I found it interesting earlier in this week’s class, when Dr. Metcalf briefly mentioned the gazi warriors being misunderstood, that they happen to be Muslims that were warriors, conquerors, seems to be a theme in history/media now, tying Islam to violence.
The whole idea of the Janissaries is fascinating, slaves from conquered areas being used as soldiers and rising up in societies. The somewhat elaborate system is pretty clever, they were slaves and had limitations like they couldn’t marry until retiring, but then these boys were given immense opportunity to rise up in the Ottoman hierarchy and cumulate wealth. It worked well for the Ottomans, because they took the strongest, most promising boys for their army, and the families of the children eventually understood the positive aspects of exchange. It was just generally interesting, sorry if I am summarizing a little bit.
The lecture on the Fall of Constantinople was interesting, and I really enjoyed the discussion of the different versions of the Fall of Constantinople. The ingenuity of Mehmet II was clear- he actually built a castle nearby to base his siege from, to be honest it peaked my interest as a tourist if nothing else! The siege and fall of the city was important however, since Constantinople was the “symbolic center of eastern Christendom” until it fell, and
Comparing the different accounts of the event and discussing which would be more influential to a historian was surprising, as I had a completely different view from the rest of the class. The issue of the use of subjective accounts in research has been coming up in other classes, and usually brings heated discussion. I still stick by my choice, the second article, as the most useful but I understand whole all the accounts are important to research in their own way, even the last account in which the Christian author used a historical event for his political agenda.
I agree with you, I think its very cool too. When learning about this I couldn't help but think about the movie "300." I kept thinking about the beginning of the movie when the young boys would compete and fight to see who will win out and become the new ruler.
ReplyDeleteIt was a well-known training practice, as well as a means to consider who deserved authority. While it was mainly a measure of physical strength instead of intellectual or tactical ability, something that you must remember is that these young boys knew each other. They had to know each other's skills and ability in order to survive, and when pitted against the other, they were served to think differently.
ReplyDeleteThe slave system in the Ottoman Empire I thought was run in a very intelligent way. The slaves were given enough freedom that would want to obey to get more rich and powerful since the option was available. Like 300, yes its cool to think of any elite fighting force, skilled and trained to win battles for an empire. It was a successful strategy employed by the Sultans.
ReplyDeleteYou are all right the tactics of the Ottomans in containing their forces and encouraging bonds between them were really successful.
ReplyDeleteAnd I loved the movie 300 :-).