The History of the World Podcast, written and presented by Chris Hasler. Volume 4, the Medieval World

Episode 5 The Rise of the Ottomans Oh, you know, now. Oh, Last time on the history of the world podcast we spoke of the Seljak Turks and how

they originated from the Turkmen of the Oz-Yabhu state and took advantage of territorial disputes in the lands of

Iran and Greater Horosan to create an empire in the Middle East during the 11th and 12th centuries.

The Seljaks were converts to Islam during their rise to prominence,

and the remnants of the Imperial Abbasid Caliphate

were still being preserved in the city of Baghdad, despite no longer having any political power.

The significance of the Abbasid Caliphate was that it represented the spiritual political

head of Islam due to the Abbasid dynasty family links to the original Prophet Muhammad.

The Seljaks were invited to take control of Baghdad by the Abbasids

in order to preserve the Sunni Islam direction of the caliphate and overthrow the preceding

Shia Islam overlords.

Before the arrival of Turkic peoples, the lands of the Middle East were dominated by Arabs, Persians and

Anatolian Greeks, among others.

And with the Turks being nomadic peoples from the step they had an ability to conduct

raids in all of these areas.

The Seljak Turks were a particular branch of Turks and by the 11th century Turkic peoples

was spread far and wide along the northern and eastern borders of the Islamic

world in many different and powerful factions.

The reason why the Turks had an interest in the lands of the Anatolian Greeks

is because they were rich and fertile, with great naval connections to the wider world.

These lands were under the control of the Byzantine Empire whose capital was based at the city of Constantinople, the modern Turkish city of Istanbul.

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