COMMERCIAL RELATIONS IN THE MIDDLE AGES 41
how firm has been his authority, how unshaken his power, . . Within a dozen years the lost provinces were reunited under the strong and able rule of Mahammud I, and the Ottoman Empire far from being weakened by the apparently crushing blow it had received in 1402, rose stronger and more vigourous after his fall, and like a giant refreshed, prepared for new and bolder feats of conquest.” [1] Cheered up by brilliant prospects Mohammed transferred his capital from Brusa in Asia to Adrianople in Europe. The Seljuk Turks reached the Hellespont but it was left to the Ottomans to cross it. Constantinople was the dream of many a Turkish ruler. They had longed for the possession of that imperial city ever since Ottoman had dreamed that he grasped it in his hand. “Thunderbolt Bayezid had besiged it. Musa had pressed it hard. Murad II had patiently planned its conquest. There was little to be won beside the city itself, for all the province round about it had long been subdued by the Ottomans, but the wealth and beauty and the strength and position, of the capital itself were quite enough to make its capture the crowning ambition of the Turks.” [2] With eagerness Mahammud II the sixth of the Ottoman emperors was in watchful waiting for pretext to capture the city. Taking advantage of the hostility of the emperor he prepared to attack the city which fell on the 29th of May 1453. The withstanding of the city for such a long time rather than its fall constitute real wonder for “at this period the state of the Byzantine empire was such as to render its powers of resistance insignificant, indeed the length of time during which it held out against the Turks is to be attributed rather to the lack of efficacious means at the disposal of its assailants than to any qualities possessed by its defenders.” [3] There is perhaps no place in the world more strategic than Constantinople in that it commands the three continents Asia, Europe and Africa, and whoever has had it, has enjoyed supremacy in all these three. Speaking of the physical strength of Constantinople and the attacks it has withstood Dr. Cunningham says, “As each century came, a new horde of invaders appeared. In the fourth
1 Stanley Lane- Poole— “Turkey”, pp. 74-75.
2 Ibid, p. 107-108.
- Enc. Brit. Vol. XXVII, p. 443.