In the minds of most people, the Ottoman Empire was an unpleasant state with brutal power and archaic orders. And so it really was: from the 18th century to the beginning of the 20th, the Turkish state was in a deep crisis, and if it were not for the genius of Ataturk, it would still be in this crisis.
However, in the period of the XVI-XVII centuries, the Ottoman Empire was one of the most developed and strong states of the modern era. Occupying a huge territory, it was like a bridge connecting Europe and Asia. The level of development of the economy, science and culture of the Ottoman Empire was no worse than that of the "developed" countries of that time, for example, France or Spain. There were even areas in which the Turks were superior to the Europeans, in particular mathematics, chemistry, medicine, geography and navigation.
Let's look at an interesting example. In 1929, the Turkish historian Ethem discovered a unique document - the nautical chart of Admiral Piri Reis. Along with the map, the author's comments and description of its creation were found. The uniqueness of this map lies in the fact that, firstly, it is very accurate (the location of objects, the correctness of the angles), and secondly, it contains such elements and objects, the knowledge of the existence of which (at the time of its creation in 1513) was absent in Europe.
What did the famous navigator depict on his map, why did the find cause such a stir? The map shows the contours of South America and Africa quite accurately, and the map is made in such a way that the scale along the parallels and meridians is the same. This in itself is already a significant discrepancy in time, since the first means of determining coordinates in longitude (along the meridians) appeared only 250 years later.
Piri Reis was an obsessed cartographer and enthusiast. According to his own notes, he made a map based on four sources. Two of them belong to the ancient era, one to the early Arab world, and the last one is the travel map of Columbus. However, these maps were made by simple planimetric methods, and in order to construct its own map, Piri Reis had to possess the basics of spherical trigonometry (which will also be discovered in Europe in about 200 years). However, he never mentions the mathematical apparatus with which his map was made, that is, it turns out that the Turkish naval commander took him for granted and did not even pay attention to his description! Meanwhile, in "civilized Europe" it will be discovered only after a couple of centuries.
The successes of the Turks in urban planning and military engineering were no less impressive. The Turks knew how to build fortresses and storm them. At one time, having lured the Hungarian engineer Urban into their service, they were able to create conditions for the development of their own artillery, and for more than 150 years Turkish guns were among the best in the world. The Turkish fleet dominated the Mediterranean, thanks to which the trade of Europe with the East was under the control of the Turks. Actually, the era of geographical discoveries began not at all in order to discover something. Its main task was to find workarounds to Asia, without the need to pay Turkish duty. At that time, the Ottoman Empire controlled the territory from the Azov to the Arabian Sea and no caravan could pass from east to west without the knowledge of Turkish officials. Besides,The Turks were well aware of their power and slowly began to stare at rich Europe, slowly starting its conquest from the Balkan countries …
What was the reason for such a dizzying success of a relatively young civilization? Where did the people, even during the last crusades, in fact, sitting quietly along the Black Sea coast, achieve such results in such a short time from?
It is believed that religion was the reason for this development. The Turks took Islam from their southern neighbors, the Arabs who lived in Palestine, Egypt and the Arabian Peninsula. Together with Islam, the Turks adopted a part of their culture and scientific knowledge from the Arabs. The amazing phenomenon of advanced Arab science has long haunted many historians. How did it happen that practically all the knowledge of antiquity was lost by the direct heirs of the Roman Empire - Europe, but was preserved by the Arabs? After all, almost two-thirds of the writings of ancient scientists and philosophers that have come down to us have been restored, mainly thanks to Arabic sources. Algebra, fundamentals of physics and chemistry, astronomy, navigation - all this came to Europe from the Arabs. Yes, to be sure, if the first higher educational institutions, universities, were created precisely in the Arab world in the VIII-X centuries,and the first European university appeared in Bologna only in the XI century. It was thanks to the Arabs and Turks that many technical and social achievements of the East appeared in Europe - from iron, gunpowder and paper to philosophical trends.
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However, by the beginning of the 15th century, the Arab world was already fragmented and did not represent, in fact, any real power. The force was a little further north. By 1450, the Turks had captured the whole of Asia Minor, and by 1500 they had seized their hands on almost all the territories of the Arab Caliphate. Thus, the Ottomans received in their property all the knowledge of the Arabs, not only in handwritten form, but also with their keepers in addition. Ascended to the throne of the Ottoman Empire, Sultan Suleiman, nicknamed in history "Magnificent" for almost half a century of his reign, elevated the Ottoman Empire to the pinnacle of its power.
Europe could not oppose anything to a new strong adversary that appeared on its eastern borders. But, in this case, fate itself favored the Europeans. The opened paths to the New World and India gave European civilization not only benefits from trade, but also the opportunity to pursue colonial policies. And the wealth of both Americas, inherited by the Spaniards, Portuguese and Dutch, in the shortest possible time, so rebuilt the economy of all of Europe that it made it possible to maintain the armies of the Old World in sufficient combat readiness to resist the Ottomans. In addition, the sultans were not particularly eager to conquer countries with other religions, for their first task was to unite all Muslims under their auspices, and only then there was the question of expansion into other cultures.
Be that as it may, at the peak of its development, the Ottoman Empire in economic development for a hundred years, and in scientific and technical development for more than two hundred years, was ahead of the "old woman-Europe" and if there were no Great Discoveries, it is still unknown how everything would turn out for Christendom …