture of which had become more important since the conquest of
Egypt, lying as it did on the direct route by sea from Constantinople.
For this purpose Solyman sent a fleet of three hundred vessels with
eight thousand Janissaries and a hundred siege guns. He marched at
the head of a hundred thousand men through Asia Minor to the bay of
Marmerice, opposite to Rhodes, whence they were conveyed to the island.
The knights, six hundred in number, with only five thousand trained
soldiers and a _levée_ of peasants on the island, made a heroic defence
under their Grand Master, de Lisle Adam. It was only after a siege of
nine months that they were at last compelled to capitulate. It was the
first occasion on which a great fortress was approached by sap and
spade work, so as to avoid gun fire, and in which bombs were used by
the attacking army. Solyman’s army is said to have lost fifty thousand
men in casualties and as many more by disease. Under the terms of
capitulation, the survivors of the garrison with all their personal
property were to be conveyed to Crete, after twelve days, in their
own galleys. After an interview with the Grand Master the Sultan is
reported to have said, with great generosity, “It is not without regret
that I force this brave man from his home in his old age.” The arms of
the knights are still to be seen carved on the houses they occupied in
Rhodes. The Turks have always respected them in memory of the gallant
defence. The terms of surrender were faithfully observed by Solyman
with the exception already referred to. The knights eventually settled
at Malta, at that time a nearly desert island. They made it the seat of
their order and fortified it. Its central position in the Mediterranean
made it a stronghold of the utmost importance. Solyman, in the last
year but one of his long reign, thought it necessary for the expansion
of his Empire, in the North of Africa, to oust the knights from their
new nest. He sent an army and a fleet under command of Piale Reis to
besiege it. There commenced another celebrated siege in which the
knights, under command of their Grand Master, Lavallette, covered
themselves with glory. The Turks were defeated in many assaults on the
fortress, and were ultimately compelled to withdraw with heavy losses.
The two years after the conquest of Rhodes were spent by Solyman in
organizing his kingdom. His inaction was greatly resented by the
Janissaries, who hated their dull life in barracks and longed for
war and for loot. They broke out in revolt and pillaged the houses
of Ibrahim and other great functionaries. The outbreak was quelled,
Solyman killing with his own hand three of the rebels. Their Agha
and other leaders were put to death. But Solyman found it expedient
to appease the mercenaries by generous presents, and in the next
year—mainly at their instigation—embarked on another war. He was urged
to invade Hungary by Francis I, King of France, who hoped to create a
diversion from the ambitious projects of the Emperor Charles V. This
may be considered as the first entry of the Turks into the maze of
European politics. Hungary and Bohemia were at that time united under
the rule of Louis II, a very young and inexperienced man.
In April, 1526, Solyman and his Grand Vizier, Ibrahim, with a hundred
thousand men and three hundred guns, marched to Belgrade, and thence
invaded Hungary. On August 27th, five months after their departure from
Constantinople, they met the Hungarian army at Mohacz, not far from
the Danube, and about half-way from Belgrade to Buda, then, as now,
the capital of Hungary. The battle was quickly decided. The Ottoman
army had the advantage of an overwhelming superiority both of men
and guns. The Hungarians were defeated. Their King, eight bishops,
a great majority of the Hungarian nobles, and twenty-four thousand
men were killed. This decided the fate of Hungary. Before marching
onwards, Solyman ordered all the prisoners he had taken—four thousand
in number—to be put to death. He reached Buda on September 10th. The
city surrendered. Solyman received there the submission of a number
of Hungarian nobles who had survived the disaster of Mohacz. At his
instance, Count Zapolya, one of the magnates of Hungary and Voivode of
Transylvania, was elected by them as King of Hungary in succession to
Louis II, who had left no heir. Solyman shortly after this—influenced
in part by news of civil disturbance in Asia Minor—left Buda and
retreated to the Danube, and thence returned to his capital. The
temporary occupation of part of Hungary had been attended with fearful
devastation and with great loss of life to its population. It was
estimated that two hundred thousand men were massacred. The retreating
army carried off an immense booty and drove before them about a hundred
thousand captives of both sexes, who were eventually sold as slaves
at Constantinople. Garrisons were left by the Turks in some of the
frontier fortresses of Hungary.
The election of Count Zapolya as King of Hungary under the dictation of
the Turks led to civil war in that country. Archduke Ferdinand, brother
of Charles V, to whom the Emperor had transferred his Archduchy of
Austria, claimed the throne of Hungary, by virtue of a treaty between
the Emperor and the late King Louis. On the other hand, it was claimed
by Zapolya and his adherents that, under an ancient law of Hungary, no
one but a native could be elected as King. In spite of this, the nobles
of Western Hungary met in Diet at Presburg and elected Ferdinand.
Ferdinand appealed to arms, and was supported by the Austrians. He
defeated his rival. Zapolya was driven from the country. He fled to
Poland, and thence he appealed to the Sultan for aid in support of
his claims in Hungary. Ferdinand, hearing of this, sent an envoy to
the Sultan. Most unwisely, he not only claimed assistance in support
of his claims to the throne of Hungary, but he demanded that Belgrade
and other towns in Hungary in possession of the Sultan should be given
up. Ibrahim, the Grand Vizier, who conducted the negotiations with the
two rivals, was most arrogant. He claimed that every place where the
hoofs of the Sultan’s horses had once trod became at once and for ever
part of the Ottoman Empire. “We have slain,” he said, “King Louis of
Hungary. His kingdom is now ours to hold or to give to whom we list. It
is not the crown that makes the King, it is the sword. It is the sword
that brings men into subjection; and what the sword has won the sword
will keep.”
The Sultan decided against Ferdinand and said to Zapolya’s envoy, “I
will be a true friend to thy master. I will march in person to aid
him. I swear it by our Prophet Mahomet, the beloved of God, and by
my sabre.” To the rival’s agent he said that he would speedily visit
Ferdinand and drive him from the kingdom he had stolen. “Tell him that
I will look for him on the field of Mohacz or even in Buda, and if he
fail to meet me there, I will offer him battle beneath the walls of
Vienna.”
In pursuance of these threats, Solyman, in 1529, at the head of two
hundred and fifty thousand men and with three hundred guns, again
invaded Hungary and laid siege to Buda. The city surrendered at
the instance of traitors among its defenders. Under the terms of
capitulation life and property were to be preserved to the garrison and
the citizens. The Janissaries, furious at the loss of loot, refused to
recognize the terms. They massacred all the garrison as they issued
from the fortress, and they carried off for sale most of the young
women of the town. Zapolya was reinstated as a vassal King of that
part of Hungary. Solyman then marched on to Vienna. He arrived there on
September 27, 1529, with over two hundred thousand men. There ensued
the first of the two memorable sieges of Vienna by the Ottomans.
Charles V, Emperor of Germany, was at this time the greatest and most
powerful sovereign in Europe. He had inherited the kingdoms of Spain,
the Netherlands, Naples and Sicily, as well as his possessions in
Germany. Born six years later than Solyman, he was elected Emperor
of Germany a year before the accession of Solyman as Sultan. He
abdicated his throne and retired to a monastery ten years before the
death of Solyman. For thirty-six years, therefore, their reigns were
synchronous. It would be hard to say which of the two sovereigns was
the more valiant in arms, or the more astute statesman. Judged by
the extent of conquests, Solyman far surpassed his rival. Charles
did little more than maintain the integrity of his immense inherited
possessions in Europe. But he acquired by conquest Tunis in Africa, and
Mexico and Peru in America.
When Solyman, instigated by Francis I of France, was invading Austria,
Charles was deeply engaged in war against France in Italy, and could
not send an army to meet the Ottomans in the field. Vienna was left to
stand the brunt of invasion without a protecting army. Its garrison
consisted of only sixteen thousand soldiers under Count de Salms.
Its fortifications were only a continuous wall 5 feet in thickness
and without bastions. Its guns were only seventy-two in number. Such
weak defences seemed to offer little hope against the overwhelming
numbers of the Ottomans. The tents of the Sultan and his army whitened
the whole plain round the city. Irregular cavalry, called Scorchers,
depending on loot for their food and pay, ravaged the country for miles
round the city with incredible cruelty and rapacity. A Turkish flotilla
of four hundred small vessels found its way up the Danube, after
destroying all bridges, and lent assistance to the siege. It was all in
vain. The Austrian and Spanish troops under the Count de Salms defended
the weak lines with the utmost courage and tenacity. The Viennese
citizens constructed lines of earthworks within the walls, against
which the lighter guns of the Turks had little effect. The powerful
siege guns of the Ottomans had been left behind _en route_, owing to
heavy rains and the badness of roads. Numerous assaults were made by
the Turks. The soldiers were at last dispirited by failure. In vain
their officers drove them on by sticks and sabres. The men said they
preferred death from their officers to death from the long arquebuses
of the Spaniards. Twenty ducats a head were given or promised to them.
It was to no purpose. Solyman, after three weeks of fruitless assaults,
found himself compelled to raise the siege and to retreat with his
great army. His irregulars had so ravaged the country that he had the
utmost difficulty in feeding his men.
Before striking the camp all the immense booty taken in the campaign
was burnt. The prisoners, most of them the peasantry of the district
round Vienna, were massacred. Only the fairest of the young women were
carried off captives to be sold as slaves. The Sultan returned to
Constantinople. There was no pursuit of his army. It came back intact.
It was a slur on the fame of Solyman that he endeavoured to conceal
his failure to capture Vienna by lying accounts of success, and by a
popular celebration of triumph, on return to his capital. There was
this much to be said for him, that he had flouted the Austrians, by
invading their country and devastating it up to the walls of Vienna,
without any attempt, on their part, to meet him in the field or to
follow him up on his retreat.
Three years later, in 1532, Solyman, with another immense army,
again invaded Hungary, with the avowed object of marching to Vienna
and attacking the army of the Emperor. Charles V, on this occasion,
took command of the Austrian army. It was expected that a trial of
strength would take place between the two potentates, and would decide
which of them was the stronger. But Solyman’s progress was delayed
by the heroic defence for three weeks of the small fortress of Guns.
After its capture Solyman made no further advance towards Vienna, but
turned aside and devastated Styria, and then led his army homeward.
The Emperor, on his part, made no effort to meet his foe and join
conclusions with him. It was evident that both of them were anxious to
avoid the issue of a great battle.
Though the Sultan had retreated and had returned to Constantinople,
peace was not concluded, and a desultory war was continued for some
years between Ferdinand and Zapolya. Peace was concluded in 1538, under
which Zapolya was to retain the title of King of Eastern Hungary and
Transylvania and Ferdinand was acknowledged ruler of the western half.
In 1566 Solyman again invaded Hungary, on his thirteenth and last
campaign, to which we will revert later.
We have thus described briefly the course of events between the Turks
and the Hungarians, supported by Austria. Though the conquests of
Solyman in this direction had been arrested by his failure to capture
Vienna, he succeeded in securing virtual possession of the greater part
of Hungary.
It is necessary to revert to Solyman’s feats in other directions. In
1534 he entered upon his sixth campaign, this time against Persia. Shah
Ismail was no longer alive, and had been succeeded by Shah Talmasp, a
very weak personage. Solyman, as a prelude to his attack, gave orders
for the execution of all the Persian prisoners at Gallipoli. Ibrahim
was sent on, in advance, by some months, with a large army. Instead of
marching by Aleppo to Bagdad, he took the route direct to Tabriz, which
he occupied without resistance on the part of the Persians. He wintered
there, and the next spring he was joined by Solyman with another
army, and together they marched to Mossul and Bagdad, through a most
difficult country, where the climate entailed great losses on the army.
Bagdad was ultimately reached. It was treacherously surrendered by its
commander. In fact, the Shah made no attempt to repel the invasion of
the Ottoman army, and the two great provinces of Mossul and Bagdad were
added to the Ottoman Empire, without any pitched battle on the part of
Persia.
There were other campaigns in Persia in 1548, 1553, and 1554, in which
the Turks often suffered more from the climate and from the difficulty
of obtaining supplies than from the guerrilla attacks of the Persians.
But there was no pitched battle between the armies of the two Powers.
The Turks maintained their conquests, and have done so to the present
year (1917).
Not less remarkable during the long reign of Solyman than his conquests
by his army were the exploits of his navy. It achieved victory in
many hard-fought battles with Spain and Venice. There was no great
disparity in naval force between the Turks and the Spaniards, but
when the fleets of Venice and the Pope were combined with those of
Spain, there was great superiority on their part in the number and
size of vessels. In spite of this, in the two great battles where this
combination was against them, the Turks were victorious, and generally,
throughout Solyman’s reign, his fleets maintained a supremacy in the
Mediterranean. This enabled him to add to his Empire the provinces of
Algiers, Oran, and Tripoli, and numerous islands in the Ægean Sea,
taken from Venice.
The Mussulman States of North Africa, at the commencement of Solyman’s
reign, were in the hands of degenerate and incompetent Mahommedan
rulers, who exercised little control over the Arabs of the hinterland.
The cities on the coast were the haunts of pirates, who sometimes
sailed under the flags of these States, but more often under no flag
but their own. They preyed on the commerce of the Mediterranean,
bringing their prizes into their ports and selling the captives as
slaves, with the result that in Tunis alone there were twenty thousand
Christian captives. These corsairs formed squadrons of ten or twenty
galleys, under the command of admirals, chosen from the most daring and
adventurous of them. They were called corsairs, but, in fact, they were
mere pirates, knowing no law but their own, and that founded on robbery
and murder. The sea-dogs in command of these pirates gained great
experience in handling their ships and squadrons. They ravaged the
coasts of Spain, Italy, and France, and even occasionally of England
and Ireland, devastating the cities and villages and carrying away
booty and captives.
It has been shown that Selim paid great attention to his navy, and
increased his ships in number and size. Solyman followed the same
course. But his admirals and captains did not compare in skill and
daring with those of the pirate squadrons. When Solyman became aware of
this, he most astutely invited the ablest and most experienced of these
pirates to take service under the Ottoman flag, and to bring with them
their ships and men. He gave high appointments to them, raised them
to the rank of admirals and commanders-in-chief of his navy, over the
heads of the officers of his regular service.
The first and most distinguished of these corsairs to take naval
service under Solyman was Kheireddin, better known in history as
Barbarossa. He was one of four brothers, of Greek descent, born in
Mytilene, three of whom in early life took to piracy as a profession,
under the pretence of legitimate commerce at sea. Two of them
eventually lost their lives in the venture, but the third survived,
prospered, and made money. He collected a squadron under his command
and became the terror of the whole Mediterranean, capturing merchant
vessels and devastating the coasts in all directions. Gathering
strength in number of ships and men, he made war on his own account.
He attacked Algiers and made himself master of that city and its
surrounding district. But finding himself unequal to the task of
maintaining an independent rule there, he recognized the supremacy of
the Sultan of Turkey. He carried on his ships seventy thousand fugitive
Moors from Andalusia, in Spain, and settled them at Algiers. Later, he
was employed by Solyman in an attack on Tunis, which was then under the
rule of Muley-Hasan, the twenty-second representative of the dynasty
of Boni Hafss—a degenerate reprobate, who had murdered all but one of
his forty-four brothers on his accession to the throne, and who spent
his energies in recruiting a harem of four hundred good-looking lads.
On the pretext of putting an end to this infamy, Barbarossa attacked
the city of Tunis, and had no difficulty in getting possession of it
and expelling the contemptible Sultan. He did not, however, remain many
months in possession of it. Muley-Hasan appealed to the Emperor Charles
for aid.
The Emperor, in personal command of a fleet of five hundred vessels and
an army of thirty thousand men, attacked and defeated Barbarossa in a
battle before the walls of Tunis, captured his vessels lying there,
and drove him into the interior of the country. Although he had come
there at the invitation of the Sultan of Tunis, and the inhabitants of
the city had given no assistance to Barbarossa in defending it against
the Spanish attack, the Emperor allowed his soldiers to sack it after
the capture. A scene of almost incredible cruelty and destruction took
place. Thirty thousand of the innocent inhabitants were massacred,
and ten thousand were sold into captivity. The mosques and all the
principal buildings were burnt and destroyed. No worse deed was ever
perpetrated by any victorious Moslem army in that age. It resulted that
Tunis, for a time, was rescued from Barbarossa and from Ottoman rule.
Muley-Hasan was reinstated there on terms of close dependence on Spain.
It was not till 1574 that Tunis finally fell into the hands of the
Turks.
Barbarossa had made a splendid defence of the city. His force was
quite inadequate for the purpose. Solyman was at the time engaged in
war with Persia and could not give adequate support. Shortly after
this, when war broke out between the Ottomans and Spain, the Sultan
invited Barbarossa to Constantinople, and made him Grand Admiral of
the Turkish fleet. In this capacity he fought in 1538 a great naval
battle off Prevesa against the combined fleets of Spain, Venice, and
the Pope, under Admiral Andrea Doria, in which he achieved victory, in
spite of great inferiority of numbers and size of vessels. He appears
to have been the first to adopt the manœuvre of breaking the line
of the enemy’s fleet, for which three centuries later Nelson was so
famous. The Turkish fleet numbered a hundred and thirty vessels, and
that of the combined Christian Powers a hundred and sixty-seven. Six of
the latter were captured and destroyed. The main body of the combined
fleet drew off, under cover of the night. Later, Barbarossa accompanied
Solyman in the attack on Corfu, which was heroically defended by the
Venetians. The Sultan was compelled to withdraw from the island.
This failure at Corfu, and that before Vienna, were the only reverses
which Solyman personally encountered in his numerous campaigns.
Barbarossa, however, in the course of the war with the Venetians,
succeeded in capturing from them all the many islands which they
possessed in the Ægean Sea, with the exception of Crete and the few
fortified places they held in the Morea. These were his last exploits.
He died at Constantinople in 1546.
Others, however, of the same brood of corsairs or pirates succeeded
Barbarossa in the Turkish navy, and maintained its reputation for
successful daring. The most distinguished of them were Dragut (or
Torghut) and Piale, both of them renegade subjects of Turkey who had
taken to piracy as a profession. Dragut, a Croatian by birth, closely
resembled Barbarossa in his career, in his prowess at sea, and in the
terror which he created on the coasts of Italy and Spain. He had little
respect for the allies of the Sultan, and captured their vessels as
readily as those of his enemies. When called to account by the Porte
for the destruction of some Venetian merchant ships, and summoned to
Constantinople, he declined to go there, well knowing the fate in store
for him. He betook himself, with his pirate squadron, to Morocco, which
he made the base for piracy for some years. Later, Solyman, finding the
need of such a daring spirit, invited him again to take service under
the Ottoman flag, and promised to make him Governor of Tripoli, if he
could capture it. Tripoli then belonged to the Knights of St. John at
Malta. Dragut attacked and captured it, and annexed it to the Turkish
Empire. Eventually Dragut was appointed Governor of Tripoli and, in
this capacity, led a fleet in aid of the attack on Malta in 1565. He
lost his life in an assault on the city.
Another such corsair was Piale, who, in his turn, after a long spell
of piracy, was taken into the Ottoman naval service by Solyman, and
rose to be commander-in-chief. He defeated the combined fleet of Spain,
Venice, and the Pope, under command of Andrea Doria, sent to recapture
Tripoli. He attacked and annexed for the Turks the province of Oran, on
the African coast, westward of Algiers. He commanded the Turkish fleet
in the attack on Malta in 1565, the last naval enterprise in Solyman’s
reign.
It was not only in the Mediterranean that Solyman’s navy was active. A
fleet was fitted out at Suez, under command of Piri Pasha. It secured
to Turkey the command of the Red Sea and enabled the capture of Aden
and Yemen. It extended its operations thence to the Persian Gulf and
the coast of India, where it came into conflict with the Portuguese,
who beat off the Ottoman ships.
The failure of the expedition to Malta, though he was not in personal
command, appears to have weighed heavily on the mind of Solyman. It was
his ambition to finish his career by a success as signal and important
as that against Belgrade, in the first year of his reign. He determined
to take command himself of the army which was to make another invasion
of Hungary in 1566, in spite of his seventy-two years and the feeble
state of his health. He was not able to mount his horse. He was
carried in a litter at the head of his army. It was his special wish
to capture Szigeth and Erlau, which had successfully resisted Ottoman
attack on the last invasion. He appears to have directed the march of
his army in the minutest detail. One of his pashas accomplished a march
in one day which he was instructed to effect in two days. Solyman was
incensed and directed the execution of the over-zealous pasha, and with
difficulty was dissuaded from this by his Grand Vizier.
The great Sultan died unexpectedly in his tent from apoplexy during the
siege of Szigeth, before the capture of this city and while the guns of
his army were thundering against its citadel, most bravely defended by
Nicholas Zriny—a fitting end to the old warrior. His death was for long
concealed from the army. The Grand Vizier directed the execution of the
Sultan’s physician, lest he should divulge the secret. Solyman’s body
was embalmed and was carried in the royal litter during the remainder
of the short campaign in Hungary, and orders were still given to the
army in the name of the defunct Sultan. It was not till news came that
Selim had arrived at Belgrade from his government in Asia Minor that
the army, on its homeward march, was informed of the death of the great
Sultan.
This was the last of Solyman’s thirteen campaigns in which he led his
armies personally on the field. There were others in which his generals
commanded. It is to be observed of all of them that there was only one
case in which a pitched battle of any great importance was fought on
land. The single case was that of Mohacz, already referred to, where
the Ottoman army greatly exceeded in number that of the Hungarians
opposed to it, and was provided with a park of artillery, in which
the enemy was wholly deficient. The result, therefore, was never in
doubt. With that exception, there was no great battle either with the
Hungarians, the Austrians, or the Persians. The campaigns consisted
of invasions by great armies of the Ottomans, with heavy parks of
artillery, and with large forces of irregular cavalry, who ravaged
and devastated the invaded country. The generals opposed to them, not
being able to meet the Turks in the field, spread their forces in
numerous fortresses, more or less strong, and the campaigns consisted
in besieging these fortresses. With rare exceptions, these sieges were
successful. The Turks brought overwhelming forces to bear on them.
Their siege guns completely overmatched the guns of the defence. It
was a question of a few days or a few weeks how long these fortresses
could resist. The wonder is that many of them resisted so long. The
usual course of such campaigns was that the Turks, having captured
the fortresses in the invaded districts, either annexed them to their
Empire, as in the case of Eastern Hungary and Mesopotamia, or compelled
the vanquished State to acknowledge the suzerainty of the Sultan and
to pay tribute, as in the case of Western Hungary, or retired, leaving
the ravaged country so destitute of supplies that the enemy could not
follow up the retreating army.
Solyman was almost always successful in his campaigns—but they do not
entitle him to a place in the first rank of great generals who have
earned their laurels by defeating opponents not unequal in number
in the open field. Practically, there was only one sovereign in
Europe—namely the Emperor Charles V—and no one in Asia, who could hope
to meet Solyman on equal terms on the battlefield, and the Emperor
evidently did not care to measure swords with him in the open.
If these considerations detract from the military fame of Solyman,
they do not lessen his reputation as an empire-builder and as an
organizer of campaigns of invasion. Seldom has an Empire been extended
to such an extent as that of the Ottomans under his efforts, with so
little expenditure of life or of the resources of the State. Solyman
evidently made it his task to run no risk of failure, but to use such
overwhelming force as made resistance all but impossible.
To put in the field these enormous armies, supported by large masses
of cavalry and great parks of artillery, to transport them from
Constantinople to the centre of Hungary, or from Scutari to the
frontiers of Persia, requiring many weeks or months, was to perform
a work of organization of the first order. In the long course of his
reign and the many expeditions led by himself and his generals, the
only failure to supply his armies in the field with food and munitions
of war was in the attack on Vienna. Solyman had also unerring judgment
and success in selecting his generals and other agents in his many
campaigns. The same may be said of his naval campaigns, in which he
took no personal part, and where success turned upon the selection of
competent admirals to command his fleets. What a stroke of genius it
was to go outside the professional men of his naval service, and to put
at the head of his fleets and of his naval administration, such men
as Barbarossa, Dragut, Piale, and others, who had gained experience
and had made their reputation as freebooters and pirates! It was due
mainly to this that the Ottomans acquired a virtual supremacy in the
Mediterranean, that Algiers, Oran, and Tripoli were brought under the
Empire, and that a fleet fitted out at Suez enabled the conquest of
Aden and Yemen.
It was not, however, only in military and naval successes and in the
additions to his Empire that Solyman showed his greatness. His firm and
resolute, yet sympathetic, policy made its mark in every department of
the State. He insisted on impartial justice to every class throughout
his Empire. Governors of provinces, or other high officials, who
erred in this respect, and who were guilty of injustice and cruelty,
or who were corrupt and incompetent, were at once dismissed, and not
unfrequently paid the penalty of death for their crimes. His very first
act on becoming Sultan was to order the dismissal of a batch of unjust
and corrupt officials. Von Hammer’s pages are full of other instances
of the same kind throughout Solyman’s reign. He made no exception for
favoured persons, however near to the throne. Ferhad Pasha, who was
married to one of the Sultan’s two daughters, was dismissed from the
governorship of a province for gross acts of injustice, cruelty, and
corruption. By the urgent entreaties of his wife, and of the Sultan’s
mother, Ferhad obtained another appointment. But on the renewal of his
misdeeds he was again dismissed, and, this time, was put to death by
order of the Sultan.
The finance of the Empire under Solyman was most carefully husbanded.
He fully recognized the strength given to his country by a well-filled
treasury. In spite of his many wars, there were only two years in
which he found it necessary to levy exceptional taxes. In other years
the ordinary revenue sufficed. Taxation was comparatively light. His
wars in part paid for themselves by levies and exactions on the
invaded countries, and by the sale of captives. Janissaries and Spahis,
numbering together about fifty thousand, formed the standing army, and
were well paid. The holders of fiefs throughout the Empire were bound
to military service in time of war, and to bring horses and arms.
They numbered about eighty thousand, and received no pay. Neither did
the horde of irregular cavalry, Tartars, and others who accompanied
his armies, receive pay. They provided for themselves by ravaging the
countries they passed through. Under these conditions, the wars of
Solyman were not burdensome to the State.
Like so many of his predecessors, Solyman had a strong bent to literary
studies and poetry. His poems have a reputation among his countrymen
for dignity. He compiled a daily journal of his campaigns which is of
historical value. He was a liberal patron of science and art. His reign
was the Augustan age of Turkey. He was generous in his expenditure
on mosques, colleges, hospitals, aqueducts, and bridges, not only in
Constantinople, but in all the principal cities of his Empire.
It is to be noted that the sobriquet ‘Magnificent’ was given to
Solyman by contemporaries in Europe. In Turkey, he was known as ‘the
Legislator.’ His reign was conspicuous for great reforms in every
branch of the law—all aimed at justice. The land laws were overhauled.
The feudal system of fiefs, which had been partially adopted on the
model of other countries in Europe, was simplified and improved. The
position of the ‘rayas,’ was ameliorated. Something like fixity of
tenure was secured to them. The condition of the peasantry in Turkey
was distinctly better than that of the serfs in Hungary and Russia.
The Greek population of the Morea preferred Turkish rule to that of
the Venetians. A certain number of Hungarian peasants voluntarily left
their country and settled under the more humane government of Turkey
in Roumelia. A further proof of the general contentment of the people
through the great expanse of the Turkish Empire was that during the
forty-six years of Solyman’s reign there was no outbreak among any one
of the twenty different races which inhabited it—and this in spite of
the fact that the country districts were denuded of troops for the many
campaigns in Hungary and Persia. While giving Solyman full credit for
all these great achievements of his reign, it is necessary to point
out that impartial historians have detected defects in his system of
government, which grew apace under his incompetent successors, and led
inevitably to the decadence of the Ottoman Empire.
A Turkish historian, Kotchi Bey, who wrote on the decline of the
Ottoman Empire in 1623, about sixty years after the death of Solyman,
and who has been described by Von Hammer as the Turkish Montesquieu,
attributed the decline in great part to the following causes:—
1. The cessation in Solyman’s time of the regular attendance of the
Sultan at the meetings of the Divan, or great Council of State.
Solyman had a window constructed in an adjoining room opening into
the council chamber, where, hidden behind a veil, he could listen
to the discussions of the Divan without taking a part in them. His
successors ceased even to listen from behind the veil. This absence of
the Sultan from his Council added to his arbitrary power and belittled
the influence of his ministers. So long as a very competent man like
Solyman was on the throne, this new practice may not have produced the
worst results, but in the case of his incompetent successors it led to
immense evils. The Sultan was finally swayed in his decisions not by
his responsible ministers or his Grand Council, but by the inmates of
his harem or by other irresponsible and corrupt outsiders.
2. The habit introduced by Solyman of appointing men to high office
who had not passed through the grades of lower offices. The first and
most conspicuous case of this kind was the promotion of Ibrahim, the
favourite companion of Solyman, from the post of Master of the Pages in
the Sultan’s household to that of Grand Vizier. Numerous other cases
could be quoted of a less conspicuous character. Solyman, in fact,
appointed outsiders to every kind of office, however important. Eunuchs
and renegades of all kinds were elevated to the highest posts. Solyman
himself appears to have been a very good judge of men, and rarely
made mistakes in his appointments, but his successors had no such
discernment, and appointments were conferred at the caprice, or under
the influence of the harem or otherwise, on the most unfit persons.
3. The venality and corruption first practised by Roostem Pasha, who
was Grand Vizier for fifteen years, and who was married to Solyman’s
daughter. The principal merit of Roostem in the eyes of his master was
his skill in replenishing the treasury. Among the means he adopted of
raising money was the exaction of large payments from persons on their
appointment to civil offices in the State. These payments in Solyman’s
time were fixed in a definite proportion to the salaries. They were
not adopted in the military and naval services. Under later Sultans
they became arbitrary and exorbitant, and were extended to the army
and navy. Practically appointments of all kinds were put up to auction
and given to the highest bidder. In order to meet these payments on
appointment, governors of provinces and all officials, down to the
lowest, were induced to adopt corrupt practices of all kinds and the
sense of public duty was destroyed.
4. The evil practice introduced by Solyman of heaping favours on his
favourite viziers, or of allowing them to amass wealth by selling their
favours to those below them in the official hierarchy. Ibrahim, who was
Grand Vizier for thirteen years, and Roostem for fifteen years, amassed
enormous fortunes. They set up a standard of extravagant life, which
was followed by other viziers and high officials. Roostem on his death
was possessed of 815 farms in Anatolia and Roumelia, 476 watermills,
1,700 slaves, 2,900 coats of mail, 8,000 turbans, 760 sabres, 600
copies of the Koran, 5,000 books, and two millions of ducats. His
example in gaining wealth was followed by others in a minor degree
according to their opportunities. High office came to be regarded as a
means and opportunity of acquiring great wealth, and this evil rapidly
spread throughout the Empire and led to corruption and extortion.
There was a corrective, or perhaps it should be called a nemesis to
this, in the fact that when an official was put to death, by order
of the Sultan, his property was confiscated to the State. Ibrahim’s
immense wealth was thus dealt with, and even in Solyman’s time, and
much more so in those of his successors, the confiscated fortunes of
viziers, governors, and other officials sentenced to death formed an
important item in the annual income of the State. There can be little
doubt that not a few pashas were put to death by the successors of
Solyman in order that the State might benefit from the confiscation
of their fortunes. It was perhaps thought that the mere fact of
accumulation of wealth by an official was sufficient proof that it had
been improperly acquired, and that the holder deserved to lose his life
and fortune.
There may be added to these causes of ultimate decadence pointed
out by the Turkish historian another which must occur to those who
closely study the reign of Solyman—namely the growing influence in
State affairs of the Sultan’s harem. The fall and death of Ibrahim,
the murder of Prince Mustapha, and the rebellion and consequent death
of Prince Bayezid were mainly due to intrigues of the harem. Great
as Solyman was, he fell under the evil influence of his favourite
Sultana, the Russian Ghowrem, better known in history as Roxelana.
Ghowrem was not only a most seductive concubine; she was a very clever
and witty woman, with a great gift of conversation. She retained her
influence over Solyman when age had reduced her personal charms. By the
entreaties of the Sultan’s mother, who perceived the malign influence
of this woman over her son, she was for a time got rid of from the
Seraglio. But Solyman could not forget her, and insisted on her recall.
Ghowrem celebrated her triumph by getting the consent of the Sultan
to many executions. Thenceforth till her death her influence was
unbounded. “I live with the Sultan,” she said, “and make him do what I
wish.” Appointments to the highest offices were made at her instance
and abuses of all kinds arose. But worst of all was the precedent that
was set for the interference of the harem in matters of State.
With Solyman’s successors the influence of the harem was continually a
growing one, and was generally, though not always, as will be seen, a
danger to the State. It became increasingly necessary for a minister
who hoped to retain his post to secure personal support in the Sultan’s
harem. The harem itself became the centre of intrigue and corruption,
with fatal effect on the interests of the State. But worst of all
dangers to the Empire was the possibility—nay, the probability—that
the succession of the great man at the helm of State able to restrain
the lawlessness of the Janissaries, the fanaticism of the mullahs, and
the corruption of pashas might not be maintained. Solyman never did a
worse deed for the future of the Empire than when he put to death his
eldest son, who had proved himself to be in every way fit to succeed
him as Sultan, and when later, at the instance of Ghowrem, he secured
the succession of his son Selim. He knew that Selim was a worthless and
dissolute drunkard. He is said to have remonstrated with his son and
endeavoured to induce him to reform his conduct. It will be seen that
it was in vain. The succession of Selim was a nemesis for the murder of
Mustapha. He was the first of a long line of degenerates, who ruined
the great work of Solyman and his predecessors.
In spite of this crime and of the base murder of his most intimate
friend and servant, Ibrahim, in spite of the inception of the grave
abuses we have referred to, it must be admitted, on an impartial review
of Solyman’s reign, that Solyman was the greatest of the Othman race
who created the Empire, and that in a generation of famous rulers in
Europe, including Charles V, Francis I, Leo X, our own Henry VIII,
Sigismund of Poland, and others, he excelled them all in the deeds and
qualities which constitute the greatness and fame of a ruler. There is
a Turkish proverb to the effect that “Happy is the man whose faults can
be numbered, for then his merits cannot be counted.”
XI
GRAND VIZIER SOKOLLI
1566-78
SOLYMAN was the last and greatest of the first ten Ottoman Sultans
who, succeeding one another from father to son, in rather less than
three hundred years, raised their Empire from nothing to one of the
most extended in the world. They must have been a very virile race, for
their reign averaged about twenty-eight years, far above the ordinary
expectations of life. With one exception they were all able generals
and habitually led their armies in the field. They were all statesmen,
persistent in pursuing their ambitious aims. Many of them were addicted
to literary pursuits, were students of history, and even had reputation
as poets. In spite of these softening influences, there was in nearly
all of them a fund of cruelty. It may be doubted whether, in the
world’s history, any other dynasty has produced so long a succession of
men with such eminent and persistent qualities.
Solyman was succeeded by his third son, Selim, commonly called ‘the
Sot,’ a sobriquet which sufficiently describes him. He was the only
son spared from the bow-string. Selim was followed by twenty-four
other Sultans of the Othman dynasty down to the present time. With the
rarest exception, they were men wholly wanting in capacity to rule a
great Empire. Only one of them was capable of leading his army in the
field. The others had neither the will nor the capacity, nor even the
personal courage to do so. They fell under the influence either of
their viziers, or of the women or even of the eunuchs of their harems.
If the persistency of type and of the high qualities of the first
ten Sultans was remarkable, no less so was the break which occurred
after Solyman, and the almost total absence of these qualities in
their successors down to the present time. One is tempted to question
whether the true blood of the Othman race flowed in the veins of
these twenty-five degenerates. Von Hammer refers to a common rumour
at Constantinople, though he does not affirm his own belief in it,
that Selim was not really the son of Solyman but of a Jew, and that
this accounted for his infatuation for a favourite Jew adventurer, who
obtained a potent influence over his weak mind. Such a break in true
descent might well have been possible in the vicious atmosphere of the
harem, in spite of the precaution that no men but those deprived of
virility were to be allowed to enter it.
Whatever may be the explanation, there can be no doubt that the
degeneracy of the Othman dynasty dates from the accession of Selim
the Sot. But this did not necessarily involve the immediate decadence
of the Empire. The Ottoman Empire could not have been built up by the
energy and ability of a single autocrat in each generation. There must
have been many capable men, statesmen, generals, and administrators,
of all ranks, who contributed in each generation to the achievements
of their rulers. Many such men survived for some years the death of
Solyman, and preserved the Empire from the ruin which threatened it.
The Empire, in fact, did not begin to shrink in extent till some years
later, and for about twelve years, as if from the momentum given to it
by the powerful Sultans of the past, it actually continued to expand.
Selim was the first of the new type of Sultans. He took no interest or
part in the affairs of State. He was a debauchee and a drunkard. He
gave an evil example to all others, high and low. Judges, cadis, and
ulemas took to drink. Poets wrote in raptures about wine. Hafiz, the
most in esteem of them, wrote that wine was sweeter than the kisses
of young girls. The attention of the Mufti was called to this, and he
was asked to censor the poem as contrary to the injunctions of the
Koran. But the Mufti replied that “when a Sultan took to drink it was
permissible for all to do the same and for poets to celebrate it.”
Selim fell completely under the influence of his Grand Vizier, who
had held the post for two years under Solyman. Sokolli, who was a most
capable man, was the virtual ruler of the Empire. He was a man of large
views. He had two important and interesting schemes in his mind. The
one to cut a canal across the Isthmus of Suez, so that the Turkish
fleet might find its way into the Red Sea and Indian Ocean, the other
to make a junction by a canal between the rivers Don and Volga. These
two great rivers, which have their sources in Russia, run a parallel
course for a long distance, and at one point approach one another
within thirty miles. They then diverge again, the one flowing into the
Sea of Azoff, the other into the Caspian Sea. By joining these two
rivers by a canal at the point where the distance between them is the
least, it would be possible for a Turkish flotilla to ascend the Don,
and then, after passing through the canal, descend the Volga into the
Caspian Sea, whence it would be able to attack the Persian province
of Tabriz with great advantage. The commercial possibilities of this
junction of the two great water highways were also obvious. The scheme,
however, necessitated taking Astrakan and other territory from Russia—a
country which had of late years largely extended its possessions and
power.
In this view, Sokolli, in 1568, sent an army of twenty-five thousand
Janissaries and Spahis by sea to Azoff. They were there joined by
thirty thousand Tartars from the Crimea, and the combined force marched
thence to Astrakan, at the mouth of the Volga. For the first time,
therefore, the Ottomans came into direct conflict with the Russians.
The expedition was a total failure. The Turks were unable to capture
Astrakan, and a Russian army completely destroyed that of the Tartars.
The main Turkish army was compelled to retreat to Azoff. Later, the
greater part of it was lost in a great tempest in the Black Sea, and
only seven thousand of its men returned to Constantinople. The project
of a Don and Volga canal was consequently abandoned. That for a canal
across the Isthmus of Suez was also indefinitely adjourned, owing to
an outbreak of the Arabs in the province of Yemen, which necessitated
sending an army there under Sinan Pasha. This was thoroughly
successful, and Yemen and other parts of Arabia were completely and
finally brought under the subjection of the Ottoman Empire.
After the reconquest of Yemen, Sokolli determined to attack Tunis,
which since its capture by the Emperor Charles V had been in the
occupation of the Spaniards. The fleet employed for this purpose was
under the command of Ouloudj Pasha, a renegade Italian, who after a
successful career as corsair and pirate was induced to take service
under the Sultan. In 1568 he was appointed governor of Algiers, and in
that capacity led the expedition against Tunis in the following year.
He defeated the Spaniards and occupied the town. But the garrison
retreated into the citadel, which they held till 1574.
In 1570 another expedition was decided on, this time for the purpose
of capturing the island of Cyprus, which was then in possession of the
Republic of Venice, with which the Porte was at peace. Sokolli, on this
account, was at first opposed to the scheme. But on this occasion, for
the first and, apparently, the only time, Sultan Selim overruled his
minister. He loved the wine of Cyprus and wished to secure a certain
supply of it. He had also, in a drunken orgy, promised to elevate his
boon companion, the Jew, to the position of King of Cyprus. The Mufti,
who had always hitherto given a full support to Sokolli, was consulted
as to whether the treaty with Venice was binding on the Sultan so as to
make an attack on Cyprus unlawful. He issued a _fetva_ to the effect
that, as Cyprus at some distant time had been under Moslem rule, as a
dependency of Egypt, it was the duty of a Mussulman prince to avail
himself of any favourable opportunity to restore to Islam territory
which had been taken possession of by an infidel Power, and that,
consequently, the treaty with Venice was not binding on the Sultan.
In accordance with this ruling of the Mufti, an expedition was fitted
out in 1570 by the Ottoman government, consisting of a hundred thousand
men, including irregulars, under command of Kara Mustapha, who was the
rival of Sokolli, and a fleet under Piale. This force laid siege to
Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus, a flourishing Christian city, where
there were said to be as many churches as there are days in the year.
After a siege of seven weeks the city was captured by assault, and
was given up to sack by the Turkish soldiers. Thirty thousand of the
inhabitants were massacred. Many women killed themselves and their
children rather than give themselves up to the maddened soldiers. Two
thousand of the better-looking children of both sexes were sold as
slaves.
Mustapha Pasha then proceeded to invest Famagosta, the principal
fortress in the island. It was heroically defended by a mixed force
of Italians and Greeks, under command of Bragadino, a brave Venetian
general. It successfully resisted attack throughout the winter of 1570.
It was not till August in the following year (1571) that the garrison,
reduced to less than four thousand men, was compelled by failure of
food and munitions of war to surrender. Very favourable terms were
promised to them by Mustapha. The lives of the garrison were to be
respected, and the property and religion of the citizens were to be
secured to them. The garrison were to be conveyed in Turkish galleys
to Crete and there released. In pursuance of these terms the captives
were embarked on board galleys ready to sail to Crete. At this stage an
interview took place between Kara Mustapha and Bragadino and his suite
of twenty officers, at which very hot words passed between them. The
Turkish general complained that some of his men, taken prisoners during
the siege, had been put to death. Bragadino denied this. His language
was considered to be insolent by Kara Mustapha, who at once gave orders
that all Bragadino’s suite were to be strangled in his presence. Their
leader was reserved for a more cruel fate. The men embarked on the
galleys were landed again and were massacred. A week later, Bragadino,
who had been treated in the interval with the greatest cruelty and the
most barbarous indignities, was flayed alive. His skin, stuffed with
hay, was exhibited to the scorn of the Turkish soldiers. The capture
of Famagosta completed the conquest of Cyprus. It remained in the
possession of the Ottomans till, as will be seen, it was handed over to
the British Government, in 1878, in pursuance of a policy devised by
Lord Beaconsfield. The Turks are said to have lost fifty thousand men
in its capture. It was in revenge for this that Kara Mustapha resorted
to the terrible deeds above described.
Meanwhile the Christian Powers had been greatly alarmed by the loss of
Cyprus and the atrocities above described. At the instance mainly of
the Pope, an alliance was formed in 1570 with Spain and Venice, with
the object of opposing the growing strength of the Ottomans in the
Mediterranean. A great fleet was fitted out by these Powers, and was
placed under the command of Don John of Austria, the natural son of the
late Emperor, Charles V, a young man of only twenty-four years, who had
shown his capacity in the measures for the expulsion of the Moors from
Spain, and was already reckoned one of the best generals of the time.
The fleet consisted of two hundred galleys and six powerful galleasses
with heavy armaments. It was manned by eighty thousand soldiers and
rowers, one-half of whom were provided by Spain and one-third by
Venice, the remainder, one-sixth, by the Pope. Don John was in supreme
command. The Spanish division was commanded by the Prince of Parma,
soon to become notorious in the Netherlands under Philip II, and who
was later in command of the Armada fitted out in Spain for the invasion
of England.
The fleet assembled at Messina on September 21, 1571, too late for the
relief of Cyprus. The Turks collected in the Gulf of Lepanto a much
greater fleet of two hundred and ninety galleys manned by a hundred and
twenty thousand soldiers and rowers. But they had no large galleasses
with powerful armaments to compare with those of the Spaniards. The
fleet was commanded by the Capitan Pasha Ali, a young man without
experience in naval war. The second in command was Ouloudj. Perted
Pasha was in command of the troops. He and Ouloudj were opposed to
an immediate battle with the allied fleet on the ground that their
men were not as yet sufficiently trained. At a council of war heated
discussion took place. The Capitan Pasha insisted on immediate attack.
Ouloudj broke off the discussion, saying, “Silence. I am ready, because
it is written that the youth of a Capitan Pasha has more weight than my
forty-three years of fighting. But the Berbers have made sport of you,
Pasha! Remember this when the peril draws near.”
The rowers of both fleets were galley slaves chained to the oars. On
the Turkish fleet they were Christians who had been made captives in
war. On the Christian fleet they were the sweepings of the jails. In
both cases the admirals promised liberty to them if they performed
their duty in the coming battle.
The two fleets met near the entrance to the Gulf of Lepanto on October
7, 1571. The Christian fleet was ranged in a crescent with the
Venetians on the left flank. The six powerful galleasses were posted
like redoubts at intervals in front of the lines of galleys. Don John
was at the centre of the crescent. The two fleets approached one
another. The engagement soon became general. The Turkish galleys as
their enemy neared them, were somewhat broken in line by the Spanish
galleasses, which raked the Turkish galleys with their more powerful
armaments. The Turkish admiral, in the _Sultana_, made a direct attack
on Don John’s ship, the _Real_, which was later supported by a second
galley. The three were locked together, and the Spanish soldiers
boarded the Turkish vessel. A desperate hand-to-hand combat took place,
in which the Turkish admiral was killed. His head was cut off and,
against the will of Don John, was stuck on the masthead of the Spanish
vessel. This caused general discouragement in the Turkish fleet. All
along the line the Turkish vessels were worsted in the combats with
their opponents. There resulted a complete defeat of their centre and
left wing. Ouloudj, in command of the Turkish right wing, was more
fortunate. He succeeded in outmanœuvring the Venetian vessels opposed
to him. He made a violent attack on fifteen galleys which were detached
from the main fleet of the allies and succeeded in sinking them. When
he became aware that the main Ottoman fleet was completely defeated by
the Spaniards, he made a dash with forty of his own galleys through
the enemy’s line and succeeded in escaping. With this exception, the
whole of the Turkish vessels, two hundred and sixty-six in number, were
captured or sunk. Fifty thousand Turks lost their lives in this great
battle, and fifteen thousand Christian slaves were liberated.
It was an overwhelming defeat for the Ottomans. No such naval victory
had occurred in the Mediterranean since that of Actium, very near to
the same spot, where (B.C. 31) Marc Antony’s fleet was destroyed by
that of Octavius. Nor was there another such decisive naval encounter
in those seas till that known as the Battle of the Nile, when Nelson
captured or sank nearly the whole of the French fleet off the coast of
Egypt.
It was to be expected that the allied Christian fleet would follow up
its great victory by attack on some Turkish territory. No such project
was entertained by its admirals and generals. The fleet dispersed after
its victory. Each detachment of it returned to its own ports, there
to receive ovations of triumph. Sculptors and painters celebrated the
event by works of art in churches at Rome, Venice, Messina, and other
cities. Never was so decisive a victory productive of so little further
result.
The contrast between the action of the defeated Turks and that of the
victors was most striking. Ouloudj, picking up forty stray galleys in
the Ægean Sea, returned to Constantinople with eighty vessels. Piale
joined him there with a few more. Sokolli and his colleagues in the
Turkish Government made the most determined efforts to restore their
fleet. Even Selim showed some spirit on this occasion. He contributed
largely from his privy purse. He gave up part of the garden of his
palace at Seraglio Point as a site for the construction of new vessels.
One hundred and sixty galleys were at once commenced, together with
eight galleasses of the largest size. By the spring of the next year
they were completed. The losses at Lepanto were made good and the
Ottoman fleet was as powerful as before the disaster. In the summer
of 1572 the allied Christian fleet was again assembled on the eastern
Mediterranean. It was still inferior in numbers of vessels to that of
the Ottomans. The two fleets came in sight of one another twice in
that season in the neighbourhood of the island of Cerigo and, later,
off Cape Matapan, but no engagement took place. It may be concluded
that Ouloudj, who was now Capitan Pasha of the Turkish navy with the
honorary name of Killidj Ali, thought it the better policy not to risk
his new fleet before the crews were thoroughly trained. He withdrew,
and the sequel showed the wisdom of his action. The allied fleet was
unable to do anything.
Later, in 1573, the Venetians found it expedient to negotiate terms
for a separate peace with the Porte. Their envoy, who appears to have
remained at Constantinople during the late war, interviewed Sokolli for
this purpose. When he alluded to the losses which the two Powers had
recently incurred, the one of the island of Cyprus, the other of its
fleet, Sokolli proudly replied:—
You have doubtless observed our courage after the accident which
happened to our fleet. There is this great difference between our
loss and yours. In capturing a kingdom we have cut off one of your
arms, while you, in destroying our fleet, have merely shorn our
beard. A limb cut off cannot be replaced, but a beard when shorn will
grow again in greater vigour than ever.
Terms of peace were concluded. Not only was the capture of Cyprus
confirmed by a formal cession of the island, but the Republic agreed
to pay to the Porte the cost incurred by its capture, estimated at
300,000 ducats. The tribute paid by Venice for the island of Zante of
500 ducats was increased to 1,500 ducats. The Republic was relieved of
the annual tribute of 8,000 ducats in respect of Cyprus. The limits of
the possessions of the two Powers in Dalmatia and Albania were restored
to what they had been before the war. The terms were humiliating to
Venice; they could not have been worse if the battle of Lepanto had
never been fought.
The rapid restoration of its fleet by the Porte gave fresh evidence
of its vital power and its unsurpassed resources. For a long time to
come the Ottoman navy, supported by the piratical contingents from its
Barbary dependents, held a virtual supremacy in the Mediterranean.
After the conclusion of peace between Venice and the Porte, Don John,
in October 1573, commanded a Spanish fleet in an expedition against
Tunis, which, as above stated, had been captured by Ouloudj on behalf
of the Turks. The task of Don John was the more easy as the Turks
had not succeeded in capturing the citadel, which was still in the
possession of its Spanish garrison. He had no difficulty in defeating
the few Turks who were in possession of the city of Tunis. He showed no
disposition to restore to his throne the Sultan Hamid. This miserable
creature appeared at Tunis and claimed to be reinstated there. But the
Spaniards would have nothing to do with him. He was deported to Naples.
Don John, having effected his object, departed to Spain, leaving at
Tunis a mixed garrison of eight thousand Italians and Spaniards. When
news of this capture reached Constantinople, Sokolli and Ouloudj were
greatly incensed. In 1574 a fleet of two hundred and sixty galleys
and galleasses with forty thousand men was sent out, under command
of Ouloudj, who made short work of the Spanish and Italian garrison
at Tunis, and recaptured the province, and finally annexed it to the
Turkish Empire. This probably could not have been effected if Venice
had remained in alliance with Spain, but alone the latter was not able
to meet the Ottoman fleet in the Mediterranean.
In 1574 Selim died under the influence of drink, and was succeeded by
his son, Murad III, as much a nullity as regards public affairs as his
father. Sokolli remained as Grand Vizier till his death, four years
later, by the hands of an assassin, but with diminishing power, owing
to the intrigues of the Sultan’s harem, which eventually contrived his
end.
In 1578, the last year of Sokolli’s vizierate, war again broke out
with Persia, and a great army was sent to Asia, under command of
Mustapha, the conqueror of Cyprus. It began by invading Georgia, then
under a native Christian prince in close alliance with, if not under
the subjection of, Persia. Mustapha had no difficulty in conquering
Georgia, and in occupying the adjacent Persian provinces of Azerbijan,
Loristan, and Scherhezol. He penetrated to Dhagestan, on the Caspian.
The war was continued under Sokolli’s successors for some years with
varying fortune. It was not till 1590 that a treaty of peace was
concluded with Persia, under which these provinces were ceded to the
Ottoman Empire.
It will be seen from this brief narrative that the acquisitions of the
Ottoman Empire during the twelve years when the Grand Vizier Sokolli
was virtually its ruler were very great and important. They included
the island of Cyprus, the province of Tunis, the kingdom of Georgia,
the provinces taken from Persia, and the Yemen, in Arabia. These, with
one exception, were the last acquisitions of the Ottoman Empire. The
exception was that of the island of Crete, which was not attacked by
the Turks till sixty-seven years later, in 1645, and was not finally
conquered till 1668. But by this time the Ottoman Empire had begun
to shrink at the hands of its enemies in other directions. It may be
concluded, therefore, that the last year of the vizierate of Sokolli,
1578, and not the last year of Solyman’s reign, was the zenith of the
Ottoman Empire.
The Empire was by this time extended from the centre of Hungary in the
north to the Persian Gulf and the Soudan in the south, from the Caspian
Sea and the borders of Persia in the east to the province of Oran
in Africa in the west. It included nearly the whole of the southern
shores of the Mediterranean, except that of Morocco, and all the
shores of the Black Sea and the Red Sea. All the islands of the Ægean
Sea except Crete belonged to it. These territories were inhabited by
twenty different races. Their population has been variously estimated
at thirty millions and upwards. Many of the Greek cities at that time
existing in Asia Minor were still very populous, in spite of the
massacres which had taken place when they were captured by the Turks.
It is probable that the population of Asia Minor, of Syria, and of
Mesopotamia was much larger than it is at the present time. That of
Bulgaria, Greece, and Macedonia was also greater than it was in modern
times before their emancipation from Turkish rule. After the death of
Sokolli there ensued an era when misgovernment and corruption played
havoc with the Empire, and a process of shrinkage began which extended
over three centuries, the exact opposite to its growth in the previous
three centuries.
It should here be noted that although the Sultans were autocrats in
the full sense of the term, there existed in practice some ultimate
check on their misdeeds. The Mufti, as the chief interpreter of the
sacred law of Islam, had the right and power to declare whether any
act of the Sultan, or any proposed act by any other person, was in
accord with or opposed to such law. As the Mufti could be deposed by
the Sultan and then be put to death, this power could be very rarely
used by him. But when outbreaks occurred on the part of the Janissaries
and reached a point when the deposition of the Sultan was demanded,
the Mufti, as a rule, was asked for his opinion. It will be seen that
of the twenty-five Sultans after Solyman eleven were deposed, and in
almost every case the Mufti gave his legal sanction. The Janissaries
may have been very lawless, but they were not the less a salutary
check on the Sultans. With one possible exception the depositions were
well deserved. It should be noted that there was also a check on the
Sultans in the Divan, which was composed of the four viziers and many
other functionaries, military, civil, legal, and religious. It met
once or twice a week and discussed matters of State. Till the time
of Solyman the Sultan presided, but he gave up this practice. In the
absence of the Sultan the Grand Vizier presided. In the reign of the
degenerate Sultans the Divan often played an important part.
[Illustration: THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE AT THE TIME OF ITS GREATEST EXTENT.
Tributary and Vassal States are outlined with colour.]
_PART II_
THE DECAY OF EMPIRE
XII
THE RULE OF SULTANAS
1578-1656
AFTER the death of Sokolli many years elapsed before another Grand
Vizier was able to wield the power of the State, in place of the weak
and incompetent Sultans who succeeded to the throne. The supreme
power fell into the hands of women of the Sultan’s harem. For a time
the chief influence lay with the Sultana Baffo, a Venetian lady of
the noble family of that name, who had been captured when young by a
corsair and sold as a slave to the harem of Sultan Murad III. She was
a very clever and ambitious, as well as a beautiful woman, and for a
time Murad was devoted to her charms to the exclusion of other inmates
of his harem. But his mother, the Sultana Validé, jealous of Baffo’s
exclusive influence in politics, contrived to draw Murad’s affection
from her by tempting him with two other very beautiful slaves. Later,
the lady who presided over the harem and her assistant improved on this
method by procuring for the Sultan a succession of beautiful slaves, in
such numbers that the price of this ware rose enormously in the slave
market.
Murad, under the influence of these attractions, devoted himself wholly
to voluptuous life in his harem. He became the father of one hundred
and three children, of whom forty-seven survived him. The Sultana
Baffo, the mother of his eldest son, though she had lost her charm for
him as a mistress, continued to influence him in public affairs by her
wit and cleverness, sharing it, however, with the other ladies referred
to. After the death of the Sultana Validé, the Sultana Baffo succeeded
in regaining much of her earlier and exclusive influence. She retained
the same authority over her son Mahomet III, who succeeded his father
in 1595. It resulted, therefore, that this lady, for twenty-eight
years, exercised the greatest power in the State. Mahomet was as much
a nullity in public affairs as his father. He signalized his accession
to the throne by putting to death his nineteen brothers. He thought
apparently that this holocaust shed some lustre on these unfortunate
princes, for he accorded to them a State funeral. They were followed
to their graves by all the high dignitaries of the State, and were
buried beside their father. Six favourite slaves of the eldest of these
princes, who might be expected to give birth to future claimants to the
throne, were sewn up in sacks and were flung into the Bosphorus.
Mahomet was the last Sultan who was allowed before his accession to
have some experience in public affairs as governor of a province.
Thenceforward it was the practice for reigning Sultans to immure their
heirs in a building in the Seraglio, at Constantinople, known as the
Cage, where they were allowed to have no intercourse with the outer
world, and could have no experience, or even knowledge, of public
affairs, and which they only left either to reign as Sultans or to be
put to death. It has been suggested by some writers that this treatment
of the heirs to the Ottoman throne was the main cause of the lamentable
degeneracy of the Othman dynasty. It must undoubtedly have contributed
to this, but it should be noticed that the three Sultans, Selim II,
Murad III, and Mahomet III, who had not been subjected to this debasing
treatment, and had been governors of provinces before their accession,
were quite as worthless and incompetent as any of their successors.
Mahomet, after eight years of a vacuous reign, was succeeded by his son
Achmet, who reigned for fourteen years. He was as incompetent to rule
as his two predecessors. He fell under the influence of other ladies
of his harem. The Sultana Baffo was ignored and lost her power. On the
death of Achmet, in 1617, he was succeeded not by his eldest son but
by his brother Mustapha, a lunatic. Achmet had spared his brother’s
life on account of his lunacy. Mustapha, therefore, by virtue of the
law of succession, succeeded, but he was deposed after a few months,
and was followed on the throne by Othman II, the son of Achmet, who
showed some greater capacity. In his short reign, however, of four
years he incurred the disfavour of the Janissaries, who insisted on his
deposition and death. The lunatic Mustapha was then reinstated on the
throne, and was again deposed, after a few months. He was succeeded by
Murad IV, a lad under twelve years. Till he came to years of discretion
his mother, the Sultana Validé, who was a clever woman, virtually
ruled. It will be shown later that Murad was of very different type
to his six predecessors. On coming of age he emancipated himself from
the influence of the harem, and was the last of his dynasty who was a
warrior and who personally led his army in the field. His rule lasted
for only eight years. On his death, in 1640, he was succeeded by his
brother Ibrahim II, a worthless voluptuary, during whose reign of
another eight years the harem recovered its influence. He was followed
by Mahomet IV, and for eight more years the rule of the harem was
maintained. From this brief narrative it will appear that from the
death of Sokolli in 1578 till 1656, a period of seventy-eight years,
during which seven Sultans occupied the throne, the supreme power in
the State was exercised by women of the harem, with the exception of
the eight years of the reign of Sultan Murad IV. For twenty-eight of
these years the Sultana Baffo, and later other ladies less known to
fame, were virtually the rulers of the Empire. Grand Viziers were made
and unmade at the will of these ladies, with occasional intervention
of the Janissaries. They seldom held the office for more than a year.
The Sultana Baffo was a grasping and avaricious woman. Under her evil
influence, and later that of other ladies of the harem, the system
of the sale of offices was greatly extended and became universal
throughout the Empire for all appointments, high and low.
It has been shown that the Grand Vizier Roostem, in Solyman’s reign,
first introduced the system of requiring payments from persons
appointed as governors of provinces and to other high civil posts; but
the sums were fixed and definite, and were paid into the treasury of
the State, and the system was not extended to the army. The payments
now became arbitrary and universal, and were extended to appointments
in the army. The Sultan himself was not above taking a part in this
plunder, and the ladies of the harem had also their full share. Grand
Viziers only succeeded in retaining their posts by large payments to
the Sultan and his entourage, male and female.
Von Hammer, on the authority of the historian Ali, tells the story
that a favourite of the Sultan, one Schemsi Pasha, who was descended
from a family formerly reigning over a province of Asia Minor, on the
borders of the Black Sea, which had been dispossessed by an early
Ottoman Sultan, on coming from an interview with the Sultan, Murad III,
exclaimed with a joyous air: “At last I have revenged myself on the
House of Othman, for I have now persuaded it to prepare for its own
downfall!” When asked how he had done that, he replied: “By persuading
the Sultan to share in the sale of his own favours. It is true that
I placed a tempting bait before him. Forty thousand ducats make no
trifling sum. From this time forth the Sultan sets the example of
corruption, and corruption will destroy the Empire.”[21]
As a result of this evil practice of the sale of offices, the whole
system of government throughout the Empire, from top to bottom, was
infected with bribery and corruption. The judges, equally with other
officers, were corrupt, and gave their judgments to the highest bidder.
Criminals of the vilest kind who could bribe the judges were allowed to
go free. All confidence in the administration of the law was destroyed.
All officers in the State, from the highest to the lowest, held their
posts at the will of those who appointed them, and were liable to be
superseded at any moment. Having paid large sums for these posts, it
was necessary for them to make hay while the sun shone, and to recoup
themselves for their outlay by exactions on those below them, and by
plundering the people in their districts.
The army being no longer exempt from this pernicious system, officers
were appointed or promoted, not because they were efficient, but
because they had the longest purses. The discipline of the army was
therefore relaxed. There was also great dissatisfaction throughout the
service because the soldiers were paid in debased coins. The garrisons
of such frontier fortresses as Buda and Tabriz broke out in revolt.
The Janissaries got out of hand. There were conflicts between them and
the Spahis. The Janissaries frequently insisted on the dismissal, and
even on the execution, of viziers and other ministers of State, and the
craven Sultans and the ladies of their harems had to consent. There
was rebellion in Transylvania, Moldavia, and Wallachia. The Christians
of the Lebanon rose against their oppressors, the Turks. Brigandage
increased to a lamentable extent in other parts of the Empire.
The ladies of the harem, it would seem, were not favourable to war.
The Sultana Baffo, being a Venetian by birth, averted war with that
Republic for many years. Peace was also made with Austria and was
maintained for some years. But in 1593, when Transylvania and Wallachia
were in rebellion, Austria and Hungary were induced by sympathy for
their people to declare war against the Porte. Their army, under
command of the Emperor Maximilian and Count Pfalfi, the Hungarian
general, marched to the Danube, capturing on their way Gran, Pesth,
Bucharest, and other strongholds of the Turks. They then crossed the
Danube and marched to Varna.
There was the greatest consternation at Constantinople at the loss of
so many strongholds and the defeat of the Turkish armies. There was
a general demand that the Sultan himself, the incompetent Mahomet,
should endeavour to restore confidence to the Turkish soldiers, by
putting himself at the head of them, as his predecessors had done in
past times. He was urged to unfurl the standard of the Prophet, and to
appeal to the religious fervour and fanaticism of the army. Mahomet
was most unwilling to adopt this course. He preferred to remain in
the Seraglio at Constantinople. The Sultana Baffo, fearing that her
influence might be lost if her son was out of her sight, backed his
refusal to march. On the other hand, his preceptor, the historian
Seadeddin, who had great influence over him, made every effort in the
opposite direction. At last the Janissaries refused to go to the front
unless their Padishah led them, and Mahomet, much against his will, was
compelled to put himself at the head of his army. The sacred standard
of the Prophet and his mantle, a most prized relic, were brought out
for the occasion. With much pomp the Ottomans marched northwards to
meet the invaders. The Austrians and Hungarians fell back at the
approach of this great army of Turks. They abandoned all the fortresses
they had captured in Bulgaria. They recrossed the Danube. The two
armies at last came into conflict on the plain of Cerestes, in Hungary,
on the 24th of October, 1596, where a memorable battle took place,
extending over three days.
It does not appear that Mahomet took any part in the direction of his
army. The Grand Vizier was virtually in command. The second in command
was Cicala, an Italian by birth who had embraced Islam, a most brave
and resolute soldier, greatly favoured by the ladies of the harem. The
Sultan, however, was present in the field, surrounded by his bodyguard.
The sacred banner of the Prophet was unfurled and roused, it was said,
the fervour of the Turkish soldiers. On the first day the Turks met
with a reverse, and a division of their army was defeated. A council
of war was held, at which Mahomet expressed his wish to retreat and to
avoid further battle. Seadeddin stoutly opposed this. “It has never
been seen or heard of,” he said, “that a Padishah of the Ottomans
turned his back upon the enemy without the direst necessity.” Mahomet
then suggested that he himself should withdraw from the battle, and
that the Grand Vizier, Hassan Pasha, should take command of the army.
“This is no affair for pashas,” said Seadeddin, “the presence of the
Padishah is indispensably necessary.” It was decided to continue the
battle in the presence of the Sultan.
The second day was no better for the Ottomans than the first. On the
third day, October 26th, the two main armies came into closer quarters.
The Hungarians, under Count Pfalfi, attacked the Ottoman artillery in
flank and captured all the guns. The battle seemed to be irretrievably
lost. The Sultan, seated on a tall camel, surrounded by his bodyguard,
watched the rout of his army. He wished to fly while there was time. He
was dissuaded again by Seadeddin, who quoted a verse from the Koran:
“It is patience which wins victory, and joy succeeds to sorrow.” The
Sultan, wrapping the Prophet’s mantle round him, consented to remain on
the field.
The Austrians now charged the Ottoman camp. The Imperial soldiers,
breaking their ranks, devoted themselves to plunder. At this point
Cicala, at the head of a large body of irregular cavalry, which had
taken no part so far in the battle, charged with irresistible force the
scattered host of the Christians. They carried everything before them.
The Austrians, in their turn, were driven from the field. Maximilian
and Sigismund were compelled to fly for their lives.
The Ottomans, as a result of this gallant charge, regained all that
they had lost. Thirty thousand Austrians and Hungarians perished.
Ninety-five of their guns were captured. The camp and the treasure
of the Archduke were taken. Never was a more complete and unexpected
victory. No thanks, however, were due to the Sultan. There can be no
doubt that if he had acted on his own impulse and had fled, the battle
would have been lost. He was a timid spectator of the conflict, and of
much the same use as the sacred standard and the cloak of the Prophet.
The victory was undoubtedly due to the courage of Cicala and the
splendid charge of his cavalry, and to the determination of Seadeddin
in compelling his master the Sultan, against his will, to remain on the
field of battle.
No more important battle had taken place beyond the Danube since that
of Mohacz in the time of Mahomet II. If the victory had resulted to
the Christians, the whole of the Ottoman possessions north of the
Danube would have been lost. The Christian army, under Maximilian,
would again have crossed that river and have advanced into Bulgaria and
Macedonia, and the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire might have been
precipitated by two or three centuries.
The craven Sultan returned to Constantinople immediately after the
battle. He received there a great ovation for the victory due to
Cicala. Never again did he lead an army on the field. He devoted
himself thenceforth to a voluptuous life in his harem. The government
of the Empire remained in the hands of the Sultana Validé.
Cicala, as a reward for his successful charge, was immediately
promoted to be Grand Vizier. It was a most unfortunate selection. He
treated with great severity the Ottoman troops who had misbehaved at
the battle of Ceresties. He accused them of cowardice. He inflicted
summary punishment on their leaders. Thirty thousand of the soldiers,
mostly belonging to Asia Minor, dispersed and returned to their homes,
spreading disaffection and rebellion in their several districts.
After this signal victory war of a desultory character was continued
with Austria for some years, now one and now the other getting the
better of it in the capture and recapture of fortresses. In 1606
peace was arrived at. A treaty was concluded between the two Powers
at Silvatorok, which was, on the whole, unfavourable to the Ottomans.
Transylvania was practically freed from their rule. They were confirmed
in the possession of one-half of Hungary, but the other half was freed
from tribute. The fortresses of Gran, Erlau, and Gradiscka were secured
to Ottoman possession, Raab and Komorn to Austria. The annual payment
of 30,000 ducats by Austria, which the Turks regarded as a tribute, was
also to cease, but a lump sum of 200,000 ducats was to be paid to the
Porte.
By the surrender of its claims on Transylvania the Ottoman Empire in
Europe entered upon a course of shrinkage, which thenceforth, up to the
present time, has been the normal course of events.
This decadence was soon to be illustrated in another direction. War
had again broken out with Persia, and the Turks sustained a series of
defeats. In 1618 peace was patched up for a time, by the terms of which
all the provinces which had been captured under Murad III and Mahomet
III were ceded again to Persia, and the boundaries between the two
Empires were restored to what they had been under Selim II. Meanwhile,
as a result of misgovernment, the Turkish Empire was going headlong to
ruin. We have a very authoritative account of the deplorable condition
into which it had fallen at this period in the reports of Sir Thomas
Roe, who was sent as the first British Ambassador to the Porte by James
I. Queen Elizabeth had already, a few years previously, entered into
correspondence with the Porte, and had urged the Sultan to join in a
naval alliance in the Mediterranean against Philip II, who was then
threatening to invade England. The reply of the Porte was friendly, but
nothing more.
In 1622 Sir Thomas Roe was sent on a mission, mainly for the purpose
of protesting against the piratical destruction of British commerce
by corsairs from Algiers and Tunis. He remained at Constantinople for
five years, and succeeded in obtaining promises of redress from the
Porte. The Pasha of Algiers was recalled and a successor was appointed.
But apparently this had very little effect in abating piracy. The
reports of Sir Thomas Roe are full of descriptions of the misery of
the inhabitants of Turkey, of symptoms of decay, and of the falling
grandeur of the Empire.
All the territory of the Grand Seignior [he says] is dispeopled
for want of pasture and by reason of violent oppression—so much so
that, in the best parts of Greece and Anatolia, a man may ride three
or four, or sometimes six, days and not find a village to feed him
or his horse, whereby the revenue is so lessened that there is not
wherewithal to pay the soldiers and to maintain the Court. It may be
patched up for a while out of the Treasury, and by exactions which
are now onerous upon the merchants and labouring men to satisfy the
harpies.[22]
I can say no more than that the disease works internally that must
ruin this Empire; we daily expect more changes and effusion of blood.
The wisest men refuse to sit at the helm, and fools will soon run
themselves and others upon the rocks.
This State for sixteen months since the death of Othman hath been a
stage of variety; the soldiers usurping all government, placing and
displacing _more vulg._ as the wynd of humour or dissatisfaction
moved them. In this kind I have seen three Emperors, seven Grand
Viziers, two Capitan Pashas, five Agas of the Janissaries, and, in
proportion, as many changes of governors in all the provinces, every
new Vizier making use of his time displacing those in possession and
selling their favours to others.[23]
In another passage he points out that the hope of booty was the main
motive for war and invasion by the Turks:—
The Turkish soldier is not only apt but desirous to make invasion
because all things are prey and all kinds of licence allowed to them;
and his hope is more upon booty and prisoners than upon conquest.
Every boy or girl is to them magazine and brings them the best of
merchandise and worth 100 dollars, so that every village is to them
a magazine and they return rich.... But I am persuaded versâ vice
if they were invaded and the war were brought to their doors they
would be found the weakest, unprovided and undisciplined enemy in the
world.[24]
The pirates of Algiers have cast off all obedience to the Empire,
not only upon the sea where they are masters, but presuming to do
many insolences even upon the land and in the best parts of the Grand
Seignior.[25]
There can be no doubt that at the beginning of the seventeenth century,
when Sir Thomas Roe wrote these dispatches, the Ottoman Empire was in
a condition of unparalleled disorganization, and its various races
were in a state of untold misery, owing in part to the want of strong
men at its head, and in greater part to the system of corruption which
had infected every branch of its administration. If at this time any
neighbouring Power had been in a position to attack it, the Empire
would not have been able to offer resistance. But Spain, after the
reign of Philip II, was almost as decadent as Turkey. Germany was
distracted by internal religious wars and was unable to concentrate on
external foes, while Russia had not as yet developed a position which
made her formidable to the Turks.
It has already been stated that there was a break in the disastrous
rule of the harem when Murad IV came of age and was able to take the
reins of government from the hands of his mother. The Sultana Validé
was a very clever woman, with excellent intentions, and practically
ruled the State during his minority. But she was not equal to the task
of coping with the grave difficulties of the time. The Empire was
going to the bad in all directions. The Persians, taking advantage
of the confusion in Turkey, declared war and successfully invaded
the provinces of Erivan and Bagdad. The two Barbary provinces of
Algiers and Tunis were asserting independence. They engaged in
piratical attacks on the commerce of the allies of the Porte, and were
negotiating separate treaties with them. The internal condition of
the Empire became worse than ever. There were frequent outbreaks of
Janissaries, who imposed their will on the Sultana.
In 1632, Murad, on reaching the age of twenty-one, took command of the
State, and soon showed that he was of very different fibre from his
six incapable predecessors. His first experience was an outbreak of
the Janissaries, who demanded that the Grand Vizier and sixteen other
prominent officials should be executed. Murad was compelled to yield.
But he felt deeply the humiliation of his surrender and was determined
to avenge it. He gathered round him a faithful band of Spahis, and
suddenly, when it was least expected, dealt with the leaders of the
Janissaries by putting them to death. This had the effect of cowing
that mutinous body. He then devoted himself to the task of purging the
State of corrupt and unjust officials of all ranks. He pursued this
task with most ruthless energy. On the slightest suspicion officials
in the highest positions were secretly put to death by his orders,
and their bodies were flung into the Bosphorus. He became a terror to
evildoers of all ranks. But he also became bloodthirsty and callous of
life in the process. Brutal as were his deeds, they had the effect of
restoring order in the State and discipline in the army. Throughout the
length and breadth of the Empire his dominant will made itself felt,
and his authority as Sultan was soon completely re-established.
Murad showed himself equally vigorous and competent as a general. His
effective reign, after taking over the government from his mother, did
not extend over more than eight years. During this time he personally
led two expeditions against the Shah of Persia, each of them occupying
two years. In the first of them he conquered Erivan. In the second he
recaptured the city of Bagdad, after a most desperate resistance by
the Persians. Of the garrison of twenty thousand men only six hundred
survived. The Ottoman army was then allowed to sack the city, and
thirty thousand of the inhabitants were massacred. The whole province
was restored to the Ottoman rule. More than eighty years passed before
another war took place with Persia.
In these campaigns Murad showed immense vigour. He marched at the
head of his army and shared with the soldiers their hardships. His
saddle was his pillow at night. There was no pitched battle with the
Persians. The campaigns consisted of sieges and captures of fortresses.
On his return to the capital after the second campaign, in 1639, Murad
received a great popular ovation. He died soon after, in 1640, from
fever, aggravated by intemperance, to which he was addicted. When he
was on the point of death he gave orders for the execution of his
brother, Ibrahim, the only surviving male of the descendants of Othman.
Ibrahim had been immured in ‘the Cage’ during the lifetime of his
brother. He was quite unfit to rule the Empire, and Murad must have
well known this. It was surmised that Murad preferred to go down in
history as the last Sultan of the Othman race rather than hand over the
throne to such an incapable successor. Others thought that he intended
his last and favourite Grand Vizier to be his successor. His mother,
the Sultana Validé, with the object of saving the life of her second
son, Ibrahim, feigned to carry out Murad’s order. She sent a message to
the dying Sultan that Ibrahim had been put to death in accordance with
his instructions. Murad, it is said, when he heard of this “grinned a
horrible and ghastly smile and then expired.”
It may well have been that those who wished for the destruction of
the Ottoman Empire regarded with complaisance the failure of Murad’s
intention of putting an end to the Othman dynasty. It was obviously
impossible that Sultans of the type of those who had succeeded the
great Solyman could for long hold the Empire intact. A new dynasty,
founded by an ambitious vizier, or some other bold adventurer, might
have invigorated the Empire and have long delayed its dismemberment.
But _Dîs aliter visum est_.
If Murad’s intention to put his brother to death was prompted by the
conviction that Ibrahim was unfit to rule the Empire, he was fully
justified by subsequent events. In his short reign of eight years
Ibrahim succeeded in undoing all the good which Murad had effected by
his ruthless vigour. He proved to be a degenerate, whose original evil
nature had been worsened by many years of immurement and constant dread
of death at the hands of his brother. He was as bloodthirsty as Murad,
without the same motive of restoring discipline in the army and order
and justice throughout the Empire. He was also cowardly and mean. He
wasted the resources of the State, which had been wisely accumulated by
Murad, in self-indulgence and in gratifying the caprices of his harem.
He was the most confirmed debauchee of the long line of the Ottoman
Sultans. The Sultana Validé pandered to his passions by presenting to
him every Friday a new female slave. By this means she obtained full
influence over him and used it in every case to the great detriment of
the State. Every abuse and evil which Murad had checked grew apace, and
the Turkish Empire, so far as internal affairs were concerned, entered
on a new course of decadence. The rule of the harem again prevailed,
without any motive but that of gratifying the caprices of its inmates.
Disaffection and rebellion spread among the Janissaries and Spahis,
and also among the ulemas and all classes of people at Constantinople.
A conspiracy was formed to get rid of Ibrahim. It was supported by
the main body of ulemas. At a meeting of the conspirators the charge
against Ibrahim was formulated as follows:—
The Padishah has ruined the Ottoman world by pillage and tyranny.
Women wield the sovereignty. The treasury cannot satiate their
expense. The subjects are ruined. The armies of the infidels
are besieging towns on the frontiers. Their fleets blockade the
Dardanelles.
It was determined to dethrone Ibrahim and to replace him by his son
Mahomet, a lad of seven years of age. The Sultana Validé did her best
to shield her son from the threatened blow, but she was ultimately
induced to give her consent to his deposition. A large body of
Janissaries then invaded the palace and insisted on Ibrahim appearing
before them. They announced to him the decision to depose him. He was
compelled to submit and was conducted to prison. The question was then
submitted to the Mufti, “Is it lawful to dethrone and put to death a
Padishah who confers all the posts of dignity in the Empire, not on
those who are worthy of them, but on those who have bought them for
money?” The Mufti replied by a _fetva_ in the laconic word “Yes.” There
was a threat of an _émeute_ among the Spahis in favour of Ibrahim.
He was promptly put to death and his son Mahomet IV was installed as
Sultan.
The eight years of Ibrahim’s reign, however, were not without some
importance as regards the external affairs of the Empire. They showed
that there were still some capable men in the service of the Sultan. In
1641 an expedition was fitted out for the recapture of the important
city of Azoff, which of late years had fallen into the hands of the
Cossacks. It was a failure and met with a reverse. In the next year a
much larger force was sent out, and was supported by a hundred thousand
Tartars from the Crimea. It succeeded in its object. The Cossacks,
before surrendering the city, destroyed all its fortifications and
burnt the town. The Turks rebuilt it and left a garrison of twenty-six
thousand in this important frontier fortress.
In 1644 another expedition was fitted out against the island of Crete,
which then belonged to the Republic of Venice. It had been bought many
years previously from the Marquis of Montserrat, to whom it had been
allotted as his share in the spoil of the Greek Empire, after the
capture of Constantinople by the Crusaders in 1204.
It appears that a fleet of merchant vessels, on their way from
Constantinople to Egypt, was captured by corsairs from Malta, who
sought shelter for a time for themselves and their prizes in one of the
ports of Crete. The Sultan was greatly incensed at this, the more so
as some of the captured vessels belonged to one of the eunuchs of his
harem. His first design was to send a fleet to attack Malta, but he was
dissuaded from this course. He decided, as an alternative, to attack
Crete, although the Porte was at peace with Venice, and the Republic
was willing to make amends for the violation of its neutrality by the
Maltese corsairs.
A fleet was thereupon fitted out, in 1645, ostensibly to attack Malta,
but with sealed orders to divert its course when at sea to Crete. It
consisted of a hundred and four vessels carrying upwards of fifty
thousand men. The fleet, under the above orders, steered for Crete,
and made a sudden attack on Canea, one of the chief ports of the
island. Having captured this city and also Retino, the army was landed.
It overran the whole island and invested Candia, its chief fortress
and capital. A memorable siege then commenced. It lasted for nearly
twenty-five years. The Republic of Venice made desperate efforts to
save the city. It was not supported by the native Greek population of
the island, who hated their Venetian rulers, and were not unwilling to
exchange them for Ottomans.
While the Porte was thus engaged in the endeavour to add to its domain
at the expense of the Republic of Venice, it was incurring a very
serious shrinkage of Empire in the Mediterranean, along the northern
coast of Africa. Historians agree in assigning to the middle of the
seventeenth century the virtual severance from Ottoman rule of the
two Barbary States of Algiers and Tunis. It is not possible to fix a
precise date in either case, for the process of amputation was slow and
was spread over some years, and long after the Sultan had practically
ceased to exercise any real power over these dependencies the semblance
and form of suzerainty was maintained. The main cause for the loss of
these provinces was the practice which had grown up, under the corrupt
administration of the Porte, of selling the posts of governors of
them to the highest bidders in money. In place of men of energy and
of capacity, able to control the unruly elements of mutinous soldiers
and disaffected Moors and Arabs, governors were appointed under a
system of purchase who were quite incapable of performing the duties
of their office, and who merely thought of filling their pockets and
recouping themselves for their outlay. The practice then arose for the
Janissaries and other Ottoman soldiers forming the garrisons of Algiers
and Tunis to elect their own chiefs. The appointments of these men,
Deys, as they were called, were for a time submitted to the Sultan for
approval or veto, but later this form was discontinued, and the Deys
elected by the soldiery became the real dominant authorities in these
States, and eventually superseded in form, as well as in substance, the
feeble pashas sent nominally as governors from Constantinople. Virtual
independence was thus achieved. Both States provided themselves with
fleets of powerful war vessels, which roamed over the Mediterranean and
the Atlantic as far as the coasts of Ireland and Madeira, preying upon
the commerce of all countries, irrespective of whether they were at war
with the Porte or not. They were, in fact, pirates. The captured crews
were employed as slaves in the bagnios of Algiers and Tunis. The best
evidence of the actual, though not yet of the formal, independence of
these Barbary States was that other Powers sent their fleets to attack
and bombard them, and to destroy, if possible, their pirate craft,
without declaring war against the suzerain power, the Porte. Thus, as
early as 1617 a French fleet, under Admiral Beaulieu, made an attack on
the Algerian fleet of forty vessels of from two hundred to four hundred
tons, and destroyed many of them. In 1620 a British fleet, under Sir
Richard Mansel, in retaliation for the capture of no less than four
hundred British merchant ships in the previous five years, made a
similar attack on Algiers, without, however, much result. In 1655,
another British fleet, commanded by Admiral Blake, under orders from
Protector Cromwell, bombarded Tunis, and destroyed a great part of its
fleet, and having effected this proceeded to Algiers. There was much
consternation there, and the captives of British birth were given up
without a struggle. In both these cases there was no declaration of war
against the Porte, and no offence was taken by the Sultan at the action
of England.
In 1663 the British Government made a treaty with the Sultan empowering
it to attack and punish the Algerines without being charged with a
breach of amity with the Porte. It frequently availed itself of this,
and many naval attacks were made on these nests of pirates, without,
however, very effectual results. In some of its naval operations in
the Ægean Sea the Porte received assistance from the fleets of these
two Barbary States. But this was entirely at the discretion of their
virtual rulers and was not considered obligatory on them. For our
present purpose, it is sufficient to point out that the States became
virtually independent of the Ottoman Empire about the year 1650. In
the case of Algiers this independence continued till the State was
conquered and annexed by France in 1830. In Tunis the same process took
place, with the difference that an hereditary Beyship was eventually
formed under a Greek adventurer whose descendants retained power there
till 1881, when the French invaded the province and eventually annexed
it to France.
Ibrahim was succeeded by his son, Mahomet IV. He reigned for
thirty-nine years. During the first eight of these there was chaos in
the Empire. The government remained in the hands of the harem. The
position was aggravated by fierce dissension in that institution. There
were two rival parties, the one led by the ex-Sultana Validé, the
mother of the late Sultan, who was loath to part with the power she
had acquired during her son’s reign, the other by the mother of the
new Sultan, Torchan by name. Both of them had their supporters among
the Janissaries and Spahis, with the result that there were frequent
disorders and encounters in the streets of the capital. Grand Viziers
were made and deposed with startling rapidity, as one or other of these
parties prevailed. Outbreaks occurred in many parts of the Empire and
there was no one with sufficient authority to cope with them. The
dispute between the two ladies was eventually settled by the murder of
the elder one. Meanwhile it was fortunate for the Empire that Austria
was so exhausted by thirty years of war in Germany that she was not
able to avail herself of the opportunity afforded to invade the Ottoman
Empire and recover Hungary and other provinces. But the war with Venice
resulting from the unprovoked attack by Ibrahim on Crete was continued
without intermission. A Venetian fleet under command of Admiral
Macenigo defeated and destroyed an Ottoman fleet off the Dardanelles
and took possession of the islands of Lemnos and Tenedos. It blockaded
the Dardanelles. Strange to say, this did not put a stop to the siege
of Candia by the Ottomans. This was maintained with pertinacity, but
for a long time without success. Meanwhile anarchy prevailed in the
Empire. Relief most unexpectedly came from the appointment of a Grand
Vizier by Sultana Torchan, by which she made some amends for her
previous misdeeds.
XIII
THE KIUPRILI VIZIERS
1656-1702
AT this stage, when the ruin of the Empire seemed to be imminent, owing
to the failure of vigour and authority of so many Sultans, the general
corruption of officials, and the lawlessness and mutinous conduct of
the army, there rose to the front a man, or rather a succession of men
of the same family, who were able to stem the evil tide and to restore,
for a time, the credit and prestige of the Empire. In the following
forty-six years four members of the Kiuprili family filled the post
of Grand Vizier—not, however, without more than one unfortunate
interregnum. They ruled the Empire in the name of the incompetent
Mahomet and his successor. This advent of a family was the more notable
as in Turkey there never was any trace of hereditary rank. While the
throne had been filled without a break by members of the Othman family,
who, in the first three hundred years, deservedly acquired prestige
so great that it has survived a yet longer succession of degenerates,
it has never been supported by an hereditary class of any kind. The
structure of the political and social system of the Ottoman Turks
has always been democratic. The highest posts in the State, equally
with the lowest, were accessible to all, irrespective of merit, often
by mere personal favour, or even, it would seem, by chance, without
consideration of birth or wealth. The unique exception to this, where
members of the same family rose to the highest position of the State
under the Sultan, was that of the Kiuprili family.
Mahomet Kiuprili, the first of this remarkable stock, was of Albanian
descent. His grandfather had migrated to Kiupril, a small town in
Amasia, in Asia Minor, whence the family took their name. Their
position must have been a very humble one, for Mahomet commenced his
career as kitchen-boy in the palace of the Sultan. He rose to be chief
cook and, later, steward and grand falconer, and thence by favour of
the harem was appointed as governor successively of Damascus, Tripoli,
and Jerusalem, acquiring in all of them the reputation of a just, firm,
and humane ruler. At the full age of seventy, on the advice of the
Sultana Validé, he was finally appointed Grand Vizier, in spite of the
protests of all the pashas, ulemas, and other officials, who alleged
that Kiuprili was in his dotage, that he could neither read nor write,
and that he was quite incompetent for the post. Never were experts more
mistaken. Kiuprili only consented to take the post upon the conditions,
solemnly swore to by the Sultana Validé on behalf of her son, who was
then only fifteen years of age, that all his acts as Grand Vizier would
be ratified by the Sultan without examination or discussion, and that
he would have a free hand in the distribution of other offices and in
the award of honours. He further fortified his position by getting from
the Mufti a _fetva_ sanctioning by anticipation all his measures.
Armed with this authority, Kiuprili entered upon the work of his
high office, and at once proceeded to use his powers with inflexible
firmness and with the utmost severity. He emulated Sultan Murad IV
in his relentless war against wrongdoers of every class, high and
low, throughout the Empire. There was not the same spirit of cruelty
or bloodthirstiness as in Murad’s case, but there was the deliberate
policy to extirpate abuses by the forcible removal of those concerned
in them. Corrupt officials, unjust judges, incompetent officers in the
army, and mutinous soldiers were promptly put to death. The same fate
befell those who were suspected of intriguing against the new Vizier.
It was said that during his five years of office thirty-five thousand
persons were executed by his orders. The number included a great many
mutinous soldiers. The principal executioner at Constantinople admitted
that he had strangled four thousand persons of some position during
this period. Terrible as was this retribution on wrongdoers of all
kinds, there cannot be a doubt that in the main it was salutary. The
effect of Kiuprili’s inflexible will and determination was speedily
apparent throughout the Empire. Corruption and injustice were stayed.
Disorders of all kinds were repressed. Discipline and subordination
were restored in the army.
Kiuprili, by his vigorous action, was able to extinguish the revolts
in Asia Minor and elsewhere. He reconstructed the Ottoman navy, with
the result that naval supremacy was again asserted in the Ægean Sea
and the war with Venice took a favourable turn. The islands of Lemnos
and Tenedos were recovered by the Porte. The siege of Candia was again
prosecuted with the utmost vigour.
Kiuprili practically ruled the Empire with unquestioned authority
for five years, till his death in 1661. In prospect of that event he
obtained from the Sultana Validé and the Sultan the reversion of the
Grand Vizierate for his son, Ahmed Kiuprili. On his deathbed he is said
to have given to the young Sultan the following heads of advice:—
Never to listen to the advice of women.
Never to allow a subject to become too rich.
To keep the treasury of the State well filled.
To be always on horseback and to keep the army on the move.
Ahmed Kiuprili, when he succeeded his father as Grand Vizier in 1661,
was only twenty-six years of age. He has rightly been considered by
Turkish historians as the most eminent in the long list of statesmen
of the Ottoman Empire, with the exception only of Sokolli. He had been
given the best of education by his father, and had early experience
in public affairs as governor of a province. He had all his father’s
inflexible will and firmness, without carrying them to excess by
wholesale executions. For a year after his accession to power he
continued his father’s régime of severity, but when he felt assured of
his position he relaxed it, and thenceforward his administration was
humane and just. He had most engaging manners, dignified and modest.
He spoke with reserve and without verbiage. He ruled the Empire for
fifteen years, until his death in 1676. During this time he enjoyed the
full confidence of Sultan Mahomet, who, though he had reached the age
of twenty when Ahmed Kiuprili was appointed Grand Vizier, and might in
due course have taken part in public affairs, devoted himself wholly to
the pleasures of the chase and never interfered with the conduct of
affairs by his great minister.
Ahmed was a most strict observer of the religious precepts of Islam.
In spite of this, he was noted for his enlightened tolerance of
other religions. He abolished the restrictions against the building
of churches by the Christian subjects of the Porte. He did his best
to improve the condition and lighten the burden of the rayas. His
administration was free from abuses. He gave an example to all below
him by refusing to take money for appointments to offices or for
any administrative acts. He kept the treasury well filled, in spite
of the many wars he was engaged in. It was, in fact, in the civil
administration of the Empire that his ability and wisdom were chiefly
conspicuous. His military career was chequered, for though he succeeded
in adding to the Empire not a few important territories, he encountered
for the first time in its history a great and historic defeat at the
hands of the Austrians and a second serious defeat by the Poles.
In 1663 war broke out with Austria, and the Grand Vizier, in command
of an army of a hundred and twenty thousand men with a hundred
and twenty-three guns, crossed the Danube at Belgrade and marched
northwards to Neuhausel, one of the three most important strongholds
in the hands of the Austrians, which, after a siege of five weeks, was
compelled to surrender. Meanwhile the Khan of the Crimea, at the head
of a horde of irregular horsemen, overran Moravia, committing the most
frightful devastation and carrying off eighty thousand Christians as
captives for sale as slaves.
After the capture of Neuhausel, Ahmed Kiuprili took other minor
strongholds in the neighbourhood, and then returned to Belgrade for
winter quarters. In the following year he again issued from Belgrade
with his army and marched to Neuhausel. He then crossed the River Mur
and captured Serivar, and on July 26 he reached Komorn, on the River
Raab, on the frontier of Hungary and Styria. The Austro-Hungarian
army, under the command of the Comte Montecuculi, a general of great
reputation—an Italian by birth and the rival of Turenne—held a position
on the River Raab not far from Komorn. It was greatly inferior in
numbers to that of the Ottomans. But since the last great battle
between the two Powers at Cerestes the Austrians had greatly improved
in the quality of their generals and officers and in their armaments.
The discipline of the Ottoman troops was no longer what it had been,
and they had not kept pace in the improvement in guns.
On August 1, 1664, the two armies met near to the Convent of St.
Gotthard, which gave its name to a memorable battle. In spite of their
great numerical superiority, the Ottomans met with a severe defeat,
largely due to the charge of heavy cavalry of the Austrians, under
the command of Prince Charles of Lorraine, soon to become famous as a
general. The Turks lost ten thousand men, many of whom were driven into
the River Raab and were drowned. Thirty thousand of their cavalry, who
were spectators of the battle from the other side of the River Raab,
took to flight when they saw the issue of the battle and abandoned
fifteen guns. The Grand Vizier was able to draw off the main body of
his army without further loss. The Austrian losses were heavy, and they
made no effort to follow up their victory. The battle, however, was of
supreme importance, for it was the first great defeat of the Ottomans
in the field by the Austrians. It broke the prestige of the former,
which had been unquestioned since the battle of Mohacz in 1526.
In spite of their victory, the Austrians were willing to negotiate with
the Grand Vizier for terms of peace, and ten days after the battle a
treaty was signed at Vascar, where the Turks were encamped. It was, in
the main, a renewal of the treaty of Silvatorok. So far as it differed,
it was favourable to the Ottomans. It provided that Transylvania was to
be evacuated by both Austrians and Turks. It recognized Apafy, whose
claims had been maintained by the latter, as prince of that province,
subject to payment of tribute to the Sultan. Serivar and Neuhausel were
to remain in the hands of the Sultan. Of seven palatinates occupied
by the Ottomans, four were to remain in their hands and three were
to be restored to the Emperor. Ahmed Kiuprili had every reason to be
satisfied with this treaty. Though defeated in a pitched battle, he
had added to the Empire of the Sultan. He led his armies into winter
quarters again at Belgrade at the end of October, and on his return to
Constantinople received a popular ovation.
In 1667 Ahmed entered upon another campaign. He was determined to bring
to a successful issue the siege of Candia, which for so many years had
baffled all the efforts of his predecessors. He landed in the island of
Crete with large reinforcements. The city of Candia was defended with
the utmost tenacity and courage by the Venetians, under the command
of Morosini, later famous for the conquest of the Morea. Ahmed spent
nearly three years before the city. He urged on the siege with great
engineering skill. The Venetians made every effort to retain possession
of the city and of the island by offers of large sums of money. Ahmed
Kiuprili proudly replied to these overtures: “We are not money-dealers.
We make war to win Candia, and at no price will we abandon it.”
In the course of 1669 the prospect of a successful defence of the
city was increased by the arrival of a French fleet, commanded by
the Duc de Noailles, and having on board the flower of the French
nobility and six thousand soldiers. They were joined later by auxiliary
squadrons of the Pope and the Knights of Malta. The combined fleet,
consisting of seventy vessels, bombarded the Ottomans from the sea,
while the besieged opened fire on their front. The allies hoped to
place the Turks between two fires and to draw them from the trenches
which invested the city by land. The attack, however, failed owing
to the accidental blowing up of some of the attacking vessels. This
brought confusion into the whole line. A sortie of the garrison was
also unsuccessful. Later, a serious misunderstanding arose between
Morosini and the Duc de Noailles, which led to the departure of the
allied fleet and the abandonment of the city to its own resources. The
garrison was now reduced to four thousand men capable of bearing arms.
Defence against the overwhelming forces of the Turks was impossible.
Terms of surrender were agreed to. The siege, which had lasted for
nearly twenty-five years, was brought to an end. Favourable terms were
accorded to Morosini and the garrison. The whole island fell into the
hands of the Ottomans, and shortly after this a treaty of peace was
effected with the Republic of Venice, which recognized the transfer of
Crete, with the exception of three small ports on its coast, which were
retained for commercial purposes.
A third war was undertaken in 1672 by Ahmed Kiuprili against Poland in
support of the Cossacks of the Ukraine, who had risen against their
oppressors, the Poles, and had appealed to the Porte for protection
against the invasion of their country by Sobieski. It was decided by
Ahmed to support these insurgents. An army of six thousand was sent
there, in concert with a much larger force of Tartars from the Crimea.
The Czar of Russia joined with the King of Poland in protesting against
this intervention of the Porte. The proud answer of the Porte was:—
God be praised, such is the strength of Islam that the union of
Russians and Poles matters not to us. Our Empire has increased in
might since its origin; nor have all the Christian kings that have
leagued against us been able to pluck a hair from our beard. With
God’s grace it shall ever be so, and our Empire shall endure to the
Day of Judgment.
Ahmed Kiuprili himself, in a letter written in his own hand to the
Polish envoy, defended his action in terms which might well have been
quoted later when the Christian subjects of Turkey rose in arms against
their oppressors and claimed the assistance of Russia.
The Cossacks [he said], a free people, placed themselves under the
Poles, but being unable to endure Polish oppression any longer,
they have sought protection elsewhere, and they are now under the
Turkish banner. If the inhabitants of an oppressed country, in order
to obtain deliverance, implore the aid of a mighty emperor, is it
prudent to pursue them in such an asylum? When the most mighty
and most glorious of all emperors is seen to deliver and succour
from their enemies those who are oppressed, and who ask him for
protection, a wise man will know on which side the blame of breaking
peace ought to rest. If, in order to quench the fire of discord,
negotiation is wished for, so let it be. But if the solution of
differences is referred to that keen and decisive judge called ‘the
Sword,’ the issue of the strife must be pronounced by God, by whose
aid Islam has for a thousand years triumphed over its foes.[26]
In the campaign of 1672, the important city of Kaminiec, the capital
of Podolia, was captured. The King of Poland then sued for peace,
and the treaty of Bucsacs was agreed to, under which the province of
Podolia was ceded to the Sultan. The treaty, however, was disavowed
by Sobieski and the principal nobles of Poland. They renewed the war
against the Turks. It lasted for four years. In 1673 the Turkish army,
under Ahmed Kiuprili, met with a crushing defeat from the Poles, under
Sobieski, near Choczim. His camp was surprised. The Wallachians and
Moldavians deserted him on the field and went over to the enemy. There
was great slaughter of the Turks. In the following year the Turks
returned to the charge, but were again worsted. In 1675 Sobieski,
aided by the Russians, gained another great victory over the Turks at
Lemberg. But in the following year the Turks, under the command of
Ibrahim Pasha, turned the tables on the Poles. The superior resources
of the Turks, under the able administration of Kiuprili, told at last
in their favour. Sobieski, who had become King of Poland, was defeated.
The whole of Podolia fell into the hands of the Ottomans. Sobieski was
now willing to come to terms. Under the treaty of Zurawna (October 27,
1676) terms rather more favourable than those under the repudiated
treaty of Bucsacs were conceded to the Ottomans. Podolia was ceded to
them.
Ahmed Kiuprili died a few days after the signature of this treaty
from the effect of drink. Though he had incurred severe defeats at
the hands of the Austrians and Poles, he had retrieved them by his
persistence and by the effective use of the resources of the Empire,
which he enlarged by the province of Podolia, the island of Crete,
and the district of Neuhausel and Serinvar, in Hungary. These entitle
him to be ranked among the makers of the Empire so far as Europe was
concerned. His enlightened administration, his humane and just bearing,
his insistence on equal justice for all, irrespective of religious
creeds, his strict observance of his plighted faith in public and
private affairs, in matters great and small, his patronage of science
and literature, earned for him a place in the first rank of Turkish
statesmen.
It was hoped in many quarters that the Sultan would appoint as
successor to Ahmed Kiuprili his brother, Zadé Mustapha Kiuprili, who
had shown as governor of provinces that he had many of Ahmed’s high
qualities. In an evil moment Mahomet conferred the post of Grand
Vizier on his son-in-law, a favourite companion in the chase, Kara
Mustapha—the black Mustapha—who was notorious for his bloodthirsty
disposition and his avidity and corruption. This seems to have been
one of the few acts of the Sultan Mahomet IV where he exercised his
royal prerogative, for as a rule he left everything to his Vizier, when
appointed, and cared for nothing but the pleasures of the chase. A
more unfortunate appointment could not have been made. Thirteen years
elapsed before Zadé Kiuprili was at last invested with the office. They
were years fraught with disaster to the Empire.
The first military effort of the new Grand Vizier was to lead an army
in 1678 across the Danube into the Ukraine. He came into conflict there
with the Russians as well as the Poles, and met with a severe defeat.
The war, however, simmered on with varying results till 1681. Peace was
then concluded with Russia, and the Turks gave up the disputed country.
In 1682 the population in that part of Hungary which was under the
rule of the Emperor Leopold revolted against his bigoted tyranny.
Kara Mustapha thought that this afforded an opportunity for attacking
Austria. He seems also to have been inflated with ambition to create
a kingdom for himself. He collected an enormous army at Adrianople,
and in the spring of the following year, 1683, he crossed the Danube
at the head of two hundred and seventy-five thousand men, without
counting a horde of irregular Tartars and camp followers. He met with
little resistance in his march northwards till he reached the walls of
Vienna at the head of two hundred thousand men. The Emperor, on his
part, was very ill-provided with troops to meet this enormous host of
invaders. He had no more than thirty-five thousand men under arms.
Of these, eleven thousand were left to garrison Vienna, and the main
body was quite insufficient to meet the Turks in the field. In his
peril the Emperor appealed for aid to Sobieski, the King of Poland.
The Poles had very recently concluded peace with the Turks. But this
made no difficulty. Sobieski undertook by treaty to send an army of
fifty thousand men in support of the Emperor. There was a clause in the
treaty of a significant character. It was not to be annulled by any
future dispensation of the Pope. The Polish army, however, was at some
distance and could not reach Vienna in less than eight weeks. There
can be little doubt that if Kara Mustapha had pressed the siege with
vigour Vienna must have fallen before the arrival of the Polish army.
This second great siege of Vienna began on July 15, 1683. The Emperor
and his family fled to Bavaria. The fortifications of Vienna had
been much neglected and offered no serious obstacle. But the city
was heroically and obstinately defended by its commander, Count von
Stahremberg, who emulated Count Salms of the first siege. Twenty
thousand of its citizens enrolled in its defence. The Turkish batteries
shattered the walls. There were frequent sorties without avail. It was
said that the Ottoman army, with its enormous superiority in numbers,
might easily have carried the city by storm, but that Kara Mustapha
hoped to gain it by capitulation, in which case the wealth of the city
would be at his own disposal as representative of the Sultan, whereas,
if it were taken by assault, the great booty would fall mainly to the
soldiers. He delayed, therefore, the final attack. Meanwhile Sobieski
had time to bring up his army from Poland and to join Prince Charles
of Lorraine, who was in command of the Imperial troops, making a total
force of eighty thousand. They crossed the Danube at Tulm by a bridge
of boats, and then made a detour through a most difficult country
behind the Kalemberg, so as to attack the Turkish army before the city
from the rear. Kara Mustapha was guilty of incredible neglect in not
offering resistance to the crossing of the Danube by the Christian
force, or to their passage through the difficult country behind the
Kalemberg. On September 6th rockets from the Kalemberg announced to the
garrison of the city that the relieving army had occupied these heights
behind the Turkish camp.
When Sobieski saw the great array of the Turkish camp exposed to
attack, he felt very confident of success. He contemptuously said of
the Grand Vizier: “This man is badly encamped. He knows nothing of war.
We shall certainly beat him.” In an address to his troops he said:—
Warriors and friends, yonder on the plains are our enemies, in
numbers greater indeed than at Choczim, where we trod them underfoot.
We have to fight them on a foreign soil, but we fight for our own
country, and under the walls of Vienna we are defending those of
Warsaw and Cracow. We have to save to-day not a single city but the
whole of Christendom, of which the city of Vienna is the bulwark.
The war is a holy one. There is a blessing on our arms and a crown
of glory for him who falls.... The infidels see you now above their
heads, and with hopes blasted and courage depressed are escaping
among the valleys destined to be their graves. I have but one command
to give—Follow me! The time is come for the young to win their
spurs.[27]
Kara Mustapha, when he saw the Christian army on the heights above
him, made immediate preparations for battle. He gave orders for the
massacre of thirty thousand Christian captives, mostly women and
children, taken prisoners on the route to Vienna and destined to be
sold as slaves. Leaving the best of his men, the Janissaries, in the
trenches before the city, he concentrated the main part of his army to
meet the attack of the Poles from the rear. Sobieski ranged his army
in a great semicircle and made a general advance against the Turks.
The Tartar irregulars fled and carried confusion to the rest of the
army. Sobieski then led his best troops direct against the centre
of the Turks. The mass of the Ottoman army was broken and routed.
Terrible slaughter followed, and the whole of the Turkish camp, with
immense booty, fell into the hands of the Christians. The Janissaries
in the trenches before the city were then attacked on two sides, by
the victorious Poles from the rear and by the Viennese garrison on the
front. They were cut to pieces and annihilated. The victory of Sobieski
was complete and final. Three hundred guns, nine thousand ammunition
wagons, and twenty-five thousand tents were captured.
The Turkish army was driven from the field and, panic-stricken, took
to flight. Untold thousands of them were killed, together with great
numbers of pashas and generals. Kara Mustapha escaped with the mob of
fugitives, carrying with him the sacred banner of the Prophet. The
débris of the army found its way to Raab, and thence to Buda, where the
Grand Vizier ordered the execution of some of the best officers of the
army, whom he falsely accused of being responsible for the disaster.
He himself then made his way to Belgrade, where, in his turn, he was
put to death, with much more justification, by order of the Sultan.
His immense and ill-gotten wealth was confiscated by the State. He had
lived in unprecedented splendour. In his harem were fifteen hundred
concubines, attended each by a servant, and seven hundred eunuchs
to guard them. His own personal servants and horses were counted by
thousands.
The second siege of Vienna, thus brought to so glorious an end by
its brave garrison and by Sobieski, differed essentially from that
undertaken by Sultan Solyman in 1529. Solyman was compelled to raise
the siege and to retreat by the failure of food and munitions. He met
with no reverse in the field, and he was able to withdraw his army
intact. Mustapha fought a pitched battle against a very inferior army
coming in relief of the city, and was defeated, and his army was routed
and broken up. There never was a greater disaster to an army or to a
general. It brought most serious results to the Ottoman Empire. It
broke once for all the prestige of the Turks as a conquering nation.
It removed the fear of an Ottoman invasion which for two centuries had
been a nightmare to the Central States of Europe.
The attack on Vienna was practically the last effort of the Ottomans
to extend their Empire into an enemy’s country. Henceforth they were
almost always on the defensive. It will be seen that the defeat of the
huge army by Sobieski resulted in the loss to the Turks of the greater
part of their conquests in Hungary, and that, in a few years, it led to
their being driven across the Danube.
Sobieski and Lorraine, after their great victory in front of Vienna,
followed it up with vigour. At Paskenay they fell into an ambuscade
prepared for them by the retreating Turks and lost two thousand men,
but two days later they attacked the enemy and defeated them with
great slaughter. The bridge of boats across the Danube by which the
Turks retreated was broken by the rush of fugitives and seven thousand
were killed or drowned. The Christian army then pressed on to Gran
and invested and captured that important fortress. It had been in
possession of the Turks for many years. Henceforth it was a rampart of
Austria and Hungary against them. This concluded the year’s campaign.
The Austrians and Poles went into winter quarters.
Meanwhile the effect of the great victory at Vienna was to stimulate
other Powers to join the combination against the Turks. The Pope
preached another crusade against them—the fourteenth. The Republic of
Venice fitted out a fleet, which was joined by galleys of the Pope,
the Knights of Malta, and the Grand Duke of Tuscany. In the following
year this fleet attacked and captured the island of Santa Maura and the
city of Prevesa, at the entrance to the Gulf of Arta. A Venetian army
also invaded Bosnia and Albania.
In this year also (1684) the Austrians, under Lorraine, issuing from
Gran, crossed the Danube and attacked and defeated the Turks at Warzen,
and again in another battle before Buda, and then besieged that
fortress. But after some weeks they were compelled by the rainy season
and disease in the army to raise the siege and retreat. Meanwhile
another Austrian army advanced into Croatia and fought and defeated the
Turks. As a result of this the province of Croatia, which had been for
one hundred and fifty-one years under Turkish rule, was freed from it,
and was thenceforward an Austro-Hungarian possession.
In the following year, 1685, the Austrians made further progress. The
important stronghold of Neuhausel, which twenty-two years previously
had been captured by the Turks, was now recaptured after a desperate
resistance. Of its garrison of three thousand men only two hundred
survived. The women and children of the Turks were sold to landowners
in the Austrian Empire. The capture of this city was the cause of great
rejoicing throughout Europe. In 1686 the siege of Buda was renewed. The
Imperial army consisted of ninety thousand men—Germans, Hungarians, and
Croats. It was under the command of the Prince of Lorraine. The siege
was commenced on June 18th. Three attempts to relieve it under Grand
Vizier Solyman failed. After six weeks of siege the Austrians assaulted
and captured the city. Its brave defender, Abdi Pasha, and its garrison
perished, and the city was given up to ruthless sack. The city had been
in possession of the Turks for a hundred and forty-five years, and
during this time had resisted successfully six sieges. It now passed
finally into the hands of the Hungarians.
The campaign of the following year, 1687, was opened on the Drave. The
Grand Vizier led an army of fifty thousand men and sixty-six guns. It
met the Austrians at Mohacz on the very field where, a hundred and
sixty years previously, the Hungarians had been defeated in the battle
which gave one-half of their country to the Turks. The Ottomans were
now in their turn defeated and routed. Twenty thousand of them were
killed, while the loss of the successful army was only a thousand.
Slavonia was in the same year cleared of all Turkish forces, and was
permanently restored to Austria, while in Transylvania the Voivode
Apafy, who owed his position to the Turks, now turned against them.
Meanwhile the Venetians had been equally successful during the past
three years. Their army, under Morosini, invaded the Morea in 1686,
captured all its strongholds, and drove the Turks from the country.
They also successfully invaded Dalmatia. In 1687 they attacked and
captured the Piræus and Athens. It was on this occasion that the
Parthenon, which, in spite of many centuries of war and dangers of
all kinds, still existed in all its original grandeur and beauty,
was irreparably ruined. The Turks had made use of it as a powder
magazine, thinking probably that it was safe from attack. A bomb from
the Venetian batteries exploded there, whether purposely or not, and
converted the temple into a ruin as we now see it. The whole of Greece
was now practically in the hands of the Venetians. The Greek population
had given no aid to the Turks in resisting the new invaders. They had
soon to learn that there was little to choose between their old and
their new masters. If anything, the Venetians proved to be the more
tyrannical and rapacious.
On the conclusion of the campaign of 1687 in Hungary the Turkish
army, as a result of its long series of defeats, was seething with
discontent, and was almost in a state of mutiny. Its leading officers
met and petitioned the Sultan, demanding the dismissal and execution
of its general, the Grand Vizier Solyman. They elected Siawousch
Pasha as their general. The army then retreated across the Danube
to Philippopolis, and thence to Adrianople, from whence it sent a
deputation to the Sultan to enforce its views. The Sultan summoned
a great Council of State, at which it was decided to accede to the
demands of the army. Siawousch Pasha was appointed Grand Vizier in
place of Solyman, who was soon after put to death by order of the
Sultan. It was hoped by this concession to appease the army, and to
prevent its march to Constantinople. The army, however, persisted
in its threatening attitude and renewed its march to the capital.
It now increased its demands. It insisted on the deposition of the
Sultan. There was general concurrence in this among officials at
Constantinople. Mustapha Kiuprili, the brother of the late Ahmed
Kiuprili, who was Kaimachan, and performed the duties of Grand Vizier
in his absence from the capital, called an assembly of ulemas at St.
Sophia. He addressed them in these words:—
Since the Padishah thinks only of diverting himself in the chase, and
at the time when the Empire is assaulted from all quarters we have
seen him dismiss all men capable of repairing our misfortunes, can
you doubt any longer that the dethronement of a Padishah who thus
conducts the affairs of the State is legally permitted?
The ulemas unanimously concurred. They decided on the dethronement
of Sultan Mahomet and his replacement on the throne, not by his son,
but by his legal heir, his next brother, Solyman. They then betook
themselves to the abode in the Seraglio where that prince was secluded,
called him forth, and announced to him their decision, citing in favour
of it a verse from the Koran: “We have named you to be Khaliff of the
country.”
There was no opposition to this. Solyman, who had spent his life in
seclusion, in constant fear of being murdered by his brother, and
who was only saved by the brave efforts of the Sultana Validé, his
mother, came out of what was virtually a prison to be invested with the
insignia of Sultan. Mahomet, who had reigned as Sultan for thirty-nine
years, which he had devoted wholly to the chase, to the neglect of
every duty of his great office, retired to the secluded building which
his brother had occupied so long. He died there a few years later,
regretted by no one.
Von Hammer gives a detailed account of one of Sultan Mahomet’s
organized expeditions in pursuit of game, which may be worth quoting
as an illustration of his pursuits and character. The scene of it was
between Adrianople and Tirnova, and it occurred in 1683, the year in
which his army was engaged in the invasion of Austria and on the siege
of Vienna. Thirty thousand peasants were brought from all parts for
the purpose of beating the woods and putting up the game. For their
subsistence a levy was made on the district of 150,000 marks. This
battue cost the lives of a great number of beaters, who succumbed to
the fatigue of the operations. Many rayas were brought from as far as
Belgrade for the occasion. The Sultan, on seeing the bodies of those
who had perished, said to his followers: “These men would doubtless
have rebelled against me. They have received their punishment in
anticipation of this.”
Mahomet, it would seem, owed his deposition not so much to his own
callous neglect of his duties as Sultan as to the arrogant incapacity
of Kara Mustapha in his campaign against Vienna and the imbecility of
the two succeeding Grand Viziers, Ibrahim and Solyman.
Solyman, who thus mounted the throne in 1687, at the age of forty-one,
showed greater capacity than was to be expected after his long
seclusion in ‘the Cage,’ but he was quite unequal to the task of
controlling the mutinous Janissaries. They filled Constantinople with
riot and slaughter. They pillaged the palaces of the viziers and
others. They attacked the harem of the Grand Vizier Siawousch, whom
they had so recently elevated to the post. He was killed in bravely
defending his harem. His favourite wife and sister were dragged naked
through the streets after being cruelly mutilated. The disorder of the
capital became so unendurable that the population rose in arms and
assisted the authorities in resisting the Janissaries. Their Agha and
principal officers were put to death, and order was at last restored.
In the spring of the next year, 1688, a well equipped army was sent
to the Hungarian frontier, in the hope of retrieving the defeats of
the past five years. The Austrians, however, had made good use of the
interval. They had now three armies in the field, under the command of
Prince Charles of Lorraine, Prince Louis of Baden, and Prince Eugène
of Savoy—all three generals of exceptional ability. They invested the
fortress of Erlau and captured it. The road to Belgrade now lay open to
them. This supremely important city, the bulwark to the Balkans and the
gateway to Hungary, was treacherously surrendered by its garrison in
August 1688 after a bombardment of only twenty-one days. Prince Louis
of Baden about the same time invaded Bosnia and occupied a great part
of it. Dalmatia revolted and threw over Turkish rule. Nisch was later
occupied by the Austrians, and Widdin, on the Danube, fell into their
hands. By 1689 the only fortresses in Hungary remaining to the Turks
were Temesvar and Warardin.
Farther eastward the Turks had been more fortunate. An army of
Tartars from the Crimea overran Poland in 1688 and defeated a Polish
army on the Sereth. In the following year, when Russia joined in the
combination against the Ottomans and sent an army into the Crimea,
it met with a severe defeat. These were the only rays of light to
the Turks. Elsewhere they met with a succession of disasters. The
Balkan provinces, for the first time since the days of Hunyadi, were
threatened by the Austrians. Parts of Bosnia and Serbia were in their
hands. The whole of Greece and Albania had been conquered by the
Venetians, under Morosini, and the Turkish fleets had been swept off
the Mediterranean by the combined fleets of Venice, the Pope, the
Knights of Malta, and the Duke of Tuscany. On the Ottoman side no
single general of any capacity had appeared.
It was under these conditions that a general council of the Empire was
summoned at Adrianople at the end of 1689. After a long discussion,
it advised the Sultan to appoint as Grand Vizier Zadé Kiuprili, who
had been passed over by Sultan Mahomet IV in favour of the corrupt and
incompetent Kara Mustapha after the death of Ahmed Kiuprili. After
thirteen years of misgovernment and calamity this third member of the
Kiuprili family was called to power. He showed at once great vigour
and capacity. Addressing the chief dignitaries of the Empire, he
described the perilous condition of affairs: “If we go on as we have
been in the past, another campaign will see the enemy encamped before
Constantinople.” He took immediate steps to restore the financial
position.
Zadé Kiuprili repleted the treasury by heavy contributions on the
officials, who had enriched themselves at the expense of the public. He
filled the ranks of the army by calling out veterans. He revived the
Ottoman navy. He fitted out a flotilla of vessels for service on the
Danube. He replaced a number of incompetent and corrupt governors by
honest men on whom he could rely. He endeavoured to win the support of
the Christian rayas throughout the Empire. He issued imperative orders
to all governors and pashas that no one should be allowed to oppress
the rayas. No taxes were to be levied on them except the capitation
tax. He allowed the Christians everywhere to build churches, though he
himself was a most strict Mussulman. He freed trade from many unwise
and unnecessary restrictions. He was personally austere and simple in
his habits, very reserved in his utterances. It was said of him that
he never committed a crime and never used a superfluous word. He was
commonly called ‘Kiuprili the Virtuous.’ Unfortunately for his country,
he held the post of Grand Vizier for less than two years, for it will
be seen that he was killed in battle in 1691.
At the time when he assumed the Grand Vizierate the Austrians had
crossed the Danube and had advanced far into Macedonia. Kiuprili sent
an army against them and defeated them in two engagements. As a result,
nearly all the important posts south of the Danube were recovered and
the pressure on the Empire in this quarter was removed. Zadé Kiuprili
now took command of the army in person, and in August, 1690, advanced
through Bulgaria, drove the Austrians from their position between
Sofia and Nisch, and besieged and captured the latter place. He then
attacked and captured in succession Semendria, Widdin, and Belgrade.
Another Ottoman army under Tekeli Pasha invaded Transylvania and drove
the Austrians from it. Kiuprili returned to Constantinople covered with
glory.
About this time Sultan Solyman died and was succeeded by his brother,
Achmet II, who, like himself, had been brought up in the seclusion
of the Seraglio, and was quite incompetent to rule the Empire or to
lead its armies. Fortunately he left matters in the hands of his Grand
Vizier. Kiuprili again led the army in the field and, advancing from
Belgrade in May, 1696, marched northwards on the right bank of the
Danube to meet the Austrians under Prince Louis of Baden, who were
advancing from Peterwardein. The two armies met at Salankemen. Their
flotillas engaged on the Danube and the Turks were there the victors.
But on land the battle ended in great disaster to them. Against the
advice of the most experienced of his generals, Zadé Kiuprili insisted
on fighting, without waiting for reinforcements that were on their way.
A most desperate battle took place in which the Turks were completely
defeated. The Grand Vizier, in the hope of restoring the fortunes of
the day, rushed into the mêlée, sword in hand, and was killed while
hewing his way through the Austrian ranks. The Turkish troops were
dispirited by the death of their general and gave way. Panic and rout
followed. The Turkish camp and a hundred and twenty guns fell into
the hands of the Austrians. About the same time Tekeli Pasha was also
defeated by the Austrians and was driven out of Transylvania. The
Ottoman Empire was again at a very low ebb after these disasters.
Sultan Achmet died heartbroken by the burden of shame and grief, and
was succeeded by his nephew, Mustapha II, the son of Mahomet IV.
The new Sultan was not wanting in the will to relieve the plight of
his country, but it will be seen that he had not the capacity or the
persistency required in such an emergency. He fully recognized that the
main causes of disaster were the dissolute habits and incapacity of his
predecessors. Immediately after his accession to the throne he issued a
Hatti-Scheriff in which he announced his intention of restoring ancient
usages and leading his armies in person. In the course of this notable
document he said:—
Under monarchs who are the slaves of pleasure or who resign
themselves to indolent slumber, never do the servants of God enjoy
peace or repose. Henceforth voluptuousness, idle pastime, and sloth
are banished from this Court. While the Padishahs who have ruled
since the death of our sublime father Mahomet have heeded naught
but their fondness for pleasure and for ease, the unbelievers, the
unclean beings, have invaded with their armies the four frontiers of
Islam. They have subdued our provinces. They have pillaged the goods
of the people of Mahomet. They have dragged away into slavery the
faithful with their wives and little ones. This is known to all, as
it is known to me. I therefore have resolved, with the help of the
Lord, to take a signal revenge upon the unbelievers, that brood of
hell; and I will myself begin the holy war against them.... Do thou,
my Grand Vizier, and ye others, my viziers, my ulemas, my lieutenants
and agas of my armies, do ye all of you assemble round my person
and meditate well on this my imperial Hatti-Scheriff. Take counsel
and inform me if I ought to open hostilities in person against the
Emperor or remain at Adrianople. Of these two measures choose that
which will be most profitable to the Faith to the Empire and to the
servants of God.[28]
In response to this, the Divan met and discussed for three days whether
the new Sultan should command in person the army about to be sent
against the Austrians. They came to an adverse decision. They thought
that it would not only expose the sacred person of the Sultan to too
much risk, but would also involve excessive expense. They probably
thought also, but scarcely dared to express it, that the Sultan, being
quite inexperienced in military matters, would be an encumbrance to
the army. They advised the Sultan that he ought not to commit his
imperial person to the chances of a campaign, but would do better to
leave the conduct of the war to the Grand Vizier. The Sultan replied
in the laconic words, “I persist in marching.” In accordance with
this decision, Mustapha in person, in spite of his inexperience,
led a well appointed army in the summer of 1696 from Belgrade to
Temesvar, capturing on the way various minor fortified places. His
first encounter with the enemy near Temesvar was successful. The
Austrians were defeated with heavy loss and Temesvar was relieved.
Mustapha, however, did not pursue his success further. He returned to
Constantinople and there received an ovation.
In the following year, 1697, Mustapha again marched with his army
from Belgrade into Hungary, without any definite plans as to what he
proposed to do. After many councils of war and much irresolution, it
was decided to advance northwards to the River Theiss. The Austrian
army was now under command of Prince Eugène of Savoy, who, we have
seen, made his début at the siege of Vienna. He was the ablest general
of his time. The two armies met at Zenta on the River Theiss, about
sixty miles above its junction with the Danube. The Turks had erected
a bridge over the river at this point. The Sultan and his cavalry,
and a great part of the artillery, had already crossed the bridge.
The infantry were still on the other side. Prince Eugène with his
army, coming suddenly upon them, caught the Turkish army _in flagrante
delicto_, divided by the river. Advancing in a wide crescent, he
attacked the whole line of the Ottoman infantry who had not crossed
the river. There was great confusion in the ranks of the Ottomans and
discord among the leading officers and a want of direction. A large
body of Janissaries mutinied on the field of battle and began to
massacre their officers. There ensued an overwhelming defeat of the
Ottomans. Twenty-six thousand Turks were slain on the battlefield and
ten thousand were drowned in their attempt to cross the river.
The Grand Vizier, four other viziers, and a great number of pashas
and thirty aghas of Janissaries were killed; four hundred and twenty
standards were captured. The Sultan, who had witnessed the battle
from the other side of the river in comparative safety, was able to
escape with some of his cavalry to Temesvar, and thence he returned to
Belgrade and Constantinople. This experience satisfied his military
ardour, and he never again appeared at the head of his army. An
immense booty fell into the hands of the Austrians. All the Turkish
guns were captured. What remained of the army defeated at Zenta found
its way to Belgrade, and thence returned to Adrianople, while Prince
Eugène crossed the Danube into Bosnia and made himself master of the
greater part of that province. This great victory of the Austrians,
after fourteen years of almost uninterrupted success, decided not only
the campaign but the war in their favour, and marked irrevocably the
decadence of the military power of the Ottoman Empire.
Six days after the battle the Sultan, in his peril, turned once more
to the Kiuprili family for help. In place of the Grand Vizier, who had
been killed at Zenta, he appointed Hussein Kiuprili, a son of the elder
brother of Mahomet Kiuprili, and therefore a cousin of Ahmed. Until
the siege of Vienna he had given himself up to a life of pleasure, but
after that grave defeat of the Turks he filled with great distinction
many high posts in the government. He was the fourth member of his
family to hold the position of Grand Vizier, and showed himself fully
capable of bearing the burden.
In the course of the following winter of 1697-8, many efforts were
made to bring about peace. Lord Paget, the British Ambassador, offered
the mediation of Great Britain and Holland on the principle of _Uti
possidetis_—that each of the Powers concerned, Austria, Venice, and
Poland, were to retain what they had wrested from Turkey. Hussein
Kiuprili summoned a great Council of State to consider this. He
had personally fought at St. Gotthard and other battles, and fully
recognized the superiority of the Austrian army. The Ottomans, since
the siege of Vienna, had been defeated by them in nine great battles,
and had lost by siege nine fortresses of the first rank. He felt that
if the war were prolonged there would be further reverses of the same
kind. At his instance, it was decided by the Council to accept the
mediation of Great Britain and Holland. The other Powers, with the
exception of Russia, were equally willing. The Czar, Peter the Great,
alone objected, and warned the other Powers not to trust in Great
Britain and Holland, who, he said, were only thinking of their own
commercial interests. In spite of his efforts, it was decided to hold a
Peace Congress, at which all these Powers, including Russia, eventually
were represented. It was held at Carlowitz, not far from Peterwardein,
on the Danube, and after seventy-two days’ discussion and negotiation
it resulted in peace on the basis suggested by Lord Paget. Austria,
it was finally agreed, was to retain possession of Transylvania and
Sclavonia and of all Hungary north of the River Marosch and west of
the River Theiss. This left to the Ottomans only about one-third of
their previous dominions in Hungary. The Emperor also was relieved
from payment of tribute in respect of Hungary and Transylvania. The
Republic of Venice was to retain the Morea and Albania, but was to give
up its conquests north of the Isthmus of Corinth—the only departure
from the principle of _Uti possidetis_. The Republic was also relieved
from payment of tribute to the Porte in respect of the island of
Zante. Poland was to retain Podolia. Russia was to have Azoff and
the districts north of the Sea of Azoff which were actually in her
occupation. The Czar Peter was dissatisfied with this and refused
to enter into a treaty upon these terms. He would only agree to an
armistice for two years on this basis. The other three Powers concerned
entered into treaties of peace for twenty-five years.
This treaty of Carlowitz was of supreme importance in the international
relations of Europe. It recognized for first time that the status of
the Ottoman Empire was a matter for the concern of all the Powers
of Europe, and not only of those at war with it. It established the
principle of equality of the Powers concerned, and rejected finally
the pretensions of the Ottoman Empire, founded on its long career of
conquest. Thenceforth there was no longer any fear of the invasion of
Central Europe by the Turks. The settlement was not so ignominious to
them as the later treaties of Passarowitch, Kainardji, Adrianople, and
Berlin, but not the less it was a great triumph for the Christian
Powers of Europe. In view of the long series of defeats of the Ottoman
army and the exhausted state of the Empire, Hussein Kiuprili acted
the part of a wise statesman in assenting to the treaty. If his
advice and that of other members of his family had been followed, and
the Christian subjects of the Empire had been treated with justice,
later humiliations might have been avoided, and the Empire might have
survived intact to a much later date.
Hussein Kiuprili retained the post of Grand Vizier for three years
after the treaty of Carlowitz. During this time he showed that he
had most of the qualities of his more distinguished relative, Ahmed
Kiuprili. He was a man of high culture and public spirit. He did his
best by wise and salutary reforms to stem the growing evils of the
State. He aimed at curbing the mutinous power of the Janissaries. He
endeavoured in many ways to improve the deplorable condition of the
rayas. His reforms met with violent opposition from reactionaries. His
health broke down under the stress and he was compelled to resign his
post. He died within a few weeks, in 1702. His reforms did not survive
him. His successor, Daltaban Pasha, was a man of a totally different
type, a savage Serbian, who could neither read nor write, and who had
acquired a reputation for gross cruelty which he fully justified in his
more exalted position.
Once again, in 1710, another member of the Kiuprili family, Nououman
Kiuprili, was appointed Grand Vizier, but though he had many of the
virtues of his race he did not prove to be equal to the post. He
insisted on attempting to do too much. He interfered with every detail
of the State and accumulated the hostility of all his subordinates. The
affairs of the government fell into confusion and he was in consequence
deposed after a very few months. The names of five other members of the
same family appear in the history of the next few years as generals and
governors of provinces.
It may be doubted whether in the annals of any country a single family
has produced so many distinguished men, owing their position, not to
personal favour, but to their own merits and to the exigencies of the
State. The case is unique in the history of Turkey, where it would be
difficult to find another instance where two members of any family rose
to distinction.
XIV
TO THE TREATY OF PASSAROWITCH
1702-18
MUSTAPHA did not long survive as Sultan the death of his great Vizier,
Hussein, the fourth of the Kiuprilis. He had not fulfilled the early
expectation of his reign, when, against the advice of the Divan, he
took command of his army in the field. Disappointed and discouraged
by his failure, he fell back on a life of indolence and debauchery.
After the death of Hussein Kiuprili there was widespread discontent
throughout the Empire, and in most parts imminent danger of rebellion.
Mustapha had not the courage to cope with it. He abdicated the throne
and retired voluntarily to the Cage. He was succeeded by his brother,
Achmet III, at the age of thirty, who reigned for twenty-seven years
till he was deposed at the instigation of the Janissaries.
Achmet had not been subjected by his uncle to the customary seclusion.
He came to the throne, therefore, with greater knowledge of the world.
He was not a warrior. He did not attempt to lead his armies in the
field. But he did not allow the affairs of State to fall into the hands
of women of his harem. Neither did he permit ambitious Viziers to
monopolize power. He changed them so often that this was impossible.
During the first fifteen years of his reign there were twelve Grand
Viziers. It was imputed to him that these frequent changes were due
to his want of money and the extravagances of his harem. It was the
custom for Grand Viziers, on their appointment, to make very large
presents in money to the Sultan, and Achmet looked on this as a source
of income. But during their short tenures of office he interfered very
little with them. He was, however, personally in favour of a policy
of peace, and supported his Viziers in its maintenance. The first six
years and the last twelve years of his reign were periods of almost
unbroken peace to the Empire. In the other nine years there were many
important events bearing on the extension or reduction of his Empire.
Territory formerly in the possession of the Ottomans was reconquered,
and provinces long held by them were lost. The city of Azoff and its
adjoining territory—important for the protection of the Crimea—were
recovered from Russia. The Morea and Albania were reconquered from the
Republic of Venice. By agreement with Russia a partition was made of
important provinces belonging to Persia, some of which had formerly
been in the possession of the Porte. On the other hand, as the result
of war with Austria, the remaining part of Hungary, not included in
the cession made by the treaty of Carlowitz, and considerable parts of
Serbia and Wallachia were lost to the Empire. The gains in territory
exceeded in area the losses. But there can be little doubt that the
loss of prestige by the Ottomans from the defeats of their armies by
the Austrians under Prince Eugène was not compensated for by victories
over the Venetians and Persians, or over the very inferior army of
Peter the Great.
The first of the wars thus referred to was that with Russia, then under
the rule of Peter the Great. He was ambitious of extending his Empire
by the acquisition of the Crimea, and of thus getting access to the
Black Sea. It was only after the defeat of Charles XII, the King of
Sweden, at the battle of Pultowa in 1709, and the consequent conquest
of Livonia, that his hands were free for aggression elsewhere. Russia
was already in possession of the important fortress of Azoff, on the
north-east shore of the sea of that name. The Czar had also fortified
Taganrog and other places threatening the Crimea. The Porte was alarmed
by these manifest preparations for war. The relations of the two
Governments were also embittered by the fact that the Swedish King,
Charles XII, after his defeat at Pultowa, sought refuge in Turkey,
and that the Sultan accorded a generous hospitality to him, and with
great magnanimity refused the demand of Peter for his extradition. It
followed that, in 1711, the Porte anticipated the undoubted hostile
intention of the Czar, and declared war against Russia. An army was
sent by the Sultan across the River Pruth into Moldavia, under command
of Grand Vizier Baltadji. This pasha had risen to his post from the
humble position of woodcutter at the palace, through the intrigues of
his wife, who had been a slave in the Sultan’s harem. The Czar, on his
part, had collected his forces in the south of Poland and marched into
Moldavia. The two armies met on the River Pruth. The Russian army,
already greatly reduced in number by want of food and disease, numbered
no more than twenty-four thousand men. The Ottomans, who had been
reinforced by a large body of Tartars, under the Khan of the Crimea,
were at least five times more numerous. The Czar Peter, unaware that
the Ottomans had crossed the Danube, advanced rashly on the right bank
of the Pruth, and was posted between that river and an extensive marsh
not far from Zurawna. The position was dominated by hills, which the
Grand Vizier occupied in force, and his numerous and powerful guns
swept the position of the Russians, cut off their access to the river,
and completely hemmed them in. Their plight is best described in a
letter which the Czar wrote to the Russian Senate at Moscow from his
camp at this point:—
I announce to you that, deceived by false intelligence and without
blame on my part, I find myself shut up in my camp by a Turkish army.
Our supplies are cut off, and we momentarily expect to be destroyed
or taken prisoners, unless Heaven should come to our aid in some
unexpected manner. Should it happen to me to be taken prisoner by the
Turks you will no longer consider me as your Czar and Sovereign, nor
will you pay any attention to any orders that may be brought to you
from me, not even if you recognize my handwriting; but you will wait
for my coming in person. If I am to perish here, and you receive well
confirmed intelligence of my death, you will then proceed to choose
as my successor him who is most worthy among you.
There can be no doubt that the Russian army was completely at the mercy
of the Ottomans, and might have been entirely destroyed or captured.
It was saved from either fate by the Czar’s wife, Catherine. She was
the daughter of a peasant, married in the first instance to a dragoon
in the Russian army, and later the mistress of Prince Menschikoff.
Peter, smitten by her beauty and wit had recently married her, and
she was with him on this campaign. This lady, with great presence of
mind, collected what money she could, to the value of a few thousand
roubles, and sent it and her jewellery with a letter to the Kiaya of
the Grand Vizier, suggesting a suspension of hostilities with a view
to terms of agreement. In this way relations were established between
the two generals, and a treaty of peace was agreed to. Its terms were
very humiliating to Russia. Azoff and its surrounding district were to
be surrendered to the Porte. Taganrog and some other fortresses were
to be dismantled. The Russian army was to withdraw from Poland. The
King of Sweden was to be allowed safe conduct through Russia to his
own country. There was to be no Russian ambassador in the future at
Constantinople. In return for these great concessions the Russian army
was to be permitted to retreat without molestation.
The preamble to the treaty contained the following remarkable admission
of the predicament in which the Czar and his army were placed:—
By the grace of God, the victorious Mussulman army has closely hemmed
the Czar of Muscovy with all his troops in the neighbourhood of the
River Pruth, and the Czar has asked for peace, and it is at his
request that the following articles are drawn up and granted.
It was also declared in the treaty by the Grand Vizier “that he made
the peace by virtue of full powers vested in him, and that he entreated
the Sultan to ratify the treaty, and overlook the previous evil conduct
of the Czar.”
The signing of the treaty of the Pruth was vehemently opposed by the
King of Sweden, who was in the Ottoman camp, and by the Khan of the
Crimea. They doubtless had good reasons of their own for wishing the
war with Russia to be prolonged. It was due to their intrigues at
Constantinople that violent opposition was roused to the ratification
of the treaty. Baltadji found on his return that, instead of being
received with acclamation for having recovered Azoff and other
territory, of which the Porte had been deprived a few years previously,
he was dismissed from his office with disgrace. The Kiaya Osman and the
Reis Effendi Omer, who were believed to be largely responsible for the
treaty, were put to death by order of the Sultan.
The Porte refused to ratify the treaty, and preparations were made
for a renewal of the war with Russia. But wiser counsels ultimately
prevailed, largely through the advice of the British Ambassador, Sir R.
Sutton; and two years later, after long negotiation, another treaty was
concluded with the Czar, which embodied all the terms of that effected
by Baltadji which had been so much objected to.
Many historians have found fault with Baltadji for having neglected
the opportunity of destroying or capturing the Russian army and the
Czar Peter himself, and for having allowed them to escape by concluding
the treaty. It has been suggested that he was bribed by the Empress
Catherine. It is, however, inconceivable that one in the high position
of Grand Vizier, where there were such immense opportunities for
enrichment, could have sold himself and his country for so small a
price. It is more probable that the presents of the Empress were made
to the subordinate of the Grand Vizier for the purpose of opening
negotiations with him. It is also more reasonable to conclude that
Baltadji was convinced that no better terms could be obtained by a
prolongation of the war. The destruction of the Russian army or its
capture, together with the Czar, would have roused the Russian people
to a great effort to avenge such a disaster. It is significant that the
Sultan, while putting to death the Kiaya and Reis Effendi, spared the
life of Baltadji, who was mainly responsible, and simply dismissed him
from the office of Grand Vizier. This seems to indicate that the Sultan
had given authority in advance to Baltadji, as stated in the treaty, to
agree to terms such as were actually obtained. It seems to be unlikely
that Sultan Achmet desired to extend his Empire beyond the territory
of Azoff into the heart of Russia. What better terms, then, could have
been obtained by prolonging the war?
It has also been contended by some historians that it was unwise
policy to impose such a humiliation on the Czar as that embodied in
the treaty; that it was certain to lead to a renewal of the war for
the purpose of avenging it. But the Czar himself did not apparently
take this view of the case. After the escape of his army from disaster
he showed no inclination to renew the war. He was willing, two years
later, to re-enact the treaty, in spite of its humiliating terms. He
did not break peace with the Turks in the remaining ten years of his
reign. He did not bear a grudge against them and after a few years he
entered into an arrangement with the Sultan for the partition of a
large part of Persia.
On a review of the whole transaction, we must conclude that the Grand
Vizier Baltadji was fully justified in effecting the treaty of the
Pruth, and that it was no small achievement, by the skilful manœuvring
of his army and without the loss of a single life, to impose terms
on the Czar, under which the Ottoman Empire recovered Azoff and its
district, the key to the Crimea, and obtained the other valuable
concessions embodied in the treaty.
In 1715 the Porte embarked on another war, this time against the
Republic of Venice, with the object of recovering the Morea, which
sixteen years previously had been conquered by the Republic, when in
alliance with Austria, and the possession of which had been confirmed
to the Republic by the treaty of Carlowitz. Morosini, the Venetian
general by whom this conquest had been achieved, was now dead. It was
thought that Austria would not intervene. A pretext for the war was
found in the assistance which the Republic rendered to the Montenegrins
in an insurrection against the Porte. The army, which had been equipped
for war with Russia, was now available for other purposes. The Grand
Vizier Damad, who was also otherwise known as Coumourgi, son-in-law of
the Sultan, took command of an army of a hundred thousand men. A fleet
of one hundred sail co-operated by sea. The Sultan himself accompanied
the army as far as Larissa, in Thessaly, but no farther. He left the
direction of it wholly in the hands of Damad, who showed great ability
in the conduct of the war. It commenced with the siege of Corinth,
which, after a brave defence of three weeks, capitulated on July 7,
1715, on favourable terms. But a powder magazine blew up during the
evacuation of the fortress, killing six or seven hundred of the Turkish
soldiers. This afforded an excuse for breaking the agreement, and for
a general massacre of Venetians and Greeks, whether of the garrison or
inhabitants—much to the disapproval of Damad. This siege of Corinth
formed the subject of Lord Byron’s well-known poem, in which Damad is
referred to under the name of Coumourgi:—
Coumourgi—can his glory cease,
That latest conqueror of Greece,
Till Christian hands to Greece restore
The freedom Venice gave of yore?
A hundred years have rolled away
Since he refixed the Moslem sway.
With poetic licence Byron attributes to the Venetian governor of
Corinth the setting fire to the powder magazine and the fearful
destruction of life which it caused:—
When old Minotti’s hand
Touched with the torch the train—
’Tis fired.
There seems to have been no more justification in fact for this than
for the statement that the Venetians gave liberty to the Greeks.
Nothing is more certain than that the Greeks hated the rule of Venice
as more oppressive than that of the Turks.
After the capture of Corinth the Ottoman army, in two divisions,
invaded the Morea, and had no difficulty in capturing all the Venetian
fortresses there, such as Modon, Coron, and Navarino. The Greek
inhabitants gave no assistance to their Venetian masters. They welcomed
the Turks as their deliverers from an odious tyranny.
The reconquest of the Morea occupied Damad and his army for only a
hundred and one days. There was no pitched battle with the Venetians.
The campaign consisted of a succession of sieges of fortresses. It
was the intention of the Ottomans to complete the expulsion of the
Venetians by the capture of Corfu and the other Ionian islands, but at
this stage the Emperor of Austria, Charles VI, intervened, and entered
into a defensive alliance with the Republic of Venice. It was too late,
however, to save the Morea. There was much difference of opinion at the
Court of the Sultan whether the action of Austria should be treated as
a _casus belli_. The Grand Vizier Damad vehemently contended that it
was a breach of the treaty of Carlowitz. He was a man of great force of
character and very eloquent. But there was strong opposition to him.
The debates in the Divan, in presence of the Sultan, have been recorded
and are interesting reading. The Mufti, when consulted on the subject,
gave his judgment in favour of Damad. This decided the Council. War was
declared against Austria, and in 1716 an army of a hundred and fifty
thousand was sent, under command of Damad, to attack the Austrians. It
reached Belgrade in September. A council of war was then held to decide
whether to advance towards Temesvar or Peterwardein. There was again
difference on the subject. Damad ultimately gave his decision in favour
of the latter project.
The Turks crossed the River Saave by a bridge of boats, and then
marched along the bank of the Danube towards Peterwardein. Their van
came in contact with that of the Austrians at the village of Carlowitz,
where, sixteen years before, the last treaty had been signed. From
Carlowitz to Peterwardein the distance is only two leagues. The
Austrian army, greatly inferior in numbers to that of the Turks, was
posted in front of the great fortress, behind entrenchments which had
been made by Siawousch Pasha in the last war. It was again commanded
by Prince Eugène of Savoy, who, in the interval, had gathered fresh
laurels in many hard-fought battles for Austria, and who was second to
no living general, save only the Duke of Marlborough, by whose side
he fought so many battles. The two armies came to issue on August
10, 1716. At first the battle went in favour of the Ottomans. Their
redoubtable Janissaries broke the line of the Austrian infantry opposed
to them. Prince Eugène then brought up his reserve of cavalry. They
charged the Janissaries with irresistible force, and retrieved the
fortunes of the day. Damad Pasha, when he saw that the tide of battle
was turning against him, put himself at the head of a band of officers
and galloped into the thick of the battle, in the hope of infusing
fresh courage in his army. He was struck down and was carried from the
field to Carlowitz, where he died.
As so often happened to the Turks, the loss of their leader caused a
panic in their ranks and completed their discomfiture. Their left wing
retreated in the direction of Belgrade, and was followed by the débris
of the rest of the army. One hundred and forty of their guns were
captured. Their camp and an immense booty fell into the hands of the
enemy. The battle, however, was not very costly in men to either side.
The Austrians lost three thousand men and the Turks about double the
number. Eugène followed up his success by the siege of Temesvar, the
last great stronghold of the Ottomans in Hungary. He appeared before it
twenty days after the battle of Peterwardein. Its garrison of eighteen
thousand men capitulated, after a siege of five weeks, on November
25th. This completed the campaign of 1716. The Turks had not been more
successful in other directions. They were compelled to raise the siege
of Corfu. Their fleet often met that of the Venetians and had rather
the worst of it, though there was no decisive battle.
In the year following, 1717, another large army was sent from
Constantinople to the Danube, under Grand Vizier Khalil, who had
succeeded Damad after the battle of Peterwardein. It consisted of
a hundred and fifty thousand men, of whom eighty thousand were
Janissaries and Spahis. It was no more fortunate than that under Damad
in the previous year. Prince Eugène, still in command of the Austrians,
had opened the campaign by marching to Belgrade with a force of not
more than seventy thousand men. He besieged the city and fortress,
which was garrisoned by thirty thousand Ottomans. When, after three
weeks of siege, the Ottoman army came in sight, so vastly superior in
numbers, the position of Eugène was most critical. The garrison of
Belgrade was in front of him and Khalil’s army, double in number of his
own, threatened his rear.
It is highly probable that if the Ottoman general had attacked the
Austrians without delay he would have been successful. He hesitated and
delayed. He ended by an effort to besiege the besiegers. He entrenched
his army in the rear of that of Eugène. The two armies then fired their
heavy guns on one another without much result. The Turks were greatly
superior in this respect. They were provided with a hundred and forty
guns and thirty-five mortars. Failure of food would have compelled
the Turks to an issue. But Prince Eugène anticipated this by making
an attack himself on the Ottoman lines. Never was a bolder course
attempted by a general, and never was there a more brilliant success.
With greatly inferior force, the Austrians stormed the Turkish lines
on August 16, 1717, little more than a year from the day on which the
battle of Peterwardein had been fought. The Ottomans gave way along
their whole line. Twenty thousand of them were killed or wounded, while
the loss of the Austrians in killed was no more than two thousand.
Prince Eugène himself was wounded for the thirteenth time in his great
career. The Turks retreated in disorder. They lost a hundred and
thirty-one guns and thirty-five mortars and a vast supply of munitions.
On the following day Belgrade and its garrison of thirty thousand men
surrendered.
After the battle before Belgrade and the capture of that fortress, the
Austrians advanced and occupied a great part of Serbia and Western
Wallachia. They appealed to the Serbian people to rise against their
Ottoman masters, but not more than twelve hundred answered the appeal
and joined the Austrian army. There was no desire on the part of the
Serbians to exchange Turkish for Austrian rule. The occupation by the
Austrians of territory south of the Danube proved to be temporary.
Twenty-two years later the Ottomans recaptured Belgrade and drove the
Austrians from Serbia.
Meanwhile the Grand Vizier Khalil was dismissed from office by the
Sultan for the incapacity which he had shown in the campaign and in the
battle of Belgrade. After a time he was succeeded by Damad Ibrahim,
a son-in-law and lifelong favourite of the Sultan, who held the post
for twelve years, till the deposition of Achmet in 1730. He proved
himself in every way worthy of his high office. There was a desire
in many quarters to embark on another campaign for the recovery of
Hungary. But in the winter of 1717-18 the British Ambassador again
proposed mediation, on behalf of England and Holland, on the principle
of _Uti possidetis_. This was accepted by both Austria and the Porte.
The Emperor was willing to content himself with what he had already
achieved, the more so as there was danger of war in other directions.
There was more difficulty on the part of the Ottomans. But the Sultan
and the Grand Vizier ultimately gave their decision in favour of peace.
The precedent of the Congress of Carlowitz was closely followed. A
congress was held at Passarowitch, a small town in Serbia. England and
Holland again acted as mediators. After long discussion, agreement was
arrived at, and was embodied in a treaty known as that of Passarowitch,
on July 21, 1718. By its terms the whole of what remained of Hungary
to the Ottoman Empire after the treaty of Carlowitz, a large part of
Wallachia, bounded by the River Aluta, and the greater part of Serbia,
and a portion of Bosnia bounded by the Rivers Morava, Drina, and Unna,
together with the fortresses of Belgrade and Semendria, were ceded to
the Emperor.
The Republic of Venice, on whose behalf Austria had embarked on the
war, fared badly by the treaty. It had to give up to Ottoman rule the
whole of the Morea which had been reconquered by Damad, but received
some concessions in Dalmatia. It was, however, arranged by the Congress
that the Porte should have an access to the Adriatic, so as to protect
the Republic of Ragusa from Venice. There remained to Venice of its
possessions in this quarter only the island of Corfu, the other Ionian
islands, and a few ports on the Albanian and Dalmatian coasts. The
Porte engaged by the treaty to put a stop to the piracy of Algiers,
Tunis, Tripoli, and Ragusa, and to prohibit the residence of the
Hungarian rebels in the vicinity of the new Austrian frontier.
The treaty of Passarowitch, following on the great defeats of the
Ottomans at the battles of Peterwardein and Belgrade, was almost as
important as that of Carlowitz. It determined finally the release of
the whole of Hungary from the Ottomans. Their rule there had never
been more than a military occupation. There was no real incorporation
of the country in the Ottoman Empire. There had been no attempt to
settle Turks there, or to impose the Moslem religion on its population.
After the expulsion of the garrisons from the various fortresses, all
vestiges of the Ottomans disappeared, and no trace of them remained
as evidence that they had ever been masters there.[29] It was a great
achievement of the Austrians, for which Prince Eugène was mainly
responsible. It should be added, however, that there does not appear to
have been any popular rising of the people of Hungary, whether Magyars
or Sclavs, either in these last two years of war or in the previous
war of 1698-9, against their Ottoman rulers. It has been shown that
the earlier war had its commencement in an insurrection against the
Austrians in that part of Hungary subject to their rule. The Turks
hoped to take advantage of this. They appear to have been in close
relation with these insurgents throughout these two wars. The Austrians
defeated the Turks and drove them out of the country, but their bigoted
tyranny was not more acceptable to the inhabitants than that of the
Turks. Many years were to elapse before the Magyars of Hungary secured
for themselves the benefits of self-government.
The war with Austria, which resulted in the treaty of Passarowitch, did
something more than free Hungary from Ottoman rule. It completed the
destruction of the prestige of the Turkish armies which had so long
weighed on the mind of Europe. The great battles of Peterwardein and
Belgrade, in which the Turks were defeated by Austrian armies of very
inferior numbers, following as they did a long succession of similar
defeats from the battle of St. Gotthard downwards, showed conclusively
that the Ottoman armies were no match for the well-disciplined forces
of Austria when led by competent generals. The Ottomans seem to have
been completely cowed by the succession of defeats. Thenceforth they
were always on the defensive in Europe, and never willingly acted the
part of aggressors. It became the settled conviction of Europe not only
that there was no longer any reason to fear invasion from the Turks,
but that it was only a question of time when they would be driven back
into Asia.
XV
TO THE TREATY OF BELGRADE
1718-39
THE remainder of Sultan Achmet’s reign, till his deposition in 1730,
was a period of uninterrupted peace, so far as Europe was concerned.
Damad Ibrahim retained his post as Grand Vizier for twelve years,
during which he had the absolute confidence of the Sultan and
practically ruled the Empire. His policy was distinctly favourable to
peace. The only disturbance to it was on the frontier of Persia. That
kingdom was in a state of commotion. Its feeble and incompetent ruler,
Shah Hussein, was subverted by an Afghan adventurer, Mahmoud. Hussein’s
son, Tahmasp, appealed to the Czar of Russia and to the Sultan of
Turkey for aid to recover his kingdom. Peter the Great offered his
support in return for the cession of provinces in the Caspian and Black
Sea, and sent an army to take possession of them. This greatly alarmed
the Porte, and it threatened war with Russia. Eventually, however, war
was avoided. An agreement was arrived at, in 1723, between the two
Powers for the partition between them of the greater part of North
Persia. The Porte was to have as its share the provinces of Georgia,
Erivan, Tabriz, and Baku. Russia was to have Schirvan and the other
provinces already promised to it by Tahmasp. Russia was practically
already in possession of its share. The Porte had to send an army
to conquer the provinces which were to be its portion. It met with
some opposition, but the cities of Erivan and Tabriz were captured.
This brought the Porte into conflict with Tahmasp, but eventually
an agreement was arrived at. Tahmasp was thrown over, and Mahmoud
recognized the sovereignty of the Porte over the provinces referred
to. It is not worth while entering further into details of these
transactions, for it will be seen that in a few years Persia, under
Nadir Khan, acting on behalf of Tahmasp, recovered these provinces.
After a reign of twenty-seven years a mutiny broke out against Achmet
among the turbulent Janissaries, headed by Patrona, an Albanian soldier
in their ranks. It speedily spread among the whole body of soldiers,
and was supported by the dregs of the population of the city and by a
band of criminals whom they had released from prison. It was probably
promoted by enemies of the Grand Vizier. There was much want of vigour
in dealing with the outbreak at its early stage. Subsequent events
under Achmet’s successor showed that it was not really of a formidable
character and that it might easily have been put down at its inception
by strong measures against its ringleaders. It was allowed, however,
to gather head and to spread. It was said that the mutiny was due
to the unpopularity of the Sultan, his profuse expenditure, and the
great pomp he maintained. This scarcely seems to afford a sufficient
explanation. It has also been suggested that among other causes was the
discontent of the soldiers on account of the long peace and the lack of
opportunity for loot, and perhaps also the expectation of the customary
large presents on the accession of a new Sultan. When the rebels got
the upper hand they made no substantial proposals for a new policy.
The Sultan, at an early stage, consulted his sister, the Sultana
Khadidjé, who advised him to keep his ministers close at hand, so that
he might save his own life at their expense, if the rebels would be
satisfied by a concession of this kind. He appears to have followed
this advice. He lost his head in the crisis, and quailed before the
mutineers. He entered into parleys with them. They demanded the
surrender to them of three of the principal ministers. Achmet asked
whether they wished these ministers to be handed to them alive or dead.
They unanimously agreed that they wished to have the dead bodies. The
Sultan thereupon had the base and incredible meanness to order that his
Grand Vizier—his lifelong friend, married to his daughter—the Capitan
Pasha, and the Kiaya were to be strangled and their bodies given up to
the mutineers. This did not content the Janissaries. They demanded the
deposition of the Sultan. Achmet then offered to abdicate the throne
on condition that his life and those of his children should be spared.
They agreed to this. Achmet thereupon summoned before him his nephew,
Mahmoud, whom he acclaimed as Padishah in place of himself and made
obeisance. He then retired to the Cage from which Mahmoud had emerged,
and there spent the remainder of his life in seclusion.
Mahmoud, the son of Mustapha II, succeeded at the age of thirty-four.
Achmet had not treated him with the same generosity that he had himself
experienced from Mustapha II, but had insisted on his seclusion in the
Cage. After spending so many of his best years in this way, Mahmoud
was unfitted for active duties as head of the State. He had a turn
for literature, and was a generous patron of public libraries and
schools; but as regards the direction of affairs of the Empire he was
wholly incompetent. He fell completely under the influence of the
Kislaraga, the chief eunuch of his harem, Bashir by name, who acted as
his secretary. Bashir had been an Abyssinian slave, and was bought for
the Sultan’s harem for 30 piastres. Little is known of the personality
of this man, save that, from behind the curtain of the harem, he
practically exercised supreme power for nearly thirty years, and died
at a very advanced age, leaving a fortune of more than thirty millions
of piastres and immense quantities of valuables. These included more
than eight hundred watches, set with precious stones, which, it must be
presumed, were the gifts of applicants for appointments. Bashir made
and unmade Grand Viziers at his will, and if any one of them complained
of Bashir’s interference with his duties, that was the more reason for
his instant dismissal. In Mahmoud’s reign of twenty-four years there
were sixteen Grand Viziers. In any case, it must be admitted that the
success of Mahmoud’s reign, such as it was, and the continuity of
policy, were mainly due to this aged eunuch.
In the first few weeks of the new Sultan’s reign the supreme power of
the State was practically in the hands of the rebel Janissaries, under
the leadership of Patrona and Massuli, who were soldiers in their
ranks. These men soon made themselves intolerable by their insolence
and bravado. Patrona installed his concubine in one of the Sultan’s
palaces, and when she gave birth to a child there, insisted on the
Sultana Validé treating her with all the courtesies due to royalty.
He insisted also on the appointment as Hospodar of Moldavia of his
personal friend, a Greek butcher named Yanaki, who had lent him money.
The bolder men about the Sultan determined to get rid of these men.
The Janissaries and other soldiers who had joined in the deposition of
Achmet were brought to a better frame of mind by large distributions
of money. They promised to obey their officers, on condition that no
punishment should be awarded to them for their part in the rebellion.
Patrona and Massuli and twenty-one of their leading adherents were then
summoned to a meeting of ministers at the palace, and were massacred
there in presence of the Sultan himself. Within three days seven
thousand of the rebellious Janissaries were put to death.
Pacification having thus been effected at the capital, attention was
turned to Persia, where, as has been pointed out, a partition treaty
with Russia had assigned a large part of that kingdom to the Porte,
but the possession of which had not yet been obtained. In the meantime
a brigand chief, Nadir, later to become world-famous as the invader
of India, had taken service under Tahmasp, the son of the dethroned
Hussein. Nadir succeeded in driving the Afghans out of Persia and
reinstating Tahmasp as Shah. He proceeded, however, to usurp the power
of that feeble monarch, and eventually got himself accepted as Shah
in place of Tahmasp. He declared war against the Turks in 1733-5 and,
after defeating them in several engagements, compelled them to sue for
terms of peace. The Porte was the more ready to accede to terms as
war with Russia was imminent. A treaty of peace was therefore agreed
to with Nadir in 1735, under which all the provinces which were the
subject of the partition treaty with Russia were restored to Persia.
Russia also, in prospect of war with Turkey, came to terms with Nadir,
and surrendered nearly all the territory which had been acquired under
the partition treaty with Turkey.
Peter the Great had died in 1727, and in 1730 was succeeded by the
Empress Anne, a clever and ambitious woman. She was incited to war
with Turkey by Marshal Munnich, the ablest general whom Russia so
far had produced. He promised to drive the Turks out of Europe. At
Constantinople the eunuch Bashir was in favour of a policy of peace. He
was over seventy years of age and wished to end his days in repose.
He resisted as far as he could every attempt to draw the Sultan into
war. The French Ambassador, under instructions from his Government,
was most anxious to embroil Turkey with Austria. The two maritime
Powers, however—Great Britain and Holland—pulled in the opposite
direction, and peace was maintained as long as possible. But when, in
1735, the Russians, though nominally at peace with Turkey, captured
two fortresses in the neighbourhood of Azoff and threatened that most
important outpost of the Empire, the Porte declared war. A Russian
army of fifty-four thousand men, under command of Marshal Munnich,
then invaded the Crimea. They stormed and broke through the fortified
lines of Perekop at the isthmus of that name, joining the Crimea to the
mainland, hitherto thought to be impregnable. They captured the city
of Perekop, and then overran the whole of the Crimea, devastating it
and massacring its inhabitants by thousands. The Russian army, however,
suffered greatly from exhaustion and disease in the campaign, and it
eventually withdrew from the Crimea before the winter. Another Russian
force, under General Leontiew, captured Kilburn, and a third, under
General Lascy, an Irishman by birth, attacked and captured the city of
Azoff.
Meanwhile the Russian diplomatists discovered that the Emperor of
Austria, Charles VI, was quite as anxious as the Czarina Anne to
possess himself of Turkish provinces, and was ready to enter into a
coalition for the purpose. In the winter of 1736-7 a secret treaty for
this purpose was entered into between the two potentates. But as it
was not thought expedient by the Austrians to commence their attack
until all their preparations for it were completed, a pretence was
made of negotiations with the Porte, who had made overtures of peace
to the Russians. For this purpose a Congress was held at Nimirof early
in 1737. Later it became known that the negotiations on the part of
the two allied Empires were illusory, and that there never was any
intention to come to terms. The Porte, on its part, was extremely
anxious for peace, and was ready to make large concessions, but the
terms suggested on behalf of Russia were so extortionate that it was
quite impossible for the Sultan and his ministers to entertain them.
The Russians demanded the cession of the Crimea, the independence of
Wallachia and Moldavia under a native prince, subject to the supremacy
of Russia, the opening of the Black Sea and access to it through the
Bosphorus and the Dardanelles to Russian vessels of war, and the
payment of fourteen millions of roubles. Austria, on its part, demanded
the cession of the whole of Bosnia and Serbia. Such terms could only
be assented to by the Porte after complete and disastrous defeat. They
were indignantly rejected, and, much against the wish of the Porte, the
Congress came to an end, and the Sultan was forced to take up arms in
defence of his Empire.
A Russian army of seventy thousand men, under Marshal Munnich, opened
the campaign of 1737 by an attack on Oczakoff, the most important of
the Ottoman fortresses on the northern shores of the Black Sea, and
General Lascy, with forty thousand men, again invaded the Crimea.
Oczakoff was vigorously defended by twenty thousand Turks. After some
days of siege the principal powder magazine in the fortress blew up,
causing enormous destruction and loss of life. The Turkish general,
dismayed by this, capitulated on favourable terms. But this did not
prevent the massacre of the greater part of the garrison, and only
three thousand of them survived. The losses of the Russians, chiefly by
disease, were also very great, and nothing more was done by Munnich in
this year’s campaign. Meanwhile Lascy in the Crimea had repeated the
operation of Munnich of the previous year, and eventually retreated
from it.
The Austrians, on their part, invaded Bosnia and Serbia with two
armies. The principal one, under General Seckendorf, attacked and
captured Nisch and, later, Widdin. But this exhausted their efforts for
the year, and most of their army perished from disease in the marshes
of the Danube.
The campaign of 1738 was little more decisive. The Ottomans, with
revived courage, took the offensive, and, advancing into Hungary,
under Grand Vizier Yegen Mahomet, captured Semendria and Orsova. The
Austrians fell back on Belgrade. General Lascy again, for a third time,
invaded the Crimea, but the country had been so devastated by the two
previous invasions that he could find no means there of feeding his
army, and he was soon compelled to withdraw. In the winter great
efforts were made by the Porte to arrive at terms of peace, and it
was willing to make great sacrifices. But Marshal Munnich vehemently
opposed all peace proposals at the Russian Court. He was still inflamed
with the desire to invade Turkey and to capture Constantinople. At
his instance emissaries were sent into the European provinces of the
Ottoman Empire to incite the Christian rayas to rise in arms against
their masters and oppressors—the first instance of the kind.
On the opening of the campaign of 1739 Munnich led his army through
Podolia, a province then belonging to Poland, whose neutrality he
violated. He spread desolation along his march, as though he were
passing through an enemy’s country. He crossed the frontier of Moldavia
and defeated a Turkish army at Khoczim, and then advanced to Jassy, the
capital of the province, and captured it.
Meanwhile the Austrians renewed their attack on Serbia and Bosnia
under two new generals, Wallis and Niepperg. An army of fifty-six
thousand Austrians issued from Peterwardein and marched southwards,
apparently in total ignorance of the strength of the Turkish army which
was advancing to meet them. By great efforts the Porte had raised and
equipped an army of two hundred thousand men, under the Grand Vizier
Elhadji Mahomet. It met the Austrian army at Krotzka, half-way between
Semendria and Peterwardein. The Austrians were defeated, as was to be
expected, in view of the enormous disparity of the two armies. They
fell back again on Belgrade. The Ottomans followed up their victory and
commenced a bombardment of Belgrade.
Nothing could exceed the imbecility and infatuation of the Austrian
generals, Wallis and Niepperg. They were now as anxious to make peace
as they had been boastful and bellicose at the commencement of the
campaign. The French Ambassador, Villeneuve, was with the Turkish army.
His mediation was accepted by the Austrians, and terms of peace were
agreed to, without consultation with the Russian generals. Belgrade and
all the parts of Serbia and Bosnia which had been ceded to Austria by
the treaty of Passarowitch and a great part of Wallachia were restored
to the Ottoman Empire. The victory of the Ottomans at Krotzka and,
still more, the treaty of Belgrade which followed, caused dismay and
indignation to the victorious Russians in Moldavia. It was obviously
impossible for their army at Jassy to make any further advance into
Turkey, or even to hold its own in Moldavia, when an Ottoman army of
two hundred thousand, fresh from victory over the Austrians, was on
their flank on the Danube. Munnich’s grandiose scheme for the capture
of Constantinople was extinguished. It became necessary for the
Czarina to follow the example of the Austrians and to make peace with
the Turks. Terms were ultimately agreed to, under which the Russian
conquests in Moldavia and the Crimea and the city of Oczakoff were
given up. Russia retained only a narrow strip of land on the shores of
the Black Sea. The city of Azoff was to be demolished and its territory
was to form a belt of borderland, uncultivated and desert, between the
two Empires. The Russians were prohibited from maintaining a fleet
either in the Black Sea or the Sea of Azoff.
The two treaties, as a result of the campaign of 1739, were a triumph
for Turkey. They were more due to the imbecility and incapacity of the
Austrian generals than to the valour of the Ottomans, for it was no
great feat of arms for two hundred thousand Turks to defeat fifty-seven
thousand Austrians at the battle of Krotzka. But the strategy of the
Porte in concentrating their main force against the Austrians on the
Danube, while making little resistance to the Russians in Moldavia, was
fully justified.
XVI
TO THE TREATY OF KAINARDJI
1739-74
THE campaign, and the resulting treaty of Belgrade, saved the Ottoman
Empire from further shrinkage for many years. There followed a long
period of peace. This was due not merely to the fact that the Porte
pursued a policy of peace, but because the two great Powers in Europe,
Russia and Austria, who were bent on the dismemberment of Turkey,
were not in a condition to prosecute their aims, and were not able
to enter into any combination for the purpose. In 1740 the Emperor
Charles VI died. This event led to a scramble among the neighbouring
Powers for his inheritance, and to the war known as that of the
Austrian Succession, which was brought to an end by the Treaty of
Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748. This was followed later again by another war,
known as the Seven Years War, which was concluded in 1763. In neither
of these great wars did the Porte take any part, and it is to its
credit that it did not take advantage of them to attempt the recovery
from Austria of any of its lost dominions in Hungary. Till war broke
out with Russia in 1768 there was profound peace.
Sultan Mahmoud died in 1754 and was succeeded by his brother, Othman
II, who reigned for three years only. He was deformed—a hunchback. He
does not appear to have made any change in the foreign policy of his
government. In his three years of reign there were six Grand Viziers,
and it seems probable that the real power of the State was exercised by
the successor to the Kislaraga Bashir, from behind the curtain of the
harem.
Mustapha III succeeded his brother at the age of fifty. He had spent
his life up to this time in seclusion, in the Cage of the Seraglio,
cut off from all contact with, or even knowledge of, public affairs.
For the first six years of his reign he left matters very much in the
hands of his Grand Vizier, Raghab Pasha, the last of the many who had
filled this post under Mahmoud. Raghab proved to be a most wise and
competent statesman, not far behind Sokolli and the Kiuprilis, and,
like them, devoted to a policy of peace.
After the death of Raghab in 1763 Mustapha gradually took into his own
hands the reins of government. Though well-intentioned and with a sense
of public duty, he was feeble, hasty, and impatient, and was wanting
in the most essential faculty of a ruler, that of selecting competent
men as generals and administrators. He abandoned the policy of peace
and allowed himself to be drawn into war, with the most unfortunate
results to his Empire. It was his misfortune that his reign coincided
with those of two such able and unscrupulous neighbouring potentates as
Catherine II of Russia and Frederick the Great of Prussia.
The Empress Catherine was invested with supreme power in Russia in the
year 1762, in place of her worthless husband, after a military revolt.
At her instance, Russia embarked on a policy of aggrandizement against
both Poland and Turkey. Frederick the Great also, who had very recently
favoured an alliance with the Porte with the object of checking the
advance of Russia, now reversed his policy. In 1764 he made a treaty
with the Russian Empress reciprocally guaranteeing their possessions,
and promising assistance to one another, if the territories of either
of them were invaded. But if France were to attack Prussia, or Turkey
to attack Russia, assistance was to be given in money. Very soon
after this an agreement was arrived at between these two Powers for
the dismemberment of Poland and the partition between them of part of
its territory. The Empress of Austria, Maria Theresa, also, though
most unwillingly, became a partner in this scheme. The Porte was much
opposed to this Polish policy of the three conspirators. It protested
strongly but in vain against the occupation of Poland by Russian and
Prussian troops and against all the infamous proceedings which led to
the first partition of Poland. The Russian Government made no effort
to avert war. On the contrary, it showed by many actions a deliberate
intention to drive the Turks into war. It fomented and encouraged
rebellion against the Sultan in the Crimea, the Morea, Montenegro,
and Georgia. It violated the neutrality of Turkey by pursuing Polish
refugees across the frontier of Bessarabia into territory belonging to
the Khan of the Crimea, a vassal of the Sultan, and destroying there
the town of Balta.
At a Divan held at Constantinople in October 1768 it was decided that
Russia, by its proceedings against Poland, had broken the treaty
of Belgrade, and that war against her would be just and necessary.
The only opposition to this came from the Grand Vizier, Mouhsinzade
Pasha. He did not, indeed, object in principle, but he maintained
that it was most unwise to declare war until full preparations had
been made for it. He pointed out that the frontier fortresses were in
a most unprepared state, and that as military operations could only
be commenced by the Turks in the next spring, Russia would be placed
in an advantageous position by an immediate declaration of war. For
this advice, which the sequel fully justified, the Grand Vizier was
dismissed from his office. In his place Emen Mahomet was appointed—a
most incompetent man, knowing nothing about military matters, by his
own admission. As a result of this premature declaration of war, Russia
had full notice, and entered on the campaign of 1769 in Moldavia
before the Porte was ready to send an army to defend that province.
The Empress put into the field three armies. The principal one, under
command of Prince Galitzin, invaded Moldavia and laid siege to Khoczim.
It was not till May 1769 that the Grand Vizier was in a position to
issue from his camp at Babatagli and march to Isakdji, near Ismail.
He there summoned his generals to a council of war and opened the
proceedings by an astounding admission of incompetence. Asking for
their opinion as to what direction his army should be led, he said, “I
have no experience of war. It is for you to determine what operation
shall be undertaken and what are the most favourable chances for the
army and the Sublime Porte. Speak without hesitation and enlighten me
by your counsel.”
The generals were struck dumb with astonishment at this confession of
ignorance and impotence. Eventually a discussion arose. There was great
difference of opinion. As a result, the only decision arrived at was
to cross the Danube into Moldavia, and then proceed as circumstances
might suggest. In fact, there was no definite plan of campaign. The
army, in accordance with this, crossed the Danube. It was then decided
to march to the River Pruth. It reached a point about half-way between
Khoczim and Jassy. But already it suffered greatly from want of food,
for which no preparations had been made. The soldiers also were
harassed by swarms of mosquitoes in the marshes of the Danube and the
Pruth. It was unable to prevent the capture of Khoczim by the Russians.
It was ultimately forced to retreat before coming into serious contact
with the enemy, and it found its way back to the Danube; and thus
concluded the campaign of 1769.
The Russians did little in the early part of 1770. Prince Galitzin was
almost as imbecile and incompetent as the Grand Vizier. The Empress
recalled him and appointed in his place General Romanzoff, a most able
and determined soldier. The Sultan, on his part, recalled Emen Pasha
and gave orders for his execution.
Meanwhile, the Empress Catherine was engaged in carrying out another
part of her ‘Oriental project,’ as it was called. She had sent numerous
emissaries disguised as priests to various parts of Greece with the
object of stirring up rebellion against the Sultan. Under the belief
that a general rising would take place, she sent a great fleet from the
Baltic to the Mediterranean for the purpose of giving support to the
insurgents. It consisted of twelve ships of the line, twelve frigates,
and numerous transports conveying a military force. The expedition was
under the supreme command of Alexis Orloff, the brother of her then
lover, who had led the military revolt which placed her on the throne.
He had expectations that a throne would be found for himself at the
expense of the Turks. The fleet was under virtual, though not nominal,
command of an Englishman, Admiral Elphinstone, who was supported by
numerous other British officers. It was said that every vessel in the
fleet had one of these officers on board. This must have been with the
cognizance and approval of the British Government, which at that time
favoured the aggrandizement of Russia. This fleet left Cronstadt at
the end of 1769, and arrived off the coast of the Morea in February
1770. It was welcomed by a large body of insurgent Greeks (Mairotes)
and a Russian force was landed. The insurgents perpetrated the most
atrocious acts of cruelty on the comparatively few Turks resident in
the district.
The ex-Grand Vizier, Mouhsinzade Pasha, now Governor of the Morea,
showed great vigour. Collecting a force of Albanians, he succeeded in
defeating the insurgent Greeks, fifteen thousand in number, and their
Russian allies. The Russians were compelled to re-embark in their
fleet. The Greeks who remained on shore were subjected to ruthless
slaughter, as were also the inhabitants of the district. The whole
countryside was devastated by the Albanians. The Russian fleet, after
ineffectual attempts to capture Modon and Coron, sailed away. It came
in contact, off the island of Scios, with the Ottoman fleet, not very
unequal in number and size of vessels. A naval battle took place on
July 7, 1770, in which the Turks were worsted. The defeat would have
been the more serious if it had not been for the extraordinary bravery
of one of their captains, Hassan of Algiers, who had gained experience
as a corsair. Laying his vessel alongside of that of the Russian
admiral, he fought with the utmost desperation till both vessels were
blown up.
The defeated fleet sought refuge in the small harbour of Tchesmé, where
it was blockaded by Admiral Elphinstone. The British officers devised a
scheme for destroying the Turkish fleet. Lieutenant Dugdale volunteered
to pilot a fire-ship against them. Before coming to close quarters the
Russian sailors deserted the vessel, and Dugdale alone remained on
board. He steered the vessel against a Turkish ship and set fire to it.
The fire spread to the other vessels, closely packed in the harbour,
and the whole of the Ottoman fleet was burnt and destroyed with the
exception of a single frigate. A more gallant and successful attack has
never been recorded in the annals of naval warfare.
Elphinstone, who had fortunately escaped death—as did also Hassan
the Algerian, when their warships were blown up in the recent naval
battle—then advised that the Russian fleet should sail without delay
to the Dardanelles and force its way through the Straits to the Sea of
Marmora and Constantinople. But Orloff hesitated and delayed, with the
result that the Turks, getting wind of the intention, hastily erected
four batteries at the Dardanelles, two on either side of it, crossing
their fire. These were sufficient to make it impossible for the
Russian fleet to force its way through the Straits.
Orloff and the Russian fleet then proceeded to the island of Lemnos,
where it landed troops and besieged the chief fortress. It was
evidently hoped to secure a base for the fleet in the Ægean Sea. After
sixty days of siege the garrison gave in, and terms of capitulation
were agreed upon with Orloff. In the meantime, however, Hassan had
persuaded the Porte to allow him to make a desperate effort to save
Lemnos. He enlisted four thousand ruffians at Constantinople for this
purpose. When it was pointed out what a hazardous enterprise it was,
the reply was that it mattered little whether it was successful or not.
If successful, Lemnos would be saved; if unsuccessful, Constantinople
would be rid for ever of four thousand of its greatest blackguards.
Hassan landed unexpectedly in Lemnos, and, declining to recognize the
capitulation, attacked the Russians and defeated them, and compelled
them to take to their ships again.
Hassan, after this successful exploit, was made Capitan Pasha of the
Ottoman navy. He managed to collect together another fleet, and engaged
the Russian fleet again off Mondreso. Both fleets claimed victory, but
it would seem that the Russians had the worst of it, for they sheered
off and left these waters. When next heard of, the Russian fleet was
engaged in giving support to Ali Bey, the head of the Mamelukes of
Egypt, who had risen in rebellion against the Turkish pasha there,
and who was now invading Syria. Orloff landed four hundred soldiers
in Syria in support of this rebel. But Ali Bey soon found himself in
difficulties. An outbreak took place in his own army against him,
fomented by his brother-in-law. Ali Bey was defeated and put to death,
and the four hundred Russians were slain in battle. The Porte for a
time recovered its hold on Egypt.
The story of Orloff’s expedition has been told as it is a good
illustration of the use of a naval force which can command the sea in a
war of this kind, and of its inability to undertake operations on land,
or to force its way against land batteries, unless supported by an
adequate army. Orloff’s fleet remained in the east of the Mediterranean
till the close of the war in 1773, but it did not effect anything of
importance.
Reverting to the military operations on the Danube, the autumn campaign
of 1770 was very unfavourable to the Ottoman cause. Khalil Pasha, who
was now in command, proved himself to be no more competent than his
predecessor. Romanzoff, in command of the Russian army, overran the
whole of Moldavia. Khalil led thirty thousand efficient soldiers and a
host of Tartar irregulars against him. The two armies came in contact
at Karkal, where Khalil entrenched himself in front of the Russians,
while his Tartars ravaged the country behind them and threatened their
communications. Romanzoff then stormed the Turkish line. The Turks
fled in panic. Their camp and guns and immense stores fell into the
hands of the Russians. The surviving Turks recrossed the Danube. At the
close of the campaign of 1770 all the Turkish fortresses north of the
Danube were in the hands of the Russians. The Grand Vizier’s army was
practically destroyed. Only two thousand men were left to him under
arms.
In the following year, 1771, still greater disasters attended the
Turks. Prince Dolgorouki, at the head of eighty thousand Russians and
sixty thousand irregular Tartars, invaded the Crimea after storming
successfully the lines of Perekop. The whole province was overrun.
Kertch and Yenikale were captured. Wallachia and Moldavia successively
fell into the hands of the Russians. Khoczim and Jassy were captured.
The only gleams of success to the Turks in this campaign were the
recovery of Giurgevo on the Danube and the successful defence of
Oczakoff and Kilburn on the shores of the Black Sea. In the Caucasus
the Russians were also successful and drove the Turks from Georgia and
Mingrelia.
These repeated successes of the Russians began to cause alarm
to Austria and Prussia, who by no means wished for the undue
aggrandizement of their neighbour. They therefore attempted
negotiations with Russia for mediation on behalf of the Ottoman
Empire. But the Empress Catherine obstinately resisted anything in
the way of interference by other Powers, and made it known to the
Sultan that terms of peace must be settled with herself alone. In his
desperation the Sultan proposed to Austria a joint partition of Poland
as a bribe for assistance against Russia, oblivious of the fact that
he had entered upon war with Russia on behalf of Poland. The offer
was declined by the Emperor, not because he had any objection to a
scheme of plunder, but because he did not consider the Porte to be in a
position to become an effective partner in such a scheme. As a matter
of fact, Austria, Russia, and Prussia were continually negotiating
schemes for the dismemberment either of Poland or Turkey, as might be
most convenient to them.
At the end of the campaign of 1771 an armistice was agreed to between
Russia and the Porte, and the greater part of the following year was
occupied in discussing terms of peace at a conference or congress at
Bucharest. An ultimatum was eventually presented by Russia, embodying
terms of what might seem to be a very moderate character, in view of
the great success of her armies and the extent of territories which
they had practically conquered. The Sultan himself and his Grand Vizier
and principal ministers and generals were in favour of accepting the
terms as offered, but the Mufti and the whole body of the ulemas were
vehemently opposed to them. The Divan therefore rejected them and war
was renewed. As these terms did not substantially differ from those
which were accepted two years later, it is not worth while at this
stage to explain them.
Meanwhile there had been for more than a year a suspension of
hostilities, and a breathing time had been afforded to the Porte,
during which strenuous efforts were made for another campaign. At the
end of 1772, Mouhsinzade Pasha, who had so distinguished himself in the
defence of the Morea, was again appointed Grand Vizier. He infused new
vigour into the army. In the spring of 1773, when the negotiations at
Bucharest were brought to a conclusion, hostilities were recommenced.
The campaign in Europe, in this year, was confined within the
quadrilateral formed by the fortresses in Silistria and Rustchuk on
the Danube, the city of Varna on the Black Sea, and the great fortress
of Schumla to the north of the Balkan range. There were several
engagements between divisions of the two armies in this district, in
which the Turks were generally worsted, but these victories were not
of much avail to the Russians so long as the three great fortresses of
Silistria, Varna, and Schumla remained in the hands of the Turks.
The two main features of the campaign were the successful defences
by the Turks of Silistria and Varna against overwhelming forces of
Russians. General Romanzoff crossed the Danube early in the year near
Silistria. He defeated a Turkish division and compelled it to retreat
to that fortress, where it added to its garrison. Romanzoff then laid
siege to it. His army stormed the outer defences with the utmost
vigour and succeeded in forcing them. But their difficulties only then
commenced. The Turks, under command of Osman Pasha, maintained an
heroic resistance. The whole male population turned out in aid of the
army. They fought the advance of the Russians street by street. In the
end the Russians were compelled to retreat, after the loss of eight
thousand men. Later, Romanzoff inflicted a severe defeat on the Turks
at Korason. This opened the way to Varna. But here again a successful
defence was offered by the Turkish garrison, supported by the seamen of
the Ottoman fleet in the Black Sea. This was the closing scene of the
campaign of 1773. Sultan Mustapha died towards the close of this year,
and was succeeded by his brother, Abdul Hamid, who had been secluded
in the Cage for forty-eight years. As was to be expected, he showed
no capacity for the position to which he was now at last called. He
was, however, favourable to peace, as was also Mouhsinzade, who was
maintained as Grand Vizier.
At the commencement of the campaign of 1774 the Grand Vizier issued
from his camp at Schumla with twenty-five thousand men, with the
intention of taking the offensive and attacking the Russians at
Hirsova, on the Danube. The Russian forces in that district were under
command of Suvorov, who now and later was to show himself the greatest
general Russia had as yet produced. He did not wait to be attacked by
the Turks. He advanced from Hirsova and met the Grand Vizier’s army
at Kostlidji, where he gained an overwhelming victory. The Turkish
camp and all its guns and stores were captured. The defeated army
dispersed, and the Grand Vizier found himself with only eight thousand
men to defend Schumla. The Russians manœuvred so as to cut off the
communications of Schumla with the capital. Mouhsinzade thereupon asked
for an armistice. This was refused by the Russians, but they were
willing to discuss terms of peace. The assent of the Porte was obtained
by the Grand Vizier, and on July 16, 1774, after seven hours only of
discussion between plenipotentiaries at the village of Kainardji, a
treaty of peace was agreed to.
The terms were almost identical with those which had been rejected by
the Porte two years before, after the conference at Bucharest. In view
of the fact that the Ottoman armies had been everywhere defeated during
the war, and that the Russians had obtained actual possession of the
Crimea, Wallachia, Moldavia, and Bessarabia in Europe, and of Georgia
and Mingrelia in the Caucasus, the terms were distinctly moderate. The
Empress must have been very desirous of peace. There was a serious
rebellion of her southern provinces. Affairs in Poland were causing
her great anxiety. Her losses in the war with Turkey had been very
great, though her victories were many. It was all-important to her that
her hands should be free. These were doubtless adequate reasons for
moderation in her terms to Turkey.
Under this treaty Russia gave up nearly all the Turkish territory
occupied by her armies. The Crimea was not, indeed, restored to the
Turks. The independence of the Tartars there and in Bessarabia up to
the frontier of Poland was recognized under a native prince, in whose
election Russia and Turkey were forbidden to interfere. Neither Power
was thenceforth to “intervene in the domestic, political, civil, and
internal affairs of this new State.” There was, however, a grave
reservation pregnant of future aggrandizement to Russia. She was to
retain the fortresses of Kertch, Yenikale, and the cities of Azoff and
Kilburn. These would necessarily give access to and virtual command
over the Crimea to Russia at any future time. For the present, however,
the Crimea, though lost to the Turks, was not acquired by Russia. It is
probable that the ulemas would not have assented to the transfer of a
Moslem province to a Christian Power, and that the war would have been
continued if Russia had insisted on this. Oczakoff, on the opposite
side of the Dnieper to Kilburn, was retained by the Porte. But the two
Karbartas on the shores of the Euxine, though inhabited by Moslems,
were retained by Russia. With these exceptions, all the Ottoman
territories in the hands of Russia as a result of the war—Wallachia,
Moldavia, Bessarabia, Georgia, and Mingrelia—were restored to the
Sultan. In the case of Wallachia and Moldavia, this retrocession
was subject to the condition that free exercise of the Christian
religion was to be secured to their population, and that there was to
be humane and generous government there for the future. The right of
remonstrance in these respects was secured to the ministers of Russia
at Constantinople on behalf of these provinces.
Another most important clause, full of danger for the future to the
Ottoman Empire, related to its Christian subjects. “The Sublime Porte,”
it ran, “promises to protect constantly the Christian religion and
churches and allow the ministers of Russia at Constantinople to make
representation on their behalf.”
This most important provision gave to Russia a preferential right of
protection of the Christian rayas not conceded to any other Christian
Power. Provision also was made for the full access of Russian subjects
to the holy city of Jerusalem. Free navigation was provided for Russian
ships on the Black Sea and the Mediterranean, but nothing was said as
to a right of access through the Dardanelles and Bosphorus. There was
no mention of Poland in the treaty, though it had been the original
cause of the war. Two secret clauses provided for the payment by the
Porte of four millions of roubles within three years and for the
withdrawal of the Russian fleet from the Archipelago.
The importance of this treaty, moderate though it was in many of its
terms, has always been recognized by historians as the starting-point
for further and greater dismemberments of the Turkish Empire. The
treaty of Carlowitz had secured the deliverance of the Christian
population of Hungary from Ottoman rule. But this treaty now, for the
first time, tore from the Empire a Moslem province and gave to Russia
a right of intervention on behalf of all the Christian population—an
immense innovation, humiliating to the Turks, and fraught with the
gravest peril to their Empire in the future.
There can be no doubt that the Grand Vizier was fully authorized by the
Porte to agree to the terms of this treaty. He was, however, recalled
and deposed immediately after its signature, and he died from the
effects of poison on his way to Constantinople. It was probably thought
by the ministers of the Sultan that Mouhsinzade, if called to account
for concluding so humiliating a treaty, would be able to show their
full responsibility for it. It remains only to state that the Russian
plenipotentiaries at Kainardji delayed the signature of the treaty
for four days in order that it might synchronize with the anniversary
of the treaty of the Pruth, which had been the cause of so much
humiliation to Russia.
XVII
TO THE TREATY OF JASSY
1774-92
EIGHTEEN years elapsed between the peace of Kainardji, 1774, and the
treaty of Jassy, 1792, the next conspicuous event in the downward
course of the Ottoman Empire. The first thirteen of these years were a
period of external peace to the Empire under the rule of Abdul Hamid I.
The country had been completely exhausted by the late war with Russia,
and the Sultan—or, rather, his ministers, for he appears to have been
little competent himself to carry on the government—were strongly in
favour of maintaining peace, and did so in spite of great provocation
from the Empress Catherine. That able and unscrupulous woman pursued
her designs for the complete subjection of the Crimea with relentless
resolution and activity. It was an essential condition of the peace
of Kainardji that the Crimea was to be an independent State under the
rule of a native Tartar prince. The breach of it, by the assumption
of sovereignty, direct or indirect, on the part of Russia, would
undoubtedly be a just cause of war to the Turks. The Porte, however,
was not in a position to take up a challenge of the Empress. The
knowledge of this was doubtless the main motive for her proceedings
during the next few years.
The steps by which Catherine attained her object bore a striking
resemblance to those by which other annexations were carried into
effect by Russia, and might well have been predicted. A member of the
princely Tartar family of Gherai, Dewlet, was elected by the Tartars
of the Crimea as their Khan. The agents of Russia thereupon supported
the claims of a rival Gherai, Schahin. They fomented disaffection and
revolt against Dewlet. While sedulously disclaiming any project of
annexation, Catherine then sent an army into the peninsula with the
ostensible purpose of restoring order. It compelled the abdication
of Dewlet and the election of her nominee, Schahin. This prince,
raised to the throne by Russian arms, found it necessary to follow
the advice of the Russian agent, and soon made himself most unpopular
with his subjects. A revolt took place against him. He appealed to the
Empress for assistance. A Russian army again appeared in the guise
of pacificator. The Tartars who opposed were slaughtered or driven
from the country. Schahin was compelled to resign his throne, and
the Empress thereupon proclaimed the annexation of the Crimea, with
professions of acting only for the benefit of its people and to save
them from misgovernment. The wretched tool Schahin was imprisoned for a
time in Russia, and later was expelled the country into Turkey, where
he was speedily put to death. The Porte was unable to undertake a war
on behalf of the independence of the Tartars, and in 1784 a new treaty
was made between the two Powers, recognizing the sovereignty of Russia
over the Crimea and a district along the north of the Euxine inhabited
by Tartars.
Later, there were many indications of the intention of Catherine to
exploit her wider project of driving the Turks from Europe. In 1779,
when a second grandson was born to her, the name of Constantine was
given to him. Greek women were provided for him as nurses, and he was
taught the Greek language. Everything was done to stimulate the hope
that there would be a revival of a Greek Empire at Constantinople, in
substitution for that of the Ottomans.
Meanwhile there was a succession of grave internal troubles in Turkey,
fomented in part by emissaries from Russia. The brave old Hassan of
Algiers, now Capitan Pasha, who had the complete confidence of the
Sultan, was continually being called upon to put down revolts. Thus in
1776 he defeated the Sheik Jahir, who had revolted in Syria. In 1778
he was engaged in expelling from the Morea the rebellious Albanians,
who had been employed against Orloff in his invasion of that province,
and who, after his defeat, had remained in the Morea, establishing
themselves in a lawless ascendancy there, oppressing, plundering, and
slaughtering Turks and Greeks alike without discrimination. Hassan
succeeded in defeating and expelling these wild ruffians. Later,
Hassan was employed in putting down a rebellion of the Mamelukes in
Egypt. He led an army there, and succeeded in restoring the authority
of the Sultan. In 1787 he was again recalled to Constantinople, on
the imminence of war with Russia, and at the age of seventy-five was
employed for a time in command of the Turkish fleet in the Black Sea
and later as commander-in-chief of the army. It will be seen that for
the first time in his life his good fortune deserted him and that he
met with serious defeats.
It has already been shown that the Empress Catherine was very
provocative in her policy and action to Turkey. In 1787 an agreement
was arrived at between Catherine and Joseph II, Emperor of Austria, for
common action against the Turks, and with the deliberate intention of
driving them from Europe. A partition was to be made of their European
provinces between the two Powers and a Greek Empire was to be set up at
Constantinople.
The Empress made a triumphal progress through the Crimea, under the
auspices of her favourite and paramour, Prince Potemkin, to whose
efforts its annexation had been mainly due. The Emperor Joseph met her
on the way there at Kherson, and hatched with her a scheme of war with
Turkey. A triumphal arch was erected, with the inscription, “This is
the way to Byzantium.” Emissaries were sent to stir up rebellion in
Wallachia and Moldavia. Claims were raised officially against Turkey
for the province of Bessarabia and the fortress of Oczakoff, on the
ground that they had formerly been part of the domains of the Khans of
the Crimea. These claims greatly irritated the Turks. The few years
of peace had renovated them. They were now ambitious of recovering
the city of Kilburn, and even had hopes of regaining the Crimea.
Popular feeling was aroused, and at the instance of the Divan, and
without waiting to make preparations for the defence of the frontier
fortresses, the Sultan declared war against Russia on August 15, 1787.
A large force was then sent by the Porte to Oczakoff, the fortress
on the embouchure of the Dniester, with the intention of attacking
Kilburn on the opposite side. A fleet was sent, under Hassan, to
co-operate with it, and to convey the army across the river to
Kilburn. Unfortunately for the Turks, the Russian force at Kilburn
was under the command of Suvorov, a military genius of the first
rank. He allowed the larger half of the Turkish army to be conveyed
across the river and then attacked it by land, while a flotilla of
gunboats from Nicholaif engaged the Turkish fleet. This strategy was
completely successful. The Ottoman force of eight thousand men landed
on the Kilburn side was overwhelmed and slaughtered. Nearly the whole
of Hassan’s fleet was destroyed. The attack on Kilburn was completely
defeated.
Nothing more was effected by either of the two combatants in 1787.
At the beginning of the next year, 1788, the Emperor of Austria, on
February 10th, declared war against Turkey without any provocation.
He had been delayed fulfilling his agreement with Catherine by
disturbances in his own dominions. He was now free to carry out his
undertaking. The Turks, therefore, found themselves confronted by two
formidable enemies. Fortunately for them, Russia was prevented putting
forth its full strength in the south, in consequence of war having
broken out with Sweden. The Empress was unable on this account to carry
out her engagement with the Emperor to send an army into Moldavia in
support of that of the Austrians. Nor was she able to send a fleet into
the Ægean Sea, as had been promised. But Joseph took command himself
of an army of two hundred thousand men with which to attack the Turks.
He soon proved himself to be the most incompetent of generals. The
only defeat he was able to inflict was upon his own soldiers, under
circumstances unprecedented in war.
The Turks, when they found that there was no danger of any advance
on the part of the Russians, sent a great army across the Danube,
which encountered and defeated an Austrian army, under Wartersleben,
at Mendia. Joseph then marched to relieve this defeated force and
to protect Hungary. He took up a position with eighty thousand men
at Slatina, within easy reach of the Grand Vizier’s army. At the
last moment, when all the preparations had been made to attack the
Ottomans, the Emperor took alarm. He abandoned his project of attack,
and retreated in the direction of Temesvar. The retreat was begun at
midnight. Great confusion took place. An alarm was spread that the
Turks were close at hand and were about to attack. The wildest panic
occurred. The Austrian artillery was driven at full speed in retreat.
The infantry mistook them for the enemy. They formed themselves into
small squares for defence, and began to fire wildly in all directions.
In the early morning, when the sun rose, it was discovered that these
squares had been firing into one another, with the result that ten
thousand men were _hors de combat_. The Turks now came up and made a
real attack. They defeated the Austrians and captured a great part of
their artillery and baggage. No other engagement took place in this
direction in the course of this year. The Emperor lost thirty thousand
men in his attempted manœuvre and forty thousand by disease. He never
again ventured to command an army.
Little was attempted in 1788 by the Russians till August, when
Potemkin found himself in a position to invest Oczakoff. The siege was
protracted till December, when Suvorov was called in to assist. Under
his spirited advice, an assault was made on the fortress, and, in spite
of enormous losses, the Russians overcame all opposition and entered
the city. A frightful scene of carnage then occurred. The city was
given over to the Russian soldiers. Of a population of forty thousand
only a few hundreds escaped death, and twenty thousand of the garrison
were slaughtered. In spite of this great loss, the campaign of 1788
had not been altogether to the detriment of the Turks. Though they
lost Oczakoff, and all hopes of recovering Kilburn and the Crimea had
vanished, they had successfully resisted Austria. Joseph’s attack had
ignominiously failed.
The campaign of the following year was far more disastrous to the
Turks. Early in 1789 Sultan Abdul Hamid died, and was succeeded by his
nephew, Selim III, a young man of twenty-seven, of vigour and public
spirit. He had not been subjected by his uncle, Abdul Hamid, to the
debasing seclusion which had for so long been the fate of heirs to the
throne. He had been allowed much freedom. His father, Mustapha, had
left him a memoir, pointing out the dangers of the State, and advising
extensive reforms, and the young man had deeply studied this. He was
fully conscious of the necessity for radical changes, and though he
very wisely did not attempt to lead his troops in the field, he spared
no effort to improve the condition of the army and to stimulate the
warlike zeal of his subjects. He sent the immense accumulation of plate
in his palace to the Mint, and he persuaded the ladies of the harem
to give up their jewellery in aid of the treasury. He was ardently in
favour of reforms in all directions. He deserved a better fate than was
in store for him. It will be seen that his reign was one of most bitter
reverses.
Unfortunately for the Turks, ill-health prevented the Emperor Joseph
from again taking the field in command of the Austrian army. He
was replaced by Marshal Loudon—a veteran of the Seven Years War, a
Scotsman by race, who had risen from the ranks and had deservedly
won great reputation. It was said of him that he “made war like a
gentleman.” He was noted for his quick decision on the field of
battle, and though over seventy-five was still in full vigour. A
new spirit was infused into the Austrian army. A part of it under
Marshal Loudon invaded Bosnia and Serbia, where it met with brilliant
success. In Bosnia it was stoutly resisted by the Moslem population.
In Serbia it met with cordial co-operation of the rayas, who detested
their Moslem oppressors. The greater part of these two provinces was
occupied. Another Austrian army, under the Prince of Coburg, was
directed to Moldavia to act in concert with the Russian army, under
Suvorov. The Sultan, on his part, appointed Hassan as Grand Vizier
and commander-in-chief of the army. Hassan was not equal to the task
of confronting such a general as Suvorov. He advanced with a large
army against Coburg, who was stationed at Fokshani, on the frontier
of Moldavia. Coburg would have been overwhelmed by the superior force
of the Turks had it not been for the wonderful activity of Suvorov,
who marched sixty miles through a difficult and mountainous country in
thirty-six hours to relieve the Austrians. Suvorov, immediately on
arrival, late in the afternoon, made preparations for attacking the
Ottoman army. Two hours before daylight the next day he assaulted the
fortified camp of the Turks. Never was a bold course more completely
justified. The camp was carried by the Russians with the bayonet. The
Turks lost all their artillery and immense stores. Another great army
was sent by Selim and was also utterly defeated by Suvorov on the
River Rimnik in September of the same year.
These two serious defeats caused panic at Constantinople. To allay this
the Sultan, to his infinite discredit, gave orders for the execution
of the brave old Hassan—the victor in so many battles, whose advice
for the better training of the Janissaries had been cruelly neglected.
But it was the habit of the Turks to attribute every defeat to the
treason of the general and to put him to death, just as the Convention
at Paris, during the revolutionary wars, sent to the guillotine the
generals who failed—not, it must be admitted, without some result in
stimulating others to better efforts.
Farther to the west, Belgrade and Semendria were captured by the
Austrians in this campaign of 1789. In the following year the tide of
victory on the part of the Russians and Austrians was stayed by two
events. The one was that the Emperor Joseph found it necessary, in
consequence of outbreaks in almost every part of his own dominions,
caused by his hasty and ill-considered measures of centralization, in
defiance of all local customs, to hold his hand against the Turks, and
withdraw his conquering armies in order to employ them in putting down
revolution at home. His death occurred early in 1790. Leopold, who
succeeded, a wise and sagacious ruler, the very opposite to Joseph,
reversed the policy of his brother. He did not favour a Russian
alliance against Turkey.
Another cause of Austria withdrawing from the war was the entry into
the field of politics in the east of Europe of England, Prussia,
and Holland. These Powers had formed a close defensive alliance,
and had already exercised great influence by joint action. They had
extinguished French influence in Holland. They had intervened with good
effect between Russia and Sweden and had brought about peace between
them. They now proposed mediation between Austria and Turkey, not
without threats of stronger action. An armistice was agreed to between
these Powers. The death of Joseph greatly facilitated an arrangement.
Terms were agreed upon with the Turks, and were ultimately embodied
in the treaty of Sistova, on the principle of the _status quo_ before
the war, under which all the territory which Austria had occupied in
Bosnia, Serbia, and Wallachia, including the fortresses of Belgrade and
Semendria, were given back to Turkey, with the exception of a small
strip of land in Croatia and the town of Old Orsova. The acquisitions
by Austria were of very small importance and made but a poor return for
the great effort put forth in the war. But the new Emperor, Leopold,
did not think that Austria had anything to gain by the dismemberment
of either Turkey or Poland. Had he lived, subsequent events might have
turned out differently, and Poland, in all probability, would not have
been victimized.
The defection of Austria from the alliance with Russia against the
Turks was a very serious matter for the Empress Catherine. It was
balanced, however, in part, by peace with Sweden, which enabled her
to use her whole force on land and sea against her remaining enemy.
She still adhered to the project of driving the Turks from Europe, and
reconstituting a Greek Empire at Constantinople. She sent numerous
emissaries to Greece to persuade its people “to take up arms and
co-operate with her in expelling the enemies of Christianity from the
countries they had usurped, and in regaining for the Greeks their
ancient liberty and independence.”
Early in 1790 she received a deputation at St. Petersburg from some
leading Greeks. They presented a petition to her.
We have never [it said] asked for your treasure; we do not ask for
it now; we only ask for powder and shot, which we cannot purchase,
and to be led to battle.... It is under your auspices that we hope
to deliver from the hands of barbaric Moslems an Empire which they
have usurped, to free the descendants of Athens and Lacedæmon from
the tyrannous yoke of ignorant savages—a nation whose genius is not
extinguished, which glows with the love of liberty, which the iron
yoke of barbarism has not destroyed.
The Empress, in reply, promised to give the assistance they asked
for. They were then presented to the young Prince Constantine, who
replied to them in the Greek language: “Go, and let everything be done
according to your wishes.”
The wealthier Greeks in the Levant had already fitted out a squadron
of thirteen frigates in support of their cause. These were now, by
order of the Empress, supplied with guns at Trieste and were put under
command of a brave Greek admiral, Lambro Caviziani. This squadron, when
fitted out, made its way to the Ægean Sea, where it made its base in
the Isle of Scios. The Turkish fleet in those waters was at a low ebb.
The best of the Turkish vessels were being employed in the Black Sea.
But seven Algerine corsairs came to the assistance of the Porte, and,
in concert with some Turkish ships, fought a naval battle with the
Greek squadron and sank the whole of its vessels.
The Russian army on land was more fortunate. Their chief operation
in 1790 was the capture of Ismail, a most important fortress on the
northern affluent of the Danube, about forty miles from the Black Sea.
So long as this city was in the hands of the Turks an advance of an
invading army from Bessarabia into Bulgaria was hardly possible. The
fortress was defended by a very large garrison. Suvorov was again put
at the head of a _corps d’armée_ by Potemkin, the commander-in-chief,
with the laconic order, “You will capture Ismail, whatever may be
the cost.” Six days after his arrival before the fortress, Suvorov
ordered his troops to assault it. Speaking to them in his usual jocular
manner, he said: “My brothers, no quarter; provisions are scarce.” At
a terrible cost of life the city was taken by storm. A scene of savage
carnage ensued, unprecedented even in the experience of Suvorov.
Thirty-four thousand Turks perished. Suvorov admitted to a friend that
he was moved to tears when the scene was over. But he was accustomed
to shed these crocodile tears after horrors of this kind, when he had
made no effort to mitigate them. When news of the achievement arrived
at St. Petersburg, the Empress, at her levée, addressing the British
Ambassador, Sir C. Whitworth, said, with an ironic smile: “I hope that
those who wish to drive me out of St. Petersburg will allow me to
retire to Constantinople.”
Meanwhile the allied maritime Powers—England, Prussia, and
Holland—having succeeded in their mediation between Austria and Turkey,
and in restoring peace between them, on the basis of the _status quo_,
were now engaged in efforts of the same kind as between Russia and
Turkey. They offered mediation to the Empress Catherine in the course
of 1790. In a reply to the Prussian King, she indignantly rejected
intervention. “The Empress,” she said, “makes war and makes peace when
she pleases. She will not permit any interference whatever in the
management or government of her affairs.” It was understood, however,
that she was not disinclined to peace upon the terms that Oczakoff
and the district between the Rivers Dniester and Bug, which were in
her full possession, were to be retained by her, and that all other
of her conquests were to be restored to Turkey. The allied Powers
were unwilling to assent to this, and made preparations for an armed
mediation to compel Russia to restore Oczakoff to Turkey.
In the case of Great Britain, the proposed intervention on behalf of
the Turks in support of their Empire was a new departure in policy.
Its Government had been closely allied with that of Russia during
the greater part of the eighteenth century. Its policy had been
mainly determined by jealousy of France. It looked upon Russia as
a counterpoise to that State. It had never raised any objection to
the ambitious projects of Russia against Turkey. Lord Chatham, whose
foreign policy had prevailed till now, had always held that it was not
the interest of England to enter into a connection with the Turks.
England had looked on with indifference in 1784, when the Empress
Catherine had taken possession of the Crimea. Charles Fox was at that
time Minister of Foreign Affairs in England, and he showed himself as
much in favour of Russia as Chatham had been. “My system of foreign
politics,” he wrote, “is deeply rooted. Alliance with the northern
Powers (including Russia) ever has been and ever will be the system of
every enlightened Englishman.” It was an entirely new departure when
the younger Pitt, in 1790, entered the lists in alliance with Prussia
against Russia in order to restore and maintain the balance of power in
the south-east of Europe in favour of Turkey.
The British Government renewed its offer of mediation. Its Ambassador
at St. Petersburg was instructed to inform the Empress that if she
would accept a peace on the basis of the _status quo_, England would
use her influence to obtain from the Turks a formal renunciation of
their claims to the Crimea under the guarantee of the allies. The
Empress, in her reply through her minister, expressed her indignation
at the unparalleled conduct of the allies in attempting to dictate in
so arbitrary a manner to a sovereign perfectly independent, and in want
of no assistance to procure the conditions which seemed to her best
suited to satisfy her honour. Rather than diminish the glory of a long
and illustrious reign, the Empress was ready to encounter any risk, and
she would only accept the good offices of the King of England “inasmuch
as they may lead to preserve for her the indemnification she requires
of Oczakoff and its district.”[30]
The reply was important, for it showed that Russia was, at all
events, willing to bring the war to an end and to forgo its intention
of driving the Turks out of Europe. The fact was that, in spite of
repeated victories, the Russian losses in killed and wounded, and still
more by disease, were very serious. The Empress also had other troubles
on her hands. The Polish question, in which she was more interested
than in that of Turkey, was imminent. The Second Partition was decided
on. It was necessary for her to have a free hand. In spite of this, she
was determined not to yield possession of Oczakoff.
Meanwhile the British and Prussian Governments were in consultation.
They were agreed that they were bound to insist upon the surrender of
Oczakoff and its district, and upon a peace based on the _status quo_
before the war. It was contended that, as Austria and Sweden had both
made peace on such terms, the allies could not with honour demand less
for the Turks, and that Turkey would consider itself betrayed if the
allies were willing to give up those districts.
It was decided, therefore, by the allies to enforce by arms their
mediation on the basis of the _status quo_. The British Government
engaged to send a fleet of thirty-five vessels of the line into the
Baltic, and Prussia to march an army into Livonia. It was agreed that
neither Power would look for any territorial acquisition, but would
only insist on greater security for the Porte in the Black Sea.
In this view Mr. Pitt, on March 28, 1791, presented to the House of
Commons a message from the King asking for the supply of means to
augment the forces of the Crown. He based his justification, says
Mr. Lecky, who has given a summary of Pitt’s speech, mainly on the
interests of Prussia and the obligation of Great Britain to defend her.
Prussia [Pitt said], of all European Powers, is the one who would
be the most useful ally of England, and the events that were taking
place were very dangerous to her. The Turkish Empire is of great
weight in the general scale of European Powers, and if that Empire
is diminished or destroyed, or even rendered unstable or precarious,
the situation of Prussia would be seriously affected.... Could any
one imagine that the aggrandizement of Russia would not materially
affect the disposition of other Powers—that it might not produce an
alteration in Poland highly dangerous to Prussia?... If a powerful
and ambitious neighbour were suffered to establish herself upon the
very frontier of Prussia, what safety was there for Denmark, or
what for Sweden when Prussia shall no longer be in a position to
help them? The safety of all Europe might afterwards be endangered.
Whatever might be the result of the war in which the Turks were now
unhappily engaged, if its results were to increase the power of
Russia the effect would not be confined to the two Powers alone; it
would be felt by the rest of Europe.
He asked for the means to equip a great fleet to be sent to the Baltic
and a smaller one for the Black Sea.
The proposal of Pitt for giving effect to this policy was violently
opposed by Charles Fox in a speech which produced a very great effect
in the House of Commons and on the country.
The insistence [he said] on the surrender by Russia of Oczakoff
and its district was in the highest degree unjust and impolitic.
It was unjust because Russia had not been the aggressor in the war
and because, in spite of her great successes, she had consented to
concessions which displayed her signal moderation. It was impolitic,
for the only result of an expensive and dangerous war would be to
alienate, perhaps for ever, a most valuable ally, without obtaining
any object in which England had a real interest.... Russia was the
natural ally of England. What had England to gain by this policy?
In what way could English interests or English power be affected
by the acquisition by Russia of a fortress on the Dniester and a
strip of barren land along the northern shore of the Black Sea?...
The assertion that England was bound by the spirit of its defensive
alliance with Prussia was in the highest degree dangerous and
absurd. If defensive alliances were construed in such a way they
would have all the evils of offensive alliances, and they would
involve us in every quarrel in Europe. We bound ourselves only to
furnish assistance to Prussia if she were attacked. She had not been
attacked. She was at perfect peace. She was absolutely unmenaced. It
was doubtful whether the new acquisition of Russia would under any
circumstances be injurious to Prussia, and it was preposterous to
maintain that it was the duty of England to prevent any other nations
from acquiring any territory which might possibly in some future war
be made use of against Prussia.
Fox was supported by Burke in a powerful speech, in spite of their
growing differences on the subject of the Revolution in France.
Considering the Turkish Empire [he said] as any part of the balance
of power in Europe was new. The Turks were essentially Asiatic
people, who completely isolated themselves from European affairs. The
minister and the policy which should give them any weight in Europe
would deserve all the ban and curses of posterity. For his part,
he confessed that he had seen with horror the beautiful countries
that bordered on the Danube given back by the Emperor of Austria to
devastation. Are we now going to vote the blood and treasure of our
countrymen to enforce similar cruel and inhuman policy?... That so
wise a man as Pitt should endeavour, on such slight and frivolous
grounds, to commit this country to a policy of unlimited adventure,
sacrificing the friendship of one of our oldest allies and casting
to the winds the foreign policy of his own father, was the most
extraordinary event that had taken place in Parliament since he had
sat within its walls.
Pitt’s motion was carried, but by many votes short of his usual party
majority. Two other debates took place on the subject. Though Pitt
maintained his majority, it was evident that the opinion of the House
of Commons, and still more of the country, was opposed to going to war
with Russia on behalf of Turkey. Pitt very wisely decided to abandon
his policy of war. He withdrew his proposal in the House of Commons.
The Foreign Minister, the Duke of Leeds, who was personally committed
to it, resigned his office. Another messenger was sent to the British
Ambassador at St. Petersburg with instructions not to present the
menacing despatch to the Czar, and, fortunately, arrived in time to
prevent it.
Sir E. Creasy describes the action of Charles Fox in thus defeating
the policy of Pitt as due to violent and unscrupulous party motives,
and Mr. Lecky, while agreeing in substance with the arguments of Fox,
and condemning Pitt’s policy, does not acquit the former of political
partisanship. He never loses an opportunity of impeaching the conduct
of Charles Fox, on account of his action in the war with the American
colonies and in the revolutionary war with France. It may be permitted
to us to say, in spite of these high authorities, that seldom has a
greater service been done to the country than in the defeat of Pitt’s
proposal to go to war with Russia on this occasion. It was a unique
case in our constitutional history when the House of Commons by its
debates, and not by its votes, defeated a proposal for war made to
it by a Prime Minister, with all the authority of the Crown and the
Government. The merit of this was mainly due to Fox.
In the meantime the Turks were incurring further defeats on the Danube.
They made desperate efforts to replenish their armies, but the men
were ill-trained and were unable to meet the veteran troops of Russia.
Kutusoff, at the head of a Russian army, routed a great Ottoman army
at Babatagh in January 1791, and in July of the same year Prince
Repnin, with forty thousand Russians, defeated and dispersed seventy
thousand Turks at Maksyu, on the southern bank of the Danube. The Turks
were equally unfortunate on the east of the Black Sea. A Russian army
invaded the province of Kuban and defeated a Turkish army there, and
occupied the whole of the province.
As a result of all these reverses the Divan was dispirited. There was
no prospect of assistance to Turkey from any quarter. They were willing
to come to terms. The Empress, on her part, was equally willing. She
wanted her army to march into Poland to put down an outbreak of the
Poles, under Kosciuszko. In spite of her recent victories, which had
secured to her the occupation of Bessarabia, Moldavia, Wallachia, and
the Kuban, she was ready to give up all with the exception of the
fortress of Oczakoff and the country between the Rivers Dniester and
Bug. Terms on this basis, and without any mediation or interference of
other Powers, were agreed on between Russia and Turkey in August, 1791,
and were embodied in the treaty of Jassy in January of the following
year. Under this treaty the River Dniester was the new boundary of
the Russian Empire, and all conquests west of it were restored to the
Turks. Russia also gave back the province of Kuban, but the treaty
recognized the Empress as the protector of the petty independent
principalities in that region.
The project of carving for Potemkin a kingdom out of the Danubian
principalities was abandoned, and that of a Greek Empire at
Constantinople was indefinitely adjourned. Potemkin, who was a Pole
by birth and had been raised from the position of a sergeant in the
Russian army to princely rank with a fortune estimated at seven
millions of our money, died a few days after the treaty.
In the next four years the Empress achieved the final partition of
Poland, and obtained for Russia the lion’s share. Had she lived, she
would probably have used her acquisitions there as a vantage-ground for
new aggressions on the Ottoman Empire. Meanwhile Greece was abandoned
to the tender mercies of its oppressors.
XVIII
TO THE TREATY OF BUCHAREST
1792-1812
TWENTY years after the treaty of Jassy, another slice of the Ottoman
territory was ceded to Russia in 1812 by the treaty of Bucharest.
The history of Turkey during the interval is full of interest in its
relation to the Napoleonic wars, but much of it has little bearing on
the shrinkage of the Empire.
After the conclusion of the war with Russia in 1792, Sultan Selim was
most anxious to maintain peace and to keep out of the complications
arising from the French Revolution. He was fully conscious of the
necessity for reforms in every branch of the administration of his
country, and especially in the constitution and training of the
army. He regarded the Janissaries as a grave danger to the State. He
initiated many great schemes of reform. But in 1798 these were nipped
in the bud by a fresh outbreak of hostilities. War was forced upon
him most unexpectedly, and without just cause or even pretext, by the
Revolutionary Government of France, a country whose traditional policy
had been to support the Ottoman Empire against that of Austria. France
had recently become a near neighbour to Turkey. Under the treaty of
Campo-Formio in 1797, after the great victories of General Bonaparte in
Italy, the Republic of Venice ceased to exist. Venice itself, and much
of its Italian territories, were subjected to the rule of Austria, and
its possessions in the Adriatic, the Ionian Islands, and the cities on
the mainland, such as Prevesa and Parga, were ceded to France. This
change of masters was welcomed by the inhabitants of the islands, who
were weary of the tyranny of the Venetians.
The Directory, which then ruled in France, was filled with ambition
for further extensions in the East. It was under the impression that
the Ottoman Empire was on the point of complete dissolution. There
was much, at the time, to justify this view. The central power of the
State was almost paralysed. The pashas of many provinces, such as Ali
of Janina, Passhwan Oghlou of Widdin, and Djezzar of Acre, had made
themselves all but independent of the Sultan. Egypt was virtually ruled
by the Mamelukes. Its pasha, appointed by the Porte, was without any
authority. Serbia and Greece were seething with rebellion. Bonaparte,
while commanding the army in Italy, sent emissaries to several of these
provinces, and especially to Greece, holding out hopes of support in
the event of open rebellion. It seemed at first as though his ambition
was for extension of French dominion in Greece and other European
provinces of the Porte. An army of forty thousand men, including
the best of the veterans who had fought in Italy, was mobilized at
Toulon. Two hundred transports were prepared to convey them to some
unknown destination, and a powerful fleet of fifteen battleships and
fifteen frigates was ordered to act as convoy. At the last moment
the Directory, at the instance of Bonaparte, decided on the invasion
of Egypt. A blow was to be struck there, not against the Porte,
but against England, with whom France was at war. There were vague
intentions or dreams, after the conquest of Egypt, of invading India
and founding a great Eastern Empire for France on the ruins of the
British Empire. It was pretended that the attack on Egypt was not an
act of hostility to the Porte. Egypt, it was said, was to be delivered
from the cruel and corrupt government of the Mamelukes. There was no
declaration of war against the Sultan. It was expected that he would
acquiesce in the suppression of the Mamelukes.
The utmost secrecy was maintained as to the destination of the
expedition. It left Toulon on May 19, 1798, under the command of
Bonaparte. He took with him many of the ablest generals who had served
under him in Italy and a large party of ‘savants,’ who were to explore
the monuments of Egypt. The orders from the Directory to Bonaparte,
drawn up doubtless by himself, were
to clear the English from all their Oriental possessions which he
will be able to reach, and notably to destroy all their stations in
the Red Sea; to cut through the Isthmus of Suez and to take the
necessary measures to assure the free and exclusive possession of
that sea to the French Republic.
The destination of this great fleet and army was unknown to the British
Government. But there was a strong British fleet at the entrance of
the Mediterranean, under Lord St. Vincent, who detached a large part
of it, under command of Nelson, to watch the issue of the French fleet
from Toulon. It was composed of an equal number of battleships to that
of the French fleet, but of inferior size, and with fewer guns. It was
very deficient in frigates.
On June 10th, three weeks after escaping from Toulon, the French fleet
arrived at Malta. The Knights of St. John, who had made so valiant
and successful a defence of the island against the Ottomans in 1565,
now offered a very feeble resistance to the French. The knightly
monks had become licentious and corrupt. They very soon capitulated.
Bonaparte annexed the island to France, and the ancient Order came to
an ignominious end.
Leaving four thousand men at Malta, the fleet sailed for the island of
Crete, and hearing there that Nelson was in pursuit, Bonaparte at once
decided to sail to Alexandria. He then for the first time announced to
the army its destination.
Soldiers [he said in a proclamation], you go to undertake a conquest
of which the effects upon the civilization and the commerce of
the world will be incalculable. You will strike at England the
most certain and the most acute blow, while waiting to give her
the death-blow.... The Mamelukes, who favour exclusively English
commerce, some days after your arrival will exist no more.
Nelson meanwhile, when he discovered the departure of the French fleet
from Toulon, shrewdly guessed that it was bound to Egypt, and bent
his course there, hoping to find the enemy’s ships at Alexandria. He
arrived there on June 28th, before the French fleet, and, hearing
nothing of it, he doubled back to Sicily. The two fleets crossed one
another not far from Crete, and within sight of one another if the
weather had been bright; but a dense haze and the want of frigates to
act as scouts prevented Nelson discovering the proximity of his enemy.
But for this it is certain that the French fleet, encumbered as it
was with two hundred transports, would have been totally destroyed
and the whole armada would have met with unparalleled disaster. It is
interesting matter for speculation what effect this would have had on
the career of the Corsican general and on the history of Europe. As it
was, the French fleet and army, favoured by their extraordinary good
luck, arrived safely at Alexandria on July 1st. The army disembarked
there. The battleships, not being able to get into the harbour, were
anchored in Aboukir Bay. Alexandria was captured, after a slight
resistance by its small garrison—though Bonaparte himself was slightly
wounded in the attack. A week later the army commenced its march to
Cairo.
Bonaparte issued one of his bombastic and mendacious proclamations to
the Egyptian people, explaining that he was making war against the
Mamelukes, and not against them or the Sultan.
For a long time [it said] the crowd of slaves bought in Georgia and
the Caucasus have tyrannized the most beautiful place in the world;
but God, on whom all depends, has ordained that their empire is
finished. People of Egypt, they have told you that I have come to
destroy your religion. Do not believe them. Answer that I am come to
restore your rights, to punish the usurpers, and that I respect more
than the Mamelukes, God, his Prophet, and the Koran.... Thrice happy
are those who will be on our side. They will prosper in their fortune
and their rank.... But woe threefold to those who arm themselves for
the Mamelukes and fight against us.... Each man will thank God for
the destruction of the Mamelukes and will cry “Glory to the Sultan!
Glory to the French army, his friend! Malediction to the Mamelukes
and good luck to the people of Egypt.”
The army suffered greatly on its march to Cairo from the heat and
the sand. The soldiers murmured and asked for what purpose they were
brought to such a country, where they saw no evidence of wealth, and
where there was nothing to loot. But they fought two battles on the
way against the Mamelukes and easily defeated them. The armies against
them on both occasions consisted of no more than twelve thousand men,
of whom only five thousand were Mamelukes and the others ill-trained
fellaheen. These were of no avail against thirty thousand veterans
of the French. The city of Cairo, on the approach of Bonaparte, was
sacked by the retreating Egyptians. He presented himself rather as the
saviour of life and property. He had no difficulty in restoring order
there.
Meanwhile Nelson, on the arrival of his fleet at Naples, heard definite
accounts of the destination of the French armada. He retraced his
course to Egypt. On the memorable 1st of August, 1798, he came in
sight of the enemy’s fleet, anchored in Aboukir Bay. The oft-told
story of the decisive and glorious battle need not be repeated. The
French fleet, under Admiral Brueys, was annihilated by the British
fleet, much inferior in number of men and guns. The admiral was
killed. His flagship was blown up. Only two of his ships escaped for
a time, and later were captured before reaching France. As a result,
the communications of the French army with France were thenceforth
completely severed. It was hopelessly stranded in Egypt. Bonaparte
did not hear of the disaster till August 19th, on his return from an
expedition, in which he defeated and chased from the country a force of
Mamelukes, under Ibrahim Pasha. His sole remark was: “Eh bien! It will
be necessary to remain in these countries or to make a grand exit like
the ancients. The English will compel us to do greater things than we
intended.”
The signal victory of the British fleet had far-reaching results. The
Sultan of Turkey, who had hitherto been undecided as to his policy, now
felt that he might safely take up arms against the French and reassert
his sovereignty in Egypt. He well knew that Bonaparte could receive no
reinforcements from France and that the invading army must gradually
melt away. He declared war against France, and entered into alliances,
offensive and defensive, with Russia and England. His alliance with
the former led to strange results. A combined fleet of Russia and
Turkey, hitherto the most deadly foes to one another, issued from the
Dardanelles, and attacked and drove the French from the Ionian Islands,
so recently acquired by them, and from their fortresses on the mainland.
The Porte also collected two armies for the reconquest of Egypt, the
one in Syria, the other in the island of Rhodes. Bonaparte decided
to anticipate attack by the invasion of Syria. He spent at Cairo the
winter of 1798-9, the least reputable period of his amazing career. His
private life there was most scandalous, far more so than that, bad
enough, of his wife, Josephine, whom he had left at Paris. His public
life was little better. In the hopes of conciliating the Egyptian
people and facilitating the further conquests in the East, of which
he dreamt, he professed unbounded admiration for the Moslem religion.
He feigned to be a convert to that faith. His vaunting proclamations
were headed: “In the name of Allah. There is no God but God. He has
no son and reigns without a partner.” He did his best to induce his
soldiers to become Moslems, but in vain. No one was taken in by these
fooleries. He gained no respect from Egyptians of any creed. There were
many outbreaks in different parts of the country, and a most serious
one in Cairo. They were put down with ruthless severity. He followed
the Turkish practice of decapitating the prisoners and great numbers
of suspects, and exhibiting their bleeding heads in public places as a
warning to others.
Bonaparte left Egypt in January, 1799, with an army of twenty-five
thousand, made up in part by sailors of his sunken fleet, and in part
by recruits from the Mamelukes. He crossed the Isthmus of Suez, and
reached Gaza on February 25th and Jaffa on March 7th. This last city
was held by five thousand Turks. After a brave defence they capitulated
on terms that they should be treated as prisoners of war. In disregard
of this they were marched down to the beach and, by order of Bonaparte,
were slaughtered in cold blood because it was inconvenient to encumber
his army with prisoners. No worse deed of Turkish atrocity has been
recorded in these pages. Leaving Jaffa, his army arrived before Acre
in a few days. “When I have captured Acre,” he said to his generals,
“I shall arm the tribes. I shall be in a position to threaten
Constantinople. I shall turn the British Empire upside down.”
But he reached at Acre the end of his tether in the East. He had sent
his heavy guns by sea to meet him there. They were captured on the way
by the British fleet, and were now mounted on the mud ramparts of the
fortress and used against him. A British fleet, under command of Sir
Sidney Smith, was lying in the roadstead and kept the communications
open with Constantinople. The admiral and his sailors assisted in the
defence of the city, the garrison of which consisted of only three
thousand men. Its weak fortifications had been strengthened by Colonel
Philippeaux, a distinguished French royalist. Against these defences
Bonaparte hurled his army in vain. In the sixty days of siege there
were forty assaults and twenty sorties of the garrison. “In that
miserable fort,” said Bonaparte, “lay the fate of the East.”
On May 7th large reinforcements arrived from the Turkish army at
Rhodes. A last and desperate assault, led by General Kléber, was
unsuccessful. Bonaparte was compelled to admit his failure. His dream
of an Eastern Empire was dissipated for ever. On May 20th he commenced
a retreat, after a loss by death of four thousand men and eight
generals. The army suffered most severely in passing through the desert.
Shortly after the return of the French troops to Egypt on July 14th,
an army of fifteen thousand Turks, convoyed by the British fleet, was
landed at Aboukir. Bonaparte attacked on the 25th and utterly defeated
it. Thousands of the Turks were driven into the sea and drowned. This
victory of the veterans of the French army over the ill-trained Turkish
levies, without guns or cavalry, was a godsend to Bonaparte. It shed a
gleam of glory over the terrible failure of the whole expedition. His
dispatches made the most of it. At this stage news from France showed
the necessity for his return there. He decided to abandon the army
to its fate. With the utmost secrecy arrangements were made for the
embarkation of the general and his staff on board two frigates. They
rode down to the shore and got into boats, leaving their horses behind
them. The return of the riderless horses was the first intimation to
those left behind that they were abandoned by their general. The two
frigates left Egypt on August 22nd and, by hugging the African coast,
they escaped the British cruisers, and after a most hazardous voyage
of six weeks they landed their passengers in France, where Bonaparte
posed as a conqueror. Nor did his failure in Egypt interfere with his
subsequent triumphant career.
Early in March 1801 a British army of fifteen thousand men, under Sir
Ralph Abercromby, landed in Egypt, and later another contingent, under
General Baird, coming from India, also arrived there. The French army
of occupation was badly handled. It was divided between Cairo and
Alexandria. It was defeated in detail and ultimately surrendered. It
was then said to number twenty-four thousand men and three hundred and
twelve guns. On hearing of this disaster Bonaparte is said to have felt
great anguish. “We have lost Egypt,” he said. “My projects have been
destroyed by the British.” Egypt was restored to the Sultan, freed
not only from the French but also from the Mamelukes, and for a time
Turkish pashas, appointed by the Porte, ruled the country. There can
be no doubt that the Sultan owed this wholly and solely to the British
Government. It will be seen that he showed little gratitude, for in a
very few years’ time he took the part of the French in the great war.
Meanwhile, in 1802, a peace was patched up for a time between England
and France at Amiens. Concurrently with this terms of peace were agreed
upon between France and the Porte, under which the sovereignty of the
Sultan over Egypt was recognized. When, two years later, war again
broke out between France and England and other Powers, Bonaparte, then
First Consul, reversed his action as regards the Ottoman Empire, and
made an alliance with it a cardinal point of his new policy.
After the conclusion of peace with France in 1802, Sultan Selim had
a respite for a very few years before he was again involved in war.
He directed his attention to serious internal reforms of his Empire.
He fully recognized that the first and foremost of these must be the
reorganization, if not the suppression, of the corps of Janissaries.
Not only had the experience of late wars shown that they had become a
most incompetent military force, quite unable to meet on equal terms
the well-trained soldiers of Russia and France, but in every part of
his Empire they were a danger to the State, endeavouring to monopolize
power and to oust that of the pashas appointed by himself. They were
also the main oppressors of the rayas. The task of suppressing them and
of creating an army on the model of those of European Powers was a most
difficult and dangerous one, for the Janissaries were, or pretended to
be, the most devout of Moslems, and were supported by the fanatical
part of the population. They had strong supporters in the Divan. The
ulemas were almost unanimously in their favour. The Divan was divided
into two parties, those who favoured reform and who gave support to the
Sultan, and the reactionary party, who were opposed to all reform and
championed the Janissaries. There was another serious division of the
Divan—namely those who espoused the cause of Russia, not infrequently
in the pay of that Power, and those who favoured France. After the
conclusion of peace, France was represented at the Court of the Sultan
by very able ministers, who soon regained the influence for that
country which it had formerly enjoyed.
Nowhere throughout the Empire were the Janissaries more turbulent and
dangerous or more oppressive to the rayas than in Serbia. They aimed at
governing the province in the same way as the Mamelukes in Egypt and
the military Begs in Algiers and Tunis, and if they had been allowed
to have their way, Serbia would have achieved a virtual independence
of the Porte, under a military and fanatical Moslem despotism. The
Janissaries there were almost as hostile to the Spahis inhabiting
the provinces as to the rayas. They aimed at ousting the Spahis from
their feudal rights in the country districts and at an assumption of
ownership of land, more oppressive to the peasant Christian cultivators
of the soil than that of the Spahis. Both Spahis and rayas appealed to
the Porte for protection against these ruffians. The rayas in their
petition to the Sultan said that—
not only were they reduced to abject poverty by the Dahis (the
leaders of the Janissaries), but they were attacked in their
religion, their morality, and their honour. No husband was secure
as to his wife, no father as to his daughter, no brother as to his
sister. The Church, the cloister, the monks, the priests, all were
violated. Art thou still our Czar? then come and free us from these
evildoers, and if thou wilt not save us, at least tell us that we may
decide whether to flee to the mountains and forests, or to seek in
the rivers a termination of our miserable existence.[31]
The Sultan was willing to listen to these grave complaints, and to
put down the turbulent Dahis and their attendant Janissaries, not so
much out of sympathy for the rayas as in order to restore his own
authority in the province and as a first step towards the reformation
or suppression of the Janissaries elsewhere throughout his Empire. He
began by threatening the Dahis. If they did not mend their ways, he
would send an army against them. These ruffians, knowing that the
Sultan could not venture to employ a Moslem force against them, came
to the conclusion that he meant to arm the rayas of the province. They
determined to anticipate this by a general massacre. If no resistance
had been offered to this, the whole Christian population of Serbia
would have been exterminated. The rayas, however, were no longer the
submissive and patient people they had been reduced to by servitude for
two hundred and fifty years under the Turks, during which no one of
them had been allowed to carry about him a weapon of defence. As has
been already stated, they had been invited to rebel by the Austrians
in their last war with the Turks, had been armed by them, and had
given valuable assistance. Great numbers of them had been trained as
soldiers, and retained their arms when the Austrians retired from
the country, after the peace of Sistova, which provided no adequate
security for these unfortunate people.
They now, in 1807, rose in arms against their oppressors, who were bent
on exterminating them. They elected as their leader George Petrowitsch
(Kara George, as he is known in history), a peasant like themselves,
a most brave man, who had served in the Austrian army, and who soon
showed great qualities as a general. Under his leadership the rayas
succeeded in driving the Dahis and Janissaries out of the country
districts.
The Sultan at the commencement of this servile war lent his assistance
to the rayas. The Pasha of Bosnia was instructed to support them with
an armed force. The local Spahis also, who were still in the country
and had not been driven away by the Dahis, lent assistance. On the
other hand, the Dahis received assistance from the fanatical part
of the Moslems in the towns. They had also the sympathy and aid of
Passhwan Oghlou, the mutinous Pasha of Widdin. It was, however, almost
wholly due to the efforts of the Serbian rayas that the Dahis were
completely defeated. Most of them were slaughtered, and the world was
well rid of them. When this was achieved, the whole of Serbia was
practically in the hands of the Christian rayas, with the exception of
Belgrade and a few fortresses, which were garrisoned by the Sultan’s
troops.
At this stage the Sultan, when all that he really aimed at was
achieved—namely the suppression of the local Janissaries—summoned the
insurgent rayas to lay down their arms and to resume their position
as subjects of the Porte and as rayas under the yoke of the local
Spahis as of yore. The war, however, had evoked a national spirit among
the Christian population, which would not be content with the old
condition of servitude. They sent a petition to the Russian Government
claiming assistance on the ground that they were members of the Greek
Church. The Czar, in reply, advised them to present their claims at
Constantinople, and promised to give his support to them at the Porte.
They then sent a deputation to the Sultan, and boldly claimed that
Belgrade and the other fortresses should be given up to them, and
asked that arrears of taxes and tribute should be remitted. The first
of these was the most important, for it virtually meant a claim for
autonomy under the suzerainty only of the Sultan.
These demands caused the greatest indignation among the Moslems of
the capital, and the Sultan forthwith rejected them. He ordered the
members of the deputation to be imprisoned. He directed the Pasha of
Nisch to invade Serbia and reduce the contumacious rayas to their
former condition. He threatened them with death or slavery. Kara George
met this force on the frontier of Serbia and defeated it. He also
defeated two other armies which the Sultan sent against him, and he
was able, unaided by any external force, to capture Belgrade and the
other fortresses and expel the Turkish garrisons. Thus it happened that
the native Christians of Serbia, by their own heroic efforts, without
any foreign assistance, achieved a virtual independence of Ottoman
rule, an event of supreme importance in its effect on other Christian
communities under servitude to the Turks.
Meanwhile important events were developing at Constantinople. It was
the scene of a violent diplomatic struggle between Russia and England
on the one hand, and France on the other, for the support of the
Porte in the war then raging in Europe. The Emperor Napoleon sent as
ambassador there General Sebastiani, formerly a priest, now a soldier
and able diplomat. His demands were supported by the great victory
of the French over the Austrians at Ulm. The recent acquisition by
France of Dalmatia and a part of Croatia brought that Power into close
relation with Turkey. Sebastiani pressed for the support of Turkey with
great insistence.
On the other hand, Russia was equally cogent in its demands, and even
more threatening. It insisted on an alliance, offensive and defensive.
It demanded that the Sultan should recognize the Czar as the protector
of all the Christians in Turkey professing the Greek religion, and that
the Russian Ambassador should have the right of intervention on their
behalf. The Sultan, conscious of the inferiority of his military force,
could only temporize.
Moslem pride and fanaticism was greatly excited by the demands of
Russia. Sebastiani, working on this, persuaded the Sultan, by way of
retort to Russia, to depose the Hospodars of Moldavia and Wallachia, on
the ground that they were suspected of being pensioners of Russia. The
Czar treated this as a gross breach of the engagement entered into by
the Porte, in 1802, under which the Hospodars of the two principalities
were only to be removed from their posts with the consent of Russia. He
thereupon ordered an army of thirty-five thousand men, under General
Michelsen, to invade Moldavia. The army entered Jassy and, a little
later, Bucharest before the Porte was able to make any resistance.
The British Government at the same time gave full support to Russia.
Its Ambassador, Mr. Arbuthnot, insisted on the Porte joining the
alliance of England and Russia against France. The Sultan refused to
do so. Mr. Arbuthnot thereupon sailed away in a frigate and joined
the British fleet lying off the island of Tenedos, under the command
of Admiral Duckworth, which consisted of seven battleships and two
frigates. This fleet, favoured by a fair wind, then forced the
Dardanelles against the Turkish batteries on February 19, 1807, with
little damage, and made its appearance in the Sea of Marmora. It there
destroyed a Turkish battleship and four corvettes.
The fleet anchored off the Prince’s Islands, within a few miles
of Constantinople, which was exposed to bombardment from the sea.
The admiral presented a demand to the Porte for the surrender of
the Ottoman fleet lying at Constantinople and for compliance with
the demands of Mr. Arbuthnot. He threatened to bombard the city if
his ultimatum was rejected. If any serious effect could have been
given to this menace, immediate action should have been taken. The
Ambassador and the admiral allowed themselves to be drawn into a
negotiation spread over ten days, during which the Sultan and the
whole male population of his capital were engaged, with feverish
haste, in strengthening the defences of the city. A thousand guns
and a hundred mortars were mounted on its batteries. The Turkish
fleet, consisting of twelve battleships, was removed to a point in
the harbour beyond the reach of the guns of a bombarding fleet. The
defences of the Dardanelles were also greatly strengthened. Admiral
Duckworth was compelled at last to the conclusion that a bombardment
would be attended with very serious risk to his own fleet. If it were
damaged, the Turkish fleet, coming out of the Bosphorus, might assail
it with advantage. It might also be impossible for it to repass the
Dardanelles. He decided to withdraw. On March 1st he weighed anchor,
and on the 3rd he repassed the Dardanelles, this time with considerable
damage to his ships and loss of life. Some of the ships were struck
by the enormous stone balls fired from the Turkish batteries. Two
corvettes were sunk and six hundred men were killed. The fleet narrowly
escaped destruction. The whole adventure redounded little to the credit
either of the diplomacy or strategy of the British Government.
Not content with this futile demonstration against Constantinople, the
British Government attempted another expedition, even more futile and
senseless, this time against Egypt, in the hope, it may be supposed,
of bringing pressure to bear on the Sultan. A force of five thousand
soldiers was sent from Sicily, then in British occupation, and was
landed on the Egyptian coast near Alexandria on March 18th. It marched
on that city, which, garrisoned by only four hundred and fifty Turks,
surrendered. This was its first and last success. A few days later
fifteen hundred men were sent to attack Rosetta, at the mouth of the
Nile, and were repulsed. Another expedition was even more unsuccessful.
Of two thousand men sent out, one thousand were killed and wounded.
There seems to have been expectation that the Mamelukes would assist
the British against the Turkish troops. This was not realized. The
remains of the small army under General Fraser were cooped up in
Alexandria until September, when, owing to the serious disaffection of
the inhabitants of the city and the approach of a large body of Turks
from Cairo, it was recognized that its position was untenable. A flag
of truce was sent to the advancing Turks with the offer to evacuate
Egypt if the British prisoners in their hands were given up to them.
This was accepted, and on September 25th the little army embarked again
on its transports and returned to Sicily.
These two senseless expeditions had an effect the very reverse of which
was intended. They exasperated Turkish opinion and drove the Porte
into closer alliance with the French. In the meantime, and since the
failure of the demonstration by Duckworth’s fleet, momentous events
occurred in Constantinople. The Sultan took advantage of the departure
of the main body of Janissaries with the army sent to the Danube to
extend his scheme for raising a military force, clothed and drilled and
paid on the European system. He issued an edict that the youngest and
best of the Janissaries were to be enrolled in this new corps. This
caused the gravest discontent among the Janissaries still in garrison
at Constantinople, to the reactionary party in the Divan, and to the
ulemas. The Janissaries broke out in mutiny at the end of May 1807.
They put this question to the Mufti: “What punishment is deserved by
one who has established the new military force?” The Mufti replied:
“Death, and that according to the Koran, since the Divan had introduced
among Mussulmans the manners of infidels and manifested an intention to
suppress the Janissaries, who were the true defenders of the law and
the prophets.”
Fortified by this _fetva_, the Janissaries then passed a resolution
that Selim must be deposed. They sent a deputation to the Sultan to
insist on his abdication. Selim, however, had already heard of their
intention. He had no force at hand sufficient to overcome the mutinous
Janissaries. He anticipated their demands by himself going to the Cage,
where his cousin Mustapha, the next heir to the throne, was immured,
making obeisance to him as Sultan, advising him not to listen to those
who desired great changes, and wishing him a happier reign than his
own. He then attempted to commit suicide by taking poison, but Mustapha
dashed the cup containing it from his hands and swore that his life
should be saved. On the arrival of the deputation of Janissaries at the
palace they found that a new Sultan was already installed there. Selim
retired with dignity to the apartments in the Cage vacated by Mustapha.
The new Sultan, Mustapha III, was a very weak and incompetent man.
He was aged thirty, of imperfect education and poor intellect. He
filled the throne for a few months only, during which there was
practically no government. Though Selim himself was reconciled to the
loss of his throne, he had powerful friends who resented his fall.
Bairactar, the Pasha of Rustchuck, who owed his post to Selim, marched
upon Constantinople with forty thousand Bosnians and Albanians. They
overawed the Janissaries and invaded the palace. They knocked at its
gates and demanded that Selim should be brought out to them. Mustapha,
however, on their approach, had already given orders that Selim and
Mahmoud, the only survivors of the Othman race besides himself, were
to be put to death, in the hope that this might save his own life. The
mutes were able to strangle Selim, not without a desperate struggle,
which, if prolonged for a few minutes, would have saved him, for
Bairactar was already storming at the gate of the palace. Mahmoud could
not be found. Selim’s body was then cast out to Bairactar and his
men. “Here is he you seek!” it was called out. On entering the palace
Bairactar found Mustapha seated on his throne. He was dragged from it
and was sent to prison. Mahmoud, who had been hidden in the furnace of
a bath, was found and was installed as Sultan.
Bairactar, having succeeded in deposing Mustapha and installing
Mahmoud, most unwisely allowed the Bosnian and Albanian troops to
return to their homes. There remained only four thousand men as a
bodyguard on whom the new Sultan could rely. They were not sufficient
to withstand the Janissaries. These turbulent men broke out in another
rebellion. They attacked Bairactar in his palace. He took refuge in
a tower used as a powder magazine. He was there blown up, whether
by accident or wilfully is not known. There ensued a few days of
civil war. The artillery on whom the Sultan relied went over to the
Janissaries. A counter-revolution was effected. Mustapha would have
been restored to the throne if he had not been put to death in the
interval. Mahmoud owed his life to the fact that he was the last
surviving male of the Othman race. He was compelled to yield to the
menaces of the Janissaries, who were now masters of the city. An edict
was issued in his name which repealed all the reforms effected by
Selim. The old system was restored, with all its abuses. In the next
three or four years the Janissaries were virtually the rulers of the
Empire. Grand Viziers were appointed and dismissed at their dictation.
Mahmoud was greatly humiliated. But he bided his time, and it will
be seen that before long he inflicted a most bloody revenge on the
Janissaries and extinguished their corps for ever.
Meanwhile affairs on the Danube fared badly with the Turks, as might
be expected. The Russians gained complete possession of Moldavia and
Wallachia. Their armies crossed the Danube and laid siege to fortresses
on the right bank. In 1807 Russia and France came to terms. The treaty
of Tilsit provided that hostilities were to cease between Russia and
Turkey, and that the Russian troops were to be withdrawn from Moldavia
and Wallachia, till a definitive agreement had been come to between
these two Powers. But a secret article, which was not made public till
some time later, provided that all the European provinces of Turkey,
except Roumelia and Constantinople, were to be taken from the Sultan.
We now know that there were long discussions between Napoleon and the
Czar, on the River Niemen, as to the future disposal of these and
other provinces. Napoleon was ready to concede to Russia the Danubian
principalities and Bulgaria. He claimed for France Egypt, Syria,
Greece, all the islands of the Archipelago, and Crete. Austria was
to be propitiated by the cession of Bosnia and Serbia. The question
remained what was to be done with Constantinople. Napoleon would not
concede it to Russia. The Czar insisted upon this. The agreement
broke down on this point. But it is certain that Napoleon was willing
enough to throw over his recent allies, the Turks, and to join with
their hereditary foe in dismembering their Empire. A more perfidious
transaction is not to be found in history.
In compliance with the treaty of Tilsit, Russia suspended hostilities
with the Porte. But the Russian army remained in occupation of
Wallachia and Moldavia, and showed no intention to evacuate them. War
was renewed in 1809. Prince Bagration, at the head of a Russian army,
crossed the Danube and captured several Turkish fortresses on its
right bank. In the following year, 1810, the Russians captured the
important stronghold Silistria, but failed with very heavy loss in an
assault on Rustchuck. Later in the year they inflicted a severe defeat
on the army of the Grand Vizier at Baltin. They then succeeded in a
second attack on Rustchuck, and captured Sistova. But they failed to
take the fortified camp at Schumla, and were unable therefore to cross
the Balkan range.
In 1811 war was again imminent between Russia and France, and the
Russian generals on the Danube received orders to stand on the
defensive. The Turks took advantage of this, and sent a large army
across the Danube. It was eventually defeated and compelled to
surrender. In spite of their successes, the Russians were willing to
come to terms. They had hitherto insisted on the retention of Wallachia
and Moldavia. They were now ready to make concessions. The invasion
of Russia by Napoleon was imminent. It was necessary for the Czar to
concentrate all his forces in defence of his own Empire. Negotiations
were commenced in 1811, and they resulted in the treaty of Bucharest
of May 28, 1812. It was agreed that the River Pruth was to be the new
boundary between the two Empires. The whole of Wallachia and a great
part of Moldavia were restored to Turkey. Bessarabia and a part of
Moldavia were ceded to Russia.
The treatment of Serbia in the treaty was ungenerous on the part of
Russia. An amnesty was to be granted to its people. They were to be
secured in future the regulation of their internal affairs. But the
supremacy of the Sultan was to be maintained, and Belgrade and other
fortresses which had been captured by the Serbians were again to be
garrisoned by Turkish troops. This last was the cause of great troubles
in the future. But for the impending invasion of Russia by Napoleon the
terms would undoubtedly have been far less favourable to the Porte.
XIX
MAHMOUD II
1808-39
THE first four years of Mahmoud’s long reign of thirty-one years were
fraught with bitter humiliation to him at the hands of the Janissaries.
There was no indication of his subsequent career, when he proved
himself to be the most able and resolute of Sultans since Solyman the
Magnificent. But he was also the most unfortunate, for he was unable
to prevent a greater reduction of the Turkish Empire than had been
incurred by any one of the long line of degenerate Sultans. It may
well be, however, that but for his action still greater losses would
have resulted, for on his advent to the throne the Empire seemed to
be on the brink of ruin. In every part of it turbulent and rebellious
pashas were asserting independence. In Epirus the celebrated Ali Pasha
of Janina had cast off allegiance, and was threatening to extend
his rule over Greece, Thessaly, and the Ionian Islands. At Widdin
on the Danube, at Bagdad on the Tigris, at Acre in Syria, the same
process was being pursued by other pashas. In Egypt, Mehemet Ali
had assumed the position of Governor and was creating an army and a
navy independent of the Porte. In Arabia, the sect of Wahabees had
attained a virtual independence, and had obtained possession of the
holy cities. Other provinces, such as Serbia, Wallachia, Moldavia,
and Greece, were seething with disaffection caused by long and
intolerable misgovernment. The difficulty of holding together the
distracted Empire was greatly increased by the want of an effective
army under the full control of the central Government, so as to enable
it to cope with the centrifugal forces which threatened disruption.
The Janissaries, who had contributed so largely to the growth of the
Empire, were now a standing danger to it. They were able to overawe
the Sultan, and to dictate to him the appointment and dismissal of
Viziers. But successive campaigns on the Danube, and conflicts with
rebellious pashas, had given abundant proof of their inefficiency as a
military force. Compared with the armies of European Powers they were
an ill-disciplined and badly armed mob. They arrogantly refused to be
armed, clothed, and drilled after the fashion of European armies. While
useless for war, they were formidable for other purposes. They were
under no control. They terrorized the capital, and in the provinces
they were at the disposal of any adventurous pasha who suborned
them to support his ambitious and rebellious projects. Mahmoud from
the earliest years of his reign fully recognized, as many of his
predecessors had done, how urgent the necessity was to put an end to
this turbulent force, and to create a new army which would obey and
support him as Sultan, and be of value against external enemies. It is
his principal claim in the history of Turkey that he was able to effect
this. Eighteen years, however, elapsed before he felt strong enough to
grapple with these foes of his dynasty and State.
Apart from this great achievement, he showed inflexible firmness
and courage in the great difficulties which confronted him, and
almost alone he bore the burden of the State for thirty-one years of
unparalleled peril, and often of most serious disaster. It will be seen
that, in spite of these high qualities, and in spite of the reform of
his army, the losses of territory to his Empire were very serious. In
Greece, the Morea, and the provinces north of the Gulf of Corinth up
to the frontier of Thessaly, acquired complete independence under the
guarantee of the three Great Powers of Europe. Egypt, Moldavia and
Wallachia, and Serbia attained almost similar independence, subject
only to the nominal suzerainty of the Sultan of Turkey and the payment
of fixed tributes. They no longer added to the real strength of the
Empire. On the other hand, he completely destroyed the power of the
rebellious Pashas of Janina, Widdin, Bagdad, and Acre, and through
Mehemet Ali, the Pasha of Egypt, he subdued the Wahabees and recovered
the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
It should be added that Mahmoud, unlike so many of his predecessors,
devoted his life to affairs of his State rather than to his harem. He
committed at times acts of great cruelty. He put to death his brother
Mustapha and Mustapha’s only son, and caused to be drowned in the
Bosphorus four ladies of Mustapha’s harem who were enceinte. He had no
scruple in directing the secret assassination of any persons whom he
suspected of harbouring schemes in opposition to his own. He authorized
the perpetration of ruthless massacres of Greeks in all parts of his
Empire at the inception of the revolution in Greece. But these were
acts of policy in accord with the traditions of his family, approved
by public opinion of the Turks, by whom terrorism and massacre were
recognized as justifiable methods of government. The murder of his
relatives left him the sole survivor of the Othman race, a position
which secured him from intrigues against his throne by the Janissaries.
The most serious of the losses to the Empire in Mahmoud’s reign was
that of Egypt, for it was a Moslem country, and though for many years
previously the hold on it by the Ottoman Porte had been slender, and
the Mamelukes had been able, as a rule, to impose their will and
to govern the province, yet the Porte could in the main rely on it
for support to the Empire in times of emergency. It will be well,
therefore, to explain the changes effected in Egypt, for it will be
seen that they had a great bearing on events in other parts of the
Ottoman Empire.
Mehemet Ali, who effected the virtual independence of Egypt, subject
to the nominal suzerainty of the Sultan, was the most remarkable man
that the Mahommedan world had produced in modern times. The son of
an Albanian Moslem fisherman and small landowner at Kavala, on the
borders of Thrace and Macedonia, he was left a penniless orphan, and
was brought up as a dependent in the household of the chief magistrate
of the district, who was a distant relative. He never learnt to read
or write. He said of himself in later years that the only books he
ever read were men’s faces, and that he seldom made a mistake in them.
When the French invaded Egypt under General Bonaparte, Mehemet Ali was
sent in defence of it with a band of three hundred Albanians, as one
of their junior officers, and before long, on the return home of the
commanding officer, contrived to step into his place. When the Turkish
army was driven into the sea at Aboukir in 1794 by Napoleon, he was
saved from drowning by a boat from the British admiral’s ship. Later
he was put in command of all the Albanians employed in Egypt, and was
attached for a time to the British army.
After the departure of the British from Egypt, conflict arose between
the Turks and the Mamelukes for the control of the government. Mehemet
at first sided with the Mamelukes, but later he threw them over in
favour of the Albanians in the service of the Turks. When the British
Government sent its futile expedition to Egypt in 1808, Mehemet was
chiefly concerned in opposing it. He was in command at Rosetta when
a great number of British soldiers were slain, and a few days later
he entered Cairo in triumph through an avenue of British heads stuck
on pikes. Thenceforth he rapidly rose in influence and position, and
at the age of thirty-five was the most powerful man in Egypt, and was
able to instal himself as Pasha. He was harassed and opposed by the
Mamelukes. He determined to get rid of them. He invited about five
hundred of their leading men to a friendly conference at the citadel of
Cairo. After entertaining them at a sumptuous repast, he ordered the
gates to be shut, and had them all shot down in the narrow street of
the citadel. A single man only of them survived by leaping his horse
from the wall of the citadel, a height of 30 feet. This was followed by
a slaughter of nearly all the Mamelukes in the country. Mehemet in this
set the example which was followed a few years later by Sultan Mahmoud
in suppressing the Janissaries.
Thenceforward Mehemet was undisputed ruler of Egypt. He had a genius
for organization and government. Though cruel and vindictive, and even
bloodthirsty, as regards his enemies and against evildoers of all
kinds, he had a keen sense of justice, and a determination to mete
it out equally, and without favour, to the people of all sects and
races. He brought about peace and order and prosperity such as Egypt
had never of late years enjoyed. He was ambitious to extend his rule.
He organized for this purpose, and for asserting himself against the
Porte, an army of a hundred thousand men raised by conscription and
armed and drilled on the model of European armies, with the aid of
French and Italian officers who had served under Napoleon. He also
built a powerful fleet with the help of French naval constructors.
He soon proved the value of his new army by putting down a revolt in
Arabia of the Wahabees. He did this, on behalf of, and in the name of
the Sultan. He also conquered the oasis of Senaar and extended the rule
of Egypt into the Sudan. It will be seen that later, in 1825 and 1826,
he sent his army and navy in support of the Sultan to the Morea for
the purpose of putting an end to the revolution in Greece, which the
Sultan had been unable to cope with. Before dealing with this, however,
it will be well to revert to Mahmoud and explain the course of events
which compelled him to call in aid Mehemet Ali’s army.
One of the earliest matters which Mahmoud had to deal with was that
of Serbia. The treaty of Bucharest had left that province in a very
unsettled and ambiguous position. The Turks, under its terms, were
permitted to garrison Belgrade and other fortresses, and were to
concede to the Serbians self-government, but there was no adequate
guarantee for this. The Serbians, who were in possession of the
fortresses, refused to give them up to the Turks until a scheme
of self-government was arranged. The Porte insisted on immediate
surrender. Subsequent proceedings showed that there was no intention to
give effective self-government to the Serbians. The Sultan in 1813 sent
an army to enforce his claims. Kara George, in most strange contrast
to his previous heroic action, lost courage on this occasion. After
burying the treasure which he had amassed as virtual ruler of Serbia,
he fled the country and sought refuge with the Austrians. In so doing
he passed out of the history of his country, save that when, some years
later, he thought he might safely return to Serbia, he was arrested and
shot as a traitor.
After this defection Serbia seemed to be at the mercy of the Turks, and
the greater part of it was occupied by them. But at the moment of its
great peril another national patriot and hero rose to the front in the
person of Milosch Obrenowitch, who, much as Kara George had done a few
years previously, took the lead in rousing the Christian population to
resistance, and in leading them to victory. He succeeded in driving
the Turks from all the country districts and shutting them up in the
fortresses. Mahmoud then sent another army with the object of relieving
the Turks in the Serbian fortresses and subduing the rebels. The army,
however, halted on the frontier, and negotiations ensued which lasted
for some years without any result. The Sultan, it seems, was unwilling,
in view of the numerous other difficulties pending in his Empire, to
risk the loss of an army in a guerrilla war in the mountains of Serbia.
The most serious of Mahmoud’s other difficulties at this period was the
insurrection of the Greeks in 1821. Never was rebellion of a subject
race more justifiable. Nowhere throughout the Ottoman Empire were the
results of its rule more degrading and intolerable than in Greece.
It served none of the purposes for which governments exist. Life and
property and honour were without security, and justice had degenerated
into the practice of selling injustice to the highest bidder.
The condition of the Greek population was infinitely worse than that of
their compatriots in most other parts of the Empire. In Constantinople
the Greeks were a wealthy community. They had a large share in the
administration of the Empire. The Porte, in fact, could not do without
them. Their religion was under the special protection accorded to
it by Mahomet the Conqueror. The trade of the Empire was largely in
their hands. At Smyrna, Salonika, and many other cities, there were
large numbers of Greeks who had enjoyed facilities of trade and had
accumulated wealth. Mahmoud, like many of his predecessors, recognized
that, by largely contributing to taxes, these people were a source of
wealth to his Government, and was not disposed to adopt any measure
proposed by the more fanatical of Moslems to extirpate them or to drive
them into rebellion. Not a few of the islands of the archipelago, such
as Scios and Psara, were practically allowed to govern themselves, and
life there was as well-ordered as in any part of Europe.
It was very different with Greece on the mainland. It seems to have
been the policy of the Porte to prevent its becoming a populous and
wealthy country, with a view to keeping it under close subjection.
Much of its land was in the ownership of Moslems, a majority of whom
were Greeks by race, who had adopted Islam in order to save their
property. They were a fanatical class who were quite as oppressive to
the rayas, the cultivators of the soil, as were those of pure Turkish
descent. The Ottoman Government presented itself to the Greeks only as
an engine to extract taxes, and the pashas who were sent to govern them
thought only how best and most quickly to fill their pockets, knowing
that their tenure of office would be very short. The people there
compared their condition with that of the self-governing communities
of Scio and other islands. Education had spread to some extent in
spite of the neglect of the Government. Wealthy Greeks from other
districts had endowed some schools and colleges. With education came
the study of the past history of Greece and the ambition to renew its
nationality and greatness. For some time past secret societies such as
the Hetairia, promoted in the first instance by the Greeks of Odessa,
had been spreading their influence in Greece, and had laid the seeds of
revolution.
The insurrection in Greece was not only based on political and racial
ideals, it was also an agrarian war, the revolt of cultivators of
the soil against their feudal oppressors. This gave to the outbreak
in rural districts its intensely persistent, passionate, and cruel
attributes.
The revolution broke out in the Morea at the beginning of April 1821,
and soon spread over the whole of its country districts. It was
estimated that at that time there were twenty thousand Moslems thinly
spread in the country districts, most of them of Greek race, feudal
lords of the soil and oppressors of the rayas. Nearly the whole of
these Moslems were now brutally murdered, without distinction of age
or sex. The survivors fled into the fortresses, which were garrisoned
by Turks. These fortresses were speedily invested by the Greeks, and
within three months nearly all of them were compelled to surrender. In
most cases capitulations were agreed to on the terms that lives would
be respected, but in no case were these terms adhered to. The garrisons
and the Turkish inhabitants and the refugees from the country districts
who had gathered there were brutally murdered.
The first encounter between the Turkish soldiers and the Greeks that
could be called a battle was at Valtetsi, in the neighbourhood of
Tripolitza, the capital of the Morea. Three thousand Greek peasants
there defeated five thousand Turks, with a loss of four hundred Turks
and a hundred and fifty Greeks. The battle destroyed the prestige of
the Turks. It showed that they were no match for the insurgent Greek
peasants.
As a result of this victory, Navarino and Tripolitza fell into the
hands of the Greek insurgents after short sieges. In both cases the
garrisons capitulated on favourable terms for themselves and the
inhabitants of the towns. In neither case were the terms observed.
All the Moslem troops and inhabitants were ruthlessly massacred. At
Tripolitza these numbered eight thousand, including women and children.
“Greek historians,” says Finlay in his _History of Greece_, “have
recoiled from telling of these barbarities, while they have been loud
in denouncing those of the Turks.”
When news of the massacres in the Morea arrived at Constantinople the
greatest alarm and indignation arose. Bloody and ruthless reprisals
ensued against the Greeks residing there. The Sultan set the example.
He directed that many of the leading Greeks were to be immediately
executed. The Greek Patriarch was hanged by his order at the gate
of the episcopal residence. The _fetva_ authorizing this was pinned
to his body. There was no reason to believe that the Patriarch was
implicated in the outbreak in Greece. Four other bishops met the same
fate. Thousands of Greeks of inferior position fell victims to the fury
of the people at the capital and at many other cities, such as Smyrna
and Salonika, and in Cyprus. The Sultan took no steps to restrain
these horrors. Women and children equally with men were murdered.
Their houses were burnt, their property was pillaged. It was estimated
that the number of Greeks thus massacred was not short of the number
of Moslems slaughtered in Greece at the outbreak of the revolution.
Thenceforth Greeks and Turks emulated one another in their acts of
barbarity. The Turks had always been bloodthirsty when their passions
and fears were roused, and they now had terrible wrongs to avenge. The
Greeks had been degraded by long oppression, and were little better
than Turks. Both people evidently thought that the results of their
cruelties were proof of the wisdom of inflicting them. The Greeks,
by extirpating the Moslems in the Morea, cleared the country, once
for all, of their oppressors and effected that separation of the two
races which, it will be seen later, the Great Powers of Europe thought
desirable, though they hoped to attain it by peaceful expropriation
and indemnity. The Turks claimed that their severities checked the
spread of the revolution, and compelled one half of the Greek people
living within their midst to submit to Ottoman rule.
It has been shown that the revolution broke out in the Morea. Within a
few months the whole of that country was cleared of Ottoman troops and
of Moslem inhabitants. The outbreak extended to most of the islands of
the archipelago, where the Greeks predominated, where there was less
admixture of Slav blood than on the mainland, and where the traditions
of a long-past national existence and of high civilization survived in
a stronger form. In spite of their greater prosperity, due to milder
treatment at the hands of the Turks, they were ardently in favour of
independence. It was in the islands that the majority of Greek merchant
vessels were owned. They numbered between four and five hundred, and
were manned by twelve thousand Greek sailors. An active war fleet
was formed out of these vessels and sailors. They frequently met and
defeated the Turkish fleet. They made special use of fire ships, and
blew up or burnt many of the Turkish vessels and caused the greatest
alarm to the Turkish sailors.
In the course of the four years 1821-4, the Turks were generally
worsted by the Greek insurgents on land and sea. Not only the Morea,
but the parts of Greece north of the Gulf of Corinth up to the frontier
of Thessaly, including Athens—then reduced to a squalid, third-rate
town—and the islands of the archipelago, achieved a practical
independence. A national government and a representative assembly were
constituted. The outbreak in Greece roused the sympathies of great
numbers of persons in Western Europe, especially in England and France.
In spite of this, the Governments of these countries for long held
aloof and discouraged the rebellion, not wishing to see Turkey weakened
as against Russia. Lord Byron was an enthusiast for the Greeks, and in
1824 landed at Missolonghi and joined their army. But it cannot be said
that he effected much during the short time he survived there. He was
evidently disillusioned, like so many other Philhellenes who joined the
Greeks, by the discords, intrigues, and corruption of their leaders.
But he never lost faith in their future. He confidently predicted that
the Greek nation would prove itself worthy of freedom. He gave his
life to the cause. He died of malarial fever within a few weeks of
landing at this unhealthy spot. This did much to arouse the interest of
Europe and to promote its intervention on behalf of the Greeks.
After four years of futile efforts to stamp out the Greek revolution,
it became clear to Sultan Mahmoud that his army, as then constituted,
was unequal to the task. He was much impressed by the success of
Mehemet Ali in Egypt in creating an army armed and drilled in the
manner of European armies. In 1824, he called on this great vassal
to aid in the reconquest of Greece by sending his new army and fleet
there. Mehemet consented to do so, but only on the promise of the
Sultan that Syria, Damascus, and Crete, would be added to his Pashalic.
He sent his fleet to co-operate with that of the Sultan on the coast of
the Morea. It sailed from Alexandria on July 25, 1824, with an army of
ten thousand infantry and a thousand cavalry, under command of Ibrahim
Pasha, the son of Mehemet Ali. They were landed at Modon and marched
thence to Navarino. That fortress was garrisoned by sixteen hundred
Greeks. The flower of the Greek army of seven thousand men advanced
to relieve the fortress. Ibrahim with three thousand men attacked and
utterly defeated them. The Greeks fled in wild confusion. This battle
was proof that the best Greek troops were unable to encounter the
well-disciplined Egyptians in a pitched battle.
After the capture of Navarino, Ibrahim continued his reconquest of
Greece with uniform success. The Greeks were exhausted by their
long struggle against the Turks. They could offer but a very feeble
resistance to this new and far more effective enemy. In April, 1826,
the Egyptian army captured Missolonghi, causing a loss to the Greeks
of four thousand men. Thence he gradually subdued the whole of the
Morea. Later the cities of Corinth and Athens fell into the hands
of the Turks, and on May 6, 1827, at a battle at Phalerum, in the
neighbourhood of this last city, Reschid Pasha, in command of an
Albanian army, defeated and dispersed the last army of the Greeks
then in the field. The Greek Government was forced to remove from the
mainland to the island of Poros. The whole of Greece then fell into
anarchy. Though the Greek fleet continued to make a gallant stand
against the combined Turkish and Egyptian fleets, it was not strong
enough to maintain a mastery at sea and to cut off the communication
between Ibrahim’s army and its base in Egypt. It is certain that if
the Great Powers of Europe had not intervened, Greece would have been
completely subdued, and Turkish rule would have been reinstated there.
Ibrahim threatened to remove the whole Greek population and sell them
into slavery, and to replace them by Egyptians and Arabs.
Meanwhile the success of Ibrahim’s army, armed and disciplined on the
model of European armies, as compared with the failure in previous
campaigns in Greece of the ill-disciplined and badly armed troops of
Turkey, produced a great impression at Constantinople. Mahmoud now
found that his long-cherished project for the reform of the army was
supported almost unanimously by the Divan and by the whole of the
ulemas. He determined, therefore, to carry it into effect, and to
suppress his mortal foes, the Janissaries. He had been long engaged in
making preparations for a decisive issue with these turbulent troops.
He had formed a body of fourteen thousand artillerymen, drilled and
armed on the new model, and on whom he could thoroughly rely for
support. His predecessor, Selim, had enlisted a small body of infantry
on the same model. The Agha of the Janissaries, Hussein Pasha, was
devoted to him, as was also the Mufti. The Sultan thereupon, in May
1826, gave orders to the Janissaries that one-fourth of them were
to be incorporated in the new corps of infantry. The Janissaries
refused. They marched in a body, on June 14th, to the palace, intent
on overawing the Sultan, as they had so often done in the past. They
met their master on this occasion. The Sultan summoned the artillery
to his support. He unfolded the sacred banner and directed their
action. They pounded the Janissaries with cannon shot in the streets
leading to the palace and drove them back to their barracks with
heavy loss. The guns were then concentrated on the barracks and set
fire to them. No quarter was given. The Janissaries perished either
by gun fire or in the burning barracks. Four thousand of them were
disposed of in this holocaust. The Sultan ruthlessly followed up his
victory. Many more thousands of the Janissaries were put to death
in Constantinople and in other cities of the Empire. The force was
entirely destroyed. Its very name was erased from official records.
Mahmoud had obtained an overwhelming victory. His new army was at once
increased to forty-five thousand men, exclusive of his artillery, with
the intention of gradually raising it to two hundred thousand. It was
recruited, however, wholly from the Moslem population. The Christians
were excluded from its ranks as rigidly as under the old régime. There
can be no doubt that if time had been allowed to Mahmoud to complete
the number and efficiency of this new army, the Ottoman Empire would
again have become a most formidable military Power. The Sultan did
much more to centralize power in himself. He abolished the military
feudal system, which had become a gross abuse. The beys were everywhere
suppressed, or were allowed to draw their incomes only for the term
of their lives. The rents hitherto paid to these persons were in the
future to be paid directly to the State.
Mahmoud also effected many other important reforms. He abolished the
Court of Confiscations, which had provided a revenue to the State out
of property of persons condemned to death or exile, and which had
become a great abuse. He deprived pashas of their power to put people
to death at their will without trial. He enacted that no one should in
future be so dealt with without formal trial and the right of appeal.
He put the vast Vacouf property (dedicated to Islam) under State
management. He prohibited the wearing of turbans and made the use of
the fez universal in his Empire. He set the example of clothing himself
after the European fashion. He entertained ambassadors and their wives
and others at his palace as other sovereigns did. He contemplated great
reforms in favour of his Christian subjects, but it will be seen that
the task was left incomplete for his successors.
At this point of his career Mahmoud had attained unqualified success.
He had succeeded in putting down all the rebellious pashas, such as
Ali of Janina and others. Mehemet Ali of Egypt had recognized the
supremacy of the Sultan by sending his army and navy to suppress the
Greek rebellion. Greece had been practically reconquered. The Greeks
in other parts of the Empire had been terrorized into submission.
Insurrection in Moldavia and Wallachia had been suppressed. The Serbian
fortresses were in his hands. Above all, the Janissaries, who had
proved to be so useless as a military force and who had murdered two
of his predecessors and deposed many others, were suppressed. He had
carried out great reforms in his Empire. Mahmoud had effected all this
by his own inflexible firmness and by statesmanship of a high order,
not unmixed with cruelty and cunning.
Two events now occurred which materially affected the position of
Turkey, and deprived Mahmoud of the fruits of his ably devised
policy. The one was the death of Alexander, the Emperor of Russia,
the other the decision of the British Government to intervene on
behalf of Greece. Alexander for some years past had been on the horns
of a dilemma. He had a deep sympathy for the subjects of the Ottoman
Empire who were members of the Greek Church, and a great aversion to
Turkish rule. But he also hated and feared revolution. He believed
in the divine right of rulers, however bad, and would take no step
to support the revolt of their subjects, however oppressive their
government. He feared that a dangerous precedent might be extended to
his own Empire. This conflict of views paralysed his action. He gave
no assistance to the Greek insurgents. So long as he lived there was
little hope that Greece would recover its independence. He died late
in 1825, and was succeeded by his brother, Nicholas, a much younger
and more vigorous man, and a truer exponent of Russian ideals. The new
Czar had no objection to insurrection if it was not directed against
his own government. He hated the Turks and wished to drive them out of
Europe much more than he sympathized with the Greeks. He had many other
grounds of complaint against the Porte. It has also been suggested that
he wished to come to conclusions with it before time had been given for
perfecting his new army.
As regards Great Britain, its Government had not originally sympathized
with the Greek revolution, but the reverse. But public opinion,
outraged by the barbarities which had been committed, had produced
an influence on it, and Mr. Canning, the Foreign Secretary, was
personally very favourable to the cause of Greece. The Government as a
whole held the view that the continuance of disorder in Greece was a
menace to the peace of Europe. They had no wish for the extension of
Russia at the expense of Turkey. They thought that if Greece were not
pacified Russia would intervene, and would not confine its claim to
the settlement of the Greek claims, but would aim at other conquests.
They decided, therefore, to make an effort to settle the Greek question
on the basis of autonomy, subject to the suzerainty of the Sultan. In
this view the Cabinet sent the Duke of Wellington to St. Petersburg in
1826 to negotiate with the Czar. He effected an arrangement which was
later embodied in the treaty of London of July 6, 1827, between the
three Powers, Great Britain, Russia, and France, for the pacification
of Greece. Under the terms of this treaty it was agreed, with a view
to bringing about a reconciliation between the Ottoman Porte and the
Greeks, to offer mediation, and to demand an immediate armistice as a
preliminary to the opening of a negotiation.
Under the arrangement to be proposed to the Ottoman Porte, Greece was
to be granted complete autonomy, under the suzerainty of the Sultan,
and was to pay a fixed annual tribute. It was to be governed by
authorities whom its people were to nominate. In order to bring about
a complete separation between the individuals of the two nations and
to prevent the collisions resulting from a long struggle, the Greeks
were to enter upon possession of all Turkish property, either on the
continent or in the isles of Greece, on condition of indemnifying
the former proprietors by the payment of an annual sum to be added
to the tribute. By an additional secret article it was provided that
“if, within one month, the Ottoman Porte did not agree to accept
the mediation of the three Powers and consent to an armistice, the
signatories of the treaty would find the necessity for an approximation
with the Greeks by entering into relations with them, and would employ
all their means for the accomplishment of the objects of the treaty
without, however, taking any part in the hostilities between the two
contending parties.”
In accordance with this treaty, a demand was made on the Porte,
by the ambassadors of the three Powers, for an armistice, and for
a pacification of Greece on the basis above described. The Porte
indignantly refused to entertain the proposed mediation. It denied the
right of the Powers to intervene as regards its Greek subjects. In a
manifesto to its own people, the Porte justified its refusal to mediate
on the proposed basis. It denied that the Greeks had any cause for
complaint against the Ottoman rule. “It is notorious,” it said, “that
these Greeks have been treated like Mussulmans in every respect and as
to everything which regards their property, their personal security,
and the defence of their homes, and that they have been loaded with
benefits by the present Sultan.”
The negotiations between the Porte and the ambassadors were protracted
by the former, in order that an Egyptian fleet, bringing large
reinforcements to Ibrahim in Greece, might arrive at Navarino before
the conclusion of them. After the final rejection of the proposals of
the ambassadors, instructions were given to the combined fleet of the
three Powers to effect a blockade of the Greek ports, and to prevent
the entrance or departure of any Turkish or Egyptian vessels of war.
The combined fleet, under command of the British admiral, Sir Edward
Codrington, thereupon took up a position outside the bay of Navarino.
The admiral then entered into negotiations with the Turkish admiral and
concluded an armistice on behalf of the Greeks. In spite of this, the
Egyptian troops, under Ibrahim Pasha, continued to ravage the Morea in
the most cruel manner, devastating property, murdering the men, and
carrying off the young women for sale as slaves in Egypt. As the winter
was approaching, the British admiral thought it would be difficult
to maintain his position outside the bay. He determined, therefore,
to enter the bay with his fleet. The combined fleet consisted of ten
vessels of the line, ten frigates and smaller vessels, with about
twelve hundred guns. The Turko-Egyptian fleet consisted of five ships
of the line, fifteen frigates, and sixty-two smaller vessels, armed
with two thousand guns. It was anchored in a crescent facing the
entrance of the bay. There were also batteries on shore commanding
the entrance of the bay. The allied fleet entered the bay without
opposition from these batteries and anchored in a line alongside of the
Turkish and Egyptian vessels.
It was obvious that the position was a most critical one, almost
certain to lead to an armed conflict. The Turks fired the first gun
and broke the armistice, whether intentionally, or not, is not quite
clear. The challenge was taken up. There followed a fierce battle
between the two fleets. In a few hours of this 20th of October, 1827,
the Turko-Egyptian fleet was completely destroyed. With the exception
of some of the smaller craft, all the vessels were sunk or burnt. Their
crews had fought valiantly, but they were no match for those of the
allied fleet. But their guns caused much loss of life and did much
damage, and the British battleships, after the battle, were compelled
to return to England for repairs. The batteries on shore did not begin
to fire until the allied fleet had taken position. They might have
effected much more damage if they had fired on the fleet when entering
the bay. A more complete destruction of a fleet had never occurred.
This great victory gave no satisfaction to the British Government.
The spirit of Canning no longer inspired it. He had died since the
initiation of the policy which inevitably led to this naval battle. On
the meeting of the British Parliament, early in 1828, the Speech from
the Throne referred to the battle in the following terms: “His Majesty
deeply laments that this conflict should have occurred with the naval
force of our ancient ally. He still entertains a confident hope that
this untoward event will not be followed by further hostilities.” The
Duke of Wellington, who was now Prime Minister, when challenged in the
House of Lords as to the expression ‘untoward event,’ said:—
The Ottoman Empire was an essential part of the balance of power
in Europe. Its preservation had been for many years an object to
the whole of Europe. While he acquitted the British admiral of all
blame, he pointed out that, under the treaty of London, one of the
stipulations was that the operation was not to lead to hostilities.
When, therefore, the operation under the treaty did lead to
hostilities, it certainly was an untoward event.
It is difficult, however, to conceive how the Duke, who had negotiated
the treaty with the Czar of Russia, could have supposed that, in the
event of the Sultan not agreeing to the terms of mediation, the use of
force against him could be avoided.
However that might have been, the destruction of the Ottoman fleet at
Navarino was of momentous importance. It cut off the communication
between Ibrahim Pasha and Egypt. It restored to Greece command of the
sea in the archipelago. It assured the supremacy of the Russian fleet
in the Black Sea. This last was of enormous value to the Russians in
the war which soon broke out with Turkey. It facilitated the capture
of Varna, and enabled the Russian army to advance across the Balkans
and to threaten Constantinople.
Ibrahim Pasha, finding his position in the Morea untenable, entered
into a convention with the British admiral under which he was permitted
to withdraw the Egyptian army from Greece and embark it for Alexandria
without molestation from the allied fleet. There remained in the Morea
only the Turkish troops. They held most of the fortresses there. Later,
a French army, under General Maison, was, by agreement with the allies,
sent to the Morea. It soon cleared the whole country of the Turkish
troops.
Meanwhile, the Sultan at Constantinople, in spite of the destruction
of his fleet at Navarino, still maintained an obstinate refusal to
accede to the terms of the treaty of London. The ambassadors of England
and France thereupon left the city. Differences then began to arise
between the three allied Powers. The Emperor of Russia proposed to
employ coercive measures against Turkey, and for this purpose to occupy
Moldavia and Wallachia. England and France rejected the proposal.
They wished to preserve the Ottoman Empire as well as to secure the
independence of Greece. But the Greek question was only one of the
complaints of Russia against Turkey. It had also grave reasons to
complain that the treaty of Bucharest and the later treaty of Akermann
of 1826, confirming and extending it, were disregarded by the Porte,
which still occupied Moldavia, Wallachia, and Serbia by its armies.
The Sultan, in a manifesto to his own people, had publicly announced
that he had entered into the treaty of Akermann with the full intention
of not being bound by its terms, and that he regarded Russia as his
hereditary foe.
On April 26, 1828, Russia declared war against Turkey. England and
France found themselves in a position when they could not object, for
the Porte still refused their demands as regards Greece. They had
joined with Russia in destroying the Turkish fleet. They were now
compelled to stand by while the Russians invaded Turkey. The position,
and still more the results of the war, showed what a grave error
Mahmoud committed when he refused to agree to the scheme of the allied
Powers for granting autonomy to Greece under the suzerainty of Turkey.
If he had accepted, his fleet would have been intact. England and
France would have been in a position to object to Russia’s schemes.
As it was, Greece secured an absolute independence, and Wallachia,
Moldavia, and Serbia were soon, by the victories of Russia, to secure
the status of complete autonomy which the Sultan had refused to Greece.
The Emperor Nicholas, in nominal command of his army, crossed the
Pruth on May 7, 1828. His force consisted of not more than sixty-five
thousand men, a surprisingly small number for the greatest military
Power in Europe to put into the field. It was necessary, however, to
keep a large army in Poland, where an outbreak was expected. Another
army was stationed in the Ukraine to watch Austria, who regarded the
Russian attack on Turkey with suspicion and malevolence; and a fourth
army of thirty thousand men, under General Paskiewich, invaded Asia
Minor from the Caucasus. With the main army it was hoped to cross the
Balkans and to menace Constantinople. The Turks offered no resistance
in Moldavia and Wallachia. But it was not till June 8th that the
Russians were able to effect a crossing over the Danube. The Sultan,
on his part, commenced the campaign under great disadvantages. His
old army of Janissaries had recently been destroyed. The new army,
equipped and drilled in the fashion of European armies, was very raw
and ill-trained. It consisted of very young men, who were recruited
with difficulty, often by compulsion, for the new service was very
unpopular, and the older men could not be induced to join. It did not
count more than forty-five thousand men, exclusive of the artillery.
It was supplemented by irregulars from Asia, and the total force under
arms was estimated at one hundred and eighty thousand men, of whom,
after providing for the defence of Constantinople and the Dardanelles,
for a reserve at Adrianople and for other demands on the Empire in
Europe and Asia, there remained only fifty thousand men to oppose the
Russians in Bulgaria, and to provide garrisons for the fortresses on
the Danube and for Schumla and Varna. These garrisons, however, were
supported by the armed Turkish inhabitants of the towns, who could be
relied on for a vigorous resistance. The Turks were under the further
disadvantage that the greater part of their fleet had been destroyed
at Navarino. The Russians were, in consequence, completely masters in
the Black Sea. They were able to send to the Ægean archipelago another
fleet, which blockaded the Dardanelles.
In spite of these difficulties, the Turks made an unexpectedly vigorous
defence against the Russian invasion in Europe. The campaign of 1828
was mainly one of sieges, where the Turkish soldiers, supported by
Moslems of the fortified towns, fought to the best advantage behind
walls and earthworks. They could make but a poor stand in the open
against their better trained enemy.
The Russians, after crossing the Danube, laid siege to Ibrail, the
most important fortress on the lower stretch of the river, and which
it was essentially necessary to capture before making an advance to
Schumla. The garrison and inhabitants made a gallant resistance, and it
was only after five weeks that it was compelled to surrender, on June
17th. The Russian army was then divided into three parts—the one to
attack Silistria, the capture of which was almost as necessary as that
of Ibrail; the second to besiege Varna; the third and most important,
under the Emperor, to march to Schumla. The attack on Silistria
failed, and after some weeks the force employed against it marched in
the direction of Schumla to support the Czar’s army. Even with this
addition it was found impossible to invest the fortified camp of the
Turks behind Schumla, and, after a demonstration, it was compelled to
hold a defensive position, in front of Schumla, while the Czar and a
part of the army marched in support of the division before Varna.
On August 18th the Czar arrived there with a reinforcement of nine
thousand men, and the siege then commenced, while the Russian Black Sea
fleet of eight ships of the line and three frigates, under command of
Admiral Greig, joined in the attack from the sea. The Turks again made
a desperate and prolonged defence, which might have been successful if
it had not been that Jussuf Pasha, in command of the garrison, with
five thousand of his men, traitorously deserted the city, on October
14th, and threw themselves on the mercy of the Czar. The remainder
of the garrison, under the Capitan Pasha, refused to be a party to
the surrender. It was said that the cause of this extraordinary act
of treachery was that the Sultan, in pursuance of his policy of
concentrating all power and authority in himself, had been persuaded by
an intrigue to confiscate the property of Jussuf, who was one of the
few large landowners in Turkey, while the owner was gallantly fighting
the enemy at Varna. However that may be, the remaining garrison was
soon compelled to capitulate, and this most important stronghold fell
into the hands of the Russians. Without it no advance could possibly
have been made across the Balkans.
The campaign of 1828 came to an end with the surrender of Varna. Though
the Russians had been able to capture two of the four fortresses which
barred their way to the Balkans, the campaign had not been without
success to the Turks. They had shown unexpected powers of resistance,
and had prevented for a year the achievement of the main object of the
Russians—their advance to Constantinople. The losses of the Russians
had been very great, not only in the sieges, but by disease, which
dogged their armies as usual.
Baron von Moltke, the German general, who, at the invitation of the
Sultan, was with the Turkish headquarters during this war, writes of
the Russian and Turkish troops in his remarkable history of it:—
The faults of the Russian Staff were atoned for by the innate
excellence of the Russian troops. The self-sacrificing obedience of
the commanders, the steadiness of the common soldiers, their power
of endurance and unshaken bravery in times of danger, were the
qualities that enabled them to avert the dangers of their position
before Schumla and to hold the Turks in check, and to make up for all
deficiencies and overcome all resistance at Varna.[32]
Of the Turks he adds:—
We cannot say much for the skill of the Turkish commanders, but the
conduct of the Turks, from the highest officers to the last soldier
at the storming of Ibrail, their courage and steadiness in the mines
and trenches before Varna, were far above all praise.
In Asia the Turks had not done so well. General Paskiewich was able to
defeat the army in front of him and to capture the important stronghold
of Kars and its adjoining district.
The campaign of 1829 began late. It was not till the middle of May that
the Russian army again took the field, not on this occasion under the
Czar, but under General Diebitsch, who proved to be a most able general
and diplomatist. The army was again most inadequate for the campaign
which was in contemplation—namely, the crossing of the Balkans and an
advance to Constantinople. It consisted of no more than sixty-eight
thousand men, a force which, in these days, eighty-eight years later,
would count for little or nothing. It was thought necessary, as a
condition precedent to any advance, to capture Silistria. The siege
was commenced on May 17, 1829. The Russian force detailed for this
was not more than fourteen thousand men. The Turks who defended it
were twenty-one thousand in number, including eight thousand armed
inhabitants. In spite of this disparity of numbers, the town was
captured after a siege of forty-four days, on July 26th, at a loss to
the Russians of two thousand five hundred men.
In the meantime Diebitsch had advanced with the main army in the
direction of Schumla. Reschid Pasha, who had replaced Hussein Pasha as
Grand Vizier and Seraskier, issued from Schumla with forty thousand
men, and on June 18th a great battle took place at Kulewtska. The Turks
were utterly defeated by a very inferior force of Russians. They had
begun the battle with an impetuous charge, but they could not sustain
it against the serried ranks of the Russian veterans. Some ammunition
wagons exploded and, as often happened with the Turks, a wild panic
ensued. They fled from the field of battle and dispersed in all
directions. All their artillery fell into the hands of the Russians.
Reschid escaped at the head of six hundred men and found his way to
Schumla, where there were ten thousand Turks, and where a large number
of fugitives from the battle eventually found refuge. This victory at
Kulewtska had far-reaching effects. It was the first great battle in
which the new troops of Mahmoud were tested. It showed that the Russian
soldiers had an overwhelming superiority.
Silistria fell on July 13th. The Russians who had been engaged in the
siege then joined Diebitsch before Schumla. The general thereupon
decided on the bold and even perilous course of crossing the Balkans,
without previously capturing Schumla and its army. Leaving ten thousand
men to mask that fortress, where a much greater force of Turks was
now assembled, consisting largely of men demoralized by the recent
defeat, Diebitsch commenced his march with such secrecy that for some
days the Turks were not aware of it. Reschid Pasha, expecting an attack
on Schumla, and thinking his force insufficient for its defence,
had called in the various corps who were posted for the defence of
the mountain passes. Diebitsch therefore met with no opposition. He
crossed the mountains in nine days of forced marches fraught with great
hardship to his troops. When south of the mountain range, he deflected
his route to the Black Sea and got into communication with the Russian
fleet, under Admiral Greig, which assisted in the capture of Bourgas
and other ports along the coast, and afforded supplies to Diebitsch’s
army.
Three battles were fought south of the mountains, at Aidos, Karnabad
and Slivno, where small divisions of Turks were defeated and dispersed.
After three weeks from crossing the Balkans, Diebitsch arrived in
front of Adrianople, a city of eighty thousand inhabitants, with a
garrison of ten thousand men. His army was by this time reduced to
less than twenty thousand men. Its appearance before Adrianople caused
wild panic. Never before had a hostile army crossed the southern range
of the Balkans. It was thought to be impossible. It was confidently
believed that the Russian army numbered over one hundred thousand
men. The city and its garrison surrendered without making a show of
fight. Everywhere on its route through Bulgaria the Christian raya
population had received the invaders with acclamation and the Turks had
thrown away their arms and fled. The campaign of 1829 in Asia had been
almost equally disastrous to the Turks. Paskiewich had defeated them
in a pitched battle and had captured Erzerum. He was now approaching
Trebizond, after dispersing an army on the way.
When news reached Constantinople of the crossing of the Balkans and
the capture of Adrianople, there was consternation and dismay among
Turks of all classes. The Sultan almost alone maintained his presence
of mind. He issued a proclamation calling on all the Turks in the city
to join in its defence. He announced his intention to take command in
person. The sacred banner of the Prophet was unfurled. But when, at the
first review of the forces, the Sultan appeared in a carriage and not
on horseback, this “unheard of and indecorous innovation” chilled the
enthusiasm of the volunteers, and undid the good which was expected
from his action.
There was no great zeal for the defence of the capital. The chief
ministers of the Porte were unanimous in advising the Sultan to sue
for terms of peace. They were quite ignorant of the weakness of the
Russian army. They believed the stories that more than a hundred
thousand men were advancing on the capital. There were no troops at
Constantinople, they said, able to meet this army. The ambassadors of
England and France, who had recently returned to Constantinople, at the
invitation of the Sultan, backed up the ministers, and urgently advised
him to come to terms with the enemy. We now know that all this advice
and these alarms were founded on false information and that there was
no real justification for them. In fact, the real position of the
Russian army was one of extreme danger. It had suffered great losses
on the battlefields and from the hardships of the forced marches, and
was also being decimated by disease. There was no possibility of its
being reinforced. Retreat across the Balkans was almost impossible.
The Turkish army at Schumla was now reinforced. On its flank there
was an army of twenty thousand Albanians, under the rebellious Pasha
of Scotra, who had refused aid to the Porte in the earlier part of
the campaign, but who, now that the existence of the Empire was
threatened, might confidently be expected to come to its aid. Advance
to Constantinople might also be dangerous, if not impossible. It was
distant one hundred and forty miles. Its garrison of thirty thousand
men, supplemented by fresh volunteers, might be relied on to meet
the Russians, now reduced to much less than twenty thousand. These
difficulties of the Russian army, however, were not known to the Porte.
In view of the strong pressure brought to bear upon him, the Sultan,
for once in his life, gave way, and agreed to send plenipotentiaries to
Adrianople to discuss terms of peace. Diebitsch well knew the danger
of his position, and was anxious to make peace, but he maintained an
attitude of firmness and confidence. He was ready, he said, to discuss
terms, but he was equally willing to advance with his army against the
capital. Already a part of his army was pressed forward. It occupied a
line from the Black Sea at Kilia to Enos in the archipelago—a distance
of over one hundred miles, much too long for his weak force. It is
recognized by Moltke and all military authorities that if the Porte had
stood firm and had refused to agree to terms, Diebitsch could not have
made good his threatened attack on the capital. In the history of war
there has never been a more successful case of ‘bluff.’ The Porte gave
in to unreasoning and ill-informed fear, and on September 19th peace
was concluded between the two Powers and the treaty of Adrianople was
signed.
It is certain [said Moltke] that this treaty released Diebitsch from
a position as perilous as could well be conceived, and which, if
prolonged for a few more days, might have caused him to be hurled
down from the summit of victory to the lowest depth of ruin and
destruction.[33]
The terms of peace agreed to were moderate, so far as Russia itself
was concerned, though very serious in their effect on the Ottoman
Empire. The Czar had proclaimed at the outset of the war that he had
no desire for territorial aggrandizement. He fully adhered to this
promise. With two comparatively small exceptions, Russia gave up all
the territory which it had conquered in the war, both in Europe and
Asia. It retained only a small part of Moldavia which gave access to
the Sulina mouth of the Danube, a position of great importance to it
in the future. In Asia, Kars and Erzerum were given back to Turkey.
In Europe, the Pruth continued to be the boundary of the two States.
But Moldavia and Wallachia, though nominally restored to the Ottoman
Empire, were practically freed from it. They were to enjoy complete
autonomy. The Hospodars, in future, were to be appointed for life.
The two States were to be allowed to raise armies independent of the
Porte. The tribute payable in future was to be fixed, and could not
be increased. Religious and commercial freedom were to be secured to
them. The Sultan was to be their suzerain and nothing more. This meant
practical independence. The same privileges were secured for Serbia,
with the exception that the Porte was to be permitted to garrison the
fortresses of Belgrade and Orsova. The Turks were required to depart
from all other parts of the country. Silistria was to be returned to
Turkey, but other fortresses on the Danube were to be razed. That
river, therefore, ceased to be the first defence of the Turkish Empire
to the north. An indemnity of eleven and a half million ducats, equal
to five millions sterling, was to be paid by Turkey for the expenses of
Russia in the war. The payment was to be spread over ten years, and the
territory occupied by Russia was not to be wholly surrendered till this
was effected.
As regards Greece, the treaty embodied and made obligatory on the
Sultan the provisions of the treaty of London of July, 1827, between
the three Powers, and the further protocol between them of March 1829,
which defined the future limits of Greece. Under the protocol, the
boundary line was to run from the Gulf of Volo to the Gulf of Arta,
so as to include the greater part of Thessaly. The country south
of this was to be subject to a monarchical government, hereditary
in a Christian prince to be chosen by the three Powers, with the
consent of the Porte and under the suzerainty of the Sultan, and
with an administration best calculated to ensure its religious and
commercial liberty. This proposal had been submitted to the Sultan by
the ambassadors of England and France on March 22, 1829. He had then
obstinately refused to have anything to say to it. When the Russians
had crossed the Balkans, the Sultan, in the hope of propitiating
England and France, offered to the ambassadors to agree to an
autonomous Greece under a Hospodar, limited, however, to the Morea.
This the ambassadors refused. The Porte, under the treaty with Russia,
now agreed to their full demand.
The Governments of England and France appear to have taken umbrage
at the action of Russia in dealing with the subject of Greece in a
separate treaty with the Porte. It was thought that the Czar wished
to get all the credit of liberating Greece from Turkish rule. They
therefore informed the Russian Government that the execution of the
treaty of London of 1827 did not belong to the Czar alone, but was to
be the work of the three Governments. In consequence of this a further
conference took place in London, at which it was decided that the
suzerainty of the Sultan over Greece was to be abolished, and complete
independence was to be secured to the Greeks. They also came to the
unfortunate decision that the line of boundary of the new kingdom
was to be greatly restricted, and instead of running from the Gulf
of Volo to the Gulf of Arta, was to be drawn from the mouth of the
Archilous to the mouth of the Sperkius, thus excluding from the new
kingdom the whole of Acarnania and the greater part of Thessaly, where
the population was almost wholly Greek. They also decided that Crete
was not to be included, but was to be restored to Turkish rule. Mr.
Finlay says of this: “Diplomatic ignorance could not have traced a more
unsuitable boundary.”[34]
The Sultan agreed to this new project. He probably preferred a
smaller Greece with complete independence to a larger one with full
autonomy, subject to his suzerainty. Greece was accordingly recalled
into national existence with a greatly reduced area, leaving outside
large districts with completely homogeneous Greek populations. This
was fraught with grave difficulties in the future. One effect of it
was that Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg, who, later, as King of the
Belgians, proved to be one of the most able rulers of his day, refused
to accept the throne of Greece on the ground that its area was too
restricted, and Otho, a son of the King of Bavaria, was selected
by the Powers for the post, and proved to be a most incompetent
and reactionary ruler. It would seem that Lord Aberdeen, who was
Minister of Foreign Affairs in England at the time, and who was mainly
responsible for these changes, was anxious to restrict the kingdom of
Greece to the smallest possible area.
Reverting to the treaty of Adrianople, it is to be observed that while
Russia acquired a very insignificant extension of territory, and was
content with the prestige of having dictated its terms, and with
having acquired a position such that it might insist on its behests
to the Porte, as regards its Christian subjects, being obeyed in the
future, Turkey lost very greatly. It was said that the Sultan, after
signing the treaty, shut himself up in his palace at Therapia for
weeks in gloomy despair. There was much cause for this. The treaty
was a complete surrender of all that he had been contending for since
his accession to the throne. It was humiliating to himself and his
Turkish subjects. It was the inevitable precursor of much that was to
occur to other parts of his Empire. His grief and indignation must
have been greatly aggravated when he came to know the real condition
of the Russian army at Adrianople and to appreciate that, if he
had stood firm in resisting the advice of his ministers and of the
ambassadors, the Russian army would have been quite unable to make an
advance against Constantinople. This, however, should not lead us to
forget the supreme error which Mahmoud committed in refusing to come
to terms with the three Powers as regards Greece after the treaty of
London. If in 1827, the Sultan had been willing to make concessions in
the direction of autonomy to Greece, it is nearly certain that there
would have been no declaration of war on the part of Russia, and in the
event of war he would not have been wanting in allies. His fleet would
not have been destroyed at Navarino, and time would have been afforded
to him to reorganize his army and to make it effective against those
of the Christian Powers. As it was, not only did he lose all real hold
over Moldavia, Wallachia, and Serbia, not only did Greece gain its
independence, but he was soon to lose all real authority in Egypt, a
Moslem country, except the barren right of suzerainty of the Sultan and
a fixed tribute in money.
It has already been stated that when, in 1824, the Sultan invited
the aid of the Pasha of Egypt to crush rebellion in Greece, Mehemet
Ali only consented to lend his army and fleet on the express promise
that the Pashalics of Syria, Damascus, Tripoli (in Asia), and Crete
would be given to him, in addition to that of Egypt. But when in 1827,
after the destruction of the Turko-Egyptian fleet at Navarino and the
expulsion of the Egyptian army from the Morea, Mehemet Ali pressed for
the performance of this promise, he met with a blank refusal, except as
regards the island of Crete, the Pashalic of which alone was conferred
on him. Mehemet was very indignant at this breach of promise, and
determined to seize by force the provinces which he coveted. He set to
work with great resolution to build another fleet, in place of that
which had been burnt or sunk, and to improve and strengthen his army.
By 1832 he completed these preparations for war. He then picked a
quarrel with the Pasha of Syria and, pretending to make war against
him and not against the Sultan, sent an army, under Ibrahim, across
the desert into Syria. It captured Gaza and Jerusalem without
difficulty, and then marched to Acre, where the Egyptian fleet met it
and co-operated in a successful attack on that fortress. After this
success Ibrahim marched with his army to Aleppo and Damascus, defeating
two Turkish armies. He then crossed the mountains into Asia Minor, and
fought another great battle at Konia on October 27, 1832, and defeated
a large Turkish army. He then marched to Brusa.
These disasters caused the greatest alarm at Constantinople. There was
no other Turkish army in the field capable of resisting the march of
Ibrahim’s army to the Bosphorus. In his peril the Sultan appealed to
the British Government for aid against the Egyptians, offering a close
alliance for the future. He met with a refusal, at the instance of
Lord Palmerston, who did not then appear to value a Turkish alliance,
though the British Ambassador at Constantinople, Sir Stratford Canning,
strongly advised it. Mahmoud then appealed for aid to the Emperor of
Russia, who gladly availed himself of the opportunity of increasing his
influence in Turkey and of effecting a virtual protectorate over it.
For a second time, within recent years, a close alliance was formed
between the Czar and the Sultan, and in February, 1833, a Russian fleet
issuing from Sebastopol conveyed an army to the Bosphorus for the
defence of Constantinople.
For a time the influence of Russia became predominant. None but
Russians had access to the Sultan. Russian troops and sailors were seen
everywhere, and Russian officers were employed to drill and command
the Turkish battalions. This state of things caused great alarm to the
British and French Governments. They were both concerned in preventing
Russia obtaining possession or control of Constantinople. They felt it
was necessary to stay the advance of Ibrahim’s victorious army, which
was the excuse for the presence of the Russians at Constantinople.
They offered, therefore, to the Sultan that if he would insist on the
withdrawal of the Russian army from his capital, they would guarantee
him against the further invasion of Mehemet Ali’s army. France, though
always very friendly to Mehemet Ali, and in favour of his independence
as against the Sultan, had no wish to see Constantinople in the hands
of Russia.
By dint of great diplomatic pressure, in which Lord Palmerston took
the leading part with the greatest ability, a double arrangement was
effected. On the one hand, Mehemet Ali, perceiving that he would be
powerless to attack Constantinople against the opposition of Russia,
England, and France, was induced to come to terms with the Sultan. A
convention was signed between them in 1833, and a firman was issued by
the Porte under which Mehemet was confirmed as the Pasha, not only of
Egypt, but of Syria, Damascus, Adana, Tripoli, and Crete, an immense
accession of dignity and power to him. The Sultan was to be suzerain
and the Pashalics were conferred on Mehemet Ali only for his life, and
there was no promise that they would be continued to his son Ibrahim
or other descendants. The concession, however, as it stood, was most
humiliating to the Sultan. On the other hand, Russia agreed with the
Porte to withdraw its troops from Constantinople and the Bosphorus, but
only on the promise, embodied in the treaty of Hunkar Iskelesi, that
Russian ships of war should have the privilege of passing through the
Bosphorus and Dardanelles, at any time, without obtaining the consent
of the Porte, a privilege which was to be denied to the ships of other
Powers, unless with the previous consent of Russia. It also secured to
Russia the right to send an army to the Bosphorus and land it there
whenever the exigencies of the Turkish Empire made it expedient to do
so. The firman to Mehemet Ali was dated May 5, 1833, and the treaty of
Hunkar Iskelesi was agreed to with Russia on July 8th of the same year.
By these two measures, the result of a great diplomatic struggle, the
menace of Mehemet Ali against Constantinople, which at one time seemed
likely to involve all the Powers in Europe in war, was brought to an
end. The Egyptian army was withdrawn into the provinces added to the
Pashalic of Mehemet Ali, and the Russian troops were recalled by the
Czar from Constantinople.
After this settlement, very favourable both to Russia and Egypt, but
humiliating to Turkey, a period of a few years’ repose was accorded
to the Sultan, so far as his relations with the Emperor Nicholas
and Mehemet Ali were concerned. But there were frequent internal
troubles and outbreaks, which were put down by Mahmoud, not without
some difficulty. Both Mahmoud and Mehemet Ali spent the interval in
making preparations for another encounter. Mahmoud could not acquiesce
in the virtual independence of so large a part of his Empire under
Mehemet Ali. The latter was determined to convert his Pashalic into an
hereditary one and to attain virtual independence of the Porte. He had
ambitions also to supplant Mahmoud as the head of the Ottoman Empire.
The Sultan, during this time, employed a large number of Prussian
officers, under Colonel von Moltke—later to become so famous in the
Franco-German War of 1870 in command of the German army—to train his
army, while Mehemet Ali again employed French officers for the same
purpose. Five years elapsed before war again broke out between them.
In 1838 Mehemet Ali, having completed all his arrangements for war with
his suzerain, announced his intention to pay no more tribute in the
future to the Porte. This amounted to a declaration of independence and
a renunciation of allegiance. Mahmoud, on his part, was determined to
crush his rebellious vassal, and collected an army on the Euphrates for
the invasion of Syria. The opportunity seemed to be a favourable one,
as the population of Syria was in revolt against Mehemet Ali, whose
government had proved to be almost as oppressive and tyrannical as that
of the Sultan. Early in 1839 Mahmoud declared war and gave directions
to his army to invade Syria. He also fitted out a fleet, consisting of
nine ships of the line and twenty-four smaller vessels, and directed it
to proceed to Syria and to co-operate with his army advancing from the
Euphrates.
Both these expeditions of the Porte came to grief. The army which
invaded Syria met the Egyptians, again under command of Ibrahim, at
Nazeb on June 25, 1839. The two armies were about equal in number, each
of them about forty thousand. The Turks were completely defeated. Many
of their battalions deserted on the field of battle and went over to
the enemy; the remainder were routed and dispersed. Six thousand of
them were killed and wounded; ten thousand were taken prisoners. One
hundred guns and great masses of stores fell into the hands of the
Egyptians. The Turkish army in these parts ceased to exist.
The great Turkish fleet had sailed from the Bosphorus on July 6th amid
many popular demonstrations. It was under the command of the Capitan
Pasha, Achmet, who proved to be a traitor. After passing through the
Dardanelles, instead of following his instructions by making his
course to the coast of Syria, Achmet sailed direct to Egypt, and there
entered the port of Alexandria with flying colours and handed over the
fleet to the enemy of the Sultan, the rebellious Pasha Mehemet Ali, a
proceeding without precedent in history. It was only accomplished, we
may presume, by profuse bribery on the part of the crafty Pasha.
Mahmoud was spared the knowledge of these two signal disasters to his
Empire. He died on July 1, 1839, some writers allege from the effect
of alcohol, though this is doubtful. Creasy and many other historians
are unstinting in praise of Mahmoud. They assign to him a very high
position in the list of Sultans. They bear testimony to his high
civic courage, and to the firm resolution with which he confronted
the many crises of his reign. We must fully admit these qualities.
Few sovereigns in history have had to deal with such a succession of
grave difficulties. Almost alone he bore the weight of Empire. We
must not, however, lose sight of the fact that his administration
and diplomacy were fraught with failure, that his Empire incurred
greater losses than under any previous Sultan, that his armies met
with invariable defeat, not only on the part of numerically weaker
armies of Russia, but also from insurgent Greeks and Serbians, and
even from Egyptians, whose fighting qualities were much inferior to
those of the Turks. His firmness and resolution were very great,
but they failed him at the supreme crisis of his career, when the
Russian army, with quite inadequate numbers, after serious losses in
battle and by disease, threatened Constantinople from Adrianople, and
when it is now quite certain that, if Mahmoud had stood firm and had
refused to come to terms, overwhelming disaster must have befallen the
Russians. At another crisis also his firmness amounted to most unwise
obstinacy when he refused, in 1827, to concede autonomy to Greece at
the instance of the Great Powers—a supreme error from which all his
subsequent misfortunes logically followed. Mahmoud seems also to have
been wanting in magnetism to inspire his generals and soldiers with his
own courage and resolution. He does not compare in this respect with
his contemporary and rival, Mehemet Ali. He had little of the martial
vigour and of the craft of that great vassal. If the Great Powers had
not intervened, it was highly probable, if not certain, that Ibrahim’s
army would, either in 1833 or in 1839, have marched to Constantinople,
have effected a revolution there, and have put an end to the Othman
dynasty. It might have given new life to the decadent Turkish Empire.
In any case, there was no reason why Mahmoud, if he had been endowed
with Mehemet Ali’s genius and administrative capacity, should not
have created an army superior in force and discipline to that of the
Egyptian Pasha, and equal to the task of preventing the Russians from
crossing the Balkans.
XX
THE RULE OF ELCHIS
1839-76
MAHMOUD was succeeded by his son, Abdul Mehzid, a youth of sixteen
years, who proved to be of very different stamp from his father. He
was of mild and gentle nature, without physical or mental vigour,
and wanting in force of character. He was enfeebled early in his
reign by excessive indulgence in his harem. Later he was addicted to
alcohol, like many of his predecessors. His father had monopolized
power, and had frequently changed his ministers, with the result that
he left no statesman behind him who could impose his will on the
young Sultan and govern in his name. Nor was any lady of the harem
ambitious and competent to guide or misguide the ship of State, as had
not infrequently been the case in the past, when the reigning Sultan
was unequal to the task. The main power during this reign as regards
foreign affairs, and to some extent even as regards internal affairs,
seems to have been vested in the ambassadors of the Great Powers.
This power was exercised collectively by them on the rare occasions
when they were unanimously agreed, but at other times by one or other
of them, and chiefly, as will be seen, by the British Ambassador,
Sir Stratford Canning, later Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, who, by
his force of character and commanding presence, obtained immense
personal influence over the feeble mind of Abdul Mehzid, and exercised
an almost undisputed sway from 1842 to 1858, with the exception of
brief intervals when he was in England on leave, and when the Russian
Ambassador succeeded in obtaining exclusive influence.
The new Sultan was fortunate, as compared with his father, that in the
thirty-one years of his reign his Empire experienced no serious loss of
territory. It is necessary, however, to advert to the two main events
of it—the one, the suppression of Mehemet Ali’s ambitious projects and
the restriction of his hereditary Pashalic to Egypt; the other, the
Crimean War, as it is known in history—the war with Russia, the effect
of which was to stave off for nearly twenty years the dismemberment of
the Turkish Empire in Europe.
As regards the first of these events, it has been shown that, in
the last year of Mahmoud’s reign, Mehemet Ali was in a position of
great strength, which might have enabled him to overthrow the Othman
dynasty. He had destroyed the main Turkish army in Asia, at Nazeb, on
the frontier of Syria, and by the infamous treachery of Achmet Pasha
he had obtained possession of the Turkish fleet. He comported himself,
however, with moderation at this stage. He informed the Porte that he
was willing to come to terms if they would recognize the Pashalics of
Egypt, Syria, Tripoli (in Asia Minor), Adana, and Crete as hereditary
in his family. He had no intention, he said, to use the Turkish fleet
against his suzerain, the Sultan. He would give it back to the Porte,
if his terms were agreed to. If Sultan Mahmoud had been alive, it may
be confidently assumed that he would have rejected these terms with
contumely, and would have fought it out with his rebellious vassal.
But Abdul Mehzid was wanting in courage to meet the crisis. The two
disasters caused the greatest alarm at Constantinople. The majority
of the Divan were ready to concede the demands of Mehemet Ali. They
were prevented from doing so by an unprecedented occurrence. The
ambassadors of the five Great Powers—England, France, Russia, Austria,
and Prussia—met in conclave and came to the conclusion that it was
contrary to the interests of their respective Governments that Mehemet
Ali’s demands should be acceded to. They informed the Porte that their
Governments desired to discuss the questions raised by Mehemet Ali,
and invited the Sultan to suspend a definitive arrangement with him.
This was agreed to by the Divan. The settlement of the relation of the
rebellious pasha to the Sultan fell into the hands of the ambassadors,
and a kind of tutelage was established over the Turkish Empire.
The conduct of the Emperor Nicholas on this occasion was most
conciliatory to the other Powers. He intimated to them that, if they
were united on a scheme to settle the Egyptian question, he would
not insist on the special right which he had acquired under the
treaties of Bucharest and of Akermann to exclude the ships of war of
other Powers from the Dardanelles, and that he would withdraw his
few remaining troops from Constantinople and the Bosphorus. Lord
Palmerston, on behalf of Great Britain, expressed his admiration of
this attitude of the Russian Emperor. As a result, a conference took
place in London between the representatives of the Great Powers, at
which Lord Palmerston, on behalf of England, and Baron Brunnow, on
behalf of Russia, took the leading part. Grave difference soon arose at
the conference on the part of France. Its Government, though strongly
opposed to Russia obtaining possession of Constantinople, had always
been favourable to the claim of Mehemet Ali to an hereditary Pashalic
in Egypt and Syria, and had secretly encouraged him to make himself
independent of the Porte. It now supported him against the veto of the
other Powers. Eventually England, Russia, and Austria, finding that
they could not come to agreement with France, decided to act without
its concurrence, and to compel Mehemet Ali to evacuate Syria and to
restore to the Porte the Turkish fleet. After long discussion between
these three Powers, a convention was agreed to on July 15, 1840. They
presented an ultimatum to Mehemet Ali, calling upon him to submit
himself to the Porte. They promised that if, within ten days of the
receipt of the ultimatum, he would give orders for the withdrawal of
his army from Syria, and would give up the Turkish fleet to the Porte,
he would be recognized as hereditary Pasha of Egypt and as Pasha of
Syria for his own life; but, if not, the offer of the life Pashalic
of Syria and the hereditary Pashalic of Egypt would be withdrawn, and
he would have to content himself with the Pashalic for life of Egypt.
It was also intimated to him that if there was refusal or delay the
fleets of the three Powers would at once institute a blockade of Egypt
and Syria. This ultimatum of the three Powers, when it became known in
France, caused the most profound indignation; the more so when, on the
refusal of Mehemet Ali to accede to the ultimatum, the British fleet,
supported by war vessels of the two other Powers, made its appearance
on the coast of Syria. This was thought to be an insult to France.
War between that country and England was imminent. There were violent
scenes in the French Chambers, and most bitterly hostile articles
in the French papers. There were threats of war on the part of the
Government of France. But prudent counsels ultimately prevailed, when
it was discovered that France was not prepared for a naval war, and
that its fleet could not hope to contend with the British fleet in the
Mediterranean or to land an army in Syria.
The three Powers, on their part, mainly at the instance of Lord
Palmerston, declined to submit their policy to the threats of France,
and persisted in their demonstration of force against Mehemet Ali. War
was averted between England and France, and Louis Philippe (then King
of the French) contented himself with the cynical observation that
there was all the difference in the world between threatening war and
actually going to war.
Meanwhile the British fleet, under Admirals Stopford and Napier,
appeared before Beyrout and bombarded and destroyed its forts. Two
thousand men were landed, under Napier, and defeated the Egyptian
forces. The same operation was repeated a few days later at Acre. The
powerful defences of this fortress were demolished by the guns of the
British fleet, and six thousand men were landed, under Napier, and
defeated Ibrahim’s army. It was in these attacks on Beyrout and Acre
that steamships made their first appearance in maritime war. The allies
were greatly assisted by the revolt of the people of Syria against
Mehemet Ali’s oppressive government. Desertion also was very rife in
the Egyptian force, and Ibrahim’s army, which had originally consisted
of seventy-five thousand men, had dwindled down to twenty-five thousand.
After these operations on the coast of Syria, Napier and his squadron
appeared before Alexandria and threatened bombardment. But Mehemet
Ali, by this time, had realized that he could not hope to make war
successfully against the three Great Powers as well as the Sultan. He
entered into negotiations with Admiral Napier. He agreed to evacuate
Syria and to give up the Turkish fleet to the Porte, provided that
the Sultan would recognize him as hereditary Pasha of Egypt. In the
meantime the Sultan of Turkey had issued a firman deposing Mehemet Ali
from all his Pashalics. This did not necessarily mean much, for the
Porte on four previous occasions had publicly deposed the rebellious
pasha, but without any result. Eventually, on September 20, 1841,
agreement was arrived at between Mehemet Ali and the three Powers. In
spite of his deposition by the Sultan, Mehemet Ali was confirmed in
the position of hereditary Pasha of Egypt, but was deprived of all
his other governments. He was to pay tribute to the Porte equal to
one-fourth of the revenue of Egypt—later fixed at an annual sum of
£400,000. He was to withdraw his army from Syria and to maintain no
larger force in Egypt than eighteen thousand men.
The intervention of the three Great Powers, taking the matter out
of the hands of the Sultan, brought about an arrangement much more
favourable to him than the Divan were willing to agree to. Syria
was relieved of the government of Mehemet Ali and was placed again
under the control of the Porte. Egypt, on the other hand, was made
practically independent, subject only to a fixed tribute in recognition
of the nominal suzerainty of the Sultan. This result was achieved
not by the force of arms of the Sultan, but by the action of the
three Great Powers, directed chiefly by the able diplomacy of Lord
Palmerston, who steered this concert through all its difficulties and
against the violent opposition of France. The final settlement thus
imposed on Mehemet Ali, which extinguished his ambitious projects and
reduced his rule to Egypt alone, is said to have broken the heart of
the old man. He lived on for eight more years, but they were spent
in gloom and depression, aggravated by the death of his able and
distinguished son Ibrahim. It should be added here that in 1841, as
a sequel to the arrangement about Egypt, a convention was agreed to
between the Great Powers, including Russia, and Turkey by which the
vessels of war of all countries except Turkey were forbidden to pass
through the Straits to and from the Black Sea.
The settlement of these grave questions, in 1841, was followed by
twelve years of comparative repose in Turkey, broken only by occasional
revolts of pashas, or of subject races driven to desperation by chronic
misgovernment. These were put down by the Seraskier, Omar Pasha, who
proved to be a very competent general for this purpose. It was during
this period that Sir Stratford Canning, as British Ambassador to the
Porte, attained a personal influence over the Sultan, Abdul Mehzid, of
an unprecedented character, such that he may be said to have virtually
ruled the State.
Canning on three previous occasions had represented the British
Government at Constantinople during the reign of Mahmoud. In 1812 as
Minister Plenipotentiary, when quite a young man, he had gained immense
credit by inducing the Sultan to come to terms with Russia, by the
treaty of Bucharest. The effect of this was to free the hands of the
Czar and to enable him to withdraw his army from the Danube and to use
it on the flank of Napoleon’s army in the celebrated Moscow campaign.
This largely contributed to the defeat of the invasion of Russia.
Later he had been engaged in the delimitation of Greece, after the
recognition of its independence, and had shown himself a Philhellene.
In 1842 Lord Aberdeen, then Foreign Minister of England, sent him again
as ambassador to the Porte at the age of fifty-seven. He remained
there, with two short intervals, till 1858. He acquired, during these
sixteen years, the title of “The Great Elchi,” the ambassador _par
éminence_. By the Christian rayas of the Ottoman Empire he was known
as the Padishah of the Padishahs. He was the most distinguished envoy
ever employed in the British Diplomatic Service. He belonged to an old
school of diplomats, when communications with the Home Government were
long in reaching their destination, and when ambassadors necessarily
took much responsibility upon themselves, and dictated rather than
followed the policy of their Governments. He held himself to represent
his sovereign rather than the transient ministers of the day. His
mien was such as greatly to impress the Turks. It was stately and
dignified. His countenance was noble and spirituelle. His eyes seemed
to penetrate the minds of those with whom he transacted business,
and made it difficult for them to conceal their intentions. His own
methods were always honourable and straightforward. Though he was well
versed in the arts of diplomacy and could meet mine by countermine,
he never resorted to trickery. The Turks learned that his word was
implicitly to be trusted, and that he wished well to their country.
He treated the Turkish ministers with the utmost hauteur. With some
of them, whose hands were known to be stained with blood, he refused
to have any communication. If his demands were refused at the Porte,
he went direct to the Sultan and fairly bullied that weak, gentle,
and well-intentioned sovereign into acquiescence. He entered on his
work in this embassy with two main convictions, one might almost say
obsessions—the one that it was the interest of England, and therefore
his own duty, to oppose the schemes of Russia at every turn; the other
that it was his duty to urge, and even to compel, the Porte to carry
out internal reforms, and to come into line with other civilized
countries in Europe, in default of which he fully recognized that the
Ottoman Empire could not be maintained. He had a firm belief that this
was possible, and that he was himself the appointed man to effect it.
For this purpose he freely made use of threats of force from England if
his behests were refused, and of promises of protection against Russia
if they were agreed to. An envoy of this character, great as were his
qualities and personal merits, was a cause of embarrassment to British
policy, for the Government could not control him. One might say of him,
in the words of Shakespeare:—
If great men could thunder as Jove himself does,
Jove would ne’er be quiet.
Canning used the thunder of his country freely in pursuance of his own
policy. He was undoubtedly the main cause of the war which soon ensued
between Great Britain and Russia.
Meanwhile the reform of its administration and its laws had long been
recognized by the very few honest and capable statesmen of Turkey as
indispensable to the maintenance of its Empire. Mahmoud himself, in the
latter part of his life, had appreciated this necessity, and had given
his sanction to a scheme of reform. But death came to him before it
was issued. He must have instructed his son as to this policy, for one
of the first acts of Abdul Mehzid, by the advice of his Grand Vizier,
Reschid Pasha, was to issue the important declaration of reform which
had been prepared by Mahmoud, and was known as the Hatti-Scheriff of
Ghulkané. It promised equally to all his subjects, without distinction
of creed or race, security of life, of honour, and of property, the
equitable distribution of taxes, the public trial of all prisoners,
the right of all to hold and devise property, and the systematic
recruiting of the army. It appointed a council to elaborate the details
of administrative reform to give effect to these principles. But
this great charter of reform lacked the will of a Mahmoud to enforce
it. There ensued a dangerous reaction. Reschid Pasha was compelled
to resign. Riza Pasha, who succeeded him, and his colleagues, were
reactionary, fanatical, and anti-Christian. The Hatti-Scheriff, like
almost every other promise of reform in Turkey, became a dead letter.
Riza was also corrupt and venal, and robbed the treasury of untold
sums. It became the principal object of Canning to obtain the dismissal
of this man and of the gang of peculators who worked with him, and the
reinstatement of Reschid. Proposals for reform in favour of the rayas
were impossible with ministers who carried their hatred of Christianity
to the length of excluding from the public service every Turk who could
speak a Christian language.
By dint of long and patient efforts Canning obtained such a mastery
over Abdul Mehzid that he was able to bring about a change of
ministers, and to reinstate Reschid Pasha as the only statesman in
Turkey who was capable of carrying out reforms, and who was willing to
be guided by himself as to their main principles.
In 1852 a serious diplomatic dispute broke out at Constantinople,
between the representatives of France and Russia, as to the
guardianship of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem and many trumpery
details connected with it. Early in 1853 there were strong indications
that the Emperor Nicholas intended to take the opportunity of this
dispute to raise a much more serious question against the Porte. He
evidently desired to disarm the opposition of England to his schemes.
In a private conversation at St. Petersburg with Sir Hamilton Seymour,
the British Ambassador at his Court, he opened his mind:—
The affairs of Turkey are in a very disorganized condition. The
country itself seems to be falling to pieces. The fall will be a
great misfortune, and it is very important that England and Russia
should come to a perfectly good understanding upon these affairs, and
that neither should take any decisive step of which the other is not
apprised.... We have on our hands a sick man—a very sick man. It
will, I tell you frankly, be a great misfortune if one of these days
he should slip away from us before all necessary arrangements were
made.
With this intimation the conversation appears to have dropped. A few
days later it was renewed at a private entertainment.
You know [the Emperor said] the dreams and plans in which the Empress
Catherine was in the habit of indulging; these were handed down to
our time; but while I inherited immense territorial possessions,
I did not inherit these visions—those intentions, if you like to
call them so. On the contrary, my country is so vast, so happily
circumstanced in everything, that it would be unreasonable in me to
desire more territory or more power than I possess; on the contrary,
I am the first to tell you that our great, perhaps our only, danger
is that which arises from an extension given to an Empire already too
large.
Close to us lies Turkey, and in our present condition nothing better
for our interests can be desired. The time has gone by when we had
anything to fear from the fanatical spirit or the military enterprise
of the Turks, and yet the country is strong enough, or has hitherto
been strong enough, to preserve its independence, and to insure
respectful treatment from other countries.
In that Empire there are several millions of Christians whose
interests I am called to watch over, while the right of doing so is
secured to me by treaty. I may truly say that I make a moderate and
sparing use of my right, and I will freely confess that it is one
which is attended with obligations occasionally very inconvenient;
but I cannot recede from the discharge of a distinct duty....
Now, Turkey has by degrees fallen into such a state of decrepitude
that, eager as we all are for the prolonged existence of his life,
he may suddenly die on our hands; we cannot resuscitate what is
dead. If the Turkish Empire falls it falls to rise no more, and I
put it to you, therefore, whether it is not better to be provided
beforehand for a contingency than to incur the chaos, confusion,
and the certainty of a European war, all of which must attend the
catastrophe, if it should occur unexpectedly and before some ulterior
system has been sketched. That is the part to which I am desiring you
should call the attention of your Government.
Now, I desire to speak to you as a friend, and as a gentleman. If
England and I arrive at an understanding in this matter, as regards
the rest it little matters to me. It is indifferent to me what others
do or think. Frankly, then, I tell you plainly that, if England
thinks of establishing herself one of these days at Constantinople,
I will not allow it. For my part, I am equally disposed to take
the engagement not to establish myself there—as proprietor, that
is to say—for as occupier I do not say; it might happen that
circumstances, if no previous provisions were made, if everything
should be left to chance, might place me in the position of occupying
Constantinople.
On the 20th February, in a further conversation, the Emperor said:—
If your Government has been led to believe that Turkey retains any
element of existence, your Government must have received incorrect
information. I repeat to you, the sick man is dying, and we can never
allow such an event to take us by surprise. We must come to some
understanding.
The next day he added:—
The principalities are, in fact, an independent State under my
protection. This might so continue. Serbia might receive the same
form of government. So again with Bulgaria; there seems to be no
reason why these provinces should not form one independent State.
As to Egypt, I quite understand the importance to England of that
territory. I can thus only say that if, in the event of a destruction
of the Ottoman succession upon the fall of the Empire, you should
take possession of Egypt, I shall have no objection to offer. I could
say the same thing of Candia. That island might suit you, and I do
not see why it should not become an English possession.
Sir Hamilton Seymour, in reply to the Emperor, said to his Government:—
I simply observed that I had always understood that the English views
upon Egypt did not go beyond the part of securing a safe and ready
communication between British India and the Mother Country.
“Well,” said the Emperor, “induce your Government to write again upon
this subject—to write more fully and do so without hesitation. I have
confidence in the British Government. It is not an engagement or
convention which I ask of them; it is a free interchange of ideas in
case of need—the word of a gentleman—that is enough between us.”
In reporting these conversations to the Foreign Secretary, Sir Hamilton
Seymour expressed his own opinion as follows:—
It can hardly be otherwise but that the Sovereign who insists with
such pertinacity upon the impending fall of a neighbouring State
must have settled in his own mind that the hour, if not _of_ the
dissolution, at all events _for_ the dissolution, must be at hand.
In answer to these overtures the British Government, through Lord John
Russell, the Foreign Secretary, disclaimed all intention of aiming at
the acquisition either of Constantinople or any other of the Sultan’s
possessions, and accepted the assurances of the like effect which were
given by the Czar. It combated the opinion that the extinction of the
Ottoman Empire was near at hand and deprecated a discussion based
on this supposition as leading directly to produce the very result
against which it was hoped to provide. Finally, the British Government,
with abundance of courtesy, but in terms very stringent and clear,
peremptorily refused to enter into any kind of secret engagement with
Russia for the settlement of the Eastern question.
Lord Clarendon, who succeeded Lord John Russell as Foreign Minister in
the course of these proceedings, in a final despatch to Sir Hamilton
Seymour (March 23, 1853), expressed the following opinion:—
Turkey only requires forbearance on the part of its allies, and a
determination not to press their claims in a manner humiliating to
the dignity and independence of the Sultan—that friendly support,
in short, which among States as well as individuals the weak are
entitled to expect from the strong—in order not only to prolong
its existence but to remove all cause for alarm respecting its
dissolution.
It will be seen that the British Government took much too sanguine a
view of the prospects of reformed Government in Turkey, and that the
Emperor of Russia was much nearer the mark.
We have quoted these conversations at length because of their extreme
importance when read by the light of subsequent events. They produced a
bad impression at the time on the British Government, and still more so
on public opinion in England, when later they were made public.[35] It
was thought that they indicated a deliberate intention on the part of
the Emperor of Russia to force the Eastern question to the front, and
to dismember the Ottoman Empire by a partition of the same kind as that
to which Poland had been treated, a few years back, and in which Russia
would have the lion’s share.
A more reasonable view may now be taken of the policy of the Emperor
Nicholas. Subsequent events have conclusively shown that he was fully
justified in describing the Turkish Empire as sick, almost to death,
for since then it has lost almost the whole of its dominions in Europe.
Russia also has acquired but a very small share of the vast territories
that have been taken from it. It is also subject to the reflection
that, although the British Government in 1852 disclaimed any wish or
intention to join in a scheme of partition of the Ottoman Empire, it
has since acquired a considerable part of it, approximating to the
offer of the Czar—namely Egypt, the Sudan, and the island of Cyprus.
Early in 1853 the Czar sent as a special envoy to the Porte Prince
Menschikof, a rude and bluff soldier. He was instructed to insist on
Russia’s claim to the guardianship of the Holy Sepulchre, in opposition
to that of France, and with a further demand, of a more serious kind,
for a protectorate in matters of religion over members of the Greek
Church throughout the Ottoman Empire.
It was no doubt in consequence of the conversations of the Czar with
Sir Hamilton Seymour and of this special mission of Prince Menschikof
that Canning, who had, in 1852, resigned the embassy at Constantinople,
and had been created a peer, with the title of Lord Stratford de
Redcliffe, was again sent as ambassador to the Porte by Lord Clarendon,
who was now Foreign Minister in England. Lord Stratford himself
appears to have drawn up the instructions of the Foreign Office. He
was directed to neutralize, by England’s moral influence, the alarming
position opened up by the demands, as regards the Holy Places and other
matters, of Russia and France, and the dictatorial, if not hostile,
attitude they had assumed. He was left unfettered for the settlement
of the Holy Places. His own judgment and discretion might be trusted
to guide him. The Porte was to be told that it had to thank its own
maladministration and the accumulated grievances of foreign nations
for the menacing tone now adopted towards it by certain Powers; that a
general revolt of its Christian subjects might ensue; that the crisis
was one which required the utmost prudence on the part of the Porte,
and confidence in the sincerity and soundness of the advice it would
receive from him, to resolve it favourably for its future peace and
independence. He was to counsel reform in the administration of Turkey,
by which alone the sympathy of the British nation could be preserved.
In the event of imminent danger to the existence of the Turkish
Government, the ambassador was authorized to request the admiral in
command of the British fleet at Malta to hold himself in readiness,
but he was not to direct the approach of the fleet to the Dardanelles
without positive instructions from her Majesty’s Government.
Lord Stratford, on arrival at Constantinople, found that his protégé,
Reschid Pasha, had been dismissed from the post of Grand Vizier, at the
instance of the new envoy of Russia, and replaced by a pasha favourable
to that Power. Prince Menschikof, by the use of menaces, and probably
with the aid of bribes, had obtained a commanding influence over the
Sultan’s Government. He insisted that his demands on the Porte should
be kept secret, and threatened to leave Constantinople if they were
divulged to the British Ambassador. Lord Stratford, however, found no
difficulty in obtaining full information as to the Russian demands.
He showed very great diplomatic skill in separating the question of
the Holy Places from the more serious one of the protectorate over the
Greek Church. He contrived to settle between Russia, France, and the
Porte the dispute as to the Holy Sepulchre. There remained, however,
the more serious one of the protectorate. This was aggravated by
personal rivalry and hate between the Czar Nicholas and Lord Stratford.
The real question in dispute became largely whether Russian or British
influence was to predominate in Turkey, and whether reforms, so
essential for the security and well-being of its Christian population,
were to be carried out under a protectorate by Russia or by England.
It is impossible to read the able biography of Lord Stratford by Mr.
Lane Poole, or Mr. Kinglake’s well-known chapters on the causes which
led to the Crimean War, without concluding that the policy of England
at this crisis was virtually directed, not by the British Cabinet in
London, but by Lord Stratford at the Embassy at Constantinople. Prince
Menschikof, in the struggle which ensued at the Porte, was little
competent to contend against so practised and wary a diplomat as
Stratford, and was completely worsted in the attempt.
Early in May, after the arrival of Stratford, a reconstruction of
the Turkish ministry was effected at his instance. The nominee of
Russia was dismissed. Ref’at Pasha took his place as Grand Vizier,
and Reschid, Lord Stratford’s main ally, was reinstated in office as
Minister of Foreign Affairs.
By Stratford’s advice the Porte determined to resist the Russian
demands. The claim to protect the members of the Greek Church was
pronounced to be inadmissible. Prince Menschikof was informed to this
effect, and on May 21st he broke off diplomatic relations with the
Porte, and left Constantinople in high dudgeon. This was followed,
on May 31st, by an arrogant despatch to the Porte from the Russian
Government, insisting on the acceptance of the Menschikof demands.
At the instance of Stratford, the Porte again refused, and thereupon
a Russian army crossed the Pruth, on July 3rd, and occupied Moldavia
and Wallachia. In a manifesto, issued a few days later, the Czar
disclaimed any intention of conquest, and justified his occupation of
the provinces as a material guarantee for the fulfilment of his demands
on behalf of the Christian population of Turkey.
That there was ample cause for the complaints of the Russian Government
of the maltreatment of the Christian population in Turkey cannot
be disputed. On July 22, 1853, Lord Stratford himself, in a formal
communication to the Porte, forwarded reports from the British Consuls
at Scutari, Monastir, and Prevesa, which detailed “acts of disorder,
injustice, and corruption of a very atrocious kind, which he had
frequently brought to the notice of the Ottoman Porte.” He complained
that the assurances given by the late Grand Vizier of remedies for
such evils had not been carried out, and he observed, with extreme
disappointment and pain, the continuance of evils which affected so
deeply the welfare of the Empire.
Again, on July 4th of the same year, in a further communication to the
Porte, Lord Stratford wrote:—
The character of disorderly and brutal outrages may be said with
truth to be in general that of Mussulman fanaticism, excited by
cupidity and hatred against the Sultan’s Christian vassals.
Unless some powerful means be applied without further delay, it
is to be feared that the authority of the central Government will
be completely overpowered and that the people, despairing of
protection, will augment the disorder by resorting to lawless means
of self-preservation.
Lord Clarendon, the Foreign Minister, also, in a communication to the
British Ambassador, showed that he was fully alive to the serious
character of the disorders in the Turkish Empire. He wrote:—
It is impossible to suppose that any true sympathy for their rulers
will be felt by the Christian subjects of the Porte, so long as
they are made to experience in all their daily transactions the
inferiority of their position as compared with that of their
Mussulman fellow-subjects; so long as they are aware that they will
seek in vain for justice for wrongs done either to their persons
or their properties, because they are deemed a degraded race,
unworthy to be put into comparison with the followers of Mahomet.
Your Excellency will plainly and authoritatively state to the Porte
that this state of things cannot be longer tolerated by Christian
Powers. The Porte must decide between the maintenance of an erroneous
principle and the loss of sympathy and support of its allies.
In spite, however, of the experience of the futility of all past
promises to carry out the most elementary reforms in favour of the
Christian subjects of the Porte, both Lord Stratford and Lord Clarendon
appear to have based their policy largely on the belief that the Porte
would be more amenable in the future.
The occupation of the Danubian principalities by a Russian army did not
of itself necessarily involve war with Turkey. Though the Sultan was
suzerain of these provinces, they enjoyed complete autonomy under the
protection of Russia. Under certain conditions that Power was entitled
to send its army there. But the continued occupation of them was
clearly antagonistic to the sovereign rights of the Sultan and would
ultimately lead to war.
With a view to avoid war, a conference was held by the representatives
of all the Powers except Russia at Vienna, and an agreement was arrived
at for the settlement of the question between Russia and Turkey by
England, France, Austria, and Prussia. This was agreed to by Russia.
It was commended to the Porte by the Powers, and Lord Stratford was
instructed by Lord Clarendon to use all his efforts to obtain its
consent.
Officially, Lord Stratford performed his task in due accord with
the instructions of Lord Clarendon. But his biographer and, still
more, Mr. Kinglake admit that the rejection of the Vienna demand was
mainly due to the British Ambassador. After quoting the words of Lord
Stratford, in which he described his efforts to induce the Porte to
accede to it, Kinglake writes:—
These were dutiful words. But it is not to be believed that, even
if he strove to do so, Lord Stratford could hide his real thoughts
from the Turkish ministers. There was that in his very presence which
disclosed his volition; for if the thin, disciplined lips moved in
obedience to constituted authorities, men who knew how to read the
meaning of his brow, and the light which kindled beneath, could
gather that the ambassador’s thoughts concerning the Home Governments
of the four Great Powers of Europe were little else than an angry
_quos ego_; the sagacious Turks would look more to the great signs
than to the terms of formal advice sent out from London, and if they
saw that Lord Stratford was, in his heart, against the opinion of
Europe, they could easily resolve to follow his known desire and
to disobey his mere words. The result was that without any sign of
painful doubt the Turkish Government determined to stand firm.
This is the view of a panegyrist of Lord Stratford. We have quoted it
for the purpose of showing that it was practically Lord Stratford who
guided the Turkish Government in this matter.
After the failure of the settlement prepared at the Vienna Conference,
the Porte, on October 1st, by the advice of Lord Stratford, made
a formal demand on Russia for the evacuation of the Danubian
principalities, and in default of this, a fortnight later it declared
war. The Turks then boldly took the initiative. Their army, under Omar
Pasha, crossed the Danube in November, 1853, and fought two battles
successfully against the Russians at Oltenitza and Citale in Wallachia.
Meanwhile, on October 22nd, when Russia and Turkey were already
at war, the fleets of England and France entered the Dardanelles.
Though this was not an infraction of the treaty of 1841, it was a
distinctly hostile act on the part of these Powers against Russia. But
negotiations still continued. Whatever hopes, however, there were of a
favourable issue were destroyed when, on November 30th, a Russian fleet
of six battleships, issuing from Sebastopol, attacked and completely
destroyed a Turkish squadron of eleven cruisers and smaller vessels
lying at anchor in the port of Sinope, on the coast of Asia Minor.
Four thousand Turkish sailors perished in this engagement. This was
an act of war, as legitimate as the attack by the Ottoman army on the
Russian force north of the Danube, the more so as the Turkish vessels
were believed to be carrying munitions of war to arm the Circassians
against Russia. It caused, however, an immense sensation in England
and France. It was denounced as an act of treachery and as a massacre
rather than a legitimate naval action. The fleets of the two Powers
then lying in the Bosphorus were at once instructed to enter the Black
Sea and to invite any Russian ships of war they might meet there to
return to their ports. They were to prevent any further attack on
Turkey. This made war inevitable. But negotiations were still for
a time continued, and it was not till March 28, 1854, that war was
actually declared against Russia by England and France. Armies were
then sent by these Powers to Constantinople, and thence to Varna,
in the Black Sea, with the object of protecting Turkey against the
attack of a Russian army and of assisting the former in compelling the
evacuation by the Russians of the two Danubian provinces.
Meanwhile, early in the spring of this year (1854), a Russian army had
crossed the Danube and had invested Silistria, the great fortress which
barred the way to the Balkans and Constantinople. It was defended with
the utmost bravery and tenacity by a Turkish army under Moussa Pasha,
assisted by two British engineer officers, Butler and Nasmyth. On June
25th the Russians recognized that they could not capture the fortress.
They raised the siege and retreated across the Danube, after incurring
immense loss of life and material.
All danger of an advance by the Russians across the Danube and the
Balkans was now at an end. The Turks unaided had effectually prevented
any such project. The Russian army thereupon retreated from the
Danubian principalities. Their place there was taken by an Austrian
army, with the consent of both Russia and the two Western Powers. No
reason existed, therefore, why the war should be continued, so far as
England and France were concerned. There was no longer any necessity
for their armies to defend the frontiers of Turkey. But a war spirit
had been roused in the two countries and was not to be allayed without
much shedding of blood. The two Powers decided to use their armies
which had been collected at Varna for the invasion of the Crimea and
the destruction of the naval arsenal at Sebastopol, which was regarded
as a permanent menace to Turkey.
Thenceforth, the part of the Turks in the war became subordinate and
even insignificant. The war was fought _à outrance_ between the two
allied Powers and Russia. The successful landing of the two armies
at Eupatoria, in the Crimea, their splendid victory over the Russian
army at the Alma, their flank march to the south of Sebastopol, the
commencement of the long siege of that fortress, the famous battles
of Balaklava and Inkerman and the terrible sufferings of the British
army in the winter of 1854-5, the memorable defence of Sebastopol
under General Todleben, the capture of the Malakoff by the French on
September 8th, 1855, and the consequent evacuation of the city and
forts of Sebastopol, on the southern side of its great harbour, are
events of the deepest interest in the histories of the allied Powers
and Russia, but have comparatively little bearing on our present theme.
Very little use was, in fact, made of the Turkish army by the Allies
in the course of the war. A division of seven thousand men was sent to
the Crimea in the autumn of 1854, and was employed for the defence of
Balaklava. It was led by most incompetent officers, and when attacked
by the Russians on the morning of the Battle of Balaklava, the men
precipitately fled. This exposed the flank of the allied army to
great danger. Later, another Turkish force under Omar Pasha was sent
to Eupatoria. It was attacked there by a much superior Russian army,
early in 1855, and fighting behind earthworks it made a very effective
resistance and completely repulsed the Russians. It was said that the
humiliation of this defeat of his troops by the despised Turks was the
immediate cause of the death of the Emperor Nicholas.
In Asia Minor another Russian army invaded Turkish territory and laid
siege to the fortress of Kars. There followed the memorable defence of
this stronghold by the Turks, assisted, if not commanded, by General
Williams, later Sir Fenwick Williams, and Colonel Teesdale. It was
ultimately, after a four months’ siege, compelled by want of food and
munitions to capitulate. The failure to relieve it was due to the
grossest and most culpable negligence of the Turkish Government. In
this siege and in that of Silistria and the defence of Eupatoria, the
Turkish soldiers gave ample proof that when well led they had lost none
of their pristine valour in defence of earthworks. The allied Powers,
however, seem to have been quite ignorant or unmindful of the military
value of the Turkish soldiers and made little or no practical use of
them. An army of fifty thousand Turks led by English or French officers
would have been of the utmost value in the earlier part of the war.
It was only towards the close of it that twenty thousand Turks were
enrolled under British officers. But this action was too late, and they
took no part in the war.
The writer, as a young man, spent a month in the Crimea in 1855, and
was present as a spectator on Cathcart’s Hill on the eventful day when
the Malakoff was captured by the French, and the British were repulsed
in their attack on the Redan. He well recollects the prevalent opinion
among British officers, whom he met, that the Turkish army was a
negligible force and of no military value in the field. This opinion
was abundantly shown in the attitude of British and French soldiers to
the Turkish soldiers whenever they met, and must have been very galling
to the pride and self-respect of the latter.
The capture of the Malakoff, a great feat of arms on the part of the
French army, was the last important event in the campaign of 1855.
Early in 1856 there were strong indications that the Emperor of the
French was weary of the war. Public opinion in France declared itself
unmistakably against its continuance. France had nothing to gain by
its prolongation. Its military pride had been satisfied by success in
the capture of Sebastopol and the destruction of the Russian fleet.
Its army in the Crimea was suffering severely from disease. With the
British it was otherwise. Their army before the enemy was in greater
force than at any previous period of the war. It was eager to retrieve
its prestige, which had been somewhat impaired by the failure at the
Redan. The British Government was as anxious for another campaign as
was the army. But without their French ally they could obviously do
nothing. The French Emperor entered into secret negotiations with the
Emperor Alexander, who had succeeded Nicholas. The success of the
Russian army in the capture of Kars and the valour it had shown in
defence of Sebastopol made it easy to negotiate peace without slur
on its military fame. It is impossible for us, who now look back on
these times, to perceive what possible object could have been gained
by England in prolonging the war. The projects of completing the
conquest of the Crimea, and of sending an army to the Caucasus in aid
of the Circassians, and another army to the Baltic to free Finland
from Russia, were fantastic and perilous. England was saved from these
adventures by the wiser policy of the French. The British Government
against its will was compelled to enter into a negotiation for peace.
This was effected through the mediation of Austria. Terms were
provisionally agreed to, and a Congress of the Great Powers was held in
Paris in 1856, at which a treaty of peace was finally concluded.
Under the terms of this treaty all the territories conquered by Russia
in Asia or by the allied Powers in Europe were restored to their
former owners. The small part of Bessarabia conceded to Russia by the
treaty of Bucharest and giving access to the Danube was reannexed to
Moldavia. The exclusive protectorate of Russia over the two Danubian
principalities was abolished, and they were placed under the joint
protection of all the Great Powers. The suzerainty of the Sultan over
them was recognized. But the Porte engaged to preserve for them an
independent and national administration, with full liberty of worship,
of legislation, and of commerce. They were to be permitted to organize
national armed forces. Serbia was accorded the same treatment, except
as regards a national army, but the armed intervention of the Porte
was to be permitted only with the consent of the Powers who were
signatories to the treaty. The Black Sea was neutralized. It was thrown
open to the mercantile marine of all nations, but was interdicted
to the war vessels of either Russia or Turkey, and these two Powers
engaged not to establish or maintain any military maritime arsenals on
its coasts.
As regards the internal administration of Turkey and the treatment of
its Christian population, the treaty contained the following clause:—
The Sultan, having by his constant solicitude for the welfare of
his subjects issued a firman (the Hatti-Humayun), which, while
ameliorating their condition without distinction of religion or race,
records his generous intentions towards the Christian population of
his Empire, and wishing to give a further proof of his sentiments in
that direction, has resolved to communicate to the contracting Powers
the said firman emanating spontaneously from his sovereign will. The
contracting Powers recognize the high value of this communication.
It is clearly understood that it cannot give to the said Powers
the right to interfere either collectively or individually in the
relations of H.M. the Sultan with his subjects or in the internal
administration of his Empire.
The latter part of the clause, it will be seen, completely nullified
and destroyed the effect of the earlier part of it, and practically
gave full licence to the Sultan to continue his misgovernment of his
Empire and to refuse the just demands of his Christian subjects—a very
lame and impotent conclusion to the war.
In explanation of this clause, it should be stated that Lord Stratford,
shortly before the meeting of the Congress, had succeeded, after long
efforts, in extracting from the Porte another charter of reform in
favour of its Christian subjects, known as the Hatti-Humayun. This was
referred to in the treaty, not as an act binding on the Porte, but
merely as an indication of the Sultan’s good intentions, and with the
express condition that neither the Great Powers signatories to the
treaty nor any one of them were to be entitled to call him to account
in the event of his pious intentions not being carried into effect.
Lord Stratford, when he heard at Constantinople of the intentions of
the Congress, but before a final conclusion was arrived at, wrote to
Lord Clarendon the following strong protest:—
There are many able and experienced men in this country who view with
alarm the supposed intention of the Conference at Paris to record
the Sultan’s late Firman of Privileges (the Hatti-Humayun) in the
treaty of peace, and at the same time to declare that the Powers
of Europe disclaim all right of interference between the Sultan
and his subjects. They argue thus: The Imperial firman places the
Christians and the Mussulmans on an equal footing as to civil rights.
It is believed that the Porte will never of its own accord carry the
provisions of the firman seriously into effect. The treaty, in its
supposed form, would therefore confirm the right and extinguish the
hope of the Christians. Despair on their side and fear on that of the
Turks would, in that case, engender the bitterest animosity between
them, and not improbably bring on a deadly struggle before long.[36]
This protest, which doubtless represented Lord Stratford’s own
convictions, was of no avail. Lord Clarendon was powerless at the
Congress. He met with no support from the French representatives. They
cared nothing for reforms in Turkey. The Russians, in view of the
origin of the war and the refusal of the other Powers to recognize
their claim to intervention on behalf of the Christians in Turkey, were
naturally indisposed to concede it to others, either individually or
collectively. The nullifying provision was inserted in the treaty. It
abrogated whatever effect the recognition of the firman might have had.
The Hatti-Humayun became, _ipso facto_, a dead letter. Lord Stratford
was bitterly disappointed. “He felt very keenly,” says his biographer,
“the pusillanimity of his own Government, who had made him a victim
to their deference to France.” In a letter to his brother after the
conclusion of the treaty, Lord Stratford wrote: “To be the victim of so
much trickery and dupery and charlatanism is no small trial. But I have
faith in principles as working out their own justification, and fix my
thoughts steadily on that coming day when the peace of Paris will be
felt and its miserable consequences.”
Lord Clarendon, in a letter to the ambassador, thus described his own
views of the treaty:—
I think as you do about the terms of peace, but I am not the least
sorry that peace is made, because, notwithstanding our means of
carrying on the war, I believe we should have run risks by so doing
for which no possible success would have compensated. We should have
been alone.... If you could have seen all that was passing when I
got to Paris—the bitterness of feeling against us, the kindly (I
might almost say the enthusiastic) feeling towards Russia, and the
determination, if necessary, to throw over the Vienna conditions in
order to prevent the resumption of hostilities (money matters and
Bourse speculations being the main cause), you would have felt as
I did, that our position was not agreeable, and that Brunnow was
justified in saying that they did not come to make or negotiate
peace, but to accept the peace which was to be crammed down their
throats.... Unluckily, too, just as negotiations began the French
army fell ill, and the Emperor himself admitted to me that, with
twenty-two thousand men in hospital and likely to be more, peace
had almost become a military as well as a financial and political
necessity for him.[37]
Lord Stratford’s words on hearing that the treaty was signed were, “I
would rather have cut off my right hand than have signed that treaty.”
The writer paid a second visit to Constantinople in 1857. He rode there
from Belgrade, passing through Bulgaria on the way, and was witness
of the miserable condition to which this province had been reduced by
Ottoman rule. He spent a few weeks at Therapia, where the Ambassador
was residing, and was favoured by many conversations with him. Lord
Stratford was always most kind and communicative to young men. He
made no secret of his bitter disappointment. The treaty of Paris, he
alleged, was a death-blow to the cause of reform in Turkey. If the
Christian population were not protected from misgovernment, the Empire
was doomed. He was under no illusion as to the misgovernment of the
country. He knew that if left to themselves the Turks would do nothing,
and that all the reforms promised by the Hatti-Humayun which he had
obtained with so much labour and difficulty before the conclusion of
the Crimean War would remain unexecuted and would be a dead letter.
He considered that England had been betrayed at the Congress of
Paris, that the clause in the treaty which embodied the Hatti-Humayun
was nullified by the provision that its recognition did not entitle
the Great Powers either collectively or separately to interfere in
the internal affairs of Turkey. He held that this was fatal to the
enforcement of the new reforms. He maintained that the only way to
induce the Turks to act in accordance with them was through threats
and fear, and that some external Power should bring such pressure to
bear on them. This might be done by England alone, or by England in
alliance with France, or by the Great Powers collectively. He preferred
the first of these; he had little hope of the last; but the treaty had
extinguished all methods equally.[38] It was the last year of the Great
Elchi’s reign at Constantinople. He retired from his post and from the
public service in the following year at the age of seventy-one.
He was succeeded by Sir Henry Bulwer, later Lord Dalling, an ambassador
of a very different type. Though an able diplomat, he cared nothing
for reform in Turkey. He allowed himself to be placed under personal
obligation to the Sultan, which destroyed his influence. He made no
effort to induce, still less to compel, the Porte to give effect to the
Hatti-Humayun which his predecessor had obtained with so much labour.
The cause of reform in Turkey [says Mr. Lane Poole], for which
Lord Stratford had striven for so many years, began its downward
course when the Turks understood the altered character of the
British Embassy under Sir Henry Bulwer. Lord Stratford’s farewell
to Constantinople was the occasion for a stately ceremony, in which
the Sultan and all his ministers and the whole population joined in
paying a last tribute to the departing Elchi.... He knew, however,
that he was assisting in the obsequies of his hopes. His long
struggle for reform of the Ottoman Empire was at an end, and in the
character of his successor he could trace the antithesis of all he
had striven for, the abandonment of all he had won.[39]
Lord Stratford lived on in retirement to the age of ninety-three, long
enough to see the verification of all his fears as to the effect of the
unfortunate clause in the treaty of Paris in nullifying the promises
of reforms in Turkey and of all his predictions as to the result of
this in the revolt in 1874 of the Christian populations of Bosnia,
Herzegovina, and Bulgaria under the stress of appalling misgovernment
and tyranny, and in their final liberation from Turkish rule by the
armies of Russia. On this occasion the revolt of these subjects of the
Porte had his full sympathy, and he admitted that Russia was fully
justified in its intervention.[40]
Mr. Gladstone in 1876 dedicated to Lord Stratford his pamphlet on
Bulgarian atrocities, which had such a powerful effect in preventing
England from taking up arms again in support of Turkey.[41]
Looking back at the Crimean War, it is now possible for us to perceive
and admit that its main, if not its only, result was to postpone for a
few years the break up of the Turkish Empire in Europe. It negatived
for a time the claim of Russia to an exclusive protectorate over the
Christian populations of the Balkans which would secure to them the
benefit of good government. Lord Stratford’s hopes of a reformed
Turkish Empire, more or less under the ægis of England, were frustrated
by the treaty of Paris. As a result, no reforms were effected in
Turkey. Its downward course was retarded, but not averted. When, in
1876, the accumulated grievances of the Christian population compelled
an outbreak, it will be seen that the intervention of Russia on their
behalf was practically admitted by England and the other Great Powers.
Abdul Mehzid died in 1861. He had not realized even the small promise
of his youth. He had many instincts that were sound and good. He was
the most humane of the long list of Sultans. He fully recognized the
urgent necessity for reforms in his State, in order to bring it into
line with other civilized States in Europe. But he had not the energy
or the will to carry them into effect, and the programme of reform
conceded to Lord Stratford remained a dead letter. He was prematurely
aged by debauchery. He was the first Sultan to fall into the hands of
moneylenders of Western Europe. Great sums were borrowed ostensibly
for the war with Russia. But the larger part of them was expended by
Abdul Mehzid in wild extravagance, in gratifying the caprices of the
multitude of women in his harem, in building palaces, and in satisfying
the demands of corrupt ministers. On the occasion of the marriage of
one of his daughters with the son of a Grand Vizier he spent forty
millions of francs on her trousseau and in fêtes. Meanwhile the
services of the State were neglected, nothing was done to relieve Kars,
and corruption spread in all directions.
Abdul Aziz, who succeeded his brother and reigned for fifteen years,
was physically one of the finest of his race. He was majestic in
appearance. His mien was gracious. He was every inch a Sultan. But
this was about all that could be said for him. His mind was vacuous.
His education had been neglected. He had spent many years in forced
seclusion, but had secretly intrigued with the more fanatical party
in the State against his brother, and had raised hopes that on coming
to the throne he would reverse the measures of reform, such as they
were, which his two predecessors had initiated. But he belied these
expectations for a time. On his accession he issued a proclamation
announcing his intention to follow his two predecessors in the path
of reform. He promised to economize the resources of the State and
to reduce the vast expenditure of the palace. He pensioned off the
multitudes of concubines of his brother, and gave out that he meant to
content himself with the most modest harem. But these proved to be no
more than good intentions, which only paved the way to very opposite
measures. Before long his own retinue of women was increased to nine
hundred, and the number of eunuchs in his palace to three thousand.
His extravagance soon emulated that of his brother. His reign was one
of external peace, which afforded full opportunity for giving effect
to the reforms promised by his brother and registered by the treaty of
Paris. Nothing was ever done. The firman proved to be a dead letter.
His ministers cared no more than himself for reforms. Successive
British Ambassadors made no serious efforts in this direction. Indeed,
they were precluded by the treaty of Paris from any exclusive pressure
on the Porte, without the support of all the other Powers.
The reign was chiefly conspicuous for the enormous borrowings of money
in London and Paris by the Porte, following on the bad example set by
Abdul Mehzid. The debt was rapidly increased by Abdul Aziz till it
reached a total of nearly two hundred millions sterling. It does not
appear that the accruing interest on this great debt was ever paid out
of the revenues of the Empire. Fresh loans were continually raised, out
of which the accumulated interest on previous loans was provided. Huge
commissions to financiers who brought out the loans, and bribes to
pashas for consenting to their issue, accounted for another large part
of the borrowed money. What remained was mainly devoted by the Sultan
to new palaces and to extravagances of his harem. This merry game went
on as long as credulous people in Western Europe could be induced to
continue lending. But the credit of the Turkish Empire was exhausted in
1874. A repudiation of half of the interest was then announced, and in
the following year the remaining half was repudiated. This did much to
weaken the interest of Western Europe in the Turkish cause. Eventually
a composition was arrived at with the creditors of the State. An
International Commission was appointed, in whom certain revenues of the
State were vested, out of which the interest of a greatly reduced total
of the original debt was to be paid. The principle of foreign control
over the finance of the Empire was thus introduced.
The Russian Government during this reign, by its skilful diplomacy,
backed by threats of force, recovered much of its old influence at
the Porte, and its ambassador, General Ignatief, began to dominate
its councils and to nominate its Grand Viziers. Three events during
the period showed the gradual downward course of the Empire. In 1867
the two Danubian principalities succeeded in accomplishing their
long-desired object of uniting together in a single State, thenceforth
known as Roumania; and in 1868 Prince Charles of Hohenzollern was
elected, and was invested by the Sultan as the hereditary ruler of
this new State. The union of the two provinces into a single State
practically secured independence to it, while the connection of its
ruler with the reigning family of Prussia marked the advent of that
Power into the political system of the Christian States founded on
the débris of the Turkish Empire in Europe, and was the first of many
important alliances of which we now see the intent and result. Serbia
also made an important advance to independence. In 1867 the Turkish
garrison in Belgrade, the occupation of which had been confirmed by the
treaty of Paris, was withdrawn by the Porte. These two events were the
result of pressure of the ambassadors of the Great Powers, who were
anxious to minimize the causes of friction to the Porte, which did not
add to its real strength.
Another important event was the repudiation by Russia on October 31,
1870, during the Franco-German War, of the clause in the treaty of
Paris of 1856 which interdicted the Black Sea to Russian and Turkish
vessels of war, and forbade to both Powers the creation or maintenance
of naval arsenals on the coasts of that sea. We now know that Prince
Bismarck, on behalf of Prussia, secured the neutrality of Russia in
the war with France, in 1870, by promising to support this repudiation
by the Czar of his treaty obligation. Complaint has not unfrequently
been made of the refusal or neglect of the British Government, of which
Mr. Gladstone was then the head, to insist on the maintenance of this
treaty by Russia, even at the risk of war. But the Porte, in whose
interest the provision had been framed by the Congress of Paris, and
which was primarily concerned in its maintenance, showed no desire or
intention to make its breach by Russia a _casus belli_, and it would
have been sheer madness for England, either with or without Turkey,
to have taken up the challenge of the Czar. A humiliating restriction
such as this on the sovereign rights of a great country was obviously
of a temporary character, and could not, in the nature of things, be
a permanent arrangement. It had served its purpose by giving to the
Porte a respite of fourteen years from naval attack by Russia. Lord
Palmerston, who was Prime Minister in England when the treaty was made,
had himself put on record the opinion that the enforced neutrality of
the Black Sea might be expected to last for fifteen years. It is to be
noted that some years would necessarily elapse after the repudiation of
the treaty before a Russian fleet could be created in the Black Sea and
before Sebastopol could be restored as a naval base. In point of fact,
in the war, which was soon to break out between Russia and Turkey, in
1877, the latter Power had virtual command of the Black Sea, and the
Russian army which crossed the Balkans and advanced to the vicinity of
Constantinople did so without the support of a naval force in the Black
Sea, as had been the case in 1829.
Another event also occurred in 1870, the significance of which was not
fully appreciated at the time. Previous to that year the Christian
Slav populations of the Balkans, such as the Bulgarians, Bosnians, and
others, were under the spiritual jurisdiction of the Greek Ecumenical
Patriarch and were regarded as Greeks. The ancient history of Bulgaria
and its claims to a distinct nationality appear to have been forgotten
or ignored by politicians interested in the Eastern question. On
March 10, 1870, Abdul Aziz, under pressure from Russia, backed by its
able ambassador, General Ignatief, issued a firman recognizing the
separate existence of Bulgaria, and creating for it a national Church
independent of the Greek Church, though differing in no important
respect in point of doctrine or ritual. This laid the foundation for
a new nationality in the Balkans. Bulgaria, long forgotten, emerged
from obscurity and came to the front as a competitor of the Greeks.
The importance of this will be appreciated later, when we come to the
rivalry of these races for the débris of the Ottoman Empire in Europe.
In 1876 a bloodless revolution took place in Constantinople. A new
ministry was forced upon Abdul Aziz, of which Midhat Pasha—one of
the few genuine and convinced reformers among the leading Turks—was
a member. They decided to depose the Sultan. They obtained a _fetva_
from the Mufti justifying this on the ground of his incapacity and
extravagance. No single hand was raised in his favour. After a vain
protest, he submitted to his fate, and was removed from his palace to
another building destined to be his prison. Four days later he was
found dead there, and nineteen physicians of the city, including men of
all nationalities, testified that Abdul Aziz died by his own hand.
XXI
ABDUL HAMID II
1876-1909
ON the deposition of Abdul Aziz, his nephew, the eldest son of Abdul
Mehzid, much against his will, was proclaimed as Sultan, under the
title of Murad V. His feeble mind, reduced to a nullity by long
seclusion in the Cage, and by the habit of intemperance, was completely
unhinged by this unexpected elevation, and after a few weeks—on August
31, 1876—it became necessary for the committee of ministers who had
set him on the throne to depose him in favour of the next heir. His
brother, Abdul Hamid II, held the Sultanate for thirty-three years, and
is still alive, in the custody of another brother, the present Sultan,
after being deposed, in his turn, in 1909.
Abdul Hamid proved to be the most mean, cunning, untrustworthy, and
cruel intriguer of the long dynasty of Othman. His mother was an
Armenian. He was destitute of physical courage. He lived in constant
fear of plots and assassination, and in suspicion of every one about
him. He trusted no one, least of all his ministers. He allowed no
consultations between them. If he heard that two of them had met in
private, his suspicions were aroused and they were called to account.
He employed a huge army of spies, who reported to him directly and
daily as to the doings of his ministers, of the ambassadors, and of
any one else of importance. They fed him with reports, often false,
on which he founded his actions. Plots were invented in order to
induce him to consent to measures which otherwise he would not have
sanctioned. He claimed and exercised the right of secret assassination
of his foes or suspected foes. No natives of Turkey were safe. They
might disappear at any moment, as so many thousands had done by the
order of the Sultan, through some secret agent, either to death or
exile. This was not so much from pure wickedness of heart as from fear
of being assassinated himself, and the belief that his safety lay in
exterminating his enemies before they had the chance of maturing their
plans against himself. The ambassadors of foreign Powers had little
influence with him, except so far as they were able to threaten the
use of armed force, when, sooner than risk war, he gave way. He showed
great cunning in playing off one ambassador against another, and was an
adept in all the meanest intrigues of diplomacy.
Abdul Hamid’s life was one of incessant labour. He devoted himself most
assiduously to the work of his great office. Whatever his demerits,
he was absolute master of his ministers and of his State. There never
was a more centralized and meticulous despotism. As he trusted no one,
he was overwhelmed by most trivial details and graver questions were
neglected. He could not, indeed, administer the vast affairs of his
Empire without information or advice from others, but no one knew from
day to day who was the person on whose advice the Sultan overruled
his ostensible ministers, whether a favourite lady of his harem, or a
eunuch, or some fanatical dervish, or an astrologer, or a spy. There
was constant confusion in the State, arising from antagonism between
the officials of the Porte and the minions of the palace.
Outwardly, Abdul Hamid had the manners of a gentleman, but inwardly he
was as mean a villain as could be found in the purlieus of his capital.
He was avaricious to an extreme, and though his expenditure was most
lavish and his charities wide, he amassed immense wealth, which he
invested secretly through German bankers against the rainy day which he
expected. When it came and he was deposed, amid universal execration
and loathing, his life was spared in the hope mainly of extracting
from him these secret investments. He was not above receiving bribes
himself, on a great scale, from financiers in search of concessions.
He did nothing to check the chief evil of Turkish rule—the sale of
offices and the necessity for officials to recoup themselves for their
outlay by local exactions. Though he was not without some instincts for
good government, and was free from any fanaticism, his system was such
that everything went to the bad in his reign, and that many years of
peace, after the treaty of Berlin, were attended by no improvement in
the condition of his people, but the reverse. The result of his policy
was that his Empire suffered a greater dismemberment than had been the
bad fortune of any of his predecessors, and as he monopolized power, he
must be held mainly responsible for its evil results.
At the very outset of his reign Abdul Hamid was confronted with most
serious questions affecting the integrity of his Empire. In 1875 an
outbreak had occurred in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the result not merely
of misgovernment by the Turkish pashas and officials, their rapacity
and exactions, and of the system of farming the taxes, but of a vicious
agrarian system. The great majority of landowners, though of the same
Slav race as the rayas, the cultivators of the soil, were Moslems by
religion. Their forbears had become so when the Ottomans conquered
their State in order to save their property. They were as rapacious and
fanatical as any landowners of Turkish race in any part of the Empire.
No Christians were employed in the administration of these provinces.
The evidence of the Christian rayas was not admitted in the courts of
law. Justice or injustice could only be obtained by bribes. The police
and other officials lived by extorting money from those whom it was
their duty to defend.
The bad harvest of 1874 was the immediate cause of the outbreak, for
the farmers of the taxes refused to make any concessions. It was, in
the first instance, directed rather against the Moslem landowners
and the local Turkish officials than against the Sultan, but it
rapidly developed into a general insurrection against the Sultan’s
government. Every effort was made by Austria and Russia to localize
it and to induce the Porte to make concessions. Count Andrassy,
the Austro-Hungarian Foreign Minister, drew up a scheme for the
pacification of the two provinces. It proposed that the system of
farming the taxes should be abolished, that the taxes raised in the
provinces should be expended locally for their benefit, that complete
religious equality should be established, and that a mixed commission
should be appointed to supervise the carrying out of these reforms. The
scheme was agreed to by Russia, Great Britain, and the other Powers,
and was presented to the Sultan, who acquiesced in it. But it proved,
like other promises of reform in Turkey, to be a dead letter. Not a
single step was taken to give effect to any part of it. The rebellion
in the two provinces continued. The insurgents increased their demands.
They insisted that one-third of the land should be given up to the
rayas. The movement soon extended to Bulgaria, which was seething with
disaffection.
On April 21, 1876, an outbreak of Bulgarians occurred on the southern
slopes of the Rhodope Mountains, of which Batak was the centre. It
was put down without difficulty by a small Turkish force sent from
Constantinople, under Achmet Agha, with little loss of life to the
troops engaged, but with relentless cruelty, not only to the actual
insurgents who surrendered on promise of life, but to the whole
population of the district. Bands of Bashi-Bazouks, consisting of
Tartars from the Crimea who had been planted in Bulgaria, were let
loose on them. Indiscriminate murders, rapes, and rapine took place.
Sixty villages were burnt. Twelve hundred persons, mostly women and
children, took refuge in a church at Batak and were there burnt
alive. In all about twelve thousand persons perished in these brutal
reprisals. Achmet Agha received a high decoration from the Sultan for
this performance. There was nothing new in this method of dealing with
an outbreak by the Porte. It was in accord with its traditional system
and policy to wreak vengeance on those revolting by orgies of cruelty,
which would strike terror among subject races and act as a warning to
them in the future.
What was new in the case of the Bulgarians in 1876, and was fraught
with misfortune to the Turkish cause, was that full and graphic
accounts of the horrors committed at Batak, written by Mr. Edwin Pears
(now Sir Edwin), the correspondent at Constantinople of the _Daily
News_, appeared in the columns of that paper. They produced a profound
impression on public opinion in England. Discredit was thrown on the
story in the House of Commons by Mr. Disraeli, the Prime Minister, but
it was fully confirmed by Mr. MacGahan, another correspondent of the
same paper, who visited the district, and later by Mr. Walter Baring, a
member of the British Embassy at Constantinople, who, by the direction
of the Government, made full personal inquiries on the spot. He
described what had taken place as “perhaps the most heinous crime that
has stained the history of the present century.”
It was also unfortunate for the Turks that Mr. Gladstone, the only
survivor in the House of Commons of the British statesmen responsible
for the Crimean War, who had recently retired from the leadership of
the Liberal party, was fired by the description of these horrors in
Bulgaria to emerge from his retirement and to take up the cause of the
Christian population of European Turkey, for which he held that the
treaty of Paris had made his country responsible.
Meanwhile the horrors at Batak had also aroused the indignation of
Russia and the fears of Austria. A fanatical outbreak of Moslems at
Salonika resulted in the murder of the Consuls of France and Germany.
Serbia and Montenegro, impelled by sympathy for their fellow Slavs
in Bosnia, declared war against Turkey. A Turkish force defeated the
Serbians, who appealed to Russia for assistance. At this stage another
effort was made by Russia and Austria, supported by Germany, to avert a
general conflagration, and a scheme was embodied in what was known as
the Berlin Memorandum for compelling the Porte to carry out the reforms
which it had admitted to be necessary. The British Government, however,
very curtly refused to be a party to the scheme, on the ground that
they had not been consulted in framing it and did not believe in its
success. About this time also the British fleet in the Mediterranean
was ordered to Besika Bay, a step taken avowedly for the purpose of
protecting British subjects in the turmoil which had arisen, but which
seemed to the Porte to indicate an intention to support them against
the demands of the other Powers.
Mr. Gladstone, fearing that these actions indicated the intention of
the British Government to withdraw from the concert of Europe and to
renew the separate policy which had led to the Crimean War, made a
vehement attack on it in the House of Commons for refusing to agree
to the Berlin Memorandum. Later, in September 1876, he published
his well-known pamphlet on “the Bulgarian Horrors,” in which, with
passionate language, he dwelt at length on the massacres at Batak
and denounced the Turkish Government. He protested that he could no
longer bear his share of responsibility for the Crimean War. Otherwise
he might be accused of “moral complicity in the basest and blackest
outrages upon record in that century.”
Those [he wrote] who opposed the Crimean War are especially bound to
remember that the treaty of Paris made Europe as a whole, and not
Russia alone, responsible for the integrity and independence of the
Ottoman Empire, which had given this licence to Turkish officers
to rob, murder, and ravish in Bulgaria.... As an old servant of
the Crown and State, I entreat my countrymen, upon whom far more
than perhaps any other people of Europe it depends, to require and
insist that our Government, which has been working in one direction,
shall work in the other, and shall apply all its vigour, in common
with the other States of Europe, in obtaining the extinction of the
Turkish executive power in Bulgaria. Let the Turks now carry away
their abuses in the only possible manner, namely, by carrying off
themselves. Their zapties and their mudirs, their bimbashis and
their yuzbashis, their kaimakans and their pashas, one and all, bag
and baggage, shall, I hope, clear out from the province they have
desolated and profaned.[42]
The pamphlet produced an immediate and profound effect on public
opinion in Great Britain. It was followed up by speeches of the same
force and eloquence on the part of the veteran statesman. Meetings took
place in every part of the country, at which sympathy was expressed
for the Christian populations of Turkey. The Turks were denounced
for their cruelties and bad government. Resolutions were unanimously
passed in accord with the policy recommended by Mr. Gladstone. Lord
Stratford himself expressed sympathy with the movement, differing only
in this from Mr. Gladstone, that England, in his view, should exert
its influence not only for the Bulgarians, but for all the oppressed
subject races in Turkey. Many of the most cultivated men in England
joined in the movement quite irrespective of party politics.
Mr. Disraeli, who was created Earl of Beaconsfield in the course of
these events, on his retirement from the House of Commons, showed great
courage and persistence in resisting the movement. His sympathies lay
wholly in the opposite direction. His Eastern policy was in accord
with that of the previous generation of statesmen, such as Palmerston,
and, indeed, Gladstone himself in his earlier stage of opinion, who
believed that the maintenance of the Turkish Empire was essential
to the integrity of the British Empire. He saw no reason for change.
He dreaded the further advance of Russia. He did not believe in the
honesty of the professions of its Emperor. He enforced his views at a
public meeting at Aylesbury on September 20th, and endeavoured to stem
the movement. He scoffed at the Bulgarian horrors. He declared the
perpetrators of them were not so bad as those who made them the subject
of agitation for their political purposes. He was evidently prepared to
support the Turks against any invasion of their country by Russia, and
to renew the policy of the Crimean War. But it was in vain.
Though the agitation promoted by Mr. Gladstone did not result in
inducing the Government to join the other Powers in compelling the
Turkish Government to concede autonomy to its Christian provinces,
or to carry out reforms, it had two effects of great historical
importance, which must be our justification for referring to the
subject. It made impossible the renewal of the policy of the Crimean
War—the armed support by Great Britain to the Turks against an invasion
by Russia on behalf of the Christian population of the Balkans. It
paralysed the hands of those, like Lord Beaconsfield, who desired
to support the Turks and the _status quo_. On the other hand, it
doubtless stimulated Russia to armed intervention, by making it clear
that there would be no resistance on the part of Great Britain. Lord
Beaconsfield’s Cabinet was divided on the subject. A majority of its
members evidently concurred with Lord Derby, the Foreign Secretary, in
opposition to war with Russia on behalf of Turkey.
On September 21st, the day after Lord Beaconsfield had delivered
his fiery pro-Turkish speech at Aylesbury, Lord Derby, on behalf of
the Government, in a despatch to the Ambassador at Constantinople,
directed him to inform the Porte that the atrocious crimes of the
Turkish authorities and troops in Bulgaria had aroused the righteous
indignation of the British people, and that Great Britain, as signatory
to the treaty of Paris, could not be indifferent to them. He demanded
that examples should be made of the perpetrators of these crimes.
On October 30th Lord Derby further informed the Russian Government,
through the ambassador at St. Petersburg, that, however strong the
feeling in England against the Turkish cruelties, it would be
superseded by a very different sentiment if it were believed that
Constantinople was threatened, or that British interests in the Suez
Canal were in any danger. This message to the Emperor could only be
interpreted as meaning that the British Government would not interfere
with any action that Russia might take against Turkey, provided it
did not involve the conquest of Constantinople or endanger British
interests in Egypt. It was evidently so understood by the Emperor, for
immediately on receipt of the above despatch, on November 2nd, he gave
his word of honour to the British Ambassador that he had no designs on
Constantinople and no intentions whatever to annex Bulgaria.
In spite of this explicit announcement on the part of the Emperor,
in response to the despatch from the British Foreign Minister, Lord
Beaconsfield, a few days later, on November 9th, at the annual civic
banquet at the Guildhall of London, delivered himself of a most
bellicose speech on behalf of Turkey, practically threatening war with
Russia, without any reference to the pacific assurance of the Czar,
which, as we now know, was in his hands at the time when he made this
speech. There could not well be a clearer intimation on the part of the
British Premier that he had no belief in the good faith of the Emperor.
This menacing speech of the British Prime Minister was telegraphed to
Russia, with the result that the Czar was greatly incensed, and on the
next day, November 10th, he made a public pronouncement at Moscow to
his people of the gravest importance, to the effect that, if he could
not obtain adequate guarantees from the Porte for the protection of its
Christian subjects, he would act independently of other Powers, relying
on the loyalty of his people to support him.
In the meantime, through Lord Derby’s efforts, it had been arranged
with Russia and the other Great Powers that a Conference should be held
at Constantinople of representatives of all the Powers, for the purpose
of deciding what administrative changes should be proposed to the
Sultan, with a view to the common purpose—namely the better protection
of his Christian subjects in Europe.
Lord Salisbury, as a member of the British Cabinet and Secretary of
State for India, represented England at this Conference. It met at
Constantinople on December 23, 1876. On the day before the meeting
of the Conference at Constantinople a firman was published by the
Sultan, at the instance of Midhat Pasha, promulgating a scheme of
constitutional reform, which had been agreed to by the ministers of
the Porte in the short reign of Murad, but which Abdul Hamid on his
accession had refused to sanction. A National Assembly was convoked,
to be elected by universal suffrage, without distinction of race or
religion, throughout the Empire. It was hoped to anticipate the demands
of the Conference by a scheme of reform wider than they were likely
to advise. This was effected with perfect good faith by Midhat, who
was earnestly in favour of reform. But subsequent events showed that
the Sultan adopted this course for the purpose only of throwing dust
in the eyes of the Conference, and with the full intention of setting
aside the Constitution as soon as the Conference had broken up. The
Conference might perhaps have acted more wisely in treating this act of
the Sultan as an honest proposal, and in making it the basis of a wide
reform of the Ottoman Empire. They held it to be a sham. They proceeded
with their discussions as if it had not been issued. They preferred
an alternative scheme of providing autonomous institutions for the
Christian provinces of Turkey, and for the appointment of governors
subject to the approval of the Great Powers. There was practically no
difference of opinion at the Conference between the British and Russian
delegates, Lord Salisbury and General Ignatief. The Conference, at
their instance, reduced its demands on the Porte to the most moderate
minimum.
The Sultan refused point-blank to entertain the proposals of the
Conference, on the ground that they interfered with his sovereign
powers. He pleaded the new Constitution which he had just accorded
to the Empire. There never was any intention on his part to make any
concessions. He was under the belief that if war resulted with Russia
from his refusal to agree to reforms his country would not stand alone.
He took the policy of England from the speech of Lord Beaconsfield
at the Guildhall; and not from Lord Derby or Lord Salisbury. Lord
Beaconsfield had, in fact, thrown over his colleague, Lord Salisbury,
in that unfortunate utterance and had insured the failure of the
Conference at Constantinople.
A few days after the break-up of the Conference, Midhat Pasha was
ignominiously dismissed from office. The new Constitution did not
long survive its author. In May, 1877, Abdul Hamid suspended it and
dismissed the National Assembly which had been convoked. During the
two months of its existence its members had shown a determination to
expose the scandalous abuses of the Hamidian system. Later Abdul Hamid
trumped up a charge against Midhat of having been responsible for the
murder of Sultan Aziz. Two men employed by that Sultan, a wrestler and
a gardener, were suborned to confess that they strangled Aziz at the
instance of Midhat. Midhat was tried by corrupt judges and was not
allowed to cross-examine these men. He was found guilty and condemned
to death. At the instance mainly of the British Government the sentence
was commuted to banishment to Arabia. Midhat was there strangled
by order of Abdul Hamid in 1882, and his embalmed head was sent to
Constantinople, in order that the Sultan might be assured of his death.
The two men who had confessed to the murder of Aziz were released
and were pensioned by the Sultan. Sir Henry Elliot, who was British
Ambassador at Constantinople at the time of the death of Sultan Aziz,
put on record his conviction that it was a case of suicide, that the
charge against Midhat was trumped up, and that the whole proceedings
are an indelible stain on Abdul Hamid.
Meanwhile, in 1877, another attempt was made by the Great Powers to
effect a settlement of the Eastern question. Count Schouvaloff was
sent to London by the Emperor of Russia on a special mission for the
purpose. Agreement was arrived at between the Powers. It was embodied
in a protocol, and was presented to the Porte. It was promptly rejected
on April 10th by the Sultan as inconsistent with the treaty of Paris
by interfering with the independence of the Ottoman Empire. Russia
thereupon declared war against Turkey, justifying it in a dignified
manifesto, on the ground that the Sultan, by rejecting the protocol,
had defied Europe. Russia, therefore, held the strong position of
acting on behalf of Europe. England was the only Power to take
exception to this. Lord Derby, in a despatch to the Russian Government,
said that he and his colleagues regarded the action of Russia as
an obstacle to reform in Turkey, and held that the plight of the
Christian population could not be improved by war—a most unfortunate
prediction, as the result proved. More fortunate was the prediction of
Mr. Gladstone at the close of a speech which he made in the House of
Commons, on April 24, 1877, immediately after the declaration of war
by Russia, when moving a resolution intended to prevent the Government
from taking up a hostile attitude to Russia in the coming war.
I believe, for one [he said], that the knell of Turkish tyranny in
these provinces (the Balkan provinces) has sounded. So far as human
eyes can judge, it is about to be destroyed. The destruction may not
come in the way or by the means that we should choose; but come from
what hands it may, I am persuaded that it will be accepted as a boon
by Christendom and the world.[43]
The answer of the Government to Mr. Gladstone was given in the debate
by the Home Secretary, Sir Richard Cross, later Lord Cross. It showed
that the policy of Lord Derby, and not that of Lord Beaconsfield, had
prevailed in the Cabinet. The Government, he said, regretted the war
which had been declared by Russia, and did not believe that it would do
any good, but it would not give support to either side, unless the Suez
Canal or Egypt or Constantinople were threatened.
It followed from this decision of the British Cabinet that the hopes
which the Sultan had formed from the speeches of Lord Beaconsfield were
not realized. He was left alone to fight against Russia in another
attack on his Empire. Immediately after the declaration of war, on
April 24, 1877, two Russian armies invaded Turkey—the one in Europe,
of two hundred and fifty thousand men, under the nominal command of
the Grand Duke Nicholas, the other in Asia, of a hundred and fifty
thousand men from the Caucasus, under that of the Grand Duke Michael.
The former crossed the Pruth into Roumania, which was still nominally
a part of the Ottoman Empire. But on April 15th the Roumanian Chamber
had given its assent to a convention with Russia providing for the
passage of the Russian troops through the principality and otherwise
giving promise of friendly support. The Porte, as was to be expected,
treated this as a hostile act, and directed the bombardment of Calafat,
a Roumanian fortress on the Danube. The Roumanians thereupon, on May
21st, declared war against Turkey. They gave most effective support to
the Russians throughout the campaign. Indeed, it may be fairly said
from the course of the campaign that the invasion of Bulgaria would not
have been successful without the help of the Roumanians.
The Emperor of Russia had further prepared the way for the invasion of
Turkey by securing the neutrality of Austria-Hungary. At a personal
meeting in the previous year at Reichstadt, he had assured the
Emperor of Austria that he had no intention of taking possession of
Constantinople. He further promised that Bosnia and Herzegovina would
be handed over for occupation by Austria-Hungary as a reward for
neutrality in the event of success in his war against the Turks.
Owing to unprecedented inundations in the valley of the Danube, it was
not till two months after the commencement of the campaign that the
Russian army was able to cross that river. It did so at two points,
the one in the Dobrudscha, the other at Hirsova. In neither case did
it meet with serious opposition. The Turkish army of defence was
little inferior in numbers to that of the Russians, but its general,
Abdul Kerim, proved to be quite incompetent. He spread his forces
in detachments over a front of five hundred miles, and was too late
in concentrating them. The Russians, after capturing Nicopolis, the
Turkish stronghold on the Danube, advanced into Bulgaria and captured
Tirnovo, its ancient capital. Everywhere they were received by the
Bulgarians with rapturous demonstrations of delight at the prospect of
deliverance from Ottoman rule.
General Gourko, with a flying corps, then made a very hazardous but
successful march across the Balkans by the Hainköi Pass, and advanced
into Bulgaria along the Trudja Valley as far as Eski Zagra. Thence,
turning back, he attacked the more important Shipka Pass from the
south, and defeated a Turkish force in occupation of it. Meanwhile,
early in July, the main Russian army from Tirnovo came in contact
at Plevna, twenty miles south of the Danube, with a Turkish army of
fifty thousand men under Osman Pasha, who had been sent in relief of
Nicopolis, but was too late for the purpose.
Plevna was not a fortress. It was a strong natural position, where
the Turks entrenched their army behind earthworks and redoubts with
great engineering skill, and where they maintained an obstinate and
memorable defence for nearly five months, the most striking incident
of the campaign of 1877. Three unsuccessful assaults were made by the
Russians, assisted by a Roumanian army, in which great losses were
incurred. Thereupon, by the advice of General Todleben, the hero of
the defence of Sebastopol in the Crimean War, the attempt to take
these works at Plevna by assault was given up, and it was subjected
to a close investment. The occupation of the Shipka Pass by Gourko
prevented the advance of a Turkish army in relief of Plevna, in spite
of successive attacks by the Turkish army under Suleiman Pasha. As
a result, after five months of heroic resistance, Osman Pasha found
himself in great straits for want of food for his army. He determined
to make a great effort to break through the lines of the investing
army. The sortie failed, and Osman and his whole remaining army of
thirty-two thousand men were compelled to surrender on January 9, 1878.
This had the effect of releasing the Russian army in front of Plevna.
General Gourko and the main part of the Russian army thereupon marched
to Sofia. General Skobeleff, in command of another army, determined
to force his way across the Balkan range. An army of ninety thousand
Turks under another Pasha was stationed at the southern end of the
Shipka Pass and barred his way. Directing a part of his army to make a
feint attack along the Shipka Pass, Skobeleff led the remainder by two
sheep tracks distant about six miles from the pass, and crossing the
mountains, was able to attack the enemy on the flank at Shenova. The
Turks were defeated and their whole army was compelled to surrender.
By this brilliant manœuvre of Skobeleff, the Grand Duke Nicholas, in
nominal command of the whole Russian army, was able to advance without
further opposition to Adrianople. He took possession of it on January
28th. Meanwhile the Turks met with further defeats from the Serbians
and Montenegrins. The former captured the important town of Nisch. The
latter captured Spizza, in the bay of Antivari, and Dulcigno, in the
Adriatic.
In Asia the Turks were no more fortunate than in Europe. Their army
under Muktar Pasha was little inferior in numbers to that of the
Russians, but it was divided between Kars, Ardahan, and Erzerum.
The Russians in the course of the campaign of 1877 succeeded in
successively capturing these important fortresses and in getting
possession of nearly the whole of the districts inhabited by Armenians.
By the middle of January 1878 the resistance of the Turks was
practically at an end in both continents. They were compelled to sue
for peace and to appeal for the mediation of the other Powers of
Europe. On January 31st an armistice was agreed on.
The capture of Adrianople and the fact that there was no Turkish
army capable of resisting the further advance of the Russians to
Constantinople caused great alarm to the British Government. Opinion
in England, which had not supported Lord Beaconsfield in his desire to
renew the policy of the Crimean War, and to assist the Turks against
the invasion of Bulgaria by the Russians, now veered round, at least
among the wealthier and a large section of the middle class, and
declared itself vehemently opposed to the occupation of Constantinople,
which appeared to be imminent, even if it should be only of a temporary
character.
The British fleet at Besika Bay was ordered to enter the Dardanelles.
The House of Commons was asked to vote six millions for war
purposes. Every preparation was made for war. Russia replied to
these demonstrations by advancing its army nearer to Constantinople.
The headquarters of the Grand Duke Nicholas were established at San
Stefano, a village on the shore of the Marmora, within sight of
Constantinople. A portion of the British fleet then took up a position
near to Prince’s Island, also within sight of the capital. The position
between the two countries, England and Russia, was therefore most
critical.
Meanwhile negotiations took place directly between Russia and the
Porte. Terms of peace were offered and agreed to, and on March 3,
1878, a treaty was signed between the two Powers at San Stefano. It
was in accord with the promises which had been made to the British
Government by the Czar. Constantinople, the province of Thrace, and
Adrianople were left in possession of the Turks, and the capital was
not even to be temporarily occupied by the Russian army. Bulgaria was
not to become a Russian province or even an independent State. But a
great Bulgaria from the Danube southward, with frontiers on the Black
Sea and the Ægean Sea, and including the greater part of Thrace, was
constituted as an autonomous State, subject to the nominal suzerainty
of the Sultan, under a prince to be elected by its people and approved
by Russia. As thus constituted, it would cut off the Porte from direct
junction and communication by land with its remaining possessions
in the Balkan peninsula, such as Macedonia, Epirus, and Albania.
Serbia and Montenegro were to be greatly enlarged and both were to be
independent States. Bosnia and Herzegovina were to be endowed with
autonomous institutions while remaining subject to the Porte. Reformed
administration was to be secured for the remaining Balkan provinces. No
extension was conceded to Greece, but Thessaly, Epirus, and Crete were
included in the provision of reformed administration. The Roumanians
were very shabbily treated after the valuable assistance they had
rendered to the Russian army. The part of Bessarabia, inhabited largely
by Roumanians, which had been taken from Russia by the treaty of Paris
and added to Moldavia, was to be restored to the Czar, together with a
small strip which brought Russia up to the Danube as a riverain State.
In exchange, Roumania was to be content with the barren Dobrudscha,
sparsely inhabited by Bulgarians and Turks. Roumania was to be an
independent State. In Asia, Kars, Ardahan, Bayezid, and Batoum, and
their districts were to be ceded to Russia. Erzerum was to be restored
to Turkey. An indemnity for the war of twelve millions sterling was to
be paid by Turkey.
The publication of these terms did not allay the apprehensions of
the British Government. They were regarded, in the first instance,
as meaning the complete dismemberment of Turkey in Europe. Lord
Beaconsfield and the Turkophil members of the Government believed that
a great Bulgaria would be completely under the influence of Russia,
and would be used as a stepping-stone for the ultimate acquisition of
Constantinople by that Power. They could not understand, what was often
insisted upon by Mr. Gladstone in his speeches, that the best barrier
against the advance of Russia, in the Balkan peninsula, would be a
self-governing, contented, and prosperous State, and that the larger it
was the better it would serve that purpose. The Government, under these
misapprehensions, determined to resist the creation of a big Bulgaria,
even at the risk of war with Russia. They maintained that the treaty
of San Stefano was completely at variance with the treaty of Paris
of 1856, and must be revised by a new Congress of the great Powers of
Europe.
The Russian Government would not agree to submit the whole treaty to
a Congress, but only some parts of it. A collision between Russia
and England seemed to be imminent. War preparations were continued
by the latter, and Indian troops were sent to Malta. Lord Derby, the
Foreign Minister, and Lord Carnarvon, the Colonial Secretary, who were
opposed to war, resigned, and the war party in the Cabinet prevailed.
But the Czar was very averse to war, whatever might be the wishes of
his generals at the front before Constantinople. At the last moment
terms of reference to a Congress were agreed upon between the two
Governments, and war was averted. By an agreement which was intended
to be secret, but which was divulged to the Press in England by an
unscrupulous employé at the Foreign Office, the British Government
promised to support, at the Congress, the main clauses of the treaty
of San Stefano, subject to a concession, on the part of Russia, as to
Bulgaria. Under this agreement, the intended big Bulgaria was divided
into three parts. That between the Danube and the Balkan range was to
be dealt with as proposed in the San Stefano treaty. It was to be an
autonomous State under the suzerainty of the Sultan, with a prince
elected by its people. A second part of it, immediately south of the
Balkan range, to be called Eastern Roumelia, was to be an autonomous
province more directly under the control of the Porte. A third, the
part bordering on the Ægean Sea and containing a mixed population
of Bulgarians, Serbians, Greeks, and (in parts) Moslems, was to be
restored to the Porte subject to conditions for better administration
equally with other Turkish provinces in Europe. This part has since
been generally spoken of as Macedonia.
The Congress of the Powers met at Berlin on June 13, 1878, under the
presidency of Prince Bismarck. It was the most important gathering
of the kind since the Congress of Vienna in 1815. The Great Powers
were represented by their leading statesmen. England, by Lord
Beaconsfield and Lord Salisbury; Russia, by Prince Gortchakoff and
Count Schouvaloff; France, by its Prime Minister, Waddington; Italy,
by Count Corti, its Foreign Minister; Austria, by Count Andrassy.
The Porte, apparently, was unable to find a competent Turk for the
purpose. It was represented by Karatheodori, a Greek, and by Mehemet
Ali, a renegade German. Germany, it need not be said, was represented
by Bismarck, who acted as the ‘honest broker.’ Although apparently
invested with unlimited authority to deal with all questions arising
out of the treaty of San Stefano, the Congress found that its hands
were practically tied behind its back by the agreement between England
and Russia. It had no other option than to cut down the big Bulgaria
under the tripartite scheme already described, which was the essence
of the Anglo-Russian agreement. As regards the artificially created
province of Eastern Roumelia, Lord Beaconsfield, who throughout the
proceedings of the Congress championed the Turkish cause, insisted that
the Porte was to have the right to maintain garrisons in its frontier
fortresses. He threatened to break up the Congress if this was not
conceded. Russia, though strongly opposed to this, ultimately gave way.
This was a triumph for Beaconsfield, the value of which we can now
appreciate, with the knowledge that no advantage was ever taken by the
Porte of this permission to garrison Eastern Roumelia.
The most important point on which the Congress effected a change in
the treaty of San Stefano was in respect of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
At the instance of Bismarck, these two provinces, instead of being
endowed with autonomous government, were handed over to Austria for
occupation and administration, while remaining nominally a part of the
Turkish Empire. Montenegro was to lose half of the territory conceded
to it at San Stefano.[44] The claims of Greece for a definite extension
of its territory were championed by the representative of France, but
were opposed by Lord Beaconsfield. The Congress contented itself with
a recommendation to the Sultan that the boundaries of Greece should
be extended so as to include Thessaly and a part of Epirus. Organic
reforms of administration and law were to be carried out by the Porte
in the European provinces of the Empire on the recommendation of a
Commission to be appointed by the Great Powers.
The Congress confirmed to Russia the acquisition of the provinces
in Asia above referred to, and the restoration of Erzerum and
Bayezid to the Porte. The Armenians were guaranteed good government
and protection from the raids of Kurds and Circassians. Some other
amendments of the San Stefano treaty of no great importance were
decided upon, and on July 13, 1878, the treaty of Berlin was signed
by the representatives of all the Powers, after exactly a month of
discussion.
After his success at the Congress in respect of the Roumelian
garrisons, obtained by the threat of war, Beaconsfield was able to
return to England with a flourish of trumpets, boasting that he had
succeeded in obtaining ‘peace with honour.’ Though the treaty of
Berlin nullified that of San Stefano as regards the big Bulgaria, it
did, in fact, ratify the virtual dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire
in respect of four-fifths of its territory in Europe and freed about
eight millions of people from its rule. This great achievement was due
to Russia alone, and the gains to that Power in Bessarabia and Armenia
were in comparison small and unimportant. The splitting up of Bulgaria,
which constituted the main difference between the two treaties, was due
to British diplomacy, backed by threats of war. But the result obtained
did not stand the test of even a short experience. Two of the Bulgarian
provinces thus torn asunder were reunited seven years later. More
recently, the parts of Macedonia and Thrace restored to full Turkish
rule by the treaty of Berlin have, within the present century, again
been freed from it, and have been annexed to Serbia and Greece in about
equal portion.
It will be seen from this brief statement that by the treaty of Berlin
Great Britain obtained nothing for itself, unless it were that the
division of Bulgaria was of permanent value to it in strengthening the
hold of the Turks on Constantinople, a contention which has not been
confirmed by subsequent events. It did, however, succeed in getting
something out of the general scramble for territory. By another secret
treaty which, to the amazement of the members of the Congress at
Berlin, was made public during their sittings, the Porte agreed to hand
over to the occupation of England the island of Cyprus, on terms very
similar to those under which Bosnia and Herzegovina were placed under
the charge of Austria. The occupation of the island was limited to the
time during which Kars and Ardahan should be in possession of Russia.
As a condition of this occupation, Great Britain guaranteed to the
Porte its Asiatic possessions. But this guarantee was conditional on
good government being secured to the Armenian population in the east
of Asia Minor, a condition which has never, in fact, been fulfilled.
The treaty was justified in the British Parliament on the ground that
Cyprus would be of great value as a _place d’armes_ for the British
army in the event of attack by Russia on the Asiatic provinces of
Turkey or of an attack from any quarter on Egypt. The Porte was
guaranteed by the British Government an annual tribute so long as
the occupation should last, based on the average revenue which it
had received from the island. The proceeds were assigned for payment
of the interest on the loan raised by Turkey during the Crimean War,
guaranteed by England and France. The arrangement was made hastily
and without due inquiry, with the result that the island has been
burthened with a charge far in excess of its past payments to the
Porte, and the British taxpayers have been compelled to bear a part of
the burthen. An occupation such as that of Cyprus was almost certain to
become permanent, and in 1914, during the existing war, the island was
permanently annexed by the British Government.
Looking back at the events which led to the liberation of Bulgaria from
Ottoman rule and to all the other changes sanctioned by the treaty of
Berlin, it must now be fully admitted that the agitation which Mr.
Gladstone promoted against the Turkish Government had a great ultimate
effect. It averted the use of armed force by Great Britain for the
purpose of preventing the intervention of Russia on behalf of the
Christian population of the Balkans. In a great speech in the House
of Commons in review of the treaty of Berlin, Mr. Gladstone delivered
himself of this verdict on it:—
Taking the whole provisions of the treaty of Berlin together, I
must thankfully and joyfully acknowledge that great results have
been achieved in the diminution of human misery and towards the
establishment of human happiness and prosperity in the East.
As regards the conduct of England at the Congress he added these
weighty words:—
I say, Sir, that in this Congress of the Great Powers the voice of
England has not been heard in unison with the constitution, the
history, and the character of England. On every question that arose,
and that became a subject of serious contest in the Congress, or
that could lead to any practical results, a voice has been heard
from Lord Beaconsfield and Lord Salisbury which sounded in the tones
of Metternich, and not in the tones of Mr. Canning, or of Lord
Palmerston, or of Lord Russell.... I do affirm that it was their part
to take the side of liberty, and I do also affirm that, as a matter
of fact, they took the side of servitude.[45]
Lord Salisbury himself lived to make the admission that England in its
Eastern policy “put its money on the wrong horse.”
The three years which followed the treaty of Berlin were spent by
the Great Powers in the endeavour to give effect to its provisions,
by settling the boundaries between Turkey and its _disjecta membra_,
and other important details. Two of these questions led to great
difficulty. The Porte, as was to be expected, put every obstruction in
the way and resorted to its accustomed dilatory methods. By the treaty
Montenegro had been guaranteed a port in the Adriatic. It was not till
1880, after the return of Mr. Gladstone to power in England, that
effective pressure was put on the Porte. He induced the other Powers to
join in sending a combined fleet to the Adriatic to blockade its coast
as a demonstration against the Porte. This, however, was not effective
for the purpose. It mattered little to the Porte that its coast in
the Adriatic was blockaded. It was not till the British Government
threatened to send its fleet to Asia Minor, and by seizing some custom
houses there to cut off supplies of money, that the Sultan was brought
to book. Eventually the port of Dulcigno and the district round it
were ceded to Montenegro and its claim for access to the Adriatic was
conceded.
The case of Greece caused even greater difficulty. The treaty of
Berlin, it has been shown, contained no specific promise or guarantee
of a cession of territory to Greece. It merely made a recommendation
to that effect, leaving it to the discretion of the Porte whether
to accede to it or not. As Greece had taken no part in the war of
liberation of the Balkans, it had no special claim, except such as
arose from a wish of the Powers to avoid complications in the future.
It was admitted, however, by the Porte that something should be done
in the way of rectifying its frontier in this direction. Another
conference of the Powers at Berlin reported in favour of drawing the
frontier line so as to include in the kingdom of Greece the whole of
both Thessaly and Epirus. This was gladly assented to by Greece, but
was rejected by the Sultan. The Powers, however, were not willing to
back up their proposals by armed force. The French Government, which
had supported the claim of Greece at the Congress, now drew back.
Eventually, after two years of diplomatic labour, a compromise was
arrived at, mainly at the instance of the British Ambassador to the
Porte, Mr. Goschen, who showed infinite skill and patience in dealing
with the Sultan. A line of frontier was agreed to, which conceded to
Greece the whole of Thessaly and about a third part of Epirus. This
line excluded Janina and other districts inhabited by Moslem Albanians,
and also other districts where Greeks predominated, but under the
circumstances it was the most which could be effected without a
resort to arms. Greece had to wait some years before a more complete
settlement could be secured to her.
As regards the organic local reforms in administration and law which,
under the treaty of Berlin, were to be carried out in the European
provinces of the Empire, a Commission was appointed by the Great Powers
in 1880. The British representative was Lord Edmund Fitzmaurice, later
Lord Fitzmaurice. He took the leading part in drawing up a large and
complete scheme of reform, which was agreed to by the Commission and
was presented to the Sultan for his approval in accordance with the
treaty.
There followed, after these proceedings, a period of twenty-eight
years, up to 1908, during which Turkey, under the rule of Abdul Hamid,
was free from external war, and opportunity was therefore afforded
for giving effect to the promises by the Porte, guaranteed by the
treaty of Berlin, of reforms and improved administration in Macedonia
and other Balkan provinces left in its possession, and also in Crete
and Armenia. Except as regards Crete, not a single step, however, was
ever taken by the Porte to give effect to these promises. The scheme
of organic reform was never approved by the Sultan. It was treated as
waste-paper, like every other promise of reform in Turkey. Disorder and
misgovernment continued unabated.
Several events soon took place which showed that the disintegration
of the Ottoman Empire was still slowly but surely proceeding. The
most important of these was in relation to Bulgaria. The reduced and
mutilated province under that name, as settled by the treaty of Berlin,
chose as its ruler, with the consent of the Powers, Prince Alexander
of Battenberg, a young man of great merit and promise. Eastern
Roumelia, cut off from Bulgaria, was also constituted as a separate
province, more immediately dependent on the Porte, but with autonomous
government, under a Christian governor nominated by the Sultan. But
this ingenious scheme of Lord Beaconsfield did not work in practice.
Economic difficulties, arising from separate tariffs, equally with
national aspirations, necessitated union. The representative chambers
of both provinces were incessant in their demands for this.
The union of the two States was now opposed by Russia. But, strange
to say, it was supported by Great Britain, at the instance of
Lord Salisbury, who had been associated with Lord Beaconsfield at
the Congress of Berlin in insisting on the severance of the two
provinces. He had since been persuaded by the British Ambassador at
Constantinople, Sir William White, a far-seeing statesman who had
intimate knowledge of the Balkans, that a united and strong Bulgaria
would, in the future, be a bar to the ambitions of Russia against what
remained of Turkey.
Fortunately for the Bulgarians, the Sultan arrived at the same
conclusion. When, therefore, in 1885, the two provinces insisted
on union, and a Bulgarian army occupied Eastern Roumelia, with the
full assent of its population, who deported the Turkish governor to
Constantinople, the Sultan made no real opposition. He was persuaded
to accept the union as a _fait accompli_. The diplomatic difficulty
arising out of the treaty of Berlin was evaded by the Sultan in 1886
nominating the Prince of Bulgaria as governor of Roumelia. Thenceforth
the representative chambers of the two States met as one body at Sofia,
and the union was practically effected. This caused great discontent in
Serbia, which was jealous of the aggrandizement of its neighbour and
demanded territorial compensation. War consequently broke out between
Serbia and Bulgaria. After a three days’ battle at Slivnitza, the
Bulgarians, contrary to all expectations, were completely successful,
under the able generalship of Prince Alexander. Belgrade lay open to
the victorious army. But the Great Powers then again intervened and
insisted on terms of peace between the belligerents, based upon the
_status quo_ before the war. The Emperor of Russia deeply resented the
action of his relative, Prince Alexander. The Prince was kidnapped and
was forcibly conveyed out of the country and compelled to abdicate.
There ensued a strong movement in his favour in Bulgaria. He was
recalled from exile. But at this critical moment of his career the
Prince appears to have lost his nerve, and instead of standing firm and
relying on the support of the people, for whom he had done so much, he
gave way to the demands of the Czar, and retired into obscurity as a
cavalry officer in the Austrian army. In his place Prince Ferdinand of
Saxe-Coburg was elected as ruler of the united province, subject to the
nominal suzerainty of the Sultan.
Another cause of frequent international difficulty during the reign of
Abdul Hamid was that of the island of Crete. The Powers at Berlin had
refused to include it in the kingdom of Greece or even to recommend
this course to the Porte. They contented themselves with a provision
in the treaty guaranteeing to the island a reformed administration
under a Christian governor. In compliance with this, Photiades Pasha,
a Greek subject of the Porte of administrative capacity, was appointed
governor, and a representative chamber was constituted. For a few years
the island enjoyed peace and prosperity. But later, on the retirement
of Photiades, the Sultan endeavoured to restore his authority in the
island by appointing a Moslem governor and suspending the national
assembly. Insurrection followed in 1896. The Greeks of the island, who
formed by far the greater number of its inhabitants, were supported by
the Government and people of Greece. War broke out in 1897 between the
Porte and Greece. It was the first occasion on which the Turkish army,
which had been trained by German officers, under command of General von
der Goltz, was able to show its quality. In thirty days it completely
defeated the Greek army and occupied Thessaly and Epirus. The Powers
thereupon intervened and prevented the Porte from taking advantage of
its success. Peace was again insisted upon between the belligerents.
Greece was compelled to submit to a small rectification of its
frontier and to pay the cost of the war, estimated at four millions
sterling.
The Turks thereupon evacuated Thessaly, and with them departed the last
of the Moslem beys or landowners. Though Greece had at the time a navy
superior in strength to that of the Porte, it effected nothing in the
war by sea. Turkish troops had been able to invade Crete, and were in
practical occupation of it. The four Powers, not including Germany,
whose Kaiser was already coquetting with the Sultan, with a view to a
future military alliance, then blockaded the island, occupied ports
on its coast, and ultimately compelled the Turkish troops to evacuate
it. In 1898 Prince George of Greece, a son of the King of Greece, was
appointed governor of the island at the suggestion of the Powers, and
the native assembly was recalled into existence. This arrangement was
obviously of a temporary nature. It lasted with growing friction till
the revolution in Turkey in 1908. When Austria annexed Bosnia and
Herzegovina, the Cretan Assembly proclaimed annexation to Greece, and
thenceforth the union of the island to the present kingdom was complete
and was fully recognized by the Powers.
The Great Powers were less successful in securing performance of the
promises of the Sultan under the treaty of Berlin in the case of
the Armenians. The Porte had undertaken by the treaty to carry out,
without delay, “the amelioration and reforms demanded for provinces
inhabited by Armenians and to guarantee their security against Kurds
and Circassians.” Periodic reports showing what reforms were effected
were to be laid before the Powers, who were also to superintend their
application. These provisions were the more important as they were
practically the conditions on which the provinces of Erzerum and
Bayezid, which had been occupied by the Russians in their invasion of
the Asiatic provinces of Turkey in 1877, were restored to the Porte.
It may be taken that, if the Powers had conceived it possible that
these promises would not be carried out, they would not have been
so cruel as to restore these two provinces, inhabited so largely by
Armenians, to Turkish rule. Lord Salisbury in 1888 did, in fact, use
strong language to the Porte on the subject of Armenia, and threatened
armed force if reforms were not carried out. In spite of this threat,
no reforms were effected. Mr. Gladstone, when he came into power again
in 1892, endeavoured to bring pressure on the Porte in favour of the
Armenians, but he met with no support from other Powers. Bismarck at
last intimated to him that the subject had better be allowed to drop.
Russia, it seems, was at that time engaged in the effort to induce the
Armenians inhabiting the districts round Kars, which had been ceded to
it under the treaty of Berlin, to give up their national Church and to
join the Greek Church. It was little disposed to give support to the
Armenians who remained subjects of the Porte.
As a result, the Armenians obtained no valid protection, and the Kurds
and Circassians continued their raids against these peaceful people.
Later, suspicion of Armenian insurrection arose in the mind of Sultan
Abdul Hamid. There were a few isolated cases in which insignificant
numbers of Armenians, prompted by their compatriots across the frontier
in Russia, formed conspiracies against the Turkish Government. But
these feeble sparks were extinguished by the Turkish officials on the
spot without difficulty. They were made the excuse, however, by the
Sultan for a new policy of massacre directed against these unfortunate
people. Massacres on a small scale began in 1889.
In 1890, when the writer was at Constantinople, he was favoured with
an interview by the Sultan, who spoke on the subject of the Armenians,
and sent a message to Mr. Gladstone, conveying his most positive
assurances that he was animated by none but the most friendly feelings
towards these people, and that he was determined to secure to them
good government. Such assurances from this quarter were but proofs
of malevolent intentions. Certain it is that the tale of official
massacres was thenceforth for some years a continuous one. Abdul Hamid
appears to have deliberately made up his mind, if not to settle the
Armenian question by extermination of the Armenians, once for all, at
least to inflict such a lesson on them as would never be forgotten.
This policy culminated in 1894. Commissioners were then sent into the
country inhabited by Armenians with directions to summon the Moslems of
the district to the mosques and to inform them of the Sultan’s wishes
and plans. They were to be told that liberty was given to them to take
by force the goods of their Armenian neighbours, and if there was any
resistance to kill them. It was not an appeal to the fanaticism of the
Moslems, but rather to their greed for loot and to their jealousy of
their more prosperous neighbours.
At the same time every precaution was taken to prevent the news of
these wholesale acts of rapine and massacre from being known to the
outside world. No strangers or visitors were allowed to enter the
country where these scenes were taking place, and the most rigorous
censorship was applied to all letters coming from them. Save in a
few rare cases where the mollahs refused to obey, in the belief that
the Koran did not justify such acts, the instructions were acted on
and the policy of murder and robbery was preached in the mosques. In
the province of Bitlis twenty-four Armenian villages were destroyed
by Zeki Pasha. Their inhabitants were butchered. Zeki was decorated
by the Sultan for this infamy. In 1895, and again in 1896, wholesale
massacres of Armenians took place, organized by Sultan Abdul Hamid,
and effected through the agency of Shakir Pasha and other officials,
civil and military. It was estimated that a hundred thousand Armenians
were victims of these massacres, either directly or indirectly by
starvation and disease which followed them. Constantinople itself, on
August 22 and 28, 1896, was the scene of an organized attack on the
Armenian quarter. It was invaded by gangs of men armed with clubs,
who bludgeoned every Armenian to be found there. In vain did the
ambassadors protest and appeal to the treaty of Berlin. In vain did
Mr. Gladstone issue, for the last time, from his retirement and appeal
to public opinion on behalf of these people, designating the Sultan as
Abdul the Great Assassin. No Power was willing to use force or even to
threaten force on behalf of the Armenians. Even Russia was disinclined
to do so. These people had no wish to be absorbed by Russia. An
Armenian of good position and wide acquaintance with his countrymen in
Asia Minor, when questioned by the writer on this point in 1890, said
that the Armenians had no desire to become subjects of Russia. They
would prefer to remain under the Turks, if England would hold a big
stick over the Sultan; but if England would not do this, they would
prefer Russia, or the devil himself, to the Turk.
It need not be said that those massacres of 1890-5 have been completely
put into the shade by the far more extensive and bloody massacres
of 1915, and that the policy of deporting the whole population of
Armenians has been carried to a terrible conclusion.
There remains the case of the Macedonians and other people of the
Balkans who were replaced by the treaty of Berlin under Ottoman rule.
The difficulty of dealing with them was aggravated by the fact that the
population of these districts was not homogeneous. Bulgarians, Greeks,
and Serbians were in many districts mixed up, each with separate
villages or communities, so that no definite geographical lines could
be drawn between them. The neighbouring States of Bulgaria, Serbia,
and Greece were furiously jealous of one another, each claiming these
intervening districts. This, however, was no excuse to the Porte for
the continued misgovernment of these provinces. Their unfortunate
populations, while enduring the evils of misrule, were able to compare
their position under Turkish rule with that of their more fortunate
neighbours who had been liberated from it by the treaty of Berlin, and
were enjoying all the benefits of self-government in Bulgaria, Serbia,
and Greece.
The writer had the opportunity of personally forming an opinion on
this subject. In 1887 and 1890 he paid visits to Greece, and in 1890
he visited Bulgaria on his way to Constantinople, staying a few days
at Sofia and Philippopolis. In both cases he was able to compare the
new condition of things with what he recollected of his previous
visits to these districts in 1857. Nothing could be more striking and
more satisfactory to those who had felt confidence in the principle
of self-government and of democratic institutions. The change in
Bulgaria was the more remarkable as it had been effected in the twelve
years which had elapsed since the treaty of Berlin. In these few
years the Bulgarians had equipped themselves with the machinery of a
progressive democratic community, with schools and colleges, and with
compulsory education. Roads, harbours, and improvements of all kinds
were in course of construction. The Tartars and Circassians who had
been planted in Bulgaria by the Porte after the conquests by Russia
of the Crimea and the Caucasus, and who were the main instruments of
the horrors of Batak, had again been transplanted by the Porte in Asia
Minor. But the indigenous Moslems, whether of Slav or Turkish race, in
spite of vehement exhortations of their mollahs, remained and were
well treated by the Christian population now in possession of power.
They had no cause for complaint. They were represented in the National
Assembly of Bulgaria by not a few men of their own religion.
The Bulgarian peasants, who, under Turkish rule, had in many parts been
driven from the fertile plains into the Rhodope Mountains and had there
formed congested districts, had migrated again into the plains and were
extending cultivation. A member of the Bulgarian Chamber of Deputies,
when asked by the writer what his constituency of peasants thought of
the change since old Turkish times, replied that they all admitted that
though taxation had not been reduced there was this great difference:
Under the Turkish régime the taxes went into the pockets of the Turkish
officials and of the Sultan’s gang of robbers at Constantinople, and
the peasants who paid got no return for them. But under the new régime
they had full return for their money in schools and roads, with other
improvements, and in the protection of life and property. Brigandage,
which used to be rampant, had wholly ceased, and justice could be
obtained from the magistrates without bribes.
In Greece there was everywhere the same story, the same comparison of
the present with the past, to the immense advantage of the existing
state of things. Brigandage had entirely ceased. Athens had become a
capital worthy of the nation—remarkable for the number and character of
its public buildings and institutions, for its museums, colleges, and
schools, founded for the most part by wealthy Greeks in all parts of
the world.
There remains to consider what had been the relative and
contemporaneous changes in the Balkan provinces still remaining under
Turkish rule and in the (mainly Moslem) countries of Asia Minor, Syria,
and Mesopotamia. To inquiries of the writer in all quarters, in 1890,
there was but one answer, that since the treaty of Berlin the condition
both of Christians and Moslems throughout the Turkish Empire had gone
from bad to worse. In the Christian Balkan provinces still under
Turkish rule misgovernment was more rampant. Brigandage had increased.
The rapacity and exactions of the Turkish officials were worse than
ever. Discontent was seething in all directions—the more so when the
populations compared their fate with that of their more fortunate
neighbours across the frontiers who had been liberated by the armies
of Russia and by the treaty of Berlin. Nor were the reports as to the
condition of the Moslem subjects of the Porte in any way better. The
exactions of Turkish officials had increased on people of all races
and religion. The concurrent testimony from all quarters was that the
condition of the Moslem peasants had greatly deteriorated.
The writer, on his return from the East in 1890, in the following
paragraph described the danger to Turkey resulting from this state of
things:—
The danger to Turkey in its Eastern provinces of Asia Minor and in
its European provinces in Macedonia and Epirus is the comparison
between the condition of those who were freed in 1878 from the
Sultan’s rule, and who have become self-governing, as in the case
of the Bulgarians, or have gone under the rule of Austria, Russia,
or Greece, with those who remain the subjects of Turkish rule.
When, on one side of mere geographical lines, without any physical
difference, the populations are flourishing and improvements of
all kinds in roads, railways, harbours, schools, etc., are being
effected; when brigandage is at an end, and the cultivation of land
is extending; when justice is equally administered, and security
to life and property is afforded by the authorities; and when
all these improvements date from the time when they ceased to be
under Turkish rule; and when, on the other side of these lines,
the conditions are the same as formerly, or even worse, and no
improvement of any kind has taken place, the contrast must inevitably
lead to fresh aspirations of the peasantry, to renewed political
difficulties, to threats of intervention, and to further schemes for
disintegrating the Empire at no distant date. The real defects of
the Turkish Government appear to be the same as ever, not so much in
the laws themselves as the administration of them, or the want of
administration, the excessive centralization, the want of honest and
capable governors, the corruption which infects all official classes,
the want of money to supply the needs of the central Government and
the extravagance of the Sultan, the consequent excessive taxation,
the complete absence of security for life and property.[46]
For seventeen more years these evils continued unabated in the Ottoman
Empire under Abdul Hamid, while the condition of the liberated
provinces was continually improving and the contrast was becoming
every year more striking. Discontent and disaffection to the Turkish
Government, and contempt and hatred of the Sultan, the head of it,
increased not only among his Christian subjects, but equally among the
Moslems throughout the length and breadth of the Empire.
The provinces of the Empire which had attained virtual independence
under Moslem rulers, such as Egypt and Tunis, were little more
fortunate in their experience. They were infected with the same
radical defects and misgovernment as the suzerain Power. In Egypt the
enlightened despotism of Mehemet Ali had degenerated into the corrupt
administration of his grandson, Ismail Pasha. Egypt fell into the
hands of French and English moneylenders, and millions of borrowed
money were squandered by the Pasha with little or no benefit to his
country. Bankruptcy ensued to the State, and the bondholders persuaded
the French and English Governments to interfere on their behalf and to
insist on a financial control through their Consuls. Later, in 1881, a
popular movement arose in Egypt against this foreign control, and the
army, under Arabi Bey, revolted. France refused to join with England in
putting down the revolt and in maintaining the dual control. England
alone undertook the task. It sent an army to Egypt, defeated Arabi and
his native army, and restored the nominal rule of the Khedive. The
dual financial control of Great Britain and France was maintained. But
a virtual protectorate by the former was established, with the result
that it became eventually the master of Egypt.
In no case was the action of Abdul Hamid more fatuous and more
opposed to the real interests of his Empire than in dealing with this
Egyptian question. It was the policy of Great Britain, at the time we
are referring to, pursued by both political parties in the State, to
maintain as far as possible the authority of the Sultan in Egypt and
the integrity of the Turkish Empire. When, in 1881, Mr. Gladstone’s
Government proposed to send an army for the temporary occupation of
Egypt in order to put down the rebellion of the Egyptian army, it was
most anxious to do so with the consent and support of the Porte. It
invited Abdul Hamid to send troops there to act in concert with the
British army and in support of his own sovereign rights. The Sultan
refused to do so. He could not be brought to believe that, in the event
of his refusal, the British Government would act without him. But this
was precisely what it did. A British army was landed in Egypt and put
down the rebellion without any support from the Sultan. When it was too
late, Abdul Hamid discovered the supreme error of his policy.
Later again, between 1885 and 1887, when Lord Salisbury was Prime
Minister, he was most anxious to come to an arrangement with the Porte
for the ultimate withdrawal of the British army in occupation of Egypt.
He sent a special envoy (Sir H. Drummond Wolff) to Constantinople,
with the offer of a treaty to the Sultan, under which the British
army was to be wholly withdrawn from Egypt within seven years, but
with the condition that if, later, armed intervention should again
become necessary, British troops should be employed for the purpose
in preference to those of any other Power. This most friendly and
advantageous proposal was agreed to by all the ministers of the Porte
and was favoured at first by the Sultan, but, after long negotiation,
he refused to sign the treaty. Later, when he perceived the mistake
which he had made, he offered to reopen the negotiations, but met
with a rebuff from Lord Salisbury. The two incidents are important as
showing that Egypt became a dependency of Great Britain mainly through
the perversity, folly, and stupidity of Abdul Hamid.
In Tunis analogous agencies had been at work in favour of France. The
occupation of this province had been the subject of conversations
between the Powers at the Congress of Berlin. Prince Bismarck himself
suggested it to the representative of France, hoping perhaps that it
would be the cause of ill-feeling between that country and Italy, and
would widen the breach between them to the advantage of Germany. The
British delegates expressed themselves as not unfavourable to this
project. It followed that, between 1881 and 1883, the Government of
France forcibly assumed a protectorate over Tunis and a control of its
finance and administration, with the acquiescence, if not the full
approval, of the British Government. In the case of Tunis, however, its
connection with the Turkish Empire had been virtually severed three
centuries earlier.
Both in Egypt and Tunis, European control effected great improvements
in the condition of the native populations, especially the peasantry,
and afforded illustration to the people of Turkey of the grave defects
of their own Government and its corrupt administration. A party was
gradually formed in the first decade of the present century among
Moslems in Turkey in favour of constitutional reform. It was known as
the Party of Union and Progress. Its members were called the Young
Turks. It had its origin with Turks exiled abroad and chiefly living
in Paris, and thence it began to permeate Turkey and find influential
support in Constantinople. It obtained adherents in great numbers in
the Turkish army. It established a Committee at Salonika, where it
was in close touch with the officers of the Turkish army, which had
its headquarters there. By the year 1908 this movement had enormously
increased. Among its ablest members were many Jews and crypto-Jews of
Salonika.
There was universal discontent. The system of espionage which the
Sultan had set up, and which was his main engine of government, was
odious to people of every rank, high and low. The army shared in the
discontent. It was not till they were certain of the support of the
army that the Committee of Union and Progress attempted any overt act.
But when assured of this they boldly proceeded with their plans. On
July 23, 1908, at Salonika, Enver Bey, on behalf of the Committee,
proclaimed a revolution, and on the same day the 2nd and 3rd Army
Corps, stationed there, declared their intention of marching to
Constantinople and compelling the Sultan to reform the Constitution. It
was decided by the Committee that Abdul Hamid should not be deposed,
but that he should be allowed to remain on the throne, provided he
accepted the Constitution in good faith. The Committee had further
made certain of the support of the Albanian soldiers who formed the
bodyguard of the Sultan, and who had been looked upon by him as his
most reliable supporters. Abdul Hamid, when he found that the army was
against him and that he had no friends on whom he could rely, even
among his bodyguard, announced his willingness to concede the demands
of the revolutionary party. Never was a revolution effected with so
little bloodshed and with more complete success. The Sultan dismissed
his corrupt and hated ministers and appointed others, dictated to him
by the Committee. He agreed to summon again the Parliament which he
had dismissed in 1877. He issued a firman abolishing the system of
espionage. He publicly swore fidelity to the new Constitution. For
a time the people of Constantinople were willing to believe in his
sincerity. The Sheik ul Islam pronounced that there was nothing in
the demands of the people which was opposed to the laws of Islam. A
general election took place of members for a National Assembly under a
process of double election. Men of all races and religions were equally
admitted to the franchise.
There were everywhere great rejoicings over the new Constitution,
though very few people beyond Constantinople and Salonika had any
conception of what it meant. There was for a time great enthusiasm
for England, and the new ambassador, Sir Gerard Lowther, on arriving
at Constantinople to take up the post received a great ovation. On
December 10th the new Parliament met, and was opened by the Sultan
with a speech, in which he promised to safeguard the Constitution and
to protect the sacred rights of the nation. The various Christian and
other subject races were well represented in the Chamber of Deputies.
Its members showed an unexpected ability in the conduct of its
proceedings and in their speeches.
It was not long, however, before difficulties began to arise, and
reaction reared its head again at the secret instigation of the Sultan.
There was an outbreak in Albania against the Committee of Union and
Progress. The bodyguard of Albanians was won back to the support of
Abdul Hamid by profuse bribery. Disorder broke out in many parts of the
Empire. It was at Constantinople, however, that the gravest dangers
to the new order of things arose. The first act of the new Government
was to dismiss the host of spies, who had been maintained at a cost
of £1,200,000 a year. It was said at the time that if three persons
were seen talking together in the streets one of them was certain to
be a spy in the employment of the Sultan. These people found their
occupation gone. The new ministers also cleared the public departments
of a vast body of superfluous and useless employés, most of them
hangers-on of the palace. These two classes of people made a formidable
body of malcontents, who conceived that their fortunes depended on
the restoration to the Sultan of his old powers of corruption. They
were supported by a small body of fanatical mollahs, who believed, or
pretended to believe, that the new Constitution was in opposition to
the sacred law. But more important than these agencies of reaction were
the personal efforts made by Abdul Hamid to tamper with the fidelity
to the new Government of the troops at Constantinople by the profuse
distribution of money from his private stores. The new ministers had
also made the mistake of releasing from prison, not merely great
numbers of persons imprisoned at the will of the Sultan for political
reasons, but also all the prisoners convicted of serious crimes. These
formed an element of disorder in the city and caused alarm and distrust
among the well-disposed citizens.
On April 13, 1909, nine months after promulgation of the new
Constitution, a revolt broke out among the troops at Constantinople,
and a counter-revolution was proclaimed. It had no ostensible leader of
any repute or influence. Abdul Hamid avoided committing himself openly
to the movement. But for the moment, backed by elements of discontent,
it was successful. The new ministers, the members of the Committee of
Union and Progress, and the members of the new Assembly were compelled
to seek safety by flight. If Abdul Hamid had boldly come forward as the
champion of the reactionaries and fanatics, he might have crushed his
enemies and have restored the old régime. But he lacked the courage for
a desperate game. He contented himself with the secret supply of money
in support of the movement.
Meanwhile the Committee of Young Turks met at Salonika, and determined
to put down the counter-revolution by force. They called on Mahmoud
Shefket Pasha, in command of the 3rd Army Corps, to support them. He
said that he had sworn to maintain the Constitution, and agreed to
march his army to Constantinople. At San Stefano he met the members of
the Assembly and the ministers who had fled from the city. By the 24th
of April the army had overcome the feeble opposition of the rebellious
troops and were in occupation of the most important parts of the
capital. The counter-revolution was suppressed at a very small cost
of lives. The National Assembly met again, and the first question for
their decision was what should be done with Abdul Hamid. They put the
following question to the Sheik ul Islam:—
“What should be done with a Commander of the Faithful who has
suppressed books and important dispositions of the Sharia law; who
forbids the reading of, and burns, such books; who wastes public money
for improper purposes; who, without legal authority, kills, imprisons,
and tortures his subjects and commits tyrannical acts; who, after he
has bound himself by oath to amend, violates such oath and persists
in sowing discord so as to disturb the public peace, thus occasioning
bloodshed?
“From various provinces the news comes that the population has deposed
him; and it is known that to maintain him is manifestly dangerous and
his deposition is advantageous.
“Under these conditions, is it permissible for the actual governing
body to decide as seems best upon his abdication or deposition?”
The answer was the simple word ‘Yes.’
Never was a sovereign condemned by a more emphatic and laconic word.
Upon this the National Assembly unanimously decided on the deposition
of Abdul Hamid. They sent a deputation to the palace to inform him to
this effect. He appears to have taken the sentence of deportation very
quietly. “It is Kismet,” he said. “But will my life be spared?” He who
had been so merciless to others was chiefly concerned now in claiming
mercy for himself. He pleaded that he had not put to death his two
brothers, Murad and Réchad. The question was reserved for the National
Assembly.
Abdul Hamid found himself deserted and friendless. He was execrated by
his subjects and despised and distrusted by all his fellow sovereigns
in Europe, unless it were the German Emperor, who, of late years, had
given a support to him in all his misdeeds at home and abroad. In his
hour of peril the Emperor gave him no support, but the reverse. When
he found how the wind was blowing, William II commenced an intrigue
with the Committee of Union and Progress through Enver Bey, who had
received a military training in Germany and was personally known to
him. It is said that the Emperor insisted as a condition of recognition
of the new order that the life of Abdul Hamid should be spared. There
was another reason for doing so—namely the hope of the Young Turks
to squeeze his hidden wealth from the deposed Sultan. However that
may be, Abdul Hamid’s life was spared. He was deported with a few
of the more favoured members of his harem to Salonika, where he was
detained as a virtual prisoner, but not otherwise maltreated. After
his departure money and diamonds to the value of over a million pounds
sterling were found in his palace, a small part only of his ill-gotten
wealth. Two millions sterling were deposited with German banks and
very large sums were in the hands of the Emperor William. Thus ended a
reign of thirty-three years, more disastrous in its immediate losses
of territory and in the certainty of others to follow, and more
conspicuous for the deterioration of the condition of his subjects,
than that of any other of his twenty-three degenerate predecessors
since the death of Solyman the Magnificent.
XXII
THE YOUNG TURKS
1909-14
MEHMET RÉCHAD was proclaimed Sultan in place of his brother, under the
title of Mahomet V, at the age of sixty-four. He had spent the whole
period of his manhood as a virtual prisoner, the last thirty-four years
of it under the close surveillance of his brother. He was never allowed
to have friends or even to read newspapers. His servants were in the
pay of Abdul Hamid and acted as spies on him. He devoted his life to
his harem. It was not surprising that he lost what little intellect he
was originally endowed with. A diplomatist who had many opportunities
of seeing him since his elevation to the throne thus describes him:—
The very appearance of Mahomet V suggests nonentity. Small and
bent, with sunken eyes and deeply lined face, an obesity savouring
of disease, and a yellow, oily complexion, it certainly is not
prepossessing. There is little or no intelligence in his countenance,
and he never lost a haunted, frightened look, as if dreading to find
an assassin lurking in some dark corner ready to strike and kill
him.... Abdul Hamid hated and despised him, but was afraid to have
him killed—perhaps through fear that a stronger man might take his
place.[47]
The new Sultan had not been a party to the conspiracy which dethroned
his brother. No one in his senses would have entrusted him with so
important a secret. It was said of him that he simulated the mannerisms
of an idiot in order to allay suspicion in the mind of Abdul Hamid that
he took any interest in politics. He lived in constant fear of being
put to death. A portrait of this degenerate would explain better than
words, if it were not too cruel, the depth to which the once proud
race of Othman has fallen. It was probable, however, that the cunning
men who engineered the revolution thought it would better serve their
purpose to have a cipher as the figure-head of the Empire than a man
with a will of his own.
After the defeat of the reactionaries and the deposition of Abdul
Hamid, in 1909, the Young Turks had another spell of power,
during which they had the opportunity of effecting reforms in the
administration of the Empire. They made a bad use of it. It soon became
evident that there were two sections in the Committee in violent
antagonism to one another. That which succeeded in getting the upper
hand was chauvinistic, vehemently national in its objects and methods,
aiming at the enforcement of unity throughout the Empire by Turkifying
everything, without regard to local customs or to difference of race.
They endeavoured to impose the Turkish language on the many subject
races who spoke only their own language. They forbade the teaching in
schools of the Albanian language in Albania, and of Arabic, the sacred
language of Islam, in Arabia. They introduced compulsory service for
the army, and forced the Christians of the Balkan provinces to serve in
its ranks, with the result that thousands of young Bulgarians, Greeks,
and Serbians, inhabitants of Macedonia, fled the country and sought
refuge in the neighbouring States. The Young Turks availed themselves
of the opportunity which this afforded them of strengthening the Moslem
population of Macedonia by inviting thousands of the lowest class of
Moslem Bosnians to migrate there. These men were the cause of grave
disturbance and disorder. No provision was made for their employment.
Committees of Young Turks were formed there, who incited the Turkish
local authorities to deeds of arbitrary tyranny rivalling, if not
excelling, the infamies of Abdul Hamid’s rule. The autocracy of that
tyrant was broken at Constantinople and his system of espionage, which
had caused such indignation, was suppressed, but hundreds of local
Abdul Hamids came into existence in the provinces.
The central Government at the capital followed the method of the late
Sultan in minute interference with every detail of administration.
There can be no doubt that the condition of the Christian provinces
of the Empire became worse than ever. Meanwhile the enthusiasm for
England and for the principles of the British Constitution cooled
down at Constantinople. Whatever may have been the cause, the fact was
certain that British influence at the Porte fell to a vanishing point,
while that of Germany rapidly rose. The military alliance which has
been so valuable to Germany in the existing great war was then formed.
The period was also marked by repeated changes of the Grand Vizier,
according as one or other section of the Young Turks got the upper hand.
It was not long before the process of dismemberment of the Empire was
renewed and the wolves were gathered round it to share in the spoil.
The Young Turks were less successful in resisting them than Abdul
Hamid, who, at least, had kept them at bay by his cunning and shifty
diplomacy during the many years which had elapsed since the Congress
of Berlin, though it may well be said of him that the pent-up evils
of his long misgovernment were in great part responsible for the
dismemberments which followed in the régime of the Young Turks.
Very soon after the revolution of 1908, on October 7th, before there
was experience of the new Constitution, the Austro-Hungarian Government
took advantage of the crisis and proclaimed the annexation of Bosnia
and Herzegovina, in defiance of the treaty obligations imposed by the
Great Powers at Berlin. There was no attempt to justify this. The
annexations made little or no difference to the people of the two
provinces. They were already, for all practical purposes, under the
rule of Austria-Hungary. The main difference was that the Bosnian
soldiers discarded the fez which they wore as the symbol of Ottoman
suzerainty. The annexation, however, caused great indignation among
the Turks, who regarded it as an insult to their Empire. It was also
the cause of ill-feeling in Russia, and did something to bring about
the great war of 1914. The Austrian Government gave up its occupation
of the Sandjak of Novi-Bazar and agreed to take over a share of the
Ottoman debt, to the amount of about four millions sterling. As these
concessions were accepted, the Porte must be held to have condoned the
offence. Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria very soon followed the example of
the Austro-Hungarian Government. He proclaimed himself an independent
sovereign. This also made very little practical difference to his
subjects. On October 12th the Cretan Assembly proclaimed the union of
the island with Greece.
The next blow to the Ottoman Empire came from a very unexpected
quarter, from Italy, which made a sudden and unprovoked attack on
Tripoli. This province in Africa had never been autonomous. It was
an integral part of the Ottoman Empire, governed directly from
Constantinople. Its population was purely Moslem—Turks and Moors
in the city of Tripoli and other places on the coast, and with
semi-independent Arabs in the hinterland. There was no demand on the
part of these natives for a change of government. Italy had no valid
cause of complaint on behalf of its few subjects who resided in the
province, though it trumped up something of the kind. It was a case of
pure aggression, prompted by jealousy of France in respect of Tunis, to
which, geographically and economically, Italy had a stronger claim. It
may be confidently assumed that the French Republic gave its consent to
the seizure of Tripoli by Italy, and that Great Britain acquiesced in
it, if it did not formally approve.
Up to the end of 1910, the Italian Government had constantly professed
the desire to maintain the integrity of the Turkish Empire. When
rumours arose of an intention to grab Tripoli, its Foreign Minister,
so late as December 2, 1910, emphatically denied them in the Italian
Chamber. “We desire,” he said, “the integrity of the Ottoman Empire and
we wish Tripoli always to remain Turkish.” Nothing had since occurred
to disturb the relations between the two countries. But in September
1911 the Italian Government sprang a mine on the Porte by declaring
its intention to occupy Tripoli. On October 26th it notified to the
Powers of Europe its intention to annex that province. It sent an army
of fifty thousand men for the purpose. Its fleet bombarded the Turkish
town of Prevesa, in the Adriatic, and drove the Turkish fleet to seek
refuge within the Dardanelles. It took possession of several of the
islands in the Ægean Sea.
The Porte was caught at a disadvantage. Abdul Hamid had for many years
completely neglected his navy. He owed it a grudge for having taken
part in the deposition of his predecessor. He feared that its guns
might be trained on his palace. He had allowed the Minister of Marine,
the most corrupt and greedy of all his Pashas, to appropriate to his
own use the money allotted by the budget for the repair of warships.
For many years the battleships never left the Golden Horn. But for this
the Ottoman navy, which in the time of Abdul Aziz had been the third
most powerful in Europe, might have made the landing of an Italian army
in Africa impossible. The garrison in Tripoli, which Abdul Hamid had
always maintained in strength, had been greatly reduced by the Young
Turks. The reinforcement of it after the declaration of war, when Italy
had command of the sea, was a very difficult task, the more so as the
British Government proclaimed the neutrality of Egypt, though it was
still tributary to the Porte, and forbade the passage of Turkish troops
into Tripoli.
In spite of these obstacles, the Porte made a gallant fight for its
African province, with the aid of the Arabs of the hinterland. Both
Turkish and Italian armies committed the most horrible atrocities in
this war, and there was little to choose between them in this respect.
The war lasted till October, 1912, and was only brought to an end when
the Porte found itself confronted by danger from a quarter much nearer
home.
There can be little doubt that the war with Italy, the consequent
engagement of a large Turkish army in defence of Tripoli, and the
blockade of Turkish ports by the Italian navy, making it difficult for
the Porte to transfer its troops from Asia direct to the Balkan States,
precipitated the intervention of Greece, Bulgaria, and Serbia on behalf
of the Christian inhabitants of the remaining provinces of the Porte in
Europe, which were now on the eve of revolt.
The condition of these Christian provinces had in no way improved under
the régime of the Young Turks, but very much the reverse. The governors
and other Ottoman officials were as corrupt, rapacious, and arbitrary
as they had ever been. There was no security for life or property. The
Turkish soldiers plundered the villages of Christians which they were
sent to protect. Bands of brigands, sometimes wearing the uniforms of
Greek, sometimes of Bulgarian soldiers, devastated the country. No
attempt was made by the Young Turks to put in force any part of the
reforms which had been proposed by the Commission appointed by the
Great Powers after the Congress of Berlin.
Lord Fitzmaurice’s scheme remained as much a dead letter as it had been
for over thirty years under Abdul Hamid. The Young Turks had added new
difficulties and more causes of complaint by their attempts to Turkify
everything, and by their extension of conscription to the Christian
population. The physical situation of Macedonia made it impossible
that its people would willingly submit to this continued misgovernment
and tyranny. Their immediate neighbours were Bulgarians, Serbians, and
Greeks, of kindred race, all of whom, with the assistance of Russia
and other European Powers, had obtained freedom from Turkish rule.
The peoples of Greece, Bulgaria, and Serbia sympathized with their
compatriots who were still under the detested yoke.
If ever intervention by neighbouring States was justified for the
purpose of restoring order and securing good government in accordance
with treaty obligations, this was a case for it. The crisis was
precipitated by massacres of Bulgarians at Kotchana, in Macedonia, and
of Serbians on the borders of Montenegro.
Early in 1912 negotiations for armed intervention in Macedonia took
place between the Governments of Greece, Bulgaria, and Serbia, at
the instance mainly of the able and patriotic Premier of Greece, M.
Venezelos. For the first and only time in their history a combination
was effected between these three States against the Turkish Empire.
It will be seen that, though it was most effective for its immediate
purpose of defeating the Turks and expelling them from nearly the whole
of their European possessions, it broke down, with most unfortunate
results, almost immediately after this great success.
On March 18, 1912, a treaty was signed between Bulgaria and Serbia
for mutual military aid to one another in war with Turkey. A secret
clause provided that in the event of any portion of Macedonia being
conquered the parts respectively nearest to the two States should be
annexed to them, and that the intervening territory should be divided
between them by the arbitration of Russia. This clearly showed that the
intervention aimed at territorial conquest. Two months later another
treaty was signed between Greece and Bulgaria, binding the two States
to aid one another if attacked by Turkey, or in the event of systematic
violation of rights by that Power. Nothing was said in this as to the
division of spoil after the war. Montenegro later came into the chain
of alliances, and, in fact, was always eager for war with Turkey.
When it became known to the Great Powers that these alliances were
formed, and that war was imminent, they made every effort to allay
the storm and to maintain peace. A strong protest was addressed, on
September 25th, by Russia and Austria on behalf of all the Powers.
They endeavoured to resuscitate the treaty of Berlin, which had so
signally failed, to secure order and good government in the remaining
Christian provinces of Turkey. They undertook, by virtue of the
twenty-third article of that treaty, to insist on the realization of
the promised reforms in the administration of these provinces, but
with the reservation, which made the promise futile in the eyes of
all concerned, that the reforms should not in any way diminish the
sovereignty of the Sultan or impair the integrity of the Ottoman Empire.
The allied Balkan States, in a very dignified despatch of October 15th,
declined to act on the advice of the Powers.
The Governments of the Balkan States [they said] consider that after
so many promises of reform have been so often and so solemnly given
by Turkey, it would be cruel not to endeavour to obtain in favour
of the Christian population of the Ottoman Empire reforms of a more
radical and definite nature which would really ameliorate their
miserable condition if applied sincerely and in their integrity.
They enclosed a copy of an ultimatum which, on the same day, they
addressed to the Porte, insisting on the carrying out of a series of
reforms specially detailed.
If [they said] the Porte desires to accept these proposals, order and
tranquillity will be reinstated in the provinces of the Empire, and a
desirable peace will be assured between Turkey and the Balkan States,
which have hitherto suffered from the arbitrary and provocative
measures adopted by the Porte to them.
Among the list of reforms insisted on was the ceding and confirmation
of the ethnical autonomy of provinces of the Empire, with all its
consequences. The ultimatum was presented to the Porte, which treated
it as a declaration of war. Its first and most important act was to
come to terms with Italy in order to free its hands for the more
important war at its very portals. A treaty of peace was signed on
October 15th, by which the Porte agreed to withdraw its troops from
Tripoli, and thus virtually recognized the acquisition of that province
by Italy. Italy, on the other hand, agreed to withdraw from the islands
of the Ægean Sea which it had occupied—a promise which, in fact, it did
not perform.
Meanwhile hostilities had already commenced in the Balkans. Montenegro
declared war on October 8th. The three other States followed suit on
October 18th, and each of them sent its army on the same day, or nearly
so, across its frontiers to invade Turkey. Beyond the desire for the
better government of the Christian provinces of Turkey, there were
doubtless _arrières pensées_ on the part of all the allied States.
Greece coveted Crete and other islands in the Ægean Sea, and hoped to
extend its frontiers on the mainland. Bulgaria yearned for the big
Bulgaria as defined by the treaty of San Stefano. Serbia had ambitions
for a revival of its wide boundaries under Stephen Dushan, and aimed
at access both to the Ægean Sea and the Adriatic. Montenegro wished
for a part of Albania and for extensions in the Adriatic. Each State
had large populations of a kindred race beyond its frontier suffering
from cruel misgovernment and tyranny and crying for help. But it seems
improbable that they could have expected to realize their full hopes,
or to achieve such a _dénouement_ as actually occurred.
The allies between them had seven hundred thousand men under arms.
Turkey had no more than four hundred thousand in Europe. It had,
however, great reserves in Asia, and its aggregate force largely
exceeded that of the allies. It was to be expected that the Turkish
armies in Europe would make a good fight, and would at least afford
time for these reserves to come up.
The Greek army, under the command of the Crown Prince Constantine (the
present King of Greece), who had received a military education in
Germany, crossed the northern frontier and, in four days, on October
22nd, encountered a Turkish army, under Hassan Pasha, at Sarandoporus.
The Turks held a very strong position and were little inferior in
numbers. In spite of this, they were worsted, and were compelled to
retreat in the following night. The next day the Greeks renewed
their attack. The unfortunate Turks, disheartened by their defeat at
Sarandoporus and wearied by the long night march, were caught unawares
in a ravine which offered no possibility of defence. Terror-stricken
and demoralized, they fled before their foe. They left behind them the
whole of their artillery and transport.
The retreating Turks, despite their panic, found time to wreak their
vengeance on the unfortunate Christian inhabitants on their route and
mercilessly butchered them. What remained of their army retired on
Veria, where it was reinforced by fourteen fresh battalions. On the
28th the Greek army resumed its march. In front of Veria it again came
in contact with the Turks, who were posted in a very strong position.
The issue was not long in doubt. The unhappy Turks were mown down by
the Greek guns. Officers and men again fled like a beaten rabble.
After these signal defeats the remainder of the Ottoman army crossed
the River Vardar on November 3rd, within a few miles of Salonika. On
the 8th that city capitulated to the Greeks, not without suspicion
of treachery. Hassan Pasha and twenty-five thousand men, the remains
of his army, were made prisoners. On the next day a division of the
Bulgarians, detached from their main army in Thrace, appeared on the
scene at Salonika, after a forced march, in the hope of being able to
claim a share in the capture of that important city. At the request of
its general, the Greeks gave permission to two regiments of Bulgarians
to enter the city. In spite of this limitation, ten regiments were sent
there, and were the cause of much subsequent trouble.
While these great and unexpected successes were being achieved by the
Greeks, the Serbians were advancing from the north. A Turkish army of
a hundred thousand men, under Zeki Pasha, had marched up the valley
of the Vardar River to meet them. The two armies, about equal in
numbers, met at Koumanovo on October 23rd, the day after the victory
of the Greeks at Sarandoporus. The Turks were well supported with all
modern implements of war, with machine guns, aeroplanes, and wireless
telephone apparatus, but they had not a staff competent to make use
of them. Their artillery was the best which Krupps’ celebrated German
works could turn out, and was superior in number to that of the
Serbians. The French Creüsot guns, however, of the latter proved to be
the better in action. But, worst of all, the commissariat arrangements
of the Turks were of a most primitive character. They relied mainly
on their men feeding themselves at the expense of the peasantry on
their route, with the result that they were underfed. The weather was
most inclement and the troops were only provided with light summer
clothing. The best of soldiers cannot fight with empty stomachs and
scanty clothing. As a result, in spite of a vigorous resistance in the
great battle, the Turkish lines were broken by the splendid infantry of
the Serbians. There resulted a rout and the precipitate retreat of the
Turkish army. It lost the whole of its artillery—a hundred and twenty
guns. Of the hundred thousand men, only forty thousand survived as a
military force. Uskub, the ancient capital of Serbia, was captured.
Another Serbian army advanced towards the Adriatic and captured Durazzo.
After the fierce and decisive battle at Koumanovo, what remained of the
Turkish army retreated down the Vardar Valley to Veles, and thence,
instead of marching to Salonika, where it might have been in time to
save that city from the Greeks, it marched westward to Prilip, on the
route to Monastir. The Serbians, after a brief delay, followed it up
and came in contact again at Prilip, where the Turks held an immensely
strong position. It was taken at the point of the bayonet, a striking
proof of the superb quality of the Serbian infantry.
The Turks retreated thence to Monastir, where they found
reinforcements. On November 17th and 18th, another great battle was
fought in front of Monastir, in which the Turks were again defeated,
with the loss of ten thousand prisoners. The remains of the army
retreated into Albania, where it was too late in the season for the
Serbians to follow them. They were ultimately, in the following spring,
brought back to Constantinople by sea from the Adriatic. There could
not have been a more completely victorious campaign for the Serbians.
Zeki’s army was virtually extinguished.
While these critical events were pending in Macedonia the Bulgarians
were equally successful in the east. They invaded Thrace on October
18th in great force, and on the 22nd encountered a Turkish army at
Kirk Kilisse and, after a two days’ battle, defeated it. On the 28th
they fought the main Turkish army, under Nazim Pasha, which was drawn
up in a line from Lulu Burgas to Viza. The Turks made an obstinate
resistance, but after forty-eight hours of fierce assaults by the
Bulgarians they gave way and retreated in terrible disorder, till
they found themselves behind the lines of Tchatalja, the celebrated
fortifications which protect Constantinople at a distance of nineteen
miles on a line from the Black Sea to the Marmora. On their advance
through Thrace the Bulgarian soldiers, assisted by irregulars of Bulgar
race, committed atrocities and cruelties on the Turkish population
which rivalled all that the Turks in the past had perpetrated.
On November 17th the Bulgarians attacked these lines of Tchatalja with
great vigour. But the Turks had brought up fresh troops from Asia.
The lines were well defended with Krupp guns, and several successive
assaults were repelled.
On December 3rd, at the instance of the Great Powers, an armistice was
agreed upon between Turkey and Bulgaria and Serbia. War, however, was
continued with Greece and Montenegro. As a result of the campaign the
Turks had been defeated in every engagement by Greeks, Serbs, Bulgars,
and Montenegrins. They were driven from Macedonia and from nearly the
whole of Thrace and Epirus. They still, however, retained Adrianople,
Janina, and Scutari. It was only when in defence of such cities, or
behind such lines as those of Tchatalja that the Turkish soldiers
showed the tenacity and courage for which they had been famous.
Whenever they met the enemy in the open field they were always defeated.
It is almost incomprehensible [wrote Mr. Crawford Price, who was a
witness of this _débâcle_ of the Turkish army] that this warlike
nation, the stories of whose valour fill the most thrilling pages
of the military history of the world, could have degenerated into a
beaten rabble flying before the onslaught of despised Serbians and
Greeks, people who, till yesterday, scarce dared to lift their voices
when questions affecting their interests were discussed and settled.
The Greeks most effectually wiped out the stain of 1897. They showed
themselves the superior of the Turk in organization, strategy, and
even in personal courage.... I do not wish to dwell too strongly on
the lack of courage exhibited by the Ottoman soldiers. Words fail
me to describe the utter demoralization I found in the ranks of the
Turkish troops after their defeat.[48]
Among the chief causes of this demoralization of the Ottoman armies was
the complete absence of preparation for feeding them. It was the rule,
rather than the exception, for the troops to be left three or four
days without food. Another cause was that the Ottoman armies in this
campaign in Europe had in their ranks a large proportion of Christian
natives of the district who had been conscripted for the first time.
Their sympathies were all in favour of the enemy, and they undoubtedly
assisted in promoting the stampedes when the Turkish lines were broken.
The survivors fled to their homes.
The winter of 1912-13, after the conclusion of the armistice, was
spent in futile negotiations for peace at a Conference in London. The
main cause of failure was Adrianople. The Bulgarians insisted on its
cession to them as a condition of permanent peace. The Porte, in the
first instance, was not unwilling to give way on this. But a military
_émeute_ occurred at Constantinople. A deputation from the army, headed
by Enver Bey, insisted on entering the chamber where the Council
of Ministers were deliberating on the question, with the object of
protesting against the surrender of the stronghold. Nazim Pasha, the
Minister of War, and his aide-de-camp were killed in the endeavour to
resist this inroad. The Grand Vizier was thereupon terrorized into
resignation. In his place Mahmoud Shefket, who had proved to be so
loyal to the Young Turks at the early stage of their movement, was
appointed. He refused to surrender Adrianople. The negotiations in
London were broken off.
Early in 1913, on January 4th, the Bulgarians gave notice of the
termination of the armistice. War was renewed. On February 4th the
Bulgarian army commenced an attack on Adrianople, supported on this
occasion by fifty thousand Serbians. On the same day they fought a
battle near Bulair, defeated the Turks, and captured that important
fortress, threatening the command of the Dardanelles. The Greeks also
renewed the war. They sent an army into Epirus and, on March 6th,
captured Janina, making prisoners thirty-three thousand Turks and
seizing immense stores of guns and ammunition. On the 10th of the same
month their fleet captured the island of Samos.
On March 28th the Bulgarians captured Adrianople and its garrison of
twenty thousand Ottomans, and on April 21st the Montenegrins succeeded
in getting possession of Scutari, which they claimed as the capital of
their State. After these serious reverses the Porte was desirous of
coming to terms, and was willing even to cede Adrianople and almost
the whole of Thrace. It invited the mediation of the Great Powers.
The allied States agreed to this. A second Conference was held in
London on the basis that the Porte was to give up all its possessions
in Europe, save the small part of Thrace south of a line drawn from
Enos, in the Ægean Sea, to Media, in the Black Sea, a few miles north
of the Tchatalja lines. Crete was to be ceded to Greece, and the
destination of the islands in the Ægean Sea lately in the possession
of Turkey, and some of which were necessary for its defence, was to
be left to the decision of the Powers. A treaty was effected between
the Porte and the Powers to this effect. But there was far greater
difficulty in determining how the ceded districts were to be divided
between the victorious Balkan States. The position was aggravated by
Roumania coming into the field and claiming compensation in territory,
in consideration of the important changes impending in the balance of
power in the Balkans.
The four States so lately in alliance against the common enemy, Turkey,
were now madly jealous of one another in the division of the spoils.
Serbia, which had contributed so largely to the result by the splendid
valour of its army against the main body of Turks under Zeki Pasha, was
not content with the small slice of Macedonia which it had agreed to in
the treaty with Bulgaria in 1912, before the war. The decision of the
Powers that Albania was to be an independent State deprived Serbia of
the much-hoped-for access to the Adriatic. The acquisition by Bulgaria
of Thrace, including Adrianople, would greatly alter the balance of
power in the Balkans to the disadvantage of Serbia and justified its
claim to a larger share of Macedonia. It was already in occupation of
nearly half of that province. Bulgaria was equally ambitious to revive
the big Bulgaria of the San Stefano treaty, and could also appeal to
long past history in favour of it. It was determined to get possession
of Salonika, and was madly jealous of Greece. The Greeks, on their
part, were in possession of that city and of the southern half of
Macedonia. They had got hold of these districts by force of arms and
were determined not to give them up. No agreement could be come to in
London. Russia in vain did its utmost to compose these differences.
It offered to act as arbitrator and invited the Balkan States to send
representatives to Petrograd to settle the questions.
We now know that the Bulgarian Government had no intention whatever to
make concessions to the other Balkan States. The pacific section of its
ministers were overborne by the more bellicose members. M. Gueshoff,
the able Premier, who had been responsible for the policy which
preceded the war, and who was now in favour of a peaceful settlement,
was compelled to resign. King Ferdinand, a most unscrupulous and
ambitious intriguer, backed up the war party, and was mainly
responsible for the treacherous policy pursued, which was fraught with
so much misfortune to his State. In spite of the warnings from Russia
that, if force were resorted to, Bulgaria would find itself confronted
by a Roumanian army, and that the Porte would also join in the war
against it, King Ferdinand and his Government decided on war with their
late allies. They had unbounded and arrogant confidence in their army,
and despised those of Greece and Serbia.
On June 29, 1913, at midnight, the Bulgarian army in Macedonia made
a sudden and unprovoked attack on the Greek and Serbian outposts,
without any warning or declaration of war. This treacherous action
was followed up the next day by an advance of the Bulgarian army of a
hundred thousand men on the right flank against the Serbian army, which
was nearest to them. For the moment this seemed to promise success,
and the Serbians were compelled to fall back. But on July 1st the
Serbians, whose forces, supported by the Montenegrins, were almost
equal in number to the Bulgarians opposed to them, rallied and decided
on a counter offensive. On July 2nd they attacked the Bulgarians on the
Bragalbabza River, defeated them, and captured many of their guns. On
July 4th another battle took place with much the same result. Istib was
captured on the 8th, and the Bulgarians were then compelled to retreat
towards their own frontier.
Meanwhile the main army of the Greeks, which was concentrated at
Salonika, a day’s march from the Bulgarians on the left flank, advanced
to attack them. The two armies were equal in numbers, each of about
seventy thousand men. They met at Kiltich, about half-way between the
Rivers Vardar and Struma, and a day’s march from Salonika. The Greeks
inflicted a very severe defeat on their foes. This was followed up a
few days later by victories at Doiran and Strumnitza. In the fortnight
which followed the Bulgarians were defeated in a series of engagements
as they retreated to their own frontier.
The prediction and warnings of the Russian Government were now
verified. The Roumanians, when they found that the Bulgarians were
involved in war with the other Balkan States, announced that they were
dissatisfied with the small concession of territory made to them at
the Conference in London—namely the fortress of Silistria and a belt
of land on the Danube. They insisted on a further cession of territory
to them in the Dobrudscha. They sent an army across the Danube, on
July 10th, to support this demand. It advanced without opposition to
within a few miles of Sofia. The Turks also saw the opportunity of
retrieving out of the scramble something of their recent great losses
of territory. They determined to tear up the treaty of London, signed
only a few weeks ago. They sent an army, under Enver Pasha, into
Thrace, on July 15th, to attack Adrianople. It had no difficulty in
recapturing that most important city, from which the Bulgarians had
withdrawn nearly the whole of its garrison in order to strengthen their
armies against Greece and Serbia. It also reoccupied Demotika and Kirk
Kilisse.
The Bulgarians found themselves in a most perilous position. Their
armies had everywhere been defeated and driven back. They were
surrounded by invading armies. They were compelled to sue for terms.
On July 31st an armistice was agreed to, and a Conference was decided
on, to be held at Bucharest, between the representatives of the Balkan
States, without the presence of those of the Great Powers. At the
Conference the Bulgarians found themselves in the position of being
hoist with their own petard. They were compelled by _force majeure_ not
only to give up all their ambitious projects, but also to make serious
concessions to all their rivals. Had they been willing to come to terms
at the Conference at London or, later, to submit to the arbitration
of Russia, they would undoubtedly have secured for themselves a large
slice of Macedonia. They would have retained possession of a great
part of Thrace, with Adrianople and Demotika, and the only concessions
they would have made were Silistria and the small belt of land on the
Danube. They were now compelled to agree to the division of the whole
of Macedonia between Greece and Serbia. They had to surrender a part of
the Dobrudscha to Roumania, and the larger part of their conquests in
Thrace, including Adrianople, to the Turks. All that remained to them
in return for their stupendous efforts in the recent wars was a small
portion of Thrace with a narrow frontage to the Ægean Sea, but without
a port of any value or importance. Never was there a case in which
base treachery and overweening arrogance were followed by more fatal
retribution.
Greece got the larger share of the spoil of Turkey in the two years
of war. It obtained rather more than half of Macedonia—namely 17,000
square miles, with a population of 1,697,000. It also secured the
final cession to it of the important island of Crete, and of Samos,
and other islands in the Ægean Sea. Its territory and population
were increased by more than one-half. Serbia obtained 15,000 square
miles, with 1,656,000 inhabitants, Bulgaria only 9,600 miles and
125,000 inhabitants. Roumania secured 2,600 square miles, with 286,000
inhabitants, and Montenegro 2,100 square miles and 251,000 population;
while the Turks lost 54,000 square miles, inhabited by a population of
4,239,000. But the recovery of Adrianople, Demotika, and Kirk Kilisse
was a great coup for them. It redounded to the prestige of the Young
Turks and their leader, Enver Pasha, who soon became Minister of War.
The German Emperor telegraphed his congratulations to the Sultan on
the recovery of Adrianople, and to the King of Roumania on the success
of his intervention. He also conferred on the King of Greece, his
brother-in-law, the bâton of a Field Marshal in the German army. The
King received this honour in person at Berlin in the presence of a
great gathering of German generals. In a speech on the occasion, he
attributed his success in the recent war, in the first place, to the
bravery of his army, and in the second to the training which he and
many of his officers had received in the military schools of Berlin.
Thenceforth, till the outbreak of the great war in Europe in 1914, the
influence of Germany in the Near East, and especially in Turkey, was
continually on the increase. Enver Pasha, who now predominated in the
councils of the Porte, was devoted to the interests of Germany, and was
probably in its pay. At his instance the Turkish army, which had so
conspicuously failed in the recent wars, was put under the control of
the German General Von der Goltz, and large numbers of officers were
lent by Germany for its better training. Secret drillings of troops
took place in many remote parts of the Empire. These measures were well
timed to coincide with the outbreak in 1914 of the great war, which, it
is now very certain, had been already determined on by the General War
Staff at Berlin.
It only remains to add that when, soon after the commencement of the
war, the Porte, at the instance of Enver Pasha, declared itself against
the Allied Powers, the British Government at once proclaimed the
independence of Egypt, under its protectorate, and the annexation of
Cyprus. These were the last territorial losses of the Ottoman Empire
which can be counted as _faits accomplis_. It has been shown that, in
the past, there were due to the régime of the Young Turks, during the
six years of its predominance, from 1908 to 1914, the loss in Europe
of Macedonia, Epirus, and Albania, and of a large part of Thrace;
of Crete, Cyprus, and many other islands in the Ægean Sea; and the
suzerainty of Bulgaria, Bosnia, and Herzegovina; and in Africa of the
province of Tripoli and the suzerainty of Egypt. These great losses
rivalled in extent of territory and population those incurred either
by Mahmoud II or by Abdul Hamid II. It needs no prophet to predict a
further shrinkage of territory, or loss of independence, after the
conclusion of the existing war in Europe, whatever may be its other
results.
[Illustration:
SOUTH EASTERN EUROPE
AND ASIA MINOR
1914.
London: T. Fisher Unwin. Ltd. _Stanford’s Geog.^l Estab.^t London._]
XXIII
A RETROSPECT
IT has been shown in preceding chapters that the two great historic
movements of the growth and decay of the Turkish Empire extended over
periods not differing much in length. Reckoning its birth from the
accession, in 1288, of Othman, as chief of a small tribe of Turks
in Asia Minor, nearly three hundred years elapsed before the Empire
reached its zenith. During these years ten eminent Sultans and one
Grand Vizier (Sokolli) of a degenerate Sultan were concerned in its
extension. It was a period of almost continuous victory and conquest.
The Ottoman armies, during these years, met with only a single serious
disaster, that at Angora in 1402 at the hands of Timur and a host of
Mongolian invaders, which seemed at first to have struck a fatal blow
to the Empire. But it soon rallied, and the process of aggrandizement
was renewed. With this exception the Ottomans were almost uniformly
successful. The number, however, of pitched battles in the field,
which decided the fate of States successively invaded, was not great.
Thrace was won by the defeat of the Byzantines by Murad I at Eski
Baba in 1361. The Bulgarians were conquered at Samakof in 1371, and
the Serbians at Kossova in 1389, by the same Sultan. The Hungarians
were overthrown at Mohacz in 1529. The Persians were defeated at
Calderan, 1514, near Tabriz, and the Egyptians at Aleppo, 1516, and
Ridania, near Cairo, under Selim, 1516. The crusaders from Europe
were defeated in three great battles—at the Maritza, 1363, Nicopolis,
1396, and Varna, 1444. At most of these battles the Ottomans had great
superiority of numbers, and as against the Persians and Egyptians they
were provided with a powerful artillery, of which their opponents were
wholly deficient. The other very numerous campaigns consisted mainly
of successions of sieges by invading armies of Ottomans, where the
invaded, with inferior forces, protracted the defence, often over long
terms of years.
The Ottomans were almost equally successful at sea, with one notable
exception, at Lepanto, at the very end of the period we are referring
to, when they met with a terrible disaster from the combined navies
of Europe, much inferior in numbers of ships and men. But before this
their naval supremacy had enabled them to extend the Empire over
Algiers and Tunis. Nothing resulted from the great battle of Lepanto
except loss of prestige to the Ottomans. The combination against them
was dissolved, and for many years they maintained supremacy in the
Eastern Mediterranean.
At the close of this period of growth the Ottoman Empire reached its
zenith and extended over the vast countries described in the chapter
on the Grand Vizier Sokolli. The whole of its immense area, however,
was not in full ownership of the Ottomans. Parts of it, such as North
Hungary, were autonomous States with native rulers paying tribute to
the Porte. Other parts, such as the Crimea, Wallachia, and Moldavia,
were vassal States, whose princes were appointed by the Sultan, and
which were bound to send contingents in support of the Ottoman armies
when at war. The really integral parts of the Empire in Europe were
Thrace, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia, Bosnia, and Albania; in
Asia, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Syria, and a great part of Arabia; and
in Africa, Tripoli. Egypt, Tunis, and Algiers very early acquired a
practical autonomy under the suzerainty of the Porte, though they
were still nominally integral parts of the Empire. The Empire thus
constituted was one of the greatest in the then world. It may be worth
while briefly to review the causes which led to its aggregation.
It was the common belief in Europe, confirmed by many historians, up to
recent times, that the Ottoman armies which invaded Europe from Asia
Minor were composed of pure Turks, and that the motive which impelled
them in their conquest was the fanatical desire to extend Islam. But
these views have been modified of late years. It has been shown that
the armies which Sultans Orchan and Murad led across the Straits into
Europe were not pure Turks, but were very largely composed of subjects
of the East Roman Empire from the northern parts of Asia Minor, who,
after the defeat there of the Byzantine armies, had embraced Islam.
They were welded with the Turks by religion into something approaching
to a nation. They called themselves Osmanlis, or Ottomans, from the
founder of the Othman dynasty. It may be doubted whether the Turks
alone were capable of effecting the conquests in Europe. It is certain
that they could not have maintained the Empire when formed.
The Turks of Anatolia had many valuable qualities as soldiers. They
were, and are to this day, brave, hardy, sober, frugal, and cleanly in
their habits, as inculcated by their religion, a strong point in their
favour in days when sanitary arrangements were completely ignored by
armies. They bore the hardships of long campaigns without complaint.
But they were deficient in intelligence and education, which count for
much in war as in civil life. In this respect they were very inferior
to subjects of the East Roman Empire and to many of the Christians with
whom they came in conflict. But the Ottomans who first invaded Europe
were not simply Turks. Later, the most effective corps in the Ottoman
army was formed exclusively of the sons of Christian parents in the
Balkans, conscripted at an early age and forcibly converted to Islam.
It was with forces thus constituted that the Ottomans extended their
Empire up to and beyond the Danube. The conquests of the larger part
of Asia Minor, of Mesopotamia, Syria, and Egypt, were also effected,
by composite forces, to which Serbia and Wallachia sent contingents
by virtue of treaties with the Porte. The greater number of Ottoman
generals who distinguished themselves in these early days of conquest
were not of Turkish race, but were Greeks, Albanians, Slavs, and
Italians, who had embraced Islam or whose forbears had done so. It was
the same with almost all the naval commanders. They were of foreign
origin, who had gained experience as pirates and had embraced Islam.
The crews who manned the Ottoman navy were mainly Greeks from the
islands in the Ægean Sea.
With respect to the objects and motives of the Ottoman conquests, a
careful review of the history of the early Sultans has shown that there
was very little, if any, of missionary enterprise on behalf of Islam.
It will be admitted that there is no pretence for concluding that the
vast conquests in Asia and Africa had any such motive. The populations
there were already Moslems. The motives for conquest were the ambition
to extend the Empire at the expense of neighbouring States and the hope
of plunder on the part of the soldiers. Religious zeal had nothing to
do with it. What reason is there to suppose that conquests in Europe
had any different object than those in Asia? As a matter of fact,
there was no very large extension of Islam in Europe as a result of
Ottoman conquest. When cities were captured and their inhabitants were
massacred, or when districts were conquered and the people were carried
away as captives to be sold as slaves, they do not appear to have had
the alternative offered to them of embracing Islam.
In some few districts, as in Bosnia and parts of Albania and the Morea,
the landowners, or some of them, were allowed to avoid the confiscation
of their property by becoming Mussulmans. But these were exceptions.
The general rule was that the land of the conquered districts was
confiscated without the option to the owners of changing their religion
and saving their property. As regards the labouring people, the rayas,
there does not appear to have been any desire that they should adopt
the religion of their conquerors. They were wanted for the cultivation
of the land as serfs or slaves. It seems to have been a matter of
indifference what their religion was.
There is also nothing to show that the Ottoman soldiers were animated
by any religious zeal in their campaigns in Europe. The main cause of
their military efficiency was the organization of the army effected
by Orchan and perfected by Murad I. It offered immense rewards to the
soldiers for victories in battle and for personal valour, in the share
of booty and plunder levied in the conquered districts, of captives to
be sold as slaves, of women for wives or concubines or to be sold for
harems, and of lands to be distributed as fiefs. These rewards appealed
to the predatory instincts of the Moslem soldiers, whether Turks or
others of alien origin. In the rare intervals of peace the soldiers
soon wearied of life in barracks, and yearned for active campaigns.
At such times the Janissaries and other soldiers were a danger to the
State from their turbulence and disorder. It was necessary to find
employment for them at a distance. This acted as a constant incitement
to war and to fresh conquests. It was one of the causes of the
continuous growth of the Empire.
A second main cause of success to the Ottoman armies in Europe
was the want of union for resistance on the part of the people of
the Balkan States. There can be little doubt that if the Greeks,
Bulgarians, and Serbians had combined to resist the invading Moslems
their efforts would have been successful. But Greeks and Bulgarians,
Greeks and Serbians hated one another more than they feared and hated
the Ottomans. In the six centuries dealt with in this volume there
was only a single occasion when Greeks, Bulgarians, and Serbians
formed a combination against the Ottomans. This was not till 1912.
The combination was successful and drove the Turks out of Macedonia,
Epirus, Albania, and the greater part of Thrace. But we have shown
that it broke down on the division of the spoil, with the result that
the Turks recovered a small part of their lost territory. The case
illustrates our contention that want of union of the Christian States
was a main cause of the servitude of all of them for nearly five
hundred years under Turkish rule.
Lastly, in appreciating the causes of the wonderful growth of the
Ottoman Empire, we must not lose sight of the personal element, of
the fact that, for ten generations, the Othman family produced men
capable of leading their armies in the field to victory, and almost
equally remarkable as administrators and statesmen. This succession of
a single family, father and son, for ten generations without a break,
culminating in the greatest of them, Solyman the Magnificent, is quite
without precedent or example in history. The Othman family were pure
Turks in their origin. But the Turkish blood was very soon diluted.
The mothers of future Sultans were either captives taken by corsairs
or slaves bought on account of their beauty. They were of every
race—Greeks, Slavs, Italians, or Russians. But in spite of this mixed
blood the type of Sultans remained much the same for ten generations.
The prestige acquired by the family in these three hundred years,
as founders and maintainers of the Empire and as generals who led
their armies to victory, was such that it has impressed itself on the
imagination of all Ottomans, and has survived to this day, in spite
of the long subsequent degeneration of the family. Unquestionably, the
foundation and growth of the Empire were largely due to the personal
qualities of the Othman dynasty.
After the death in 1578 of Grand Vizier Sokolli, who carried on
the traditions of the first ten Sultans for a few years under the
worthless Selim II, the pendulum of Empire swung in the opposite
direction. Thenceforth, down to the present time, there were
successions of defeats and disasters to the Turkish Empire, with but
few intermissions. Provinces were torn from it periodically, like
leaves from an artichoke, till all but a small fraction of it in
Europe, the whole of its possessions in Africa, and a large part in
Asia have been lost to the Empire. What remains to it is the core of
Turkish and Arabic provinces in Asia, and in Europe only its capital,
Constantinople, and a small portion of Thrace to the north of it.
Five of the Great Powers of Europe have had their share of the spoils,
and six independent States have been resuscitated out of the remaining
débris of it. It is hard to say which of the Great Powers gained most.
Austria recovered by force of arms Hungary, Transylvania, Dalmatia,
Croatia, and Slavonia, and by artful policy Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Russia obtained by conquest the Crimea, Bessarabia, Podolia, and a
part of the Ukraine in Europe, and the Caucasus, and a great part of
Armenia, in Asia. France has possessed itself of Algiers and Tunis.
England has secured the suzerainty and practical possession of Egypt
and complete possession of Cyprus and Aden. Italy has seized Tripoli.
Of the six smaller independent States, Bulgaria and Roumania owe their
revival solely to Russia, Greece mainly to Great Britain and France,
Albania to the concert of the Balkan States in 1912, and Serbia and
Montenegro alone owe their freedom mainly to their own valour. It
need not be said that gratitude forms no part of the ethics of modern
statecraft, and a few only of the above States have recognized that
they owe anything to the Powers who rescued them from Turkish rule.
During the last three hundred years, when these vast changes were
being effected, the Ottoman army lost all the prestige it had acquired
during the previous three hundred years. With the single exception of
the battle of Cerestes, fought against the Hungarians in 1646, when
a _débâcle_ of the Turkish army was averted by the splendid cavalry
charge of Cicala Pasha, which saved to the Ottoman Empire the larger
part of Hungary for another term of seventy-two years, its armies were
defeated in almost every battle of any importance. In nearly all of
them the Ottomans had the advantage of very superior numbers, but this
did not save them from disaster. The armies opposed to them were led
by a succession of generals who were masters of the art of war, such
as Sobieski, King of Poland, Prince Eugène of Savoy, Prince Charles
of Lorraine, Generals Munnich, Loudon, Kutusoff, Suvorov, Diebitsch,
Paskievitch, Skobeleff, and Gourko. Compared with these, the Turks had
not a single general of eminence and only a few valiant leaders in
battle.
To what causes, then, are we to attribute the decay and dismemberment
of the vast Empire, and the complete failure of its armies to maintain
prestige for victory and valour? It is more easy perhaps to suggest
causes for downfall than for the birth and growth of the Empire. First
and foremost of the causes has unquestionably been the degeneracy of
the Othman dynasty. It could not have been by a mere chance coincidence
that the growth of Empire was synchronous with the reign of the first
ten Sultans, and that its decay and dismemberment were extended through
the reign of twenty-five successors, of whom all but two, or possibly
three, were degenerates and wholly incompetent to rule. The Ottoman
State was an autocracy in which all military, civil, and religious
faculties were centred in its head. It needed autocrats competent for
the task, and in the absence of such it was certain that the State
would take the road to ruin. Whether the degeneracy of the dynasty was
due, as has been hinted, to a break in the true succession, and the
introduction of alien blood after Solyman the Magnificent, or not, the
fact remains that we can discern no trace of the eminent qualities of
the family in those who succeeded him.
The deterioration of the race, which began with Selim ‘the Sot,’ was
confirmed and accentuated by what occurred after three more Sultans had
succeeded father to son—all of them equally unfit to fill the throne.
The original law of succession, which had been set aside by the cruel
practice of fratricide, was then reverted to, and the eldest male of
the family, and not the eldest son of a defunct Sultan, was recognized
as his successor. Thenceforth, by way of precaution against conspiracy
and rebellion, the reigning Sultans, in lieu of putting their brothers
to death, immured them as virtual prisoners in the building of the
Seraglio known as the Cage, where they were allowed little or no
communication with the world. They were permitted to maintain their
harems, but by some abominable process the women were sterilized so
as to prevent their giving birth to possible claimants to the throne.
Of twenty successors to Mahomet IV, seventeen were subjected to this
degrading treatment, and only left prison on succeeding to the throne.
Three Sultans escaped this treatment, two of them by succeeding their
fathers, in default of other male heirs of an older age. Only one of
these three was better equipped to fill the throne than the average of
the other seventeen. It is evident, therefore, that the dynasty was
worn out. It would have been well for the Empire if the Othman race had
long ago come to an end, and had been replaced by some more virile and
competent stock.
It followed, from the degeneracy of this long succession of Sultans,
that the supreme power of the State fell into other hands, either of
viziers who were able to dominate the reigning Sultans and to secure
themselves against intrigues of all kinds, or more often of the harem.
It would be difficult to exaggerate the evils which resulted from the
intervention of the Sultan’s harem in affairs of State. The harem
consisted of a vast concourse of women and slaves, of concubines and
eunuchs, maintained at a huge expense—a nest of extravagance and
corruption. It was always in antagonism to the official administration
of the Porte, which ostensibly carried on the administration of the
State under the direction of the Sultan. The favourite concubine
for the time being, or the ambitious mother of a Sultan, or not
infrequently the principal eunuch, gained the ear of the Sultan and
overruled the more experienced advisers of the Porte. The harem was
the centre from which corruption spread throughout the Turkish Empire,
as officials of every degree, from the highest to the lowest, found it
expedient to secure their interest with its inmates by heavy bribes.
It has been shown in previous pages that the sale of offices, civil
and military, became universal. This was largely responsible for the
decay and dismemberment of the State. An illustration of this was to
be found in the cases of Egypt, Algiers, and Tunis. The incompetent
pashas, who had obtained by purchase the governorships of these
important provinces, were unable to control the local Mamelukes in
Egypt, or the local Janissaries in Algiers and Tunis, with the result
that these provinces became practically independent and later were lost
to the Empire.
A second main cause of the decadence of the Empire was undoubtedly
the deterioration of its armies. We miss altogether in the many great
battles of the last three hundred years the élan and the daring
spirit by which the Ottomans won their many victories in the period
of accretion of the Empire. Two main explanations may be offered for
this. The one that the armies in the later period were formed more
exclusively from the Turkish and Arabic subjects of the Empire, and
that the proportion of men of Greek or Slav descent was far less, if
it was not wholly absent. When the Empire was extended over the whole
of Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, and Syria, the Moslem population was
enormously increased. In 1648 the corps of Janissaries ceased to be
levied from Christian youths and was recruited from Moslems. There was
wanting, therefore, to the army the spirit given to it in the past by
the Greeks and other Christian races. This difference was probably more
serious in the case of the officers than with the rank and file. The
Turks supplied very poor material for officers.
The other explanation is to be found in the absence of incentive to
military ardour in the later period. If we have been justified in the
conclusion that there was little or no motive for the Turkish army in
the shape of religious fanaticism and the desire to spread Islam, but
that plunder and the hope of acquiring lands for distribution among
the soldiers was its main inducement, it followed that this incentive
to victory and valour was almost entirely absent in the later period
when the Empire was on the defensive, when it was no longer a question
of making fresh conquests, but of retaining what had already been won.
The army could not expect to get loot and plunder or captives for
sale as slaves, or land to be confiscated for fiefs, when engaged in
war for the defence of some tributary or vassal State or of some more
integral part of the Empire. Nor could there be the feeling of fighting
for their own homes and property when defending a subject Christian
province. Yet another partial explanation is to be found in the fact
that the general corruption had infected the army, as well as the civil
administration of the State. Promotions through all the ranks went not
to merit, but to the highest bidders. The civil branches of the army
also, such as the commissariat and those for the supply of munitions,
which in the earlier period were well provided for, fell into disorder
and confusion owing to the universal spread of corruption.
In view of these many serious changes, it is not difficult to
appreciate the causes for the falling off of the _morale_ of the Ottoman
army and for its failure to maintain the reputation it had achieved
in the three centuries of conquest and extension of the Empire. The
war which is now raging in the Near East has shown that the Ottoman
soldiers, when organized, and in part led, by competent foreign
officers, when fighting _pro aris et focis_, and especially when in
defence of well fortified lines, have a great military value.
A third cause, however, for the failure of the Ottomans to maintain
their Empire in Europe is undoubtedly to be found in the continually
worsening conditions of the Christian populations subject to it. In
the earlier period there is good reason to conclude that the average
condition of the rayas in the Christian provinces subjected to Ottoman
rule and law was somewhat better than that of the peasants in some
neighbouring States, such as Hungary, Austria, and Russia. There was
something in the way of fixity of tenure accorded to the rayas which
was absent from the feudal serfs.
It was alleged that peasants from Hungary not infrequently migrated
into the Balkan States in order to enjoy this better treatment, and
it is certain that the Greeks of the Morea and Crete preferred the
rule of the Ottomans, bad as it was, to that of the Venetians, who
were even more cruel and rapacious. However that may have been, it
is certain that everywhere under Turkish rule, during the last three
hundred years, the conditions of the Christian populations became more
wretched and intolerable, and relatively far worse than in neighbouring
States. This was greatly due to the degeneracy and corruption of the
central Government at Constantinople, and to its evil example and
influence throughout the Empire. Governors of provinces and all local
officials became more corrupt and rapacious. There was no security for
life or property. Justice was not obtainable in the local tribunals.
Arbitrary exactions were levied on the peasantry. Brigandage everywhere
increased. Money levied in the provinces was never expended for the
benefit of their populations. Turkish rule acted as a blight on the
districts subject to it. Provinces liberated from it improved in
condition beyond recognition. The comparison with them was an ever
present object-lesson to those who remained under Turkish rule. The
efforts of the combined Powers of Europe to induce or compel the
Porte to effect improvements in the government of its subjects proved
to be futile and impotent. Treaty obligations with this object were
habitually disregarded by the Porte and were treated as waste-paper.
Provinces thus conditioned were always on the brink of rebellion.
They were kept in subjection, not by the maintenance of any large
armed forces there, but by periodic massacres of a ruthless character.
These were not the product of religious fanaticism, as has often been
suggested, but of deliberate policy, and were instigated by orders
direct from the Porte, with the hope of inspiring terror in the minds
of the subject races.
Foreign intervention, incited not so much by territorial ambition as by
popular sympathy for the oppressed, was resorted to for the purpose of
redressing grievous wrongs and for preserving the peace of Europe. As a
result of these causes, extending over more than three hundred years,
the Turkish Empire, so far as Europe is concerned, and in the sense of
a dominant Power over subject races, has ceased to exist. In countries
which it held in subjection for over five hundred years it has left
no trace that it ever existed. The very few Turks and the Tartars and
Circassians who had been planted there by the Porte when the Crimea and
the Caucasus were subjected by Russia have departed bag and baggage
from Europe. They have migrated to Asia Minor at the instigation of
their mollahs. The few Moslems who remain behind in these districts are
not of Ottoman or Turkish descent; they are of the same races as their
neighbours. Their ancestors adopted Islam to save their property.
The Young Turks, who of late years have controlled the Empire, have
signally failed to arrest the great movement which we have above
described. They have further developed their policy of Turkifying what
remains to them of the Empire during the existing war. Their massacres
and deportations of Armenians in Asia Minor have been on a scale and
with a cruelty without precedent in history. Whether responsibility
for this indelible crime will be enforced on them, and whether, as it
richly deserves, the Turkish Empire will suffer further reductions,
will depend on the issue of the colossal struggle in which the nations
of Europe are now engaged. Whatever the future may have in store in
these respects, there is one certain moral to be drawn from the story
which has been told in these pages, namely that an Empire originally
founded on the predatory instincts of an alien military caste, and
whose rulers during the last four hundred years have never recognized
that they had any responsibility for the good government and well-being
of the races subject to them, could not, if there be any law of human
progress in the world, be permanent, and was destined ultimately to
perish by the sword.
APPENDIX
GENEALOGY OF THE OTTOMAN SULTANS.
1. OTHMAN (accession as Emir at Sugut), 1288.
|
+-------+
| |
ALAEDDIN. |
|
2. ORCHAN, 1326.
|
3. MURAD I, 1360.
|
+-------+
| |
| JACOUB.
|
4. BAYEZID, 1389.
|
+---------+--------+-------+-------+
| | | | |
SOLYMAN. MUSA. ISSA. | MUSTAPHA.
|
5. MAHOMET I, 1402.
|
6. MURAD II, 1421.
|
7. MAHOMET II, 1451
(deposed).
|
+-------+
| |
| DJEM.
|
8. BAYEZID II, 1481.
|
+---------+--------+
| | |
KHORKAND. AHMED. |
|
9. SELIM I, 1512.
|
10. SOLYMAN I, 1520.
|
+---------+--------+
| | |
MUSTAPHA. BAYEZID. |
|
11. SELIM II, 1566.
|
12. MURAD III, 1574.
|
|
13. MAHOMET III, 1595.
|
+-----------------------+---------------+
| |
14. AHMED I, 1603. 15. MUSTAPHA, 1617.
| (deposed)
|
+-----------------------+-----------------------+
| | |
16. OTHMAN II, 1618 17. MURAD IV, 1623. |
(murdered). |
18. IBRAHIM, 1640
(deposed).
|
+---------------------+-------------------------+
| | |
| 20. SOLYMAN II, 1687. 21. AHMED II, 1691.
|
19. MAHOMET IV, 1648
(deposed).
|
+-----------------------------------------------+
| |
22. MUSTAPHA II, 1695 23. AHMED III, 1703
(abdicated). (deposed).
| |
+-----------------------+ |
| | |
24. MAHMOUD I, 1730. 25. OTHMAN III, 1754. |
|
+-----------------------------------------+
| |
26. MUSTAPHA III, 1757. 27. ABDUL HAMID I, 1773.
| |
28. SELIM III, 1789 |
(deposed). |
|
+-----------------------------------------+
| |
29. MUSTAPHA IV, 1807 (deposed). 30. MAHMOUD II, 1808.
|
+-----------------------------------------+
| |
31. ABDUL MEHZID, 1839. 32. ABDUL AZIZ, 1861
| (deposed).
|
+-----------------+--------------------------+
| | |
33. MURAD V, 1876 34. ABDUL HAMID II, 1876. 35. MAHOMET V, 1908.
(deposed). (deposed).
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Von Hammer, i. p. 28 (French translation).
[2] Cantemir, p. 20.
[3] Mr. Gibbons refuses credence to this interesting story on the
ground mainly of its inherent improbability. His argument does not
convince me. The succession of the younger brother to the Emirate
without a fight for it, on the part of the elder one, was an event so
remarkable, and so contrary to all experience in Ottoman history, as
to make the explanation given a reasonable one. The probabilities seem
to me to be all in its favour. Alaeddin died in 1337. It is admitted
that for seven years he acted as the first Grand Vizier of the Ottoman
State. It may well be, therefore, that he commenced, if he did not
complete, the important organization of the army with which he has been
credited by Turkish historians.
[4] This was not the corps of Janissaries, which, as Mr. Gibbons has
shown, was created not by Orchan but by his son Murad.
[5] Mr. Gibbons in his account of the origin of this corps disputes
the figures as reported above from previous writers, and also the
alleged motives for its constitution. After careful consideration
of the question, I have preferred to adhere to the version given by
Sir Edwin Pears, who has investigated the subject with great care in
the early Greek and Turkish histories. I have, however, followed Mr.
Gibbons in one point, namely, in attributing the constitution of the
force to Murad I rather than to Orchan. Mr. Gibbons’s account of the
corps of Janissaries is to be found on pp. 118-20 of the _Foundation
of the Ottoman Empire_, and that of Sir Edwin Pears in his work on the
_Destruction of the Greek Empire_, pp. 223-30.
[6] Pears, p. 228.
[7] Knolles, i. p. 139.
[8] Gibbons, p. 221.
[9] Froissart, xvi. 47.
[10] Boucicaut in 1399, with four ships and two armed galleys and
twelve hundred knights and foot soldiers, after defeating an Ottoman
fleet in the Dardanelles, arrived at Constantinople and gave assistance
to the Emperor in defence of the city.
[11] Gibbon, viii. p. 114.
[12] This story of the cage, which forms the subject of a scene in
Marlowe’s play of _Tamerlane_, has been discredited by some historians
of late years. But Mr. Gibbons, after a full and careful examination of
all the records of the time, has re-established its veracity.
[13] Gibbon, viii. p. 242.
[14] Von Hammer, ii. p. 379.
[15] Sir Edwin Pears, _Destruction of the Greek Empire_, p. 217.
[16] The four pages which Gibbon devotes to a description of this
attempted union of the two Churches are masterpieces of irony and scorn
(Gibbon, viii. pp. 287-91).
[17] The writer, in 1890, had the advantage of viewing what remained of
these walls in the company of Sir Edwin Pears, who has fully described
them in his admirable account of the great siege.
[18] Stone balls of considerable size were used by the Turks to defend
the Dardanelles up to a late date. When in 1855 the writer visited the
forts there, he observed that they were still provided for some of the
guns.
[19] Speech of Mahomet recorded by the historian Christobulus, quoted
by Sir Edwin Pears, pp. 323-4.
[20] Quoted by Pears, p. 303.
[21] Von Hammer, vii. p. 4.
[22] _Sir T. Roe’s Embassy_, pp. 66-7.
[23] Ibid. p. 178.
[24] Ibid. p. 206.
[25] Ibid. p. 243.
[26] Von Hammer, xi. p. 378.
[27] Schimmer, _Two Sieges of Vienna_, p. 137.
[28] Von Hammer, xii. p. 372.
[29] See the _Mémoires de Morosini_, iii. pp. 112, 113.
[30] Whitworth to Leeds, January 10, 1781; Record Office.
[31] Ranke’s _History of Serbia_, p. 115.
[32] Moltke, p. 257.
[33] Moltke, p. 443.
[34] Finlay, vii. 59.
[35] The above conversations are reported in Parliamentary Papers,
1854, Eastern Question, House of Commons, 84.
[36] _Life of Lord Stratford_, ii. p. 442.
[37] _Life of Lord Stratford_, ii. p. 436.
[38] The above is from notes of conversations with Lord Stratford made
at the time.
[39] _Life of Lord Stratford_, ii. p. 449.
[40] Lord Morley’s _Life of Gladstone_, ii. p. 555.
[41] It may be well to add, what has not been mentioned by his able
biographer, doubtless because Lord Stratford’s daughters were alive
when the book was published in 1888, that the Great Elchi gave
testimony of his belief in the permanence of the Turkish Empire by
investing the greater part of his personal property and savings in
Turkish Bonds. In 1874, when the Porte became bankrupt and repudiated
payment of interest on the debt, some friend at Constantinople wrote
to Lord Stratford giving timely information of what was coming
and advising him to sell his bonds while there was yet time. Lord
Stratford, however, thought it was inconsistent with his sense of
honour to act on this advice. His means were greatly reduced by the
bankruptcy of the Porte. After his death and the cessation of his
pension, his daughters would have been in very reduced circumstances
if it had not been for the generosity of a personal friend of their
father, the late Lady Ossington, who made up to these ladies, for their
lives, the amount of the pension from the State which had lapsed by the
death of Lord Stratford.
[42] _The Bulgarian Horrors and the Question in the East_, 1876.
[43] House of Commons, April 24, 1877.
[44] Bismarck induced Lord Beaconsfield to propose this to the Congress.
[45] Parliamentary Report, House of Commons, July 30, 1878.
[46] _Nineteenth Century Review_, December 1890. This article, which
contained other severe criticisms on the rule of Abdul Hamid, was
translated into the Turkish language, for his perusal, by the late
Professor Arminius Vambéri, who was the guest of the Sultan at the time
of my visit to Constantinople in 1890, and who had suggested to him
that he should favour me with an audience. The Professor backed up my
statements by remonstrances on his own behalf, with the result that
the Sultan took grave offence. He withdrew the pension which he had
annually paid to the Professor and put an end to their long friendship.
[47] _The Near East from Within_, p. 38.
[48] _The Balkan Cockpit_, G. M. Crawford Price, p. 102.
INDEX
Abdul Aziz, 312-16
Abdul Hamid I, 223-7
Abdul Hamid II, 316-52
Abdul Mehjid, 287-312
Abercromby, General, 244
Aboukir Bay, 242, 244
Acarnania, 280
Achmet I, 152
Achmet II, 185-6
Achmet III, 191-203
Acre, 239, 243, 255-6, 281, 290
Adalia, 38, 46
Aden, 117, 130, 374
Adrianople, 33-4, 46, 52-3, 58, 60-1, 68, 74-6, 79, 88, 92, 113, 176,
181-2, 184, 186, 188-9, 276, 280, 285, 329, 362-3, 367
Ahmed Keduk, 98, 102
Aidin, 45, 62
Aidos, 276
Akinjis (irregulars), 47
Ak-Shai, 46-7
Ak-Sheir, 38
Albania, Albanians, 37, 39, 61, 71, 90-5, 144, 168, 180, 184,
189, 192, 211, 215, 224, 252, 257-8, 264, 330, 348, 353, 359,
364, 368, 374
Aleppo, 109-10, 123, 282
Alexander of Battenberg, Prince of Bulgaria, 337-8
Alexandria, 240-1, 244, 250, 264, 271, 284
Algiers, 117, 124-5, 130, 158, 160, 164-5, 201, 224, 370
Andrassy, 318, 331
Andrea Doria, 126-7
Andronicus III, 21, 26, 61
Angora, 45, 369
Apafy, 172, 181
Arabi, 345
Arabia, 117, 145, 259, 265
Arabs, 110, 124, 138, 164, 255
Ardahan, 328, 330, 333
Argos, 52
Armenia, 48, 55, 117, 329, 332, 336, 339, 340-1, 380
Astrakan, 138
Athens, 95, 181, 264, 343
Austria, 117, 120-3, 128, 155, 157-8, 166, 171-2, 175, 186,
198-200, 202, 225-6, 247, 327, 339
Azoff, 138, 163, 189, 192, 194-6, 207, 210, 220
Babatagh, 236
Baffo, Sultana, 151-5
Bagdad, 56, 117, 123, 160-1, 255-6
Bairactar, 252
Baku, 203
Balaklava, Battle of, 304
Balkans, 25, 28, 33-4, 37, 68-9, 184, 218, 271-3, 276, 326,
330, 335, 342-3, 358, 365
Balta Oghlou, 79
Baltadji, 194-6
Baphæon, Battle of, 16
Barbarossa, 125-6, 130
Barbary States, 160, 164-6
Bashi-bazouks, 319
Bashir, the eunuch, 205, 211
Bassorah, 117
Batak, 319, 320, 342
Batoum, 330
Bayezid I, 38, 40, 44-59
Bayezid II, 98-103
Bayezid, Fortress of, 330, 332
Beaconsfield, Lord, 321-4, 330, 332-3, 337
Beglerbey of Anatolia, 69
Belgrade, 72, 90, 92, 117, 119, 127, 171-2, 178, 183, 185,
187-8, 198, 200, 229, 254, 259, 278
Berbers, 141
Berlin, 189, 342, 354, 356
Berlin Congress, 331-9
Besika Bay, 329
Bessarabia, 213, 220, 225, 231, 236, 306, 330, 374
Beyrout, 290
Bismarck, 331-2, 340, 346
Blake, Admiral, 165
Bonaparte, General, 238-44, 248, 253-4, 257, 292
Bosnia, 33, 37, 39, 41, 43, 53, 67, 71-2, 90-3, 180, 184, 188,
201, 208-9, 228, 252, 310, 318, 320, 332-3, 339, 353, 368
Boucicaut, 52
Bourgas, 276
Bragadino, 140
Brusa, 14-15, 18-19, 21-2, 33-5, 51, 58, 60, 63, 104, 282
Bucharest, 218, 220, 238-54, 259, 271, 366
Bucsacs, Treaty of, 174-5
Buda, 49, 52, 68, 119, 120, 180
Bulair, 363
Bulgaria, Bulgarians, 25, 28, 32, 36-9, 41-4, 47, 53, 69, 155,
157, 185, 231, 253, 272, 276, 296, 310, 315, 319, 327, 329,
330, 333-4, 337-8, 342-3, 357, 363, 368
_Bulgarian Atrocities_, 320-3
Burke, Edmund, 235
Byron, Lord, 263
Byzantium, Byzantines, 21, 22, 24, 28-9, 30, 32-3, 36, 41, 43,
45, 52, 82, 89, 94, 225, 369
Cæsarea, 56
Cage, the, _see_ Seraglio
Cairo, 111-12, 241-4, 251, 258
Calabria, 96, 140
Calafat, 326
Calderan, Battle of, 108
Caliph, 112, 182
Candia, 96, 167, 170, 173, 296;
_see also_ Crete
Canea, 164
Canning, Mr., 267, 270
Canning, Sir Stratford, _see_ Stratford de Redcliffe
Cantacuzene, 26-9
Carlowitz, Treaty of, 189, 190, 192, 196-7, 221
Castriota, 71
Caucasus, 220, 241, 272, 306, 342
Cephalonia, 90
Cerestes, Battle of, 155, 157, 172, 374
Chamber of Turkish Deputies, 348
Chatham, Lord, 232
Chios, 47, 79
Choczim, 175
Cicala Pasha, 155-7, 375
Circassia, 109, 303, 306, 333, 339, 340, 342, 379
Citale, 302
Coburg, 228
Codrington, Admiral, 269
Committee of Union and Progress, 347, 349
Comnenus, 90
Constantine, Emperor, 75, 77-8, 80, 82, 84, 94
Constantine, King of Greece, 359
Constantinople (attacked), 25, 46, 52-3, 61, 65;
capture of, 78-89
Corfu, 126, 197-8, 201
Corinth, 70, 189, 196-7, 264
Corsairs, 124-6, 139, 159, 164-5, 231, 373
Cossacks, 163, 174
Court of Confiscations, 266
Cracow, 177
Crete, 118, 140, 145, 163-4, 166, 173, 175, 240, 264, 280-1,
283, 330, 336, 338, 354, 359-368, 378
Crimea, 90-1, 117, 138, 163, 171, 174, 184, 192-6, 207-8, 210,
212, 217, 223, 225, 227, 232, 304-5, 342, 374
Crimean War, 288-310
Croatia, 180, 229, 248, 374
Crusades, 25, 32, 34, 45, 48-9, 90-1, 163
Cyprus, 139-41, 144-5, 262, 298, 333-4, 368, 374
Dahis, of Bosnia, 246-7
Dalmatia, 144, 181, 201, 248, 374
Damad Pasha, 196-8, 201
Damascus, 55, 169, 264, 281-3
Danube, 32, 39, 41, 49, 52, 66-9, 76, 80, 92, 98, 117, 119,
121, 155, 157, 171, 176-7, 179, 181, 184-5, 193, 235-6
Dardanelles, 33-50, 52, 64, 92, 163, 166, 208, 215, 242,
249-50, 273, 283, 289, 304, 329, 354
Demetrius, Despot of Greece, 94
Demotika, 29, 34, 36
Derby, Lord, 322-6
Dervishes, 62, 65
Deys, 165-6
Diarbekir, 103, 108
Diebitsch, Marshal, 275-8, 375
Divan, the, 147, 186, 191, 198, 213, 218, 225, 236, 245-6, 251,
265, 288
Djem, Prince, 99, 100, 115
Dobrudscha, 327, 330, 366-7
Don, River, 138
Doris, 52
Dragut, 126-7, 130
Druma, River, 37
Duckworth, Admiral, 249-51
Dulcigno, 335
Dundar, 13, 17, 18
Durazzo, 361
Earthquake at Gallipoli, 28
Egypt, 98, 100, 102-3, 109-13, 139, 164, 216, 239, 244-5,
256-8, 265, 269, 281, 283-4, 288-9, 291, 296, 345, 347, 368, 374
Elphinstone, 214-15
England, 158, 229, 231, 248, 279;
_see also_ Great Britain
Enos, 277
Enver Bey, 363, 366-7
Ephesus, 57
Epirus, 255, 330, 332, 336, 338, 344, 363, 368
Erivan, 160-1, 203
Erlau, 183
Ertoghrul, 13, 14, 15, 17, 55
Erzerum, 13, 276, 278, 328, 332, 339
Eski Baba, 33, 369
Eski-Sheir, 15
Eugène, Prince, 183, 187-8, 192, 198, 201, 375
European conquests, 25-6, 28-30, 32
Evizzo, Paul, 93
Evrenos, 33, 37, 52
Ferdinand, Archduke, 119, 120
Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, 338, 354
Fox, Charles James, 232-5
France, 238, 248-9, 257, 268, 271, 279, 282, 284, 290, 294, 345
Galata, 32
Gallipoli, 28, 51, 64, 74, 123
Gaza, 110, 112, 243, 281
Genoa, 25, 32, 67-8, 75, 77, 79, 84, 86, 90, 92
George Brancowitch, 67
George, Prince of Greece, 339
Georgia, 145, 203, 213, 217, 220, 241
Germany, 90, 121, 166, 284, 320, 339, 346, 350, 354, 367
Ghazali, 111
Ghengis Khan, 54
Ghowrem, Sultana, 115-16, 134
Ghowri, 109-11
Gladstone, 310, 314, 320-2, 326, 330, 334-5, 340, 345
Goltz, von der, General, 338, 368
Gran, 179, 180
Great Britain, 232-3, 267, 333, 345, 368
Great Powers, the, 288-9, 290, 301, 307, 313, 323, 325,
334-358, 362, 366, 374
Greece, Greek affairs, 230, 237, 239, 255, 257, 259, 260,
262-4, 266, 268, 271-2, 279, 292, 333, 335-338, 342, 356, 360,
364
Greek Church, 35, 89, 248-9, 267, 299, 314-15
Hafiz, 137
Hamid Emirate, 38, 144
Hassan, 156
Hatti-Humayun, 306-7, 310
Hatti-Scheriff of Ghulkané, 293
Herzegovina, 100, 102, 310, 318, 327, 332-3, 339, 354
Hetairia, 261
Hirsova, 219, 327
Hohenzollern, 49, 313
Holland, 201, 229, 231
Hungary, Hungarian affairs, 33-4, 39, 41, 44-6, 48-9, 50-2,
66-9, 71, 74-5, 78, 90-1, 98, 100, 116-17, 119, 120-2, 128-9,
155, 176, 180-1, 187, 189, 192, 201, 211, 375, 378
Hunkar Iskelesi, Treaty of, 283
Hunyadi, 47, 66-71, 74, 76, 91
Ibrahim, King of Karamania, 93
Ibrahim, Grand Vizier, 116, 119, 120, 123, 132, 134-5
Ibrahim, Sultan, 153, 162-3, 166
Ibrahim Pasha, 264-5, 269, 270-1, 281, 284-5, 291
Ibrail, 273
Iconium, 13
Idebali, 15, 17
Idris, 109
Ilbeki, 34
Indian troops, 321
Inkerman, Battle of, 304
Ionian Islands, 197, 238
Irene, Empress, 29
Islamism, 14, 16, 17, 22, 24, 64, 67, 89, 146, 171, 243, 266,
340, 348, 353, 372, 377
Ismail, 107-8, 123, 231
Jaffa, 243
Janina, 239, 255-6, 336, 362-3
Janissaries, 23, 41-3, 55, 60-1, 70, 74, 76, 84-5, 98, 101-4,
108, 114, 117-18, 131, 146, 152, 154, 159, 165, 178, 183,
187-8, 191, 204, 229, 238, 245-6, 251-2, 256, 265, 377
Jassy, 209, 217, 249
Jassy, Treaty, 223-37
Jerusalem, 221, 281, 294, 298
John Palæologus, 26-7, 29, 32, 34-6, 45, 66
Kainardji, Treaty of, 189, 211
Kaminiec, 174
Karamania, 14-16, 38-9, 46-8, 58, 62, 65, 67-8, 71, 90, 93-4
Kara George, 247-8, 259
Karasi, 22
Karnabet, 276
Kars, 274, 278, 304, 310, 326, 333
Kavalla, 37
Kermia, 38, 62, 65
Khadidjé, Sultana, 204
Khair Bey, 111
Khalil Pasha, 200, 217
Kherson, 225
Khocsim, 209, 213-14, 217
Khorassan, 13, 15
Khorkand, 104
Khurdistan, 103, 108
Kilburn, 217, 220, 225-7
Kilia, 277
Kirk Kilisse, 33, 361, 366-7
Kir Sheir, 56
Knights of St. John, 45, 49, 50-2, 57, 99, 117-18, 127, 240
Komorn, 171
Konia, 13-15, 48, 93, 109, 282
Kosciuszko, 236
Kossova, 39, 44, 71, 369
Kostlidji, 219
Kotchana, 357
Kotchi Bey, 132
Koumanovo, Battle of, 361
Krotzka, 209
Kuban, 236
Kulewtska, Battle of, 275
Kurds, 333, 339, 340
Kutayia, 38
Lalashahin, 33-4, 37
Larissa, 52, 196
Latin Church, 32-3, 35, 67, 69, 77
Latin Empire, 25
Lazar, King of Serbia, 37, 39, 40
Lemberg, 175
Lemnos, 90, 166, 170, 216
Leopold, Prince, 280
Lepanto, Battle of, 101, 142, 370
Lesbos, 90
Little Armenia, 14
Locris, 52
Lorraine, Prince Charles of, 172, 179, 180, 183, 375
Louis (of Baden) Prince, 183, 185
Macedonia, 43, 53, 157, 185, 330, 333, 336, 342, 344, 353, 357,
361, 367, 368, 377
Magnesia, 68, 70, 74
Magyars, 201-2
Mahmoud I, 203-11
Mahmoud II, 252-287
Mahomet I, 59-64
Mahomet II, 73-98
Mahomet III, 151-2
Mahomet IV, 166-83
Mahomet V, 352
Maksyu, 236
Malta, 118, 127, 164, 173, 180, 184, 240, 331
Mamelukes, 100, 102-3, 109, 111, 113, 216, 225, 239, 241, 243,
245, 250, 258
Mansel, Admiral, 165
Manuel, 35-6, 45-6, 52-3, 61, 64, 65
Maritza, Battle of, 369
Matthew, Emperor, 29
Mecca, 109, 112, 256
Medina, 109, 112, 256
Mehemet Ali, 257, 259, 264, 266, 281-91, 331, 345
Mendia, 226
Mentshe, 14, 45
Mesopotamia, 56, 125, 343
Michael Palæologus, 16
Midhat Pasha, 324-5
Military service, 23-4, 41, 47
Milosch Kobilowitch, 39, 40
Milosch Obrenowitch, 259
Mingrelia, 217, 220
Missolonghi, 264
Mohacz, 119, 157, 172, 180, 369
Moldavia, 155, 175, 193, 206-9, 210, 213, 217, 220-1, 226, 228,
236, 249, 253, 255, 266, 271-2, 278, 281, 300, 306
Moltke, 274, 278, 284
Monastir, 37, 300, 361
Mongols, 13, 369
Montenegro, 196, 212, 320, 328, 330, 332, 335, 359, 362, 365,
367
Moors, 101, 125, 164
Moravia, 171
Morea, 181, 189, 192, 196-7, 201, 212, 214, 218, 256, 259,
261-3, 269, 271, 279, 378
Morocco, 127
Morosini, 173, 181, 184, 196
Mosques, 97, 109, 340
Mossul, 117, 123
Mouhsinzade, 213-15, 218-19, 221
Muley-Hasan, 125, 140
Murad I, 31-44
Murad II, 64-73
Murad III, 145-51
Murad IV, 153
Murad V, 316
Musa, 60, 61
Mustapha, 65
Mustapha I, 152
Mustapha II, 186-91
Mustapha III, 211-23
Mustapha IV, 251-2
Napier, Admiral, 290
Naples, 242
National Assembly, 349, 350
Navarino, 101, 197, 262, 264, 269, 270-2, 281
Nazib, Battle of, 284, 288
Negropont, 47
Nelson, Admiral, 240, 242
Neuhausel, 171-2, 175, 180
Nevers, Count de, 48, 51
Nicea, 14, 21, 22, 25
Nicomedia, 14, 21, 22
Nicopolis, 39, 45, 47, 49, 51-3, 327, 369
Nicosia, 139
Nicotika, 26
Nisch, 37, 67, 185, 248, 328
Novi-Bazar, 354
Nubia, 117
Oczakoff, 220, 225, 227, 232-4, 236
Odessa, 261
Oltenitza, 302
Omar Pasha, 291, 302, 304
Oran, 117, 124, 127, 130, 146
Orchan, 18, 20-31
Orloff, Prince, 214, 216, 224
Orsova, 230, 278
Osmanlis, 17, 51
Othman I, 13-20
Othman II, 152
Othman III, 211
Otho, King, 280
Otranto, 90-1, 98
Ouloudj, 139, 141-2, 144-5
Padishah, 101, 155-6, 163, 182, 205
Paget, Lord, 188-9
Palmerston, Lord, 282, 289, 290-1, 314
Passarowitch, Treaty of, 189-202
Patriarch, Greek, 29, 83, 88, 262, 314
Pears, Sir E., 319
Pelecanon, Battle of, 21
Persia, 103, 105-9, 115-17, 123, 126, 129, 145, 158, 160-1,
192, 196, 203
Peterwardein, 52, 185, 201, 209
Pfalfi, 155-6
Phalerum, Battle of, 264
Pharsalia, Battle of, 52
Philippopolis, 37, 181, 342
Piale Pasha, 130, 139
Pitt, William, 232-5
Plevna, 327-8
Podolia, 174-5, 189, 374
Poland, 67, 78, 120, 171, 174-6, 184, 189, 194, 212, 217-18,
220, 230, 233, 272
Poros, 264
Portugal, 127
Potemkin, Prince, 231, 236
Presburg, 120
Prussia, 212, 217, 229, 231-4, 284, 288, 313
Raab, 172-3, 178
Raghab Pasha, 212
Ragusa, 31, 201
Retino, 164
Rhodes, 57, 90-1, 96, 98, 112-13, 117, 242, 244
Ridania, 111
Roe, Sir Thomas, 158
Roostem, Grand Vizier, 132-3, 153
Roumania, 313, 326, 328, 364-7, 374
Roumelia, 131, 133, 331
Roumelia, East, 331-2, 337
Roxelana, _see_ Ghowrem
Russia, 102, 131, 138, 174-6, 184, 188-9, 192-3, 203, 206, 212,
214, 220, 226, 231, 248, 253, 268, 271-7, 294, 313, 326, 366
Rustchuk, 218, 252, 254
Salankemen, Battle of, 185
Salonika, 66, 71-2, 260, 262, 320, 347, 349, 352, 360, 365
Samakof, Battle of, 37, 369
Samarkand, 54, 58
San Stefano, 329, 330-3
Saoudji, 35-6
Sarandoporus, Battle of, 360
Sarukhan, 14, 16, 22, 45
Scanderbeg, 71, 92, 95
Schiis, 105, 109
Schumla, 39, 218-19, 254, 272-3, 275-6
Scios, 231, 260
Seadeddin, 86, 156-7
Sebastopol, 282, 304-5
Selim I, 103-14
Selim II, 136-45
Selim III, 227-51
Seljukian Turks, 13, 14, 16
Semendria, 185, 201, 208, 229
Seraglio, 152, 155, 161, 182, 185, 191, 205, 212, 219, 251,
316, 376
Serbia, 25-8, 32-3, 37-9, 41, 43-5, 49, 50, 53, 57, 61, 67-9,
71, 74, 90, 184, 192, 200, 208, 228, 239, 246-8, 255, 259, 260,
266, 271-2, 278, 281, 296, 313, 320, 330, 333, 337, 342, 364-5
Serinvar, 172, 175
Serres, 37
Seymour, Sir Hamilton, 294-7
Sheik ul Islam, 348-9
Shipka Pass, 327-8
Siawousch, Pasha, 181, 183
“Sick man of Europe,” 295-6
Sigismund, King, 46-9, 50, 66
Silistria, 39, 47, 218-19, 254, 273, 275, 303, 305, 367
Silvatorok, Treaty of, 158, 172
Sinope, Battle of, 303
Sistova, 49, 247, 254
Sivas, 48, 55, 57
Slatino, 226
Slavery, 24, 47, 66, 100, 109, 139, 241, 265, 373
Slavonia, 181, 189
Slavs, 16, 17, 201, 263, 314, 320, 342
Slivno, 276
Smith, Admiral Sir Sidney, 243
Smyrna, 45, 57, 62
Sobieski, 174-9, 375
Sofia, 37, 185, 328, 337, 342
Solyman I, 114-36
Solyman II, 183-5
Solyman, Shah, 13
Solyman, Prince, 25-7, 29
Sophia, St., 77, 82, 86-7, 182
Soudan, 146, 259, 298
Spahis, 131, 138, 154, 162-33, 166, 246, 248
Spain, 117, 124, 126-7, 140-1
Stephen Dushan, King of Serbia, 25, 27
Stephen (of Serbia), 44, 50, 56, 67
Stopford, Admiral, 290
Stratford de Redcliffe, Lord, 282, 287, 292-3, 298, 300, 307-9,
310
Strumnitza, 366
Styria, 52, 122, 171
Suez, 127, 138, 240, 243, 323
Sugut, 15
Sultan (title), 21, 31
Sultan (accession murders), 40, 65, 96, 104, 152
Sultana Validé, 151, 153, 157, 160-3, 166, 169, 182, 205
Sunnites, 105
Suvorov, 219, 226-8, 231, 375
Sweden, 192, 194, 230, 234
Syria, 100, 103, 109, 111-13, 242, 264, 281, 283-4, 288-9, 343,
377
Syrmia, 46, 52, 260, 262
Szegeddin, 68
Szigeth, 128
Tabriz, 106, 108, 123, 138, 203
Tahmasp, Shah, 115, 123, 204, 206
Tartars, 54-9, 138, 163, 174, 176, 178, 184, 217, 220, 223,
342, 379
Tchatalja, lines of, 362, 364
Tchorlu, 29, 33
Tekke, Emirate of, 38, 46
Temesvar, 184, 187-8, 194, 226
Teutonic Knights, 49, 67
Theodora, 26-7
Theodore Palæologus, 52
Theodosius, 78
Thermopylæ, 52
Thessaly, 278, 280, 330, 332, 336, 338-9
Thomas, Despot in Greece, 94
Thrace, 369, 370
Timurlane, 53-9, 62, 76
Tirnova, 39, 47, 182, 327
Torchan, Sultana, 167, 169
Tourman Bey, 111
Transylvania, 119, 155, 158, 172, 181, 185-6, 189
Trebizond, 14, 89, 90, 106, 276
Tripoli, 117, 124, 127, 130, 169, 201, 281, 283, 354, 356, 359
Tripolitza, 261-2
Tughra, 31
Tunis, 121, 124, 126, 144-5, 158, 160, 164-5, 201, 347, 354,
370, 374
Turk (the name), 17
Tzympe, 26-8
Ukraine, 174, 176, 272, 374
Ulemas, 162, 182, 265
Vacouf lands, 266
Valtetsi, 261
Varna, 69, 218-19, 271-3, 304, 369
Vascar, 172
Venezelos, M., 357
Venice, Venetians, 25, 35, 50, 62, 66-8, 71, 75, 78, 90-1, 93,
95, 98, 101, 124, 126-7, 141-2, 164, 170, 173, 180-1, 184, 189,
192, 196-7, 201, 238, 378
Vienna, 91, 116, 120-3, 126, 176-9, 182
Viziers, 17, 20, 58, 60, 73, 75, 92, 103, 115-16, 119, 133,
136, 147, 166, 168-91, 205, 253
Voivode, 95, 119, 181
Volga, 138
Wallachia, 33, 39, 46-7, 49, 50, 52-3, 59, 61, 67, 69, 72, 76,
90-1, 95-6, 155, 175, 192, 200-1, 207, 209, 217, 220-1, 236,
249, 253, 255, 266, 271-2, 278, 281, 300
Warardin, 184
Warsaw, 177
Wartersleben, General, 226
Warzen, 180
White, Sir W., 337
Widdin, 47, 49, 183, 185, 208, 239, 247, 255-6
Wlad, 95-6
Wolff, Sir Henry Drummond, 346
Yemen, 117, 127, 130, 138, 145
Young Turks, 349, 352-69, 379
Zante, 189
Zapolya, Count, 119, 120, 123
Zenta, Battle of, 187-8
Zriny, 128
Zurawna, Treaty of, 175, 193
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