From the foundation of the Ottoman state through the the end of the Great War, the empire was ruled by direct descendents of the founder, Osman. Along the way there were revolts, coups, and civil wars within the Royal House - but the Ottoman dynasty kept its hold on the sultanate for century after century. I understand that the system of imperial concubinage (at least for much of the period) all but guaranteed male heirs (sometimes too many), but what was it about the institutions of Ottoman power and the structures of the state that allowed one family to monopolise power for so long, without challenge?
🤦♂️ I meant to say *Qing.
I'm currently reading about the Ottomans and I've noticed this is something of a theme. Are there other dynasties where killing family members was a viable way of getting to the top?
Would really like to find some books or texts that discuss it in more detail. If someone could point me in the right direction, I would appreciate it.
So 2 days ago I looked to current head of Ottoman dynasty (Dundar Ali Osman) and he doesn't have any children, not even a girl and he is in his 80s and doesn't have a wife.What's going to happen if he dies?
This is a pretty large argument, and I'm probably accidentally going to start a flame war, but I will summarize my points:
- The way the Ottomans came into becoming an empire was pretty similar in many ways to Roman and Byzantine civil wars, there were many claimants to the Roman throne and the Osmans' rise to power isn't that different from other Roman Emperors.
- Their bases of power (aka core territories) were almost exactly the same, that being the Balkans and Anatolia, they also expanded into similar territories
- The Osman dynasty were recognized by OG Romans, the Greek-speaking local populace calling themselves Romans, as the legitimate Caesar and ruler of the Roman Empire in 1453, these Romans (called Rum, mostly left in Anatolia by the early 20th century, as most Balkan Greek-speakers embraced their Hellenic identity as opposed to their Rumi/Roman identity) were still loyal to the House of Osman up around the late-19th to the 20th Century (I can talk about all the massacres, ethnic cleansing, and evil acts on all sides, but until after the end of WW1, Greeks and Turks weren't "sworn enemies"), meaning that the empire was still the "Empire of the Romans" (legally it was named "The Exalted State of Rome"). The Empire was, until later, dominated by Greek-speaking Romans population-wise.
- One of the counterarguments I got from people was "Rome can't be Muslim", and the only thing I can say to that is Rome was never inherently Christian, and in fact, it was Pagan for a pretty long time, so religion is very much irrelevant in this argument.
- "Wouldn't that imply Turkey is a successor to Rome?" No. Just no. The Republic of Turkey is not only legally but even ideally speaking not a successor state to the Ottoman Empire, right-wing rhetoric being mainstream somewhat would imply that due to the rise of Islamism and the population of the core Ottoman territory being dominated by Turks during the late years of the Ottoman Empire would mean that they're directly related to the modern republic, however upon closer inspection this falls apart. The most basic argument being Osmans themselves were hardly Turkish (this also doesn't even matter for them being Emperors of Rome, that wasn't derived from ethnicity), usually having mothers of Slavic, Caucasian, or Greek origin, on top of the fact that they spoke multiple languages and they never claimed to be particularly Turkic until when they had no power and no choice, in fact, I'd say Timur, who the Ott
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