Turkish Empire
From the Catholic Encyclopedia
Created in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries on the ruins of the Byzantine Empire, from the caliphate of Baghdad and independent Turkish principalities. It occupies a territory of 1,114,502 sq. miles, with a population estimated at 25,000,000 inhabitants, and extends over parts of Asia, Africa, and Europe between the Eastern Mediterranean, the Black Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the Red Sea. The Turkish Empire thus possesses some of the most important highways by land and sea, between these three continents.
I. GEOGRAPHY
A. The Balkan Peninsula (European Turkey)
The Balkan Peninsula (European Turkey), divided into eight provinces or vilayets, comprises the plateaux and terraces which extend to the south-east of the uplands of the Alps between the Adriatic, the Archipelago, and the Black Sea. Turkey still possesses Albania and Epirus, a vast plateau covered with towering mountain ranges (Techar-Dagh, 10,000 ft.) and with uplands stretching from the north-west to the south-east which reach as far as the Pindus; the coastal plains of the Adriatic and the small inland levels (Scutari Lake, Lake Ochrida, plains of Monastir d'Uskuf and of Yanina) are separated by very high ridges; Macedonia, a plain richly cultivated with vines, cereals, and tobacco, includes within the mountains of Macedonia to the west, Rhodope (9842 feet) to the north, Olympus to the south-west, the sharp and rocky peninsula of Chalcidice to the southeast; its only outlet, the port of Salonica (144,000 inhabitants), situated at the opening of an historical trade highway which ascends to the valley of the Vardar as far as Uskub, and over a hill of 1640 feet leads to the valley of the Bulgarian Morawa and as far as the Danube (railway route from Belgrade to Salonica): the plain of Thrace, bordering on the Archipelago and the Sea of Marmora, forming the lower level of the valley of the Maritza, of which Eastern Rumelia represents the upper. Cultivation is broken by the great stretch of sterile plateaux; the only important city in the interior is Adrianople (125,000 inhabitants), but at the extremity of the peninsula situated between the Black Sea, the Archipelago, and the Sea of Marmora, stands Constantinople, which occupies, on the Bosporus, one of the finest strategetical positions of the old continent. This metropolis of 1,500,000 inhabitants is at the cross-roads formed by the great waterway which connects the Black Sea with the Mediterranean, and by the overland route (followed by a railway) which reaches the valley of the Danube by way of Adrianople, Philippopoli, Sofia, and Belgrade. It is composed of the Turkish city of Stamboul, of the European districts of Galata and Pera separated by the natural roadstead of the Golden Horn, and of the suburbs of Scutari, Haïdar-Pacha, and Kadi Keui. These settlements are on both sides of the Bosporus, in Europe and Asia. On account of its military and commercial importance and its population composed of all the races of the earth, Constantinople is a typical cosmopolitan city.
The Peninsula of Asia Minor, or Plateau of Anatolia
Important for the richness of its coastal plains and its geographical situation; the construction of the railway from Constantinople to Baghdad (in 1912, 781 miles of track open for traffic from Constantinople to Boulgourlou by Eski-Chehir and Konieh) will result in a rebirth of this ancient country; a German company is at present fertilizing the plain of Konieh, diverting for this purpose the waters of a lake.
C. Syria
A narrow strip of land, 500 miles long by 93 wide, lies between Asia Minor; Egypt, the Mediterranean, and the Desert. It is traversed by the two parallel ridges of Libanus (ranging from three or four thousand to nine thousand feet) and Anti-Libanus, separated by a deep depression, the Gôr bounded on the north by the valley of the Orontes, on the south by that of the Jordan, which abuts on the gorge of the Dead Sea, 1200 feet below the sea level. The most important centres are the ports of Beirut (185,000 inhabitants), St. Jean d'Acre, and Jaffa (55,000 inhabitants), whence starts the railway to Jerusalem (115,000 inhabitants). The largest city is Damascus (350,000 inhabitants) in the middle of an oasis of luxuriant vegetation, one of the chief industrial centres of the Orient.
D. Mesopotamia and Turkish Armenia, or Kurdistan
Separated from Syria by the Great Desert, extends on the north to Anatolia and Armenia by the vast mountain ranges of Kurdistan, 13,000 feet, intercepted from the plains in the interior by Lake Van, whence flow the Tigris and the Euphrates, whose alluvial valleys are marvelously fertile; corn, wheat, barley, grain, one might say, originated here. Cotton may be also found in abundance, rice and plantations of date palms, and fruit-trees of every kind. The leading centres of Armenia are Erzerum, Van, and Ourfa. In Mesopotamia Mossoul (69,000 inhabitants), Baghdad (125,000 inhabitants), and Bassorah give but a feeble idea of the once great cities of Ninive, Babylon, and Seleucia-Ctesiphon.
E. The Peninsula of Arabia
The Peninsula of Arabia is a spacious desert plateau, bounded by immense mountain ranges, which rise over 9000 feet above the Red Sea. Scarcely a seventh of this vast territory (over 1,000,000 sq. miles) is dependent on the sultan, and that more nominally than in reality. The volcanic plateau of the centre (Nedjed or Arabia Petraea) is almost a desert. The population has flocked to the coast districts (Hedjaz and Yemen, or Arabia Felix). The only important centres are the sacred cities of the Mussulmans: Mecca (60,000 inhabitants) with its port Djeddah, where the Caaba, which preserves the "black stone" of Abraham, draws each year numerous pilgrims from all points of the Moslem world, and Medina (50,000 inhabitants), where Mohammed resided and died. The possession of these cities lends great political importance to the Turkish Government. A railway, intended to unite Damascus to Mecca, was laid to Medina in 1908.
F. Tripolitana
Tripolitana, occupied largely at present (1912) by the Italians, is in reality the Saharan coast of the Mediterranean. It is composed of plains of sand and rocky plateaux, to the east the plateau of Barka(ancient Cyrenaica whose coasts in antiquity were very fertile), the oasis and city of Tripoli (30,000 inhabitants), and the inland the oasis of Ghadames. On this territory of 462,767 sq. miles there are scarcely one million inhabitants. The principal resources and in the oases date palms.
II. HISTORY
The countries which form this immense territory represent what remains of the conquests of the Ottomans, a Turkish tribe originally from Khorassan, which emigrated into Asia Minor about 1224, at the time of the cataclysm produced in Central Asia by the Mongolian invasion of Jenghiz-Khan. The chiefs of the tribe of the Kei-Kankali became the mercenaries of the Seljuk emirs of Asia Minor. One of them, Othman, proclaimed himself independent at the end of the thirteenth century, and took the title of sultan, or padishah. Under Orkhan was organized with some Christian captives the permanent militia of the Janissaries; and then began incessant war between the Ottomans and the Byzantine Empire. In 1359 Suleiman entered Europe by the occupation of Gallipoli. Murad established himself at Adrianople (1360) and attacked the Slavonic peoples of the Balkans. The battle of Kossovo (1389) gave him Servia. The struggle continued until the taking of Constantinople by Mahomet II, who put an end to the Byzantine Empire (1453) and conquered the Peloponnesus (1462), Negropont (1467), Trebzond (1470), Bosnia, and Wallachia. He died in 1481, after failing to take Belgrade and Rhodes, but achieving the conquest of Anatolia as far as the Euphrates, and the peninsula of the Balkans as far as the Danube. To these conquests Selim I added Azerbaidjan, Syria, and Egypt (1517), Diarbekir and Mesopotamia (1518); he received from Mecca the banner of the prophet, and took the title of caliph, which assures to the Sultan of Constantinople the spiritual authority over all the Mussulmans of the world.
Soliman I took Rhodes from the Knights of St. John (1522) and conquered Hungary while Khaireddin Barbarossa subjected the Barbary States (1522). Selim II took possession of the Island of Cyprus (1570), but the Turkish domination had reached the limits of its extension. Soliman had been unable to take either Vienna (1526) or Malta (1562), and in 1571 the great victory of the Christian fleet at Lepanto weakened the naval power of the Turks in the Mediterranean. At the end of the sixteenth century The Turkish Empire had attained the zenith of its power on land. The siege of Vienna of 1683, which failed thanks to the intervention of the King of Poland, John Sobieski, marks the last aggressive attempt of the Turks on the West. Henceforth the western powers encroach on the Turkish Empire and begin its dismemberment. In 1699 by the treaty of Karlovitz the Sultan ceded Hungary and Transylvania to Austria. It is true that in 1739 the Turks succeeded in retaking Belgrade, but this was their last military success. The powerful militia of the Janissaries was of no further use; the administration was corrupt and venal. Moreover, the Turks were unable to impede the progress of Russia; in 1774 by the treaty of Kainardji the Turks ceded to Russia the Crimea and the coasts of the Black Sea, and to Austria Rumanian Bukowina. The French Revolution of 1789 saved Turkey from the project of division planned by Catherine II; the Peace of Jassy (1792) restored only a part of Bessarabia of the Dniester. Egypt, occupied in 1789, surrendered to Turkey in 1800, but in the most precarious condition. After the nineteenth century began the forward movement of the Christian nationalities which had submitted up to that time to Turkish domination; public opinion in Europe upheld this movement, and the governments themselves were won over. Meanwhile the rival ambitions of the powers prevented the "Eastern Question" from being regulated in a definitive manner. In 1821 the insurrection of the Greeks, supported by Europe, ended in the creation of the Kingdom of Greece (Treaty of Adrianople, 1829; and Conference of London, 1831).
The Servians formed an autonomous principality as early as 1830, and in 1832 the Pasha of Egypt, Mehemet-Ali, revolted; his independence was conceded to him in 1841, on condition that he would recognize the suzerainty of the sultan. In vain the Turks tried to reform; after the massacre and the dissolution of the Janissaries (1826) Mahmoud organized an army resembling the European, established military schools and a newspaper, and imposed the European costume on his subjects. In 1839 Abdul-Medjid organized the Tanzimât (new regime) and accorded to his subjects a real charter, liberty, religious toleration and promises of a liberal government. In 1854 the Tsar Nicholas of Russia strove to take up again the project of Catherine II, and to do away with "the sick man". Protected by France and England, Turkey kept, at the Congress of Paris (1856), all of its territory save Moldavia and Wallachia, which were declared autonomous. The Hatti-Humayoun of 16 Feb., 1856, proclaimed the admission of Christians to all employments and equality with other subjects before the law, but after the Liberal government of Fuad Pasha they resumed their former ways. On all sides the provinces revolted, and about 1875 formed the party of Young Turkey, desirous of reforming the empire on the European model.
Two sultans, Abdul-Aziz and Murad, were successively deposed. A new sultan, Abdul-Hamid, proclaimed on 23 Dec., 1876, a constitution resembling the European with a parliament and responsible ministers; but the reforming grand vizier Midhat Pasha was strangled, and the opening of parliament was no more than a comedy. Europe decided to act, and in 1877 Russia took the lead and sent an army across the Balkans, after the difficult siege of Plevna and would have entered Constantinople had it not been for the intervention of an English fleet. The treaty of San Stefano (March, 1878) established a Grand Principality of Bulgaria, and cut Turkey in Europe into many sections. Bismarck, alarmed by the progress of Russia, had this treaty revised at the Congress of Berlin (1878); the independent Bulgarian principality was reduced to Moesia to the north of the Balkans; Eastern Rumelia alone was autonomous, and Macedonia remained Turkish. The independence of Servia, Montenegro, and Rumania was sanctioned. Greece received Thessaly; Austria occupied Bosnia and Herzegovina; England established herself in the Island of Cyprus. This treaty, ratified by all the powers, was followed by new dismemberments. In 1855 Eastern Rumelia was annexed to Bulgaria. In 1897 Crete revolted, and tried to reunite Greece. After the victorious campaign of his army in Thessaly the sultan kept the sovereignty of Crete, but with an autonomous Christian governor, a son of the King of Greece.
In contrast to his predecessors, who had sought to restore their country by reforming it, the Sultan Abdul-Hamid established a regime of ferocious repression against the Young Turks, who were partisans of the reforms. A formidable police pursued all those who were suspected of Liberal ideas, and an unpitying censorship undertook the impossible task of depriving Turkey of European publications; the introduction of the most inoffensive books, such as Baedeker's guides, was prohibited. Emissaries everywhere revived Mussulman fanaticism; to the claims of the Armenian revolutionaries the Sultan responded by frightful massacres of the Armenians of Constantinople (Sept., 1895), followed soon by the slaughter which in 1896 drenched Kurdistan with blood; everywhere Armenians were tracked, and isolated massacres of Christians became also the normal order of events in Macedonia
Educated in Western ideas, the Young Turks, especially the refugees at Paris, united as early as 1895, and succeeded in spite of prohibitions in circulating in Turkey their journal the "Mechveret". A Committee of Union and Progress was even formed at Constantinople, and by constant propaganda succeeded in gaining to its cause the greater number of the officials. The uprising, the preparation of which deceived the Hamidian police, began 23 July, 1908, at Salonica; an ultimatum was sent to the sultan, who, abandoned even by his Albanians, proclaimed the re-establishment of the constitution (24 July, 1908) in the midst of indescribable enthusiasm, and called a parliament (4 Dec., 1908).
In three months 300 journals were started. Abroad, the counterstroke to this revolution was the definitive annexation, proclaimed by the Emperor of Austria, of Bosnia and Herzegovina (3 Oct., 1908). At the same time the Prince of Bulgaria took the title of Tsar of the Bulgarians (6 Oct., 1908), and repudiated the vassalage which still connected him with the sultan.
This exterior check weakened the Young Turk party, and on 13 April, 1909, a counter-revolution of Softas and soldiers of the guard broke out in Constantinople. The Young Turks had to flee the capital, but immediately the troops of Salonica, Monastir, and Adrianople consolidated and marched against Constantinople and laid siege to it (17 April, 1909). Negotiations continued for six days; finally at the moment when the massacre of the Christians seemed imminent, the Salonican troops entered Constantinople, and after a short battle became masters of the place. On 27 April Abdul-Hamid was forced to sign his abdication, and banished to Salonica. A son of Abdul-Medjid was made sultan under the name of Mohammed V, and a new constitution was proclaimed, 5 Aug., 1909, the Committee of Union and Progress superintending its execution with dictatorial powers. To-day Turkey is on the road, to reform and political reorganization.
III. RACES, NATIONALITIES, AND RELIGIONS
According to a tradition which dates back to the earliest antiquity, Oriental nationalities did not commonly form compact groups settled within well-defined boundaries. As a result of violent transmigrations of peoples owing to hurricane-like invasions, or even by the simple chance of migrations due to economic causes, all the races of the Orient are mingled in an inextricable manner, and there is not a single city of the Ottoman Empire which does not contain specimens of all races, languages, and religions. The population has therefore an entirely heterogeneous character; the Turks have never made any effort to assimilate their subjects; they do not appear even to have attempted to propagate Islamism widely. Until the constitution of 1876, and in fact as late as the revolution of 1908, they have jealously striven to safeguard their privileges as conquerors. Up to the present time the population of the empire may be said to be divided into three classes:
- The Mussulmans (Turks, Arabs, Servians, Albanians), enjoying alone the right of holding office, the only landowners, but subject to military service.
- The Raias (flocks), or infidels, conquered peoples who have obtained the right of preserving their religion, but barred from all office and subjected to heavy tax. It was upon them that the despotism of the pashas was exercised. They are still, following the creed to which they belong, divided into "nations" governed by religious authorities, Christian bishops, Jewish rabbis, responsible to the sultan, but provided with certain jurisdiction over their faithful.
- European subjects, established in Turkey for religious or commercial reasons, and under the official protection and jurisdiction of the ambassadors of the Powers. Many of the raïas of class have, however, succeeded in obtaining this privilege.
In 1535 the first "capitulation" was signed between the King of France, Francis I, and the Sultan Soliman. It accorded to France the protectorate over all the Christians. This agreement was often renewed, in 1604, 1672, 1740, and 1802. At the treaty of Kainardji Russia obtained a similar right of protection over the Orthodox Christians. The rights of France to the protection of Catholics of all nationalities have been recognized repeatedly by the Holy See, and particularly by the Encyclical of Leo XIII "Aspera rerum conditio" (22 May, 1886). The treaty of Berlin left to each state the care of protecting its subjects, but in practice France preserves the protectorate over Catholics, and even the diplomatic rupture between France and the Holy See has not impaired these civil rights. Each of the Great Powers has therefore considerable interests in the Turkish Empire: each one its own postal autonomy, courts, schools, and organizations for propaganda, teaching, and charity.
The Young Turk party, in power to-day, dreams of overthrowing this arrangement. The new constitution granted by the Sultan Mohammed V, 5 Aug., 1909, proclaims the equality of all subjects in the matter of taxes, military service, and political rights. For the first time Christians are admitted into the army, and the parliament, which meets at Constantinople, is chosen indiscriminately by all the races. The effect of this new regime appears to be, in the view of the Young Turks, the establishment of a common law for all subjects, the suppression of all privileges and capitulations. But the religious communities, or millets, hold to the ancient statutes which have safe-guarded their race and religion; the three oldest, those of the Greeks, the Armenians, and Jews, date back to the day following the taking of Constantinople by Mohammed II.
The rest of the European powers have in the Turkish Empire, political, economic, and religious interests of considerable importance; a certain number of public services, such as that of the public debt, or institutions like the Ottoman Bank, have an international character. The same holds good of most of the companies which are formed to execute public works, docks, railways, etc. . . The trade in exports and imports involves large sums of money, as one may judge by the following table:
FOREIGN COMMERCE FROM 1 MARCH, 1908, TO 28 FEBRUARY, 1909 (IN PIASTRES)
| Country |
