Monday, January 6, 2014


The Ottoman-French Connection: The Disintegration of Pax Ottomanica in the Napoleonic Era 

 

           

To initiate amicable relations with an alliance within a milieu of adversaries may seem rather difficult.  However, to maintain trust and confidence within that particular relationship could perhaps seem somewhat impossible, especially when one specific member of the alliance gradually manifests a decline in potency.  Thus the relationship disintegrates, due to the immense pressure, and eventually evolves into a vast schism and vehement distrust.  This exact paradigm marked the Franco-Ottoman pax ottomanica.[1]

            Since the unification of the Spanish and Austria-Hungarian thrones, known as the Hapsburg Empire or the Holy Roman Empire, France and the Ottoman Empire constructed a juxtaposed alliance to contest the rising threat with military, economic, and social collaborations.  Nevertheless, the pax ottomanica did not sustain indefinitely throughout the French and Ottoman connection, nor did the relationship sustain mutual trust after the invasion of Egypt by Napoleon in the summer of 1798.  Therefore even though the Franco-Ottoman pax ottomanica sustained an amicable non-inter-combatant alliance that instituted military, social, and economic collaborations for almost three centuries, the invasion of Egypt by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1798 instigated disintegration within the dynamics of the relationship as well as suspicion and infidelity.

 

Pre-Napoleonic Era: The Creation of the Pax Ottomanica

 

            After the Electors proclaimed Charles V of the Hapsburg Empire as the Holy Roman Emperor in 1521 and Francis I of France was imprisoned for defiance in 1525, the French sought assistance from the Ottoman Empire which was the only power deemed formidable enough to defy the Hapsburg Empire and preserve the European states.[2]  This invitation for aide commenced a burgeoning relationship between the two states committed to challenge the Hapsburg claim to world supremacy.  In 1526 the Ottoman state, led by the more than capable Suleyman the Magnificent, inaugurated the military segment of the alliance by advancing the campaign in Hungry, which directly threatened the back door of the Hapsburg Empire.[3] 

The military alliance retained a more formalized rhetoric in response to Genoese Admiral Andrea Dorea’s crusade and capture of Tunis in July of 1535.  With the threat of this new crusade and prominence of Admiral Dorea, the French and Ottomans realized that a joint effort against their adversaries was most beneficial.[4]  Furthermore, in 1536, the French-Ottoman joint military coalition advanced into Italy; the Ottomans advanced from the south by sea as the French upheld simultaneous pressure from the north by land.  However, the French withdrew their military forces due to significant religious influence propagated directly from the papal institution.[5]  Yet even though Suleyman the Magnificent felt somewhat betrayed, the French mended any damage sustained by warning Suleyman of an upcoming Christian crusade against the Muslims in 1542.[6] 

After the redemption of the French in the Ottoman perspective, the military relations continued to flourish with the ratification of an official treaty signed on the 1st of August, 1547.  This treaty constituted the realization that the French alliance was an extremely vital concession.  Scholar Halil Inalcik states, “The French alliance was the cornerstone of Ottoman policy in Europe.”[7]  In other words, France acted as a vital conduit to Europe, as well as played a significant role in maintaining the contemporary status-quo and preventing Hapsburg domination in Europe.

While the Franco-Ottoman military partnership continued to cultivate, the initiation of economic concessions also rendered a more lucrative proliferation.  In February of 1536, the first unofficial Franco-Ottoman trade agreement was reached and the paradigm for the particular capitulations was patterned after preceding arrangements with Venice and Genoa.[8]  The capitulations for the French offered an unreserved freedom to travel within the Eastern Mediterranean as well as immense benefits concerning trade in Ottoman ports.

Specifically, the Ottoman capitulations granted France entrance into the Ottoman market which created a sense of commercial autonomy within the state.  Within these capitulations, the French established a Frankish-like millet milieu governed by the rule of French ambassadors and representatives, by whom, operated French courts upheld by French law, which were all within the Ottoman state.  In addition, customs rates were calculated at an especially minute rate to further indemnify trade and provide sufficient monetary gain.[9]  The Franco-Ottoman capitulations were officially ratified, by the sultan and the Sublime Porte, as legal and authentic on the 18th of October, 1569.[10] 

This economic agreement further solidified the Ottoman foreign policy in regards to France being the cornerstone and window to the west.[11]  Moreover, since the French were basically the first official state to receive official capitulations in the Ottoman Empire, France fortified the most significant economic dependence as well as a pervasive influence in Ottoman commerce, especially pertaining to Egypt.[12]    

Finally, within the culminating affects of such a long term partnership, the Franco-Ottoman alliance obviously benefited socially as well as militarily and economically.  In terms of social influence, the secular modernity of the French reflected a romantic mystique and a lucid aspiration to modernize or reform one’s state rather than diminish continually in decline.  Initially, the Ottoman military capacity masked an internal decline.  Albeit, the wake of western modernity ameliorated European military might to such a significant advantage, the apparent Ottoman decline was no longer able to hide behind the façade of their gilded military.[13]  Furthermore, it was absolutely essential to initiate some kind of change or reform to meet the demands of a more modern world and to oppose the decline, particularly regarding the systematic, militaristic, and economic set backs vis-à-vis the Ottoman state which apparently originated this decline.

Consequently, the Ottoman state sought out their French alliance to again assist them in this improvement project.  One of the most significant proponents of Ottoman reform was the Sultan Selim III.  Even before Selim was sultan, and still as a resident of the palace kafes, Selim corresponded with Louis XVI of France, from whom, offered patronage and advice to the fledgling leader.[14]  Selim, accordingly, initiated reforms within the Ottoman state based on a western paradigm of thought to save his state from internal and external threats.[15] 

Although many of Selim’s reforms encompassed around his Nizam-I Cedid army, since French instructors were mainly used to train the troops within this new institution and demonstrate the pattern for military reforms, the French language as well as French intellectualism lingered within the Ottoman state.[16]  This remained a reoccurring facet within Ottoman reforms and intellectual movements, especially concerning the education of the Ottoman academics in both the Ottoman state and France, as well as the pervasive influence of the French Revolution of 1789. 

Hence, not only did the French Revolution cast a negative shadow in regards to the nationalistic ideologies of non-Muslim uprisings, such as the Greek independence movement, it also affected the Muslim conservative religious effort, namely the ulema,  to also look at French enlightenment with disdain.[17]  However the French Revolution greatly inspired a modern, secular, intellectual response responsible for the modernization of a Turkish state, Turkish nationalism, and the Turkish education system, namely sponsored by the Young Ottomans as well as the Young Turks.[18]  Thus it is apparent that the Franco-Ottoman alliance also significantly influenced the social status of the Ottoman state.   

With the establishment of pax ottomanica, the Franco-Ottoman alliance cultivated a solidified relationship of trust and dependence in a collaborated effort to sustain military, economic, and social support in order to prosper.  This rapport, however, extensively shifted as a result of Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt and the continued betrayal of Ottoman confidence.[19]  Notwithstanding, it is easy to understand within the historical analysis of Napoleon’s life, as well as the steady decline of the coined “sick man of Europe,” why Napoleon and France sought diplomacy with more prominent allies at the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries.  

 

The Disintegration of the Pax Ottomanica during the Napoleonic Era  

 

After the French Revolution and before Napoleon Bonaparte instituted his reign as emperor, the Franco-Ottoman pax ottomanica alliance experienced an immense strain with the expedition into Egypt by Napoleon as a means to rout the British’s, who were the last power left from the War of the First Coalition, commercial enterprise and trade in the Ottoman state and India.  However, not only was Egypt a means to disrupt the economic stability and concessions of Britain, it seemed that Napoleon preserved an intrinsic fascination with the enchantment of the East, as well as being a keystone in which he could possibly secure a legacy in history.  Also, Napoleon used his expedition into Egypt as an altruistic contrivance to overcome Mamluk control and appear as if the French maintained Ottoman interests as an ally.  Nonetheless, it was Napoleon’s malcontent and disparagement of the Ottoman regime that changed French-Ottoman relations and shifted the Ottoman confidence from trust to suspicion.

As Selim the Grim expanded Ottoman territory victory after victory, campaign after campaign, the gazi Sultan noticed the prolific benefits of Egypt.  Egypt boasted a prominent economy in regards to trade and agriculture as well as a well fortified location and proximity to the Hijaz which hosted the center of Islam and its two most holy sites.[20]  Yet Egypt was controlled by the Mamluk regime, which descended from medieval elite warriors originating from the Caucasus Mountains.  The Mamluks first appeared in Egypt in 1230 and quickly retained suzerainty in 1252 after assassinating Sultan Ashraf Moussa.[21]  The Mamluk authority in Egypt remained absolute until Selim the Grim seized Syria, Egypt, and the Hijaz in 1517 and catapulted Ottoman control over both the resources and provincial administration.[22] 

Nevertheless, the Mamluks still maintained a significant role in Egypt after the conquest and incorporation by the Ottomans.  For as the Ottoman central government continued to weaken, the remaining Mamluk Beys retained administrative positions which included ayans as well as ciftliks.  As the provincial Ottoman leadership, mainly held by the defterdar and qadis, began to loosen in Egypt, the Mamluk Beys consolidated further control over the province by administering iltizams or tax farming.[23]  The iltizams significantly provided control of finances to promote Mamluk affluence and power in Egypt by the time of Napoleon’s expedition.[24]  Napoleon used the Mamluk eminence to justify his expedition into Egypt with the Porte.

For Napoleon, the East (the Near East, from Egypt to India) always conceded an essence of mystical enchantment.  As a young man, Napoleon received a fundamental education of the classics and gravitated towards the heroic military conquests of Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar.[25]  These military leaders of legend lent a grand paradigm of aspiration for Napoleon.  Thus the East not only offered the opportunity to seek glory, it also founded Napoleon’s romantic conception to leave his legacy, an empire, in the pages of history.[26]  It is quite Ironic to note that the Nazis regime, during the 1930’s and 1940’s, had a similar aspiration with their desire to create the Third Reich or empire following the original two empires of Alexander and Caesar.  Napoleon instigated the Egyptian expedition on his own monetary funds and departed from Camp Formio to entertain his fantastic aspirations.  Thus, as Alexander the Great started his campaign in Egypt, so did Napoleon.

It seemed that all forces of nature were pulling Napoleon to the East and Egypt.  Napoleon’s background and aspirations all enveloped in the mystique of the East, as if beckoning him to entertain all desires to etch his name into the fabric of history.  In addition, Egypt appeared profitable for the reaping of the French Republic.  Primarily, Egypt was a perfect staging point to gain advantage in the continuing Anglo-Franco aggression.

Napoleon formulated two possible strategic advantages which merited from the control of Egypt.  First, France could establish a lucrative colony along the Nile River Delta which would provide benefits from trade, Mediterranean and Red Sea ports, and resources from colonialism.  However, most importantly, Egypt could be used as a strategic stronghold in deposing Britain and her colonies.  Britain’s commercial strength exhibited a great weakness in Egypt.  Thus after establishing a stronghold in Egypt, France could monopolize the trading routes by both land and sea.  The French saw this advantage as an opportunity to block communication between Britain and her colonies and hinder British commerce.  Moreover, Egypt yet again demonstrated its opportune geography as a perfect staging point to launch direct assaults on India, which was Britain’s most profitable colony.[27]

Napoleon perfectly depicts, in his own words, the benefits of an Egyptian expedition in a letter to his Soldiers on the 2nd of July, 1798.  Using classical rhetoric and the paradigm of both Alexander and the Roman legions, Napoleon instigates resolve amongst his men with claims that manifest destiny will favor the French mission to defeat the Mamluk Beys and smite a crucial blow to Britain.[28]  Napoleon successfully landed at Alexandria, the city founded by his hero Alexander the Great, on the 1st of July, 1798.  Yet, the Mamluks responded with a counteroffensive that culminated at the Battle of the Pyramids on the 21st of that same month.  Even though the Mamluk forces battled with a significantly larger force, they were no match for the military might of the French as well as the military brilliance of Napoleon.  Consequently, the French suffered only nine fatalities with one hundred wounded, while over sixteen hundred Mamluks soldiers perished.[29] 

With this victory, as previously mentioned, Napoleon again writes that the French sought revenge on the Mamluks for the many humiliations prompted upon French merchants, as well as for the defense of Islam and to assist the sultan in retaining control over the Egyptian province.[30]  Napoleon’s letter may have pacified the Egyptians, but the French invasion only infuriated the Ottoman regime and destroyed the contemporary Franco-Ottoman relations.  On the 9th of September, 1798, the Porte declared war and jihad against their former allies.[31] 

As Napoleon quickly arose to power with the defeat of the Mamluks and also from controlling former Mamluk tax farms to finance his eastern campaign, Napoleon and his cohorts soon experienced many hardships inherent with the East.  On the 1st of August, 1798, Napoleon found himself stranded in the East after the British Admiral Nelson routed the French fleet in Aboukir Bay.  In spite of this misfortune and as he followed in the footsteps of his hero Alexander, Napoleon and his forces continued on with the Eastern expedition which further prolonged their suffering.  After many hardships, including disease and hunger due to a poor supply line, Napoleon failed to seize Acre, which Alexander had besieged and won twenty-two centuries earlier, and was forced to return to France to battle the Second Coalition coordinated by Austria, Britain, Russia and the Ottoman Empire.[32]      

The Franco-Ottoman pax ottomanica ruptured for the first time since its initial composition.  The Ottomans continued with anti-Napoleon and anti-French sentiments by first creating an alliance between Muslim and Christian powers in 1799 and then by signing the Treaty of Defensive Alliance of September of 1805 with Russia and Britain.[33]  This permitted Russian warships passage within the Turkish Straits.  This alliance was formulated strictly to combat the rising success of Napoleon and France, except it required an unfamiliar allegiance between two natural enemies, Russia and the Ottomans.  The synthetic relationship imposed between Russia and the Ottoman state soon fell as a result of French diplomacy.  Since Napoleon’s expedition into Egypt, somehow, Selim III reconciled differences with Napoleon and condoned the betrayal of their allegiance.  For Selim still admired France and their alliance still warranted a natural connection.  Thus in 1806, Selim recognized Napoleon as the rightful Emperor of France and withdrew from their previous alliance with Russia and Britain.[34]  This turn of events, of course, ignited Russian and British indignation, but it was Selim who declared war on Russia on the 27th of December, 1806.  Still, the Russian military was far superior to that of the Ottomans and rapidly advanced into Bucharest, Wallachia, Bessarabia and even the mouth of the Dardanelles in the early months of 1807.  Unfortunately for the Ottoman state, the paucity of French reinforcements left the Ottomans to fend for themselves.[35]

The year 1807 again manifested misfortune for the Ottomans, but this time the origins were due to both internal and external strife.  The ayans, ulema, and janissary corps toppled Selim in an orchestrated coup which raised Mustafa IV to sultan and disposed of the Nizam-I Cedid.  Mustafa maintained Franco-Ottoman relations and depended significantly on their formidable ally with the utmost confidence.  However, this confidence was again misplaced.  Napoleon again sought to take advantage of his alliance with the Ottoman state to secure an even more profitable alliance.  Napoleon first met and signed the Treaty of Finkenstein, in May of 1807, with Iran, ensuring support for an Iranian campaign to reconquer the Caucasus as well as India.[36]  Additionally, Napoleon and Alexander I met in the German town of Tilsit on the 7th of July, 1807, to discuss the annexation of Ottoman territories, since the Ottoman military was so inefficient and impotent to defend them.  After a reconciliation regarding the Ottoman territories was reached between France and Russia, France persuaded the Ottoman state to sign an armistice with their infamous Russian adversary.  Yet the armistice never secured Russia’s commitment, thus confirming French perfidy and betrayal.[37]       

The Ottoman government had no choice but to plead with Britain to save them from certain annihilation, since they now found themselves shoved between two enemies.  The British and Ottomans signed the Dardanelles Treaty of Peace on the 5th of January, 1809.  Again Napoleon sought to reform the pax ottomanica with the recently ascended sultan, Mahmud II, but trust and confidence in Napoleon and France had completely disintegrated.  Thus, instead of a final renewal of a once prosperous relationship, where France acted as a cornerstone for the Ottoman foreign policy vis-à-vis the west, the Ottoman state realized that they would never fully trust France again.  Consequently, the Ottoman Porte signed the Treaty of Bucharest with Russia on the 28th of May, 1812.[38]  

 

Post Napoleonic Era and Pseudo Franco-Ottoman Relations  

 

After the defeat of Napoleon and his banishment to first the Island of Elba and then to the Island of St. Helena, the world began to repair and reorganize that which Napoleon’s so-called legacy left in shambles.  The Congress of Vienna was the world’s attempt to mend all that was broken.  Napoleon had left the continent in disarray which left nations, especially France [initially], to adopt anti-nationalistic sentiments to avoid further wars.[39]  As a result, one of the most orchestrated policies that engendered from the Congress of Vienna of 1815 was the preservation of the Ottoman Empire, which survived virtually unscathed, as the essential key in the European status-quo.[40]  Accordingly, the Ottomans were initiated in the Concert of Europe and were finally able, for a time, to focus on internal elements of the Ottoman government.

Yet, even though France and the Ottomans were united within the Concert of Europe and bound by the Congress of Vienna, still the mistrust resonated from Napoleon’s betrayals.  A pseudo alliance was thus created between the French and Ottomans where dissension prevailed whenever justified.  The Ottoman’s still used France as link to western modernity, but France never retained the loyalty and trust of the Ottoman state.  France openly participated in supporting Muhammad ‘Ali’s reform policies which assisted Egypt in ameliorating their education system as well as modernizing their military and economy, which in time, opposed the Ottoman sovereignty.[41]  Also, France participated in a territorial squabble with the Ottoman state in regards to the annexation of Algeria in 1830.[42]  Therefore, the relationship between France and the Ottoman Empire was never repaired and continued to disintegrate over time until they found themselves once again as adversaries in World War I.    

 In closing, it is safe to argue that the decision for Napoleon to ultimately betray the Franco-Ottoman pax ottomanica, which had flourished for almost three preceding centuries, was the direct consequence of the steady decline of the Ottoman state and lack of military prowess.  If the Ottoman state had maintained its efficiency as during the times of Suleyman the Magnificent, Napoleon would have greatly benefited from the Franco-Ottoman alliance because of geographical and ideological advantages.  Yet since the Ottoman inefficiency confirmed its weakened state, Napoleon betrayed an ever so solid pax ottomanica connection which led to the disintegration of Franco-Ottoman confidence and trust.


Bibliography

 

 

Badie, Bertrand.  “The Impact of the French Revolution on Muslim Societies: Evidence and Ambiguities.”  International Social Science Journal, February 1989.  (Vol. 41 Issue 1), 5-16.

 

Hanna, Nelly.  Edited by Irene A. Bierman.  “Ottoman Egypt and the French Expedition: Some Long-Term Trends.” Napoleon in Egypt.  United Kingdom: Garnet Publishing Limited, 2003. 

 

Herold, J. Christopher.  Bonaparte in Egypt.  New York: Harper and Row Publishers, 1962.

 

Hess, Andrew C.  “The Ottoman Conquest of Egypt (1517) and the Beginning of the Sixteenth-Century World War.”  International Journal of Middle East Studies, January 1973.  (Vol. 4 Issue 1), 55-76.

 

Inalcik, Halil.  The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age 1300-1600.  London, Phoenix Press, 1973.

 

Karsh, Efraim and Inari Karsh.  Empires of the Sand: The Struggle for Mastery in the Middle East 1789-1923.  Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

 

Kolla, Edward James.  “Not So Criminal: New Understandings of Napoleon’s Foreign Policy in the East.”  French Historical Studies, Spring 2007.  (Vol. 30 Issue 2), 175-201.

 

Lewis, Bernard.  The Emergence of Modern Turkey.  Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.

 

Mardin, Serif.  “The Influence of the French Revolution on the Ottoman Empire.”  International Social Science Journal, February 1989.  (Vol. 41 Issue 1), 17-31.

 

Moiret, Captain Joseph-Marie.  Translated and edited by Rosemary Brindle.  Memoirs of Napoleon’s Egyptian Expedition, 1798-1801.  London: Grenhill Books, 2001.

 

Shaw, Stanford J.  History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey: Empire of the Gazis: The Rise and Decline of the Ottoman Empire, 1280-1808, Volume 1.  Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976.

 

Shaw, Stanford J. and Ezel Kural Shaw.  History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey: Reform, Revolution, and Republic: The Rise of Modern Turkey, 1808-1975, Vol. 2.  Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977.

 

Straus, Hannah Alice.  The Attitude of the Congress of Vienna Toward Nationalism in Germany, Italy, and Poland.  New York: Columbia University Press, 1949.



[1] Nelly Hanna, “Ottoman Egypt and the French Expedition: Some Long-Term Trends,” Napoleon in Egypt, (United Kingdom: Garnet Publishing Limited, 2003), 11.   Pax ottomanica referenced the Franco-Ottoman treaty signed 1 August 1547; lasted until Napoleon’s expedition into Egypt in 1798.
 
[2] Halil Inalcik, The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age 1300-1600, (London: Phoenix Press, 1973), 35.
[3] Inalcik, 35.
[4] Stanford J. Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey: Empire of the Gazis: The Rise and Decline of the Ottoman Empire, 1280-1808, Vol. 1, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976), 97.
[5] Shaw, Vol.1, 98-99.
[6] Shaw, Vol. 1, 102.
[7] Inalcik, 37.
[8] Shaw, Vol. 1, 97.
[9] Shaw, Vol. 1, 97.
[10] Inalcik, 137.
[11] Inalcik, 137.
[12] J. Christopher Herold, Bonaparte in Egypt, (New York: Harper and Row Publishers, 1962), 10.
[13] Bernard Lewis, The Emergence of Modern Turkey, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 56.
[14] Lewis, 56.
[15] Efraim Karsh and Inari Karsh, Empires of the Sand: The Struggle for Mastery in the Middle East 1789-1923, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press), 9.
[16] Lewis, 57.
[17] Serif Mardin, “The Influence of the French Revolution on the Ottoman Empire,” International Social Science Journal, February 1989, (Vol. 41 Issue 1), 17.
[18] Bertrand Badie, “The Impact of the French Revolution on Muslim Societies: Evidence and Ambiguities,” International Social Science Journal, February 1989, (Vol. 41 Issue 1), 11.
[19] Mardin, 17.
[20] Andrew C. Hess, “The Ottoman Conquest of Egypt (1517) and the Beginning of the Sixteenth-Century World War,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, January 1973, (Vol. 4 Issue 1), 55.
[21] Herold, 7.
[22] Hess, 55.
[23] Hanna, 6-7.
[24] Hanna, 7.
[25] Edward James Kolla, “Not So Criminal: New Understandings of Napoleon’s Foreign Policy in the East,” French Historical Studies, Spring 2007, (Vol. 30 Issue 2), 177.
[26] Kolla, 179.
[27] Kolla, 182-184.
[28] Captain Joseph-Marie Moiret, translated and edited by Rosemary Brindle, Memoirs of Napoleon’s Egyptian Expedition, 1798-1801, (London: Grenhill Books, 2001), 39.
[29] Moiret, 55.
[30] Moiret, 43.
[31] Kolla, 186.
[32] Kolla, 185 and 188
[33] Karsh, 11.
[34] Karsh, 12.
[35] Karsh, 13.
[36] Stanford Shaw and Ezel Kural Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey: Reform, Revolution, and Republic: The Rise of Modern Turkey, 1808-1975, Vol. 2, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), 16.
[37] Karsh, 14-15.
[38] Karsh, 15-17.
[39] Hannah Alice Straus, The Attitude of the Congress of Vienna Toward Nationalism in Germany, Italy, and Poland, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1949), 151.
[40] Karsh, 17.
[41] Hanna, 10-11.
[42] Hanna, 11.