The Ottoman Empire lasted from AD 1299 until AD 1923; a period of over six hundred years.

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For much of this time the entire region of the Eastern Mediterranean came under Ottoman Muslim rule. The first three centuries were a time of energy and expansion.

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At its peak, between AD 1580 and AD 1650, the empire stretched from Belgrade in Europe to Iraq in the East and around the southern Mediterranean to Algeria in North Africa. From about the end of the 17th century it went into steady decline. By the 19th century it was being referred to as ‘the sick man of Europe’. The empire finally collapsed at the end of the First World War. In this talk we look at the origins of the Ottomans and their conquest of Constantinople in AD 1453, which led to the collapse of the Byzantine Empire. We also consider some of the reasons for its gradual decline and the final collapse of the Empire following the First World War leading to the creation of the modern Republic of Turkey.

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The book The Ottoman Empire, which is available at Amazon, accompanies this lecture.