Chapter 91 So That's It

It is said that the population of the Ottoman Empire was not as high as that of the Greek classical era, but who knows that the classical era was the peak of the population in the Eastern Mediterranean before modern times.

It is not even just the Eastern Mediterranean region. According to historians, the population of the Roman Empire at its peak was about 50 million, while the population of the entire Europe in the relatively stable Charlemagne era was about 25 million to 35 million. Excluding the Asian and African territories of the Roman Empire, the newly added European territories were not small.

Then can it be said that all the European rulers of this period were useless, just like Nero?

Without considering other factors, a single comparison can be said to be a violent theory.

First of all, the population of the Ottoman Empire is not necessarily lower than that of the heyday of ancient Rome, but according to climatological research, compared with 1,500 years ago, the precipitation in modern North Africa and West Asia has dropped significantly, which is the main reason for the obstruction of the revival of North Africa and West Asia in the Middle Ages.

Let us assume that if the population of a region must have increased overall, then how did the population of the ancient country of Loulan increase to a deserted area thousands of miles away?

This is the problem of external factors.

During the last round of economic expansion in the Mediterranean (15th-16th centuries after the Black Death subsided), the population increased, and a large number of coastal plains were reclaimed for concentrated planting of crops such as wheat, resulting in a decline in soil fertility and severe soil erosion.

The Little Ice Age, which began in the late 16th century, caused the Mediterranean climate to turn to wet and cold, with increased precipitation, and the coastal plains with exhausted soil fertility gradually became swamps with poor drainage.

Swamps led to the rampant spread of infectious diseases such as malaria, and at the same time, small farmers lacked the means to develop swamps, resulting in the abandonment of coastal plains (part of which turned to low-density large pastures), and the transfer of agricultural population to mountainous areas with better sanitary conditions.

The geological conditions of the Mediterranean mountains (shallow soil, unstable precipitation, and easy exhaustion of fertility) prompted mountain farmers to shift from growing wheat to growing olives and grapes, and to combine them with small-scale animal husbandry, gradually moving towards a self-sufficient economy of mixed farming and animal husbandry.

The yield of grain crops declined, and at the same time, the Baltic-Eastern European wheat competition further suppressed the grain industry in the Mediterranean region.

In this way, the decline in total reclaimed area, the reduction in agricultural scale and complexity, and the rampant epidemics caused population growth in the entire Mediterranean region to stagnate.

The shift of population to mountainous areas with inconvenient transportation also means that the regime's ability to control and register the population has declined, further reducing the number of people on paper.

This process applies to both the Ottoman Empire in the east and the Iberian Peninsula, southern France, and Italy in the west.

However, the blow to the areas ruled by the Ottoman Empire was particularly severe. This is because:

Most of the Ottoman Empire's land and almost all of its core territory are on the Mediterranean coast (it occupied two-thirds of the Mediterranean coastline in its heyday), and its political and economic system was basically established during the Mediterranean economic expansion period in the 15th and 16th centuries.

This means that the decline of Mediterranean agriculture has dealt the most serious blow to the Ottoman system.

The decline in food production (plus the impact of American silver) led to severe inflation in the Ottoman Empire since the late 16th century. The decline in real income has made bureaucrats, guards, and citizens dissatisfied, and coups and rebellions have occurred frequently.

The decline in the plain population and the increase in the mountain population are especially bad news for the empire, because the empire's main mountain farmers and herders - the Wallachians and Albanians in the Balkans, the Turks and Kurds in Asia Minor, the Maronites and Druze in the Levant, the Berber tribes in the Atlas Mountains of North Africa... - are basically all rebels.

If these people speak politely to the Ottoman Empire, then God will probably appear.

The most dangerous of them are the Turks in Asia Minor, considering their rebellious habits and their inextricable ties with the empire's mortal enemy - the Safavid dynasty of Persia and its Shiite heretic red-headed tribe.

Starting in the late 16th century, the Jelali rebellion in Asia Minor was undoubtedly related to the activities of the Turks. This war that lasted for nearly a hundred years caused the land in Asia Minor to be abandoned and nine out of ten houses were empty. Even agricultural hinterlands such as Cilicia and the Menderes River Valley became winter pastures for the Turks.

As troublesome as the mountain rebels are the plain nomads who have expanded with the decline of plain agriculture, namely the Bedouins in the Arabian Desert. This is also the next key target of Sayyid the Great, after all, Sayyid the Great is the protector of the two holy cities.

Although the entire Fertile Crescent (Syria + Iraq) region has been trapped in a vicious cycle of agricultural decline-intensified nomadic activities-deterioration of the ecological environment-continued agricultural decline since the Mongol invasion or even earlier.

At the same time, the tug-of-war between the Empire and Safavid Persia in the 15th and 16th centuries almost destroyed Iraq.

But this process reached its peak in the empire in the 17th and 18th centuries.

Especially in the late 17th century, after the tribal herders moved north from the heart of the Arabian Peninsula into Syria, the fragile balance between the Bedouin tribes and the Ottoman government was broken, and the nomads rushed to the walls of Damascus and Aleppo every year to forage for grass and grain.

Because the government could not guarantee the safety of the countryside and roads, the plain farmers abandoned their farmland and fled to the relatively safe Aravi Mountains and Lebanon Mountains.

By the 19th century, the entire plains of Syria and Iraq, except for a few large cities, had almost completely turned into uncultivated wastelands, which stunned the European scholars who came to explore the ancient Mesopotamian civilization.

On the contrary, the mountainous areas with inconvenient transportation around the plains were prosperous, with men farming and women weaving. The local snakes in the mountains - such as the Druze - soon became the emperors who gave the Ottoman government a headache.

Of course, not all Ottoman provinces were equally affected, as the vast empire also had areas less affected by the Mediterranean climate - such as Egypt, with its steady irrigation from the Nile River, and the northern Balkans/Northern Black Sea coast, which had a continental climate.

As a result, these two areas have become the breadbasket of the Ottomans, and their population has continued to increase in proportion to the total population of the empire. This is why Emperor Sai was worried. Too many Orthodox Christians is not a good thing.

By the way, the most severe period of population decline in Egypt was during the Mamluk dynasty, due to the Black Death and the transfer of sweaters from the Red Sea. The Ottoman Empire did not actually eliminate the Mamluks after conquering Egypt, so who does Egypt have to blame?

Throughout the Eastern Mediterranean, this long process of decline continued until the mid-to-late 19th century before being interrupted.

With the introduction of Western water conservancy technology and the spread of anti-malarial drugs such as quinine, the plains and swamps along the Mediterranean coast were redeveloped for agriculture.

The peace under the British Empire, especially the opening of the Suez Canal, also increased the demand for grain, accelerated the revival of Mediterranean agriculture and re-growth of the population - unfortunately, at this time, the Ottoman Empire had one leg in the coffin.

Of course, another example can be given. At the peak of Justinian I, Eastern Rome had 36.5 million people.

The production conditions it has are far stronger than those of the Ottoman Empire. Moreover, the production conditions and support capabilities of Justinian's many Italian regions and southern Iberia are stronger than those of the Ottoman Empire's extra territory in the Balkans. .

There were 7.5 million people in Italy during the Roman era, but could Emperor Seth say that Justinian was a waste?

To compare during the same period, during the Little Ice Age, the Mughals had almost 7 figures for each major famine.

In 1668, a French doctor staying in Delhi recorded this.

"Among the states that make up the vast territory of the Indian Empire, many places are little better than a blade of grass. There are also many places with barren mountains and barren fields, with few people inhabiting them. Even a large part of the fertile land remains uncultivated due to lack of manpower. plow"

The Ottoman Empire, which was roughly located at the same latitude, also suffered from the Little Ice Age, but it survived until the 18th century.

If Akbar knew this he would burst into tears. Therefore, when evaluating a country's administrative capabilities, we should not simply compare numbers, but consider the broader comprehensive impact.

Under the influence of these comprehensive factors, the Ottoman ship finally sailed into the nineteenth century.

The situation of constantly sucking blood from various parts of the empire to replenish the capital has caused the decline of various places, but it has also brought a benefit.

That is, if a capable strongman appears in the center of the empire to promote reforms, the capital's resources will be enough to suppress the local areas.

This is what gave Selim the confidence to carry out his furious reform plan.

There are too many citations, so I won’t list them all. I don’t know what you think, but I did my best.