Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 19.djvu/651

* TURKEY. 561 TURKEY. ^Mediterranean Sea the Turks were the undis- puted masters. Venice had been gradually strijiped of lier possessions in the ilorea and the Archipelago. Tripoli became sulijcot to Turkey in 1.551. Toward the close of .Solyinan"s reign in 1505, a vast Turkish force was beaten back by the heroic defenders of Alalta. In the follow- ing year the little Hungarian fortress of Szizct long kept at bay the Turkish host which the Sul- tan had marshaled against the Austrians. Soly- nian died before the fortress fell. Selim 11. (15ti(i-74) undertook to wrest Cyprus from the Venetians and this brought about a Holy League between 'enice, Spain, and the Pope, whose fleets inflicted a crushing defeat upon the Turks in the battle of Lepanto (1571). Cyprus, never- theless, was taken by the Turks. In the reign of Selim II. the subjugation of Yemen was com- pleted, and about the time of his death the Span- iards were driven from Tunis, which became subject to Turkey. With the disaster at Lepanto the decline of the Ottoman power began. In the line of Osman the first impulse of barbaric vigor had been lost in the efl'eminacy that attends success. The European nationalities were now establishing their relations on broader grounds of policy and the Ottomon rulers found that diplomacy must in a measure take the place of conquest in the future. Lender Amurath III. (1574-95) a war with Persia, in which conquests were made in Armenia, as followed by a contest with Aus- tria, which continued luider Mohammed III. (1595-1003) and extended into the reign of Achmet or Ahmed I. (1003-17). At this time Persia rose to a high pitch of power under Abbas the Great, who in 1005 won a great victory over the Turks at Basra, and who wrested large terri- tories from them, even making himself master of Bagdad (1623). The cruel but able and energetic Anuirath IV. (1623-40) restored the fortunes of Turkey inthe East, retaking Bagdad in 1638. Af- ter his death maladministration and internal dis- orders hastened the decadence of the Empire. In 1656 the Venetians, on whom the Turks had made war for the possession of Crete, appeared in the Dardanelles and defeated the Turkish fleet. The realm was raised for a brief period from this state of depression by the abilities of Mohammed Kiuprili and his son Ahmed (see Kiupkili). who successively held the position of Grand Vizier during part of the reign of Mohammed IV. (1648-87). They infused fresh vigor into the administration and to some extent enabled the Turkish arms to reassert themselves. A war with Austria, in which the Turks finally sufTcred a great defeat at the hands of Monteeuccoli at Saint Gotthard, on the banks of the Raab ( 1664) , was terminated by a peace slightly advantageous to Turkey. In 1609 the fortress of Candia fell and Venetian rule in Crete came to an end. In the regions to the north of the Black Sea the Turks fought with varying success against the Poles, and it was in the reign of Jlohammed IV. that they first came in collision with the rising power of Russia, whose Czar, Feodor II., came off victorious in the conflict. In 1683 the Porte took up the cause of Tiikiilyi. the leader of the Hungarians in their rising against Leopold I. of .ustria. and once more the tide of Moslem invasion rolled up to the gates of Vienna. Kara Mustapha (q.v.), the successor of Ahmed Kiu- prili, advanced with a vast army and laid siege to the Ilapsburg capital. For a moment the fate of Central Europe hung in the balance, but after the siege had lasted two months, the chivalry of Poland, led by King John Sobieski, and a German army came to the relief of the city, and on September 12lh the Turkish arm}' was put to flight in a great battle before its walls. The blow was a crushing one and ended the role of Turkej' as a formidable aggressive power. Aus- tria. Poland, and Venice now made a great on- slaught upon the (Ottoman ICmpire. The Aus- trians drove the Turks l)efore them in Hungary, capturing city after city. In 1080 Huda, over whose walls the crescent had been displayed for a century and a half, fell into their hands. At the same time .lohn Sobieski overran Moldavia and Wallachia and the Venetians success- fully invaded the Morea. In 1095 Peter the Great took up arms against the Turks and in 1690 he wi'csted Azov from them. The Aus- trians, under Prince Eugene (q.v.), annihilated the Turkish armj' opposed to them at Zenta in 1097. In the Peace of Karlowitz in 1699, Turkey was forced to give up all of Hungary between the Danube and the Theiss, to restore to Poland a great part of the Ukraine, acquireil in 1072, and to surrender the Morea to the Vene- tians, In the course of the seventeenth century Turkey had been gradually tightening her hold on Moldavia and Wallachia, which early in the following century were placed under the rule of Fanariot hospodars, appointed by the Porte. In 1711 Sultan Achmet III. took up arms for Charles XII. of .Sweden against Peter the Great of Russia, who had triumphed over his rival at Poltava (1709). The Czar invaded Moldavia, wdiere he was hemmed in by the Turks on the banks of the Pruth, and was glad to purchase peace by the surrender of Azov. In 1715 the Turks reconquered the Morea from the Vene- tians. The struggle with Austria was renewed in 1716. The Austrian forces under Prince Eu- gene gained a great victory in the same year at Peterwardcin and another in 1717 at Belgrade, which they captured. In the Peace of Passarowitz (1718) the Turks were compelled to cede the Banat, part of Servia (with Belgrade), and parts of Bosnia and Wallachia to Austria. The Morea remained in their hands. In 1736 Russia entered upon her role as a great assail- ant of the Ottoman Empire with the seizing of Azov and the invasion of the Crimea, which were followed by the capture of Otchakov (1737), and a victorious advance into Bessarabia and Moldavia. Austria joined Russia in 1737; but a scheme for the partition of Turkey between the two powers was foiled by the defeats inflicted upon the Austrian armies by the Turks. In the P^ace of Belgrade in 1739 Austria relinquished the Servian and Wallachian territories acquired in 1718, while Russia conchuled a peace in which she gained but little. Alarmed at the aggressive intervention of the Empress Catharine II. in the afl'airs of Poland and believing the safety of his realm to be endangered by Hiissian intrigues, Sultan IIustapha III. ventured in 1708 on a war with Russia, which proved disastrous to Turkey. The Russians advanced victoriously through Mol- davia and Wallachia, defeated the Tatar Khan of the Crimea (the vassal of the Sultan), won a victory on the Kagal (in Bessarabia), stormed