Page:Islam, Turkey, and Armenia, and How They Happened.djvu/107

Rh and founded an independent sovereignty that, under the three vigorous rulers Alp Arslan, Melik Shah and Togrul Bey, rapidly enlarged its bounds, as to include the whole of Persia, Armenia, Syria and the greater part of Asia Minor. The period of the Seljoukian kingdom in Asia Minor lasted about 250 years (1045–1299 A. D.). The Ottoman, or the present Turks, are their kindreds under a different dynasty or government, as will be seen elsewhere.

2. The Conversion of the Turks to Mohametanism. The religion of these Tartaric tribes, if they had any, seems to be very coarse heathenism; owing to their nomadic life and savage disposition they could not have fixed temples and systematic mode of worship, and regular religious organization of priesthood and teaching. In their semi-savage career, not much different from the wild animals, they did not show any sign of having been in contact with early Christianity, Hellenistic revival of letters and the European civilization; they had no literature or history until they met with the Saracens, the Mohametan warriors of Arabia, and were conquered and converted to Islam in Persia in the seventh century. Finding this new religion very suitable to their nature and habits they entered the service of the caliphs of Bagdad and swelled the Mohametan armies till the degenerate commander of the faithful (caliph of Bagdad) was compelled to resign his temporal power to the new converts, who pretended to respect the spiritual authority of the caliphate. Salur, the first Tartaric Mohametan chief of importance, called his tribe "Turk-iman," the Turks