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The Ottomans emerge from the chaos created by the Mongols and Christians. After a century-long dystopia of slaughter and mayhem, the Ottomans do not so much conquer an empire as re-assemble one from the shattered fragments of several others. In Anatolia, civilization had regressed to little more than what we see in Afghanistan and Somalia today: here and there, predatory Ghazi warlords controlling tiny patches of land in the name of Islam. Ghazw, warrior, is variously rendered as Ghazawat, even in French as razzia, for the guttural ghain letter of Arabic is the French "r" grasseyé.
Originally, the ghazawat were the battles fought by Muhammad the Prophet (saw), but the Ghazi must not be confused with our current epithet Jihadi, though both waged holy war. Ghazi is a sort of corporation, much as the Crusades were organized. They plundered and conquered in the name of the Caliph, they were his irregular soldiery of conquest. Ghazi corporations were understood to be politically dangerous, and were supposed to stand down at the orders of the Caliph, but they seldom if ever did. What the Ghazi conquered, they held.
Most of the Ghazi were Turkish, and dozens of such emirates dotted once-Seljuk Anatolia, until they were swept away by Longshanks’ ferocious buddy, Abagha the Mongol. The Ottoman re-conquest of Anatolia is fundamentally a routing-out of Mongol vassals and a reunification of the pre-Mongol Seljuk world under new management, with the old CEO, the Caliph. Othman’s son calls himself “Ghazi son of Ghazisâ€, reviving the ancient Mohammedan term, and it becomes an honorific, still heard to this day as an honorific applied to Kemal Ataturk, the father of modern Turkey and the Ghazi Osman Pasha, the much-decorated hero whose portrait I have included here. Ghazi, Victorious.
Ghazi operations were both offensive and defensive. An enormous body of literature once covered the subject of Maghazi, the battles of Islam, the protocols of conquest, the lawful and unlawful enrichment of the Ghazi corporation, the taking of slaves, the treatment of subject peoples, proper deference to the Caliph. Think of it as Warlord-ism for Dummies, a history and code of conduct. Fundamentally, warlords arise from chaos. They gather a defensive force to protect Muslims then strike out at their heathen oppressors.
As Sun Tzu would teach, conquerors must govern well if they are to govern at all, and Maghazi writings were the guide to Muslim chivalry, a far more elaborate and merciful thing than its Christian equivalent. Less-tolerant and sectarian regimes arose. the Maghazi writings fell into disreputeis no less a guide to peace as to war itself. The Ottomans are profoundly guided by this body of literature: they cannot be understood without it. The most famous of the Maghazi authors is al-Waqidi of Baghdad. Today, the genre is almost forgotten, and al-Waqidi’s Maghazi (his main surviving work, the Book of History and Campaigns, gives the genre its name) is placed in a lesser pantheon than the other biographies of Muhammad the Prophet (saw). But in his day, Maghazi writings were the guide to Muslim chivalry, a far more elaborate and merciful thing than its Christian equivalent. Less-tolerant and sectarian regimes arose. the Maghazi writings fell into disrepute
Maghazi writings were the guide to Muslim chivalry, a far more elaborate and merciful thing than its Christian equivalent. Less-tolerant and sectarian regimes arose. the Maghazi writings fell into disrepute
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