By 1336 all north-western Asia Minor was included in the Ottoman Empire, and Orkhan devoted the next twenty years of peace to the work of perfecting his military organization and consolidating the resources of his newly acquired territories, supported by his brother, Ala-ed-din. So the power that was to crush the life out of the failing Empire of the East stood armed and waiting for a favourable moment on the eastern shore of the Bosphorus. Turkish rule was predominant over all Asia Minor, and a young nation, strong and armed, watched for the moment to interfere with an old, effete Empire.
Beyond the lines of Chatalja, some fifty miles from this City, the capital of Turkey, young nations, Bulgars and Serbs, are waiting, watching, intent on hurling the Turk from Europe, as the Turk drove forth the Greeks in their day.
CHAPTER XI
The Eastern Empire—The marriage of Orkhan and Theodora—Solyman crosses the Hellespont—The death of Solyman—Amurath I conquers Adrianople—A crusade against Amurath—Amurath conquers Nish—Revolt of the Slavs—Western Europe at this period—Successes of the Slavs—The battle of Kossova—Sultan Bajazet—Another crusade against Turkey—Bajazet defeats the crusaders—The ascendancy of Tamerlane—Bajazet is defeated by Tamerlane—Death of Bajazet and Tamerlane—Civil war—Musa marches against Servia—Mohammed I succeeds Musa—Amurath II—Pretender Mustapha—Attack on Constantinople—Hunyadi Janos—Peace of Szeggedin—The death of Ala-ed-din—Battle of Varna—Mohammed, son of Amurath—Scanderbeg—Mohammed II—Conquest of Constantinople.
THAT Turkish rule has lasted as long as it has, has not died down like the power of other Asiatic races who swept over Europe, held parts of it for a while, and were then forced out again, is probably due to the fact that earlier Ottoman Sultans took no step in advance before consolidating their power behind them. They allowed time for each conquered province, each subject race to blend into the general nationality of their Empire by the assimilation of military and civil institutions. Asia Minor became a solid Empire under Turkish rule, and allowed the Sultan to look further afield for fresh conquests. He was naturally drawn towards the West, where lay the heart of the Empire out of which successive sons of Othman had carved their possessions. Again, the troubled state of the Greek Empire, frequently rent by civil war, offered the strong young Turk rulers an opportunity for interfering much in the same way that Great Powers of to-day concern themselves with the doings of less well-ordered states. The Eastern Empire was indeed in a parlous state by the time Orkhan had brought his country from a chaos of conquered provinces to a heterogeneous Empire, and invited interference. The Emperor John V (Cantacuzene) realized the power of the Turks, and sought to strengthen his position by an alliance with the Sultan, so a marriage was arranged and celebrated with great pomp and splendour between Orkhan, a widower of some sixty years, and the Emperor’s young daughter Theodora. This should have led to a good understanding between the monarchs, but it did not, as the East was pressing relentlessly on the enfeebled West, and temporary expedients could not avert the coming catastrophe. All about Constantinople were foreign settlements; Venetians and Genoese fought for mastery in the narrow waters of the Bosphorus, and both united to wring concessions out of the Eastern Empire. The rivalry of these two Republics gave Orkhan a reason for interfering, and he decided to ally himself with the Genoese, for he hated the Venetians, who had insulted him by declining to receive his envoys to the Doges. But the Venetians were allied to Emperor John Cantacuzene, in his struggles against another son-in-law, John Palæologus.
Solyman, son of Orkhan, crossed the Hellespont by night with a handful of followers and took Koiridocastron, or “Hog’s Castle.” No attempt was made to regain this castle from the Turk, as the Emperor was fully occupied with the armies of his rebel son-in-law, Palæologus, and with the Genoese fleet. The Greek Emperor, finding himself in such sore straits, without making any attempt to dislodge Solyman from the castle, without even a remonstrance, implored Orkhan to send him assistance. This Orkhan readily granted; he reinforced Solyman’s small party with an army of ten thousand men. This force defeated Palæologus and his Slavonic army, but did not return to Asia; the Turk had landed in Europe, and showed a determination to stay. Cantacuzene offered Solyman ten thousand ducats to evacuate the “Hog’s Castle,” and the Sultan’s son agreed, but before the sum had been paid an earthquake visited Thrace and threw down the walls of its strongholds. The Greeks saw in this a sign of Heaven’s ill-will, the Turks believed it to be a manifestation of the will of Allah in their favour and a plain command to proceed with the conquests in Europe. So while the Greeks were still trembling two of Solyman’s captains, Adjé Bey and Ghasi Fasil, occupied Gallipoli, marched in over its defences shattered by the earthquake. Soon after these events Solyman, when engaged in his favourite sport of falconry, was thrown from his horse and killed. He was buried on the spot where he had landed with his followers, and near him are buried his two captains, to whose efforts the Turks owe their first firm foothold in Europe, when Gallipoli, the key of the Dardanelles, the southern passage to Constantinople, fell into their hands.
From the reign of Orkhan dates the first decisive influence of Turkey over Eastern Europe. Orkhan and his brother, Ala-ed-din, forged the weapons which were to bring the Eastern Empire to its fall and set up another Empire in its place, an Empire which spread far afield over Europe, and trod Western civilization under foot from the Black Sea to the walls of Vienna. To-day that Empire’s European possessions have dwindled down to a small strip of land beyond the City’s old walls and the lines of Chatalja.
Another strong ruler followed Orkhan, Amurath I, his youngest son, in 1359. There were troubles in Asia to keep the new Sultan engaged, the Prince of Carmania stirred up several Turkish Emirs to rise against the House of Othman. This matter settled, Amurath bent his mind to further conquests in Europe, and by 1361 he had captured the great city Adrianople and made it his capital. Adrianople, the City of Hadrian, scene of many historic events. Here Emperor Valens met the Goths as they were streaming down the Valley of the Maritza, and tried to stem the tide of barbarian invasion; but the Goths broke the trained legions of Rome, who for years after could not be brought to face that foe again, and Valens, the Emperor, was numbered among the slain. A few centuries later Bulgarians and Greeks met here, and again an Emperor fell; whereas the Goths contented themselves with slaying Valens in battle, the conquering Bulgarians made a drinking-vessel of the skull of Nicephorus I, vanquished at Adrianople.
To-day Bulgarians are investing a Turkish force in Adrianople, the first European capital of the Sultans, where Amurath I lies buried. From here Amurath prepared the way for the conquest of Constantinople; from here he set out on those expeditions which brought one Christian nation after another under the Turkish yoke. Here, too, the Turks first met their present enemy, the Slav. Hitherto their opponents had been only the enfeebled Greeks, and these had few, if any, friends in Europe. As schismatics, the Pope was not concerned with their fate, but when Amurath’s campaigns extended westward, and threatened Catholic countries, Pope Urban V became alarmed, and called upon Western Europe for a new crusade. The King of Hungary, the Princes of Servia, Bosnia, Wallachia, formed a league intended to drive the Osmanli out of Europe; they collected their armed forces and marched towards the East, crossing the Maritza about two days’ march from Constantinople. There was no force of equal strength available to Lalashahin, then in command of the Ottoman forces in Europe, for the allied Princes disposed of some twenty thousand men, and the Turkish army was scattered about in various garrisons. The Christians, assured of victory, neglected all military precautions, were caught unprepared during a night of revelry, “as wild beasts in their lair. They were driven before us as flames before the wind, till, plunging into the Maritza they perished in its waters,” says Seadeddin, the Oriental historian. This was the first encounter between Turks and Slavs; there were many others, mostly with the same result, and resulting in centuries of suffering for the vanquished. But the times have changed; the Slav, no longer careless, undisciplined, ill-prepared, has met the Turk again by the banks of the Maritza, and before the West—prepared, purposeful, and strong—the East has failed as it always has done, as it ever will do.
It was Amurath I who thus began to place the yoke on the Slav nations of Eastern Europe; his troops captured Nissa (Nish), the strong city of the Servians, and forced their Prince to sue for peace; it was granted on the condition that he supplied a tribute of a thousand pounds of silver and a thousand horse-soldiers every year. Sisvan, King of the Bulgarians, had also taken part in the crusade of Western Christianity against Amurath, and he was compelled to beg for mercy, which was shown him at the price of his daughter’s marriage to the conqueror.