VENICE
This city state features a lot in European and Ottoman chronicles. It was in fact a great and very resourceful empire with colonies all around the Mediterranean and over the Russian steppes unto Siberia. It was perhaps the greatest naval power at the time we are discussing and only Spain surpassed it as from the 16th century (and later England). Another Italian port city, namely Genoa was their leser and occasional allies against the Turks and others. Their oligarchic (elected by the Senate) leader was called the doge (duke) and its gold coin the ducat. We shall see more of Venice later.
NICOPLOIS
In 1394 Pope Boniface IX organized another Crusade against the Turks. All European powers including England responded to the call, took up the cross and under king Sigismund of Hungary re-tried their luck. After running roughshod over fringe Ottoman territories in Europe their first major engagement was the investment of the crucial Turkish stronghold at Nicopolis. The Turkish commnder Doghan bey found himself surrounded by a horde of breath-taking size distributed all around the uneven land irregularly as far as the eye could see. Yildirim got the bad news and unable to trust or wait for anybody he rode alone at breakneck speed more than a hundred miles to Nicopolis. Slippiing through the Crusader lines at night he materialized under the walls of the castle and shouted up “Bre Doghan!”. Providentially Doghan bey was watching the terrain from a towerlet on the walls instantly recognized the padishah’s voice (Since some time then the Ottoman sultans were titled as ‘padishah’- emperor). Doghan bey shouted back “Padishahim, seni Allah gonderdi” (O my padishah, Allah has sent you just in time), “Come to your sevnats rescue”. “Don’t worry bre Doghan, I shall be with you within a few days, just hold fast”.
He kept his promise and descended on the Crusaders with such surprise and stealth that they were quickly overpowered, masaively decimated or put to flight and great numbers of French, Italian, Spanish, English, German, Hungarian etc nobles were brought hands-tied to Yildirim as prisoners. He treated them honourably and set them free adding “I am setting you free so that you come back with even a bigger force and I again defeat you for more glory to Islam”. None returned.
THE WANTON BATTLE OF ANKARA
In the meantime Yildirim Bayezid continued with the Ottoman absorption of the other useless Turkish beyliks all of which caused further impious pleadings for help in distant the court of Timur in Samarkand. As if having no other wrongs to avenge as the greatest emperor of Muslims of the age he massed his enormous resources for an expedition to west to reduced to subjection all Muslim (or Christian) powers on his path and teach the upstart Ottomans a lesson. From 1393 he began his occupation of Iraq and eastern Anatolia eventually camping in Azerbaijan. If some beys took refuge with Timur, some others took with Bayezid. Timur demanded their extradition to him and Bayezid naturally refused. But ironically enough Timur always adopted a very polite if patronizing correspondence with Bayezid while the latter as much puffed up with pride as prowess answered in extreme bad temper and with unpardonable insults. In one of his letters he began with “Ey Timur denen Kudurmush kopek”, i.e, “O you rabid dog called Timur”.
Thus badly compromising his righteous cause and offending man and Allah alike with his excessive arrogance and hubris he gave Timur all the right keys to play the tunes of his campaign orchestra. Additionally Bayezid felt confident on account of having field guns which didn’t. Timur’s answer to guns were his elephants but what these innocent and good-natured animals could do against devastating cannon fire throwing heavy stone balls at phenomenal speeds. One right hit was sure to eliminate an elephant instantly. So, when the two great Muslim armies sinfully met the battle naturally went Bayazid’s way or appeared so. What Timur was doing was countering Bayezids only skill his ferocity with many skills of his own. Unlike Bayezid Timur aws not only an equally brilliant general like his great grandfather Jenghis Khan but an accomplished diplomat and spymaster. Like Amr and Muawia in the battle of Siffin, when he saw Bayezid’s victory looming he ordered all the flags of all beys on the Bayezid’s side to be unfurled and callers announce that beys who wanted to throw off the Ottoman yoke report to Timur’s camp. Nothing could be more irresistible to Bayezid’s reluctant Turkish vassals. Soon they changed sides and turned on their hated ex-master. Only Bayezid’s Christian contingents from his Christian vassals put up a stiff resistance but soon they also saw their chance for freedom and ran away.
Dead tired from fighting personally against mounting odds Bayezit took to flight as well, was pursued by the terrible Mongol horsemen of Timur and captured when his horse collapsed from fatigue. Taken to Timur the latter retained his good humor while Bayezid sulked in uspeakable dejection and shame. At one early moment Timur mischievously chuckled and Bayezid asked indignantly “What are you laughing at?”. “Don’t worry my brother, I am not laughing at your tragic discomfiture, kings do not show such disrespect to fellow kings. What I am laughing at is that of all people Allah found a lame and a blind to make the kings of this world” alluding to the well-known weak eyesight of Bayezid. He then, with Bayezid in tow in a golden cage advanced west capturing and pillaging all in his way, Muslim or Christian and eventually reaching Smyrna (Izmir) on the Aegean which city’s owners the notoriously hardly and valorous Venetians fled in terror well before the new Jenghis arrived. The whole Europe trembled as the news of the unstoppable advance of Timur reached them and the terror was such that none even contemplated putting up resistance let alone launch another Crusade. But Timur had other things on his mind. He couldn’t afford to walk too far away from home for the fear that another hawk back at home raided his nest. Furthermore he had already satisfied both his curiosity and vanity in the claustrophobic small west and his heart’s real desire was conquering that vast Asia of his, especially the twin top prizes India and China. So he headed home thence and his rule of Anatolia departed with him like shadow following the body.
THE ERA OF INTERREGUM
Bayezid died in captivity and his sons began a long battle to survive as the fittest to claim the vacant throne of a much diminished kingdom. From 1402 to 1413 fortunes called and departed for each of the five princes. Eventually Mehmed won and had a hard time in reclaiming the Ottoman suzerainty over other beyliks now seceded. All powers, Muslim or Christian put a finger in the pie to gain an advantage from the outcome.
This was the first instance in the Ottoman dynasty of brother butchering brother on the way to the throne. All dynasties in history had this problem of candidates to the throne kill rivals or get killed by them. Queen Elizabeth I had Queen Mary executed lest she succeeds to replace her; Richard III killed both two princes together after imprisoning them etc. In Byzantium mothers, fathers and brothers variously disposed of each other; therefore the Ottomans were acting in the spirit of an age which looked upon such royal matters with understanding if not altogether approval. The Ottoman theory was that ‘it was better to sacrifice one or a few persons however valuable or pitifully’ rather than face the prospect of bloodshed involving thousands and quite possibly the collapse of the state. People, pious muslims or not, were simply unable to check their passions and ambitions and the losers would not hesitate to treat their rivals the same as the winner had done to them, had they been luckier. Peaceful transmission of power from one person to another has only been possible in all the world only very recently. USA led the way in the case of presidents. Modern democracies and emasculated royalty they allowed to survive transmit power under law rather than after a bloody fight-out. If the sahaba couldn’t do it how could the Ottomans?
Humanity evolves only very slowly and therefore past generations shouldn’t be judged by our standards nor there is any guarantee that if laws were relaxed or vigilance reduced same murderous practices would not engulf the political rivalries right here in the West. Only until yesterday politically ambitious in Ulster resorted to murder to eliminate political rivals even within the same party.
12. THE OTTOMAN APOGEE
HURDLES IN THE WAY
Mehmed I, better known as Chelebi Mehmed, having reached the throne after many setbacks and instances of good fortune had a great mess in his hands to sort out. He had still one brother on the loose, namely Mustafa Chelebi, whom the Byzantines protected and sought to establish on the Turkish throne. The beys who had seceded had to be brought back and as if all this wasn’t enough an alleged sufi called Sheikh Bedreddin was in revolt seeking to establish a communist state for himself and his disciples. Mustafa managed to instal himself as padishah in Rulelia, the European half of the empire and won the allegiance of some Christian vassals on that side. Mehmed had to act. The Two brothers’ armies met, Mustafa was defeated and fled to the Greek emperor Manuel. The latter made an agreement with Mehmed to restrain Mustafa for a price to be paid annulally and it worked so long as Mehmed As for the seceded beys Mehmed I had some brought back by conquest or pressure in the process expanding his frontiers along the Black sea coast to the east.
As for the rebellious sheikh (who was a well-educated alim and was even made the Kazasker, i.e., military chief judge, of Rumelia but dismissed on account of his heretical views and propaganda activities, it took quite a while to suppress him. Like the Fatimids before him he was skilfully cultivating popular membership in Rumelia and then Anatolia. He had become quite a handful with the recruitment of militants by the thousand and establishment of secret communistic colonies. One chief murid Borkluja Mustafa organizied an uprising in Anatolia while another named Torlak Kemal in Rumelia. Both were crushed and killed by the Ottoman governors in charge of the region concerned and their sheikh met the same fate when he was captured, tried and hanged (1420). Soon Chelebi Mehmed also died in a hunting campaign (1421).
MURAD II
As this son of Mehmed ascended the throne Manuel took up the blackmail about letting loose Mustafa all over again. When Murad refused to be blackmailed Manuel both released and helped Mustafa to achieve power in Rumelia and then hopefully extend it to Anatolia. Rumelia he won but his venturing into Anatolia cost him his life- he was defeated by Murad and fled. He was however captured in his Rumelian capital Edirne and hanged (1422). All of which showed once more the thorn-in-the flesh nature of Constantinople in the middle of Ottoman land. He therefore laid siege to the city but Manuel outwitted him by seducing Murad’s younger brother, another Mustafa, to take over the Ottoman throne and send him help. Rival beys Karamans and Germiyans send armies to support Mustafa who nearly succeeded. Murad rushed back to beat of competition. He persuaded Mustafa’s men to surrender the rebel to him and had him hanged. Once more fratricide was pushed to the so far reluctant Ottoman rulers. The lessons were too great to be forgotten; quite a few times the Ottoman state had brushed with extinction with enemies’ and rivals’ conspiracy and complicity. So when Mehmed II son of Murad II came to the throne he solved both problems- he summarily dispatched all his brothers and conquered and Islamized Constantinople. That made possible the secure rise of the Ottoman empire.
Murad II continued with the re-absorption of the other beyliks and conquests in Europe. Only Karamanogullary escaped his unifying success and it was left to his son Mehmed to wrap and snap up this last bastion of defiance for good. His pre-occupation with Anatolia cost Murad many reverses in the Balkans and he had to variously make concession to the emboldened Christian princes like very valorous Hunyadi Janos of Transylvania and the Hungarians. The latter imposed on him the reinstatement of the Serbian independence among other humiliating concessions. So the padishah utterly dejected abdicated in favour his 12 year old son Mehmed. The accession of so young a prince emboldened the Crusaders even more. Intent on even grabbing from the Turks what they had left to them by the previous treaties they asked and got the blessing of their mentor Cradinal Sezerini, who, by the usual attitude of Medieval Christians delared ‘null and void any agreement made with an infidel’- without however checking with the Pope.
Then the Christaian avalanche bagan to flow towards Edirne. The Turkish viziers and pashas could not leave the steering of the state to a boy, they begged Murad to abandon retirement in Magnesia and report to duty at Edirne. He demurred and Mehmed then, as padishah commanded him to come. He did not take over the throne again but at the head of the army hurried north to stop the flood. He met and soundly defeated the Crusaders near Varna in Bulgaria (1444) where king Ladislas of Hungary also fell and Hunyadi Janos barely escaped with his life. Murad returned to Magnesia again where he was following the sufi path but Hunyadi was up again in arms to avenege Varna while the Yenicheris (spelled Janissaries in English) the elite but occasionally sploit Turkish crack troops were in rebellion in Edirne. Murad had to rush back again. This time he sent his son to Manisa, having seen the drawbacks of entrusting the state to a juvenile and reassumed his sultanate. He quickly suppressed the Yenicheris, redisciplined them and prepared his armies of Yenicheris aand Sipahis (cavalry) and hurrying to meet Hunyadi met him at Kosovo. The two sides fought a very ferocious battle for three days and in the end Turkish arms prevailed (1488). This seconf battle of Kosovo ensured the Europeans that the Turks by which name they named Muslims since the Crusades in the 12th century was there to stay and they better accommodate and get used to them. After a saintly life Murad II died in 1451.
FATIH SULTAN MEHMED (MEHMED OR MOHAMMAD II)
First thing Mehmed II did after he ascended the throne was to dispatch his only brother, a baby born recently to his late father’s wife, a princess of Serbia. The mother he sent back to Serbia with profuse apologies and rich gifts. He then gathered his divan (council of ministers) whose chief minister (Wazir-e A’zam) was Chandarli Halil Pasha.
It may be opportune to explain these titles ‘pasha’ and ‘chelebi’. Pasha seems to be a contraction of Pash- or Bash-Agha, i.e, the chief elder brother, in Turkish. Turks have honorific titles for all their blood relations. Thus an elder brother is an agha or aghabey often contracted to ‘abi’ while an elder sister is addressed as ‘abla’ or ‘aba’. In Ottoman protocol Pasha means any high military commander and corresponds to European ‘general. It also is used for a government official of ministerial calibre although he may be a local governor only. As for Chelebi it derives from Turkish ‘Chalab’ which means ‘lord’ and therefore chelebi means ‘of the Lord’ and initially was applied to learned ulema and later to princes.
Mehmed consulted his divan on the feasibility of the conquest of Constantinople and met negative opinion only from Chandarli. For Mehmed’s taste his father’s legacy Chandarli Pasha sounded too good friends of the Greeks. So he had to ignore and over-rule his strong oppostion to another siege of the city and put a question mark on his name. He then ordered preparations at full speed for the conquest. Luck was on his side for a Hungarian engineer was touring the courts of Europe seeking funding for his new cannon designs. Turned down by all he came to Constantinople but the emperor, knowing full well that Mehmed was busy preparing to invest his capital failed to appreciate the importance of this opportunity. So he came to Mehmed who instantly hired him. We may note the totally mercenary nature of politics even when opposing parties profess incompatible religious or ideological stands.
Self-interest almost always overrule scruples and determine the structure of the alliances. Mehmed tackled all departments of military preparations simultaneously. A new castle was built to control the traffic narrow strait on the western shore of which the city was built. One of the new cannons was installed on it and proved its value when it sank with a single shot a Genoese galley loaded with men and munitions rushing to the aid turning out bigger anf bigger cannons shipyards around the Sea of Marmara were launching dozens of ships and troops from all parts of the empire converging to Mehmed’s camps. The Greeks were’t idle either. They sent desperate calls for help to the Pope and their Western brethren. The Pope however and as usual made his help conditional on Greeks converting to the Latin rites, saying this to the face of the emperor Romanus Paleologus who was visiting him in Italy. The emperor felt he had to bow to this most insulting demand, for Greeks and Latin Christians couldn’t hate each other more. At this price and more the Pope exhorted all his subject kings and dukes to run to the aid of his new subjects but eventually only the Genoese obeyed. They sent a 7000 strong contingent under their legendary commander Justinianus whose ships skilfully managed to outwit the blockading Turkish navy and sneaking into Constantinople laden with arms, munitions and supplies. But the Greek populace greatly resented the Latinization of their church; their bishops were being pushed aside and Roman cardinals in their black hats taking over. The populace began to say “it is better to the turban of the sultan over us than these cardinal hats”.
The siege came in early april 1453, lasted for 53 days. The new Turkish cannons could damage the famously sturdy walls of the city but the Greeks and the Genoese, all populace helping, were able do repair the damage done during day by the following night. Wave after wave of Turkish attacks were repulsed with heavy losses. Greeks had a weapon called the Greek fire which was the napalm of the times. A mixture of nitre, sulphur and naphta, when this flaming liquid was poured from above the walls on the walls it stuck to skins, water failed to put it out and burnt its victims to bones quickly. It looked as if the eternal pattern Muslims since Muawia’s time trying many times capturing this bastion of Christianity was repeating itself. But after many ardent prayers by ulema and awlia and Mehmed himself over many sleepless night the enemy made the single fatal mistake- a sortie of theirs made another surprise exit one night which sorties were meant to cause maximum damage to the attackers persons and equipment forgot in their haste to shut a small door on the walls after they slipped in and the Turks avalanched in at no time. As more and more Yenicheris squeezed to that and other doors opened by them and also by scaling the walls the Greeks were overwhelmed and in the melee their valiant emperor fighting sword in hand disappeared under the heaps of the fallen. Red Turkish flags shot up like tulips all over the walls to the deafening sounds of martial music and shouts of “Allahu Akbar”.
The Prophet’s sws promise that one day Constantinople would be conquered was fulfilled and his praises for the commander and his army achieving the feat were won by Mehmed and his Turks. (Tuesday 27 may 1453).
After the unfortunate but at the time accepted ritual pillagings the city was pacified, any who wanted, especially among the nobles were allowed to move out unmolested and the remaining Greeks, noble or populace were reassured of the padishah’s fatherly treatment of them as his new subjects. The city however was greatly damaged and depopulated over the last century or so on top of what was added to these by the specially terrible ordeal of this last battle. Accordingly, Mehmed the Fatih (Conqueror), in his usual speed and energy attended to the re-construction and re-population of his new capital. The great imperial church Aya Sophia was put to use immediately as a mosque where the Padishah and his Muslims prayed their next Friday prayers.
The whole Europe, who had however done nothing to save the doomed star of all Christian cities went into a frenzy of bewailing and a renewed terror of the Turks. Ironically however all those who made it to Constantinople soon after the conquest with their worst prejudices against Muslims aflame found the new Muslim Caesar a highly accultured, well-mannered, enlightened and hospitable prince, conversant with seven languages and qualified in many arts and sciences not the least mathematics and engineering. He could speak apart from Turkish, Greek, Italian, Serbian, Latin, Arabic and Persian. What is more he not only employed all Greek high officials of the late emperor as his officials as well but expelling the hated cardinals reinstated the Greek Orthodox Church with a saintly bishop Gennaidus as the new Greek patriarch. He equipped him with royal status like the pope and put him in autonomous charge of all the Orthodox Christians. He put him on a golden throne, put on his head a throne and dressed him in silk and brocade the Pope could hardly equal. Native Greeks who survived were helped to restart their lives, their shops repaired and capital donated. Many Turks were added to the population and soon all the old ethnic groups, including the Italians were back on board and prospering more than before. Jews also joined and the world’s most populous, prosperous and diversified metropolis came back on stream as if nothing had happened.
After this signal victory and statesmanly success Fatih went on to win more victories worthy of his new appellation. He went and put an end once and for all to the Karamanoglus, incorporating their large territory into his. To further east he defeated the threat from Uzun Hasan the upstart king of the Akkoyunlus (the tribe of white-sheep owners) and conquered small but tenacious Greek empire of Pontus based at Trebizond on the Black Sea, which was a rival of the Byzantines. He proceeded to Greece and conquered it down to Mora (included), marvelling at the dilapidated splendor of Athens and granting the city many privileges on account of its great past services to civilization. He expelled the Venetians and the Genoese from many castles and islands of Greece and the Dalmatian (eastern Adriatic coast), vassalized Albania and reduced whole Serbia to a colony except Belgrade, vassalized Wallachia and Modavia and conquered Bosnia and Hertzegovina in which process the Bosnians voluntarily embraced Islam.
It took three expeditions to reduce Albania to vassaldom and it also more than half embraced Islam. To the north he vassalized the Khanate of Crimea thus giving them a long lease of life against their Russian opponents and finally attempted to conquer Rome itself and Islamize Western Europe as much as possible. This began with the conquest of the ‘heel’ of Italia whose main stronghold fell to the Ottomans fighting under Gedik Ahmed Pasha. Italians all over south Italy including Rome began to flee expecting a Turkish advance but Fatih soon died at 51 while camping at the head of his army marching west. The rumour was that he was poisoned by his jewish physician Yaqub Pasha for bribes offered by the Pope. The doctor was lynched by the Yenicheris and so ended another campaign of conquest before it could achieve much.
It is impossible to finish with Fatih’s story without also talking about his administrative services and this we shall do in the general context of the evolution of the Ottoman imperial institutions which we now interpose into our narration.
EVOLUTION OF THE OTTOMAN INSTITUTIONS
We first take a brief look at the Anatolian Turkish culture around the time of Osman Ghazi the founder. Anatolian Seljouk times were when Turks kept arriving regularly like Europeans flowing into the New world. Moderate climate and green pastures as well as the docile Christian population of Anatolia was very attractive to these nomadic-warrior Turkish tribes who were running away from the Mongol and internecine threats infesting Central Asia and all lands west of it into the rather peaceful Anatolia. This persistent flood of Turks coupled by always significant conversions to Islam of the Anatolian Christians and therefore free intermarriages Turkefied Anatolia to a large extent within a couple of centuries during the Seljouk times. The immigrants brought with them their strong enthusiasm of Islam with a strong sufi flavour and Anatolia was therefore was covered with as much sufi houses (dergahs) as mosques. The charitable ethic Sufism instilled the Turks with found a willing ally in converted Christians who already had their own saints and monks and monastic familiarities. Turkish (meaning all Turkish speaking Muslims of Anatolia of whatever background or race) artisans and tradesmen, young men and also women organized themselves into an extensive network of fraternities called in the case of males ‘ahis’ (brothers) and in the case of females ‘bajiyan-e Rum’, i.e, ‘sisters of Rome-land’.
Like Arabs Turks called Greeks and by extension Anatolia ‘Rum’ before they conquered Balkans and transferred the name there. These fraternities (or sororities) developed an ethic of most sincere and committed mutual assistance and support turning around a lay sufi life based in local tekkes (small convent) and dergahs which also served as guest houses. No Muslim could travel and not find instant hospitality from ahis or the bajiyan. Because of the incredible extensiveness and high moral standards of these voluntary organizations neither destitution nor crime became serious issued among these Turks and had it not been their bey’s mischiefs no Turk would find another Turk. The Ottomans were lucky to have on their hands such a pool of merits to rely on in their conquests and organization.
Once they ceased being a mere tribal beylik under Osman and became a state under Orhan and the state organizations began to develop. It was Orhan’s brother Alaaddin Pasha who founded the Yenicheri army. The recruits were drawn from human levies imposed on rural Christians. About one in ten boys in each Christian village was selected by the officials sent by the state, based on fitness and intelligence. This was not a cruelty at the time because villagers were already used to their lords’ collecting boys from among them for a military profession in their armed forces. The Ottomans were simply their new lords and much more lenient and charitable ones. The boys were given to rural Turkish families to be brought up as decent muslims and learn their ways in the world. At mid teens tey reported to barracks and sifted.
The brightest were sent to the palace for an all-round education in literacy, numeracy, arts, sciences and sports on a foundation of Islamic knowledge and practice. These elite young men were then apprenticed to high officials, commanders and governors eventually replacing them. Until Selim I Ottoman high officials were a mixture of born free Turks from good families with a ruling background and devshirmes (pickings as above from among Christians) but with Selim the palace trained devshirmes, all slaves of the padishah came first to dominate and then to be exclusively eligible. The reason was to block any avenues if sedition on the part of any ambitious free Turks and it worked. Devshirmes proved extremely loyal, for they were padishah’s personal slaves yet favoured as no other subjects. They became sons-in-law to him and frequently viziers and sadrazams (chief vizier, prime minister) to him and also most of the pashas. Many traced their families and looked after them royally.
The rest were confined to barracks, drilled and fought as foot soldiers, proving the best troops anywhere in the world. Any who survived to 40 was pensioned off and joined the civilian society and could marry.
The bulk of the armed forces were drawn from Muslims under a fiefdom system whereby warrior distinguished in battle were rewarded with leasehold land big and productive enough for him to live and function like a manor. Each sipahi was under obligation to recruit and train, equip and keep ready a reasonable force of Turkish cavalry whom he had to take to the padishah’s or sadrazam’s camp before a war campaign ordered by the padishah. Several villages and towns were under a sipahi or cavalry officer who kept law and order together with the local qadi or district judge who in turn was also the mayor of the area. Several fief-holders reported to a sanjak beyi or district administrator and all sanjak beyis to the beylerbeyi (bey of the beys) ruling over vast territories in the name of the sultan and attending also the divan or the council of ministers. Fior example, the whole Rumelia was under one beylerbeyi as was Anatolia and North Africa etc. Parallel to this militarised (askeri) organizaton of civil administration was another hierarchical organization of the ulema. At the top was sheikh-ul Islam or the chief qadi of the empire who was an advisory member of the divan and padishah’s personal adviser and spiritual mentor. Before anything important could be executed or launched which needed a legal clearance his fatwa was sought. Normally they wielded enough prestige to dissuade even the most strong-willed padishahs from committing illegal or impious administrative acts.
Under the sheikh-ul Islam in rank but rather independent of him were the Kazaskers (military chief qadis) of Rumelia and Anatolia, again members of the divan. Equal to them were the viziers with various portfolios and all worked under the sadrazam who then reported to the padishah on important matters but otherwise implemented any decisions taken. Divan was also the supreme appeal court to which anybody of any rank or faith could freely appeal for judicial redress. For centuries this system worked like clockwork and represented the most efficient civil and military administration anywhere in the world. European Christians not yet conquered by the Turks and living in neighbouring countries often crossed over in whole families and villages to the sultan’s territory as political, religious or economic refugees to enjoy the religious and other civil freedoms, lower taxes and good justice there.
Fatih personally contributed to this marvel of a government by building as well as causing others to emulate him, many civilian facilities from whole arched markets and industrial estates, bridges, roads and ports, mosques, madrassas and hospitals to the promulgation of a great corpus of administrative law called Fatih Kanunnamesi (Codex Fatih) which for centuries dominated the Ottoman civil law and still forms part of the Turkish republican laws. As such he is one of the few great sultans who contributed to the Ottoman success in a multiple of capacities.
