WATCH: Unit 3 Overview

Have you ever thought about how your government  gets you to do things? Simple things, like wear a seat belt or... complicated things,  like paying taxes and registering for the draft. Some of the strategies are obvious. Governments  have armies and police forces with big guns and   the authority to make people do what they want. But, some of the strategies are... less   noticeable, and involve carrots—rather than  sticks—to convince you to act in certain ways.   Look at the money you use. It probably carries   faces of your leaders, or other symbols of  the government. Every time you buy a Mars Bar,   you're acknowledging the authority of your  government to control the medium of exchange. Governments use plenty of other cultural  symbols to convince citizens of their authority; founding myths, impressive buildings, and  religious justifications often support the   right of the government to govern. Governments  have been using these sorts of strategies for   thousands of years. I'd like to introduce you to  someone. His name is Suleiman. Or, more formally, Suleiman the First, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire,  King of Kings, Emperor of the East and West, Majestic Caesar, Prince and Lord of the most  happy constellation, Commander of the Faithful,   Refuge of all the people in the whole entire  world, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques,   the shadow of the almighty dispensing quiet on  the Earth, King of believers and unbelievers,   Possessor of men's necks, and Allah's deputy on  Earth. To his own subjects—the inhabitants of   the vast Ottoman Empire—he was commonly known  as "Suleiman the Lawgiver." Europeans simply   called him "Suleiman the Magnificent."  And his reign certainly was magnificent.   He ruled for 46 years and expanded the  territory and the wealth of the empire,   conquering North Africa, Hungary, and Mesopotamia. He also reformed the Ottoman legal system. So, that explains "Magnificent" and   "Lawgiver," but how did Suleiman earn these  other titles? And what do these titles tell   us about how the sultans of the Ottoman  Empire managed to rule for over 600 years? To answer that, let's examine some of the most  powerful governments in the early modern world. Hi, I'm Rachel Hansen, and this is Unit  3: Land-Based Empires 1450 to 1750.   By the mid-15th century, the Mongol Empire had  fractured and new empires were rising to replace   the power vacuum it left behind. Five large  land-based empires arose in territory once held   by the Mongols. In the period from 1450 to 1750, these were the most powerful states on the planet: the Ottoman, Russian, Safavid, Mughal, and the  Ming and Qing empires. Historians sometimes call   these the "gunpowder empires" because they used  gunpowder weapons to conquer and rule. In this   unit, we call them "land-based empires," meaning  they ruled vast territories of contiguous land   masses—mostly in Asia, but also parts of Africa  and Europe. Ruling such large empires wasn't easy. Thankfully, each of these empires had risen in the  wake of the Mongol collapse, and they were able to   learn from the Mongols example (that shouldn't  surprise you—you already know the mongols   were successful rulers as well as warriors). These empires competed for dominance and trade. The Ottomans and Russians repeatedly fought over  the Black Sea and Caucasus Mountains. The Safavids   found themselves at odds with the Ottomans and  the Mughals. And towards the end of this period, each of these empires increasingly clashed with  small European adventurers who were attracted by   the wealth of the Indian Ocean and the Pacific  Coast of Asia. In Unit 3, we focus in on these   five empires that ruled most of Eurasia and  North Africa. We'll attempt to understand   how they expanded and how they managed to govern  all these diverse societies that they conquered. Okay, so... what are some themes in governance  that these empires shared? The rulers of each   of these empires relied on conquest and military  might to expand their territory and keep their   subjects in line. But like your own government, they also used more... subtle methods. Here are   two in particular that historians have identified: first, all of these empires centralized authority   meaning, they kept as much power as possible  in the emperor's hands rather than delegating   to a class of aristocrats in distant provinces.  However, no emperor, no matter how magnificent, could manage such vast empires alone, so large  bureaucracies emerged to manage the complexity. These bureaucracies developed a  professional class of officials   who handled tasks like tax collection. Second, in each of these empires, religions  played a large role in governance.   In Russia, the Orthodox Christian  church worked closely with the Tzars. In the Ottoman Empire, the Sultan claimed  religious authority for all Sunni Islam.   In the Safavid Empire, the Shahs made  Shia Islam the religion of the state,   putting them at odds with the Sunni  Ottomans and Mughals. And in China,   different emperors chose to embrace and  reject different religions through the years,   including various forms of Buddhism,  Confucianism, Taoism, and Islam. So, in these large empires, culture and religion  played a critical role in administering the   empire and enhancing the authority of the  ruling dynasty and central government. Rulers wielded the authority of their gods, along  with the power of their gunpowder. Yet, emperors   also often found it useful to practice a certain  amount of religious tolerance—like the Mongols   had—allowing minorities within their empires  a role in governance or some local autonomy. Clearly, these powerful empires had many tools  at their disposal to conquer and command,   and each ruler used them somewhat differently.  Let's zoom in on the Ottoman example to see how   these themes played out. One fun way to do that  is to examine some of Suleiman's many titles.   The Ottoman Sultans claimed the title of  Caliph. That means he's the religious and   political successor to the prophet Muhammad  and leader of the Islamic world, making him   Allah's deputy on Earth. As the Ottoman  Empire conquered more Islamic territories,   this title gave the sultans more  authority over the faithful. Their conquest of Arabia also gave  the sultan's custodianship—meaning   control—of the two holiest cities in  Islam: Mecca and Medina. This one,   Majestic Caesar, is similar to another  title the sultans claimed after they   conquered Constantinople in 1453:  Kayseri Rûm, or Caesar of the Romans. The Ottomans, like the Russian Tsars and Byzantine  Emperors, claimed to be the successors of the   Roman Empire. Many empires claimed succession from  some earlier empire to bolster their authority. In the Mediterranean and Eastern  Europe, that was usually the Romans.   The Ottoman sultans understood that  they ruled many peoples, far and wide,   of many ethnicities and faiths, including  non-believers. To administer their diverse empire,   they utilized two important systems: the first was  called the Millet System, and the other was called   "devshirme." Under the Millet system, the Ottoman  Emperor permitted various religious communities   like Christians and Jews to govern  themselves by their own laws, as long as they swore loyalty—and paid taxes—to  the sultan. Milets helped the sultan in Istanbul   rule over people of many faiths without provoking  revolts in its distant provinces. Under the second   system, devshirmei, the sultan enslaved young  boys from Christian communities in the Balkans. We used the term 'enslaved' accurately, but  this was different in many ways from the   kind of slavery you're probably familiar with.  Under the devshereme system, the boys became   professional soldiers and bureaucrats, often  rising to positions of great power in the empire— several became Grand Vizier, the  second-most powerful man in the empire. Many families wanted their children to enter this  service and would bribe Ottoman officials. The   devshereme ensured that the sultan had a powerful  army and an effective bureaucracy that was loyal   to him and not to his rivals. Thanks to policies  like these, the land-based empires remained the   most powerful states through this period. Yet  by the late 18th century, their magnificence   was beginning to fade as European overseas  empires began to challenge their supremacy.