The Causes of the Successes of the Ottoman Turks

STANHOPE PRIZE ESSAY—1859.
BY JAMES SURTEES PHILLPOTTS, SCHOLAR OF NEW COLLEGE.
OXFORD: T. and G. SHRIMPTON. M DCCC LIX.

THE CAUSES OF THE SUCCESSES OF THE OTTOMAN TURKS. ————
These external circumstances are important, as having been auxiliary to the rise of the Ottomans. But the main causes of their success must be sought in the wisdom of their rulers and in the institutions which they established.
Their government was most singularly constituted, and of a character totally dissimilar to any of the governments of Christendom. The institutions too from which they derived their solid and lasting power were for the most part peculiar to themselves. On these institutions the stability of the Ottoman greatness mainly rested. With their first appearance it arose; with their gradual development it had grown; as they were neglected and fell into disuse, the ancient glory of the Crescent was dimmed, obscured, and finally extinguished.
Even in the legendary history of the founder of their nation is shadowed forth the faint outline of their peculiar, policy. By patient waiting till he attained his purpose, Othman won his wife from an alien tribe. His expeditions were sanctioned by the blessing of the Holy Scheik Edebali. From the fruit of these expeditions, from the Christian captives who were condemned to slavery, was selected the wife of his son Orchan. A Christian apostate, ‘Michael of the Pointed Beard’ was the chief of Othman’s captains.
In general the Asiatic dynasties culminate to their height of power with a marvellous rapidity, and then, dependent solely on the merits of their rulers, with no institutions calculated to ensure any lasting greatness, fall by a decline no less rapid and less marvellous than their rise. The career of Ottoman conquest lacked the dazzling grandeur which invests the exploits of Genghis Khan, or Timour, but it was not destined to be as ephemeral as they. In its slow and cautious advance, in the gradual organization of conquered provinces, in the unswerving patience which waited always for the fittest opportunity, it bore no faint resemblance to the stately march of Roman sovereignty.