Page:A History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 2.djvu/553

Rh bk. 1. CH. IV. runKEY. 537 CHAPTER IV TURKEY. CONTENTS. Mosques of Mahomet II. — Suleimanie and Ahmedjie Mosques — Mosques of Sultanas Valiile, and of Osman III. — Civil and Domestic Arcliitecture, Fountains, etc. CHRONOLOGY. DATES. Conquest of Constantinople by MaliO- niet II A.D. 1443 Bajazet II 14sl Selini l: 1512 Suleiman II., the Magnificent .... 1520 Selim II 1566 Amurath III 1574 DATES. Mahomet III a.u. 1595 Ahmed I. 1603 Amurath IT 1623 Mahomet IV 1649 Suleiman III 1687 Ahrne.l III 1703 Mahmood 1 1739 THE latter half of the 15th century witnessed some strange vicis- situdes in the fate of the Mahomedan faith in Europe. In 1492 Granada was conquered, and the Moors expelled from the country which they had so long adorned by their arts, and rendered illustrious by their cultivation of the sciences. Of all the races who, at various times, have adopted the faith of Islam, the Spanish Moors seem to have been among the most enlightened and industrious, and the most capable of retaining permanently the civilization they had acquired. They have made way for a people less progressive and more bigoted than any other population in Europe. Before, however, this misfortune happened in the West, the fairest city of the Christian world, and its most fertile provinces, had fallen a prey to the most barbarous horde of all those who had adopted the Mahomedan religion. For two centuries the Turks had gi-adually been progressing westward from their original seats in Central Asia, and at last, in 1453, Constantinople itself fell into their power, and for more than a century after this, the fate of Europe trembled in the balance. The failure of the siege of Vienna (1683) turned the tide. Since that time the Christians have slowly and surely been recovering their lost ground ; but the Crescent still surmounts the dome of Sta. Sophia. Had the Turks obtained possession of Constantino]ile at an earlier date, it is possible that their architecture might have taken a different form from that in which we now find it. But before that event the