Ottoman Sultanate

Ottoman Sultanate دولت عليه عثمانيه
Flag
Capital	Konja
Largest city	Aleppo
Official languages	Ottoman
Recognised regional languages	Arabic Greek Kurmandschi Armenian Aramaic
Demonym	Ottoman Turkish
Government	Constitutional monarchy and caliphate under a military dictatorship
Currency	Ottoman lira

The Ottoman Sultanate (Western Turkish: دولت عليه عثمانيه‎, Dewlet-e Alije-e Osmanije, /dev.let.ɯ alijje.ɯ osˈmɑːnije/), commonly known as Turkey and formerly in English as the Ottoman Empire, is a country located in western Asia. It borders several nations including Russia, Persia, Rumelia, the Mesopotamian states, Nejd, and the Hejaz.

Founded in the 13th century, the empire became a constitutional monarchy in 1888, followed by the rise of the Orkhonists, who governed the country until the partition of the Ottoman state after the Great War. Since the 1930s, the Sultanate, has been largely dominated by the Iskenderohlu family's military government alongside a number of minor cliques.

History

Main article: Ottoman history

From the late 1650s to around 1700, the Ottoman government was dominated by the ethnic Albanian Koepruelue family and the Sultan Mehmed IV, who ruled for almost half a century. The Great Turkish War of the late 17th century pitted the Ottomans against numerous European rivals, led to the loss of much of Hungary to the Austrian Empire, the Morea to Venice, and Steppe lands to Poland.

The Tulip period of the early 18th century, named for the imperial court's love of tulips and the rise of the Dutch empire, saw a cultural renaissance in the country. Territories in eastern Europe, namely Slavonia, Serbia, and Banat, were lost to Austria in the 1730s. After the war, administrations under Bejasid III and Mahmud I promulgated the Edict of Reorganization, which drastically reoriented the Ottoman Empire's diplomatic policies and ideology, as well as fostering economic and social transformation.

The 19th century is often called the Ottomans' Asr-e-Tebdil, the 'century of change'. Pax Ottomanica was broken in 1811, when Spiga's French republic declared war on the Ottomans, bringing them into the Augustine Wars. Emerging victorious three years later in the Congress of Vienna, the empire asserted their dominance over the eastern Mediterranean with the annexation of the Venetian Morea and Malta. From 1820 to 1836, the Ottomans constructed the Suez Canal alongside Britain and Genoa. In 1837, the Treaty of Adrianople guaranteed British ships free access. In 1884, Russia and Austria went to war against the Ottomans. This had disastrous consequences, including the breakaway of Moldavia, Wallachia, and Illyria, the Austrian annexation of Bosnia, and Russia's capture of Bessarabia and the Crimean Khanate. A year later, the Ottoman state broke the Treaty of Edirne with the United Kingdom, leading to the Anglo-Ottoman War of 1885 and the British occupation of Egypt.

After the defeats of the past decade, the Grand Congress was established in 1888, transforming the empire into a constitutional monarchy. Two ideologies vied for power in the late 19th century; Hatayism and Orkhonism. The latter eventually succeeded in gaining significant influence in the government in 1903 and establishing a close alliance with the new Bejasid IV in 1910. Hamza Kojundschu, the leader of the Orkhonist party, aimed to create an Ottoman national identity through extensive Turkification of Syria, Mesopotamia, Rumelia, and other majority-minority regions. After Konjundschu's unexpected death in 1914, Oguen Oesstekin was appointed Grand Vizier. His revanchist administration promoted authoritarianism and ultramonarchism, renewing territorial claims on the Crimea and Egypt. In 1929, the increasingly militarized state established an alliance with their former enemies Austria and France, creating the Tripartite Coalition.

In the spring of 1935, Oesstekin's government declared war on Russia, beginning the Great War. In the early phase of the war, the Ottoman military occupied large swathes of southern Russia, the Crimea, and Egypt. The country also supported Austria's invasion of Poland and Orkhonist Turkestan's independence war against the Russians. In 1938, Tripolitania and Tunisia fell to enemy forces, followed by a series of rapid and successful revolts in Mesopotamia and Arabia. The Russian capture of Constantinople in April led to Ottoman surrender. Following their defeat, the empire's European territories broke away and formed the Rumelian National Republic, while Constantinople was made a Russo-Rumelian condominium. The Congress of Amsterdam of 1939 stripped the Ottoman Empire of their lands in Mesopotamia, Arabia, Africa, Europe, and Cyprus.

List of leaders

List of monarchs

Name	Reign
Mehmed IV	1642	1693
Ahmed II	1693	1710
Mustafa II	1710	1728
Bejasid III	1728	1748
Mahmud I	1748	1774
Ahmed III	1774	1783
Mahmud II	1783	1784
Ahmed IV	1784	1806
Mehmed V	1806	1819
Mustafa III	1819	1837
Selim III	1837	1863
Osman III	1863	1884
Selim II	1884	1910
Bejasid IV	1910	1936