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Jaffa Gate ( Hebrew : שער יפו , romanized :  Sha'ar Yafo ; Arabic : باب الخليل , romanized :  Bāb al-Khalīl , "Hebron Gate") is one of the seven main open gates of the Old City of Jerusalem .

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178-480: The name Jaffa Gate is currently used for both the historical Ottoman gate from 1538, and for the wide gap in the city wall adjacent to it to the south. The old gate has the layout of a medieval gate tower with an L-shaped entryway, which was secured at both ends (north and east) with heavy doors. The breach in the wall was created in 1898 by the Ottoman authorities in order to allow German emperor Wilhelm II to enter

356-609: A Jew and was considered as such by some, this religious identification was undermined by the decadent lifestyle of the Herodians , which would have earned them the antipathy of observant Jews. Herod later executed several members of his own family, including his wife Mariamne I. Herod's rule marked a new beginning in the history of Judea. Judea had been ruled autonomously by the Hasmonean kings from 140 until 63 BCE. The Hasmonean kings retained their titles, but became clients of Rome after

534-540: A bodyguard of 2,000 soldiers. Josephus describes various units of Herod's personal guard taking part in Herod's funeral, including the Doryphnoroi , and a Thracian , Celtic (probably Gallic ) and Germanic contingent. While the term Doryphnoroi does not have an ethnic connotation, the unit was probably composed of distinguished veteran soldiers and young men from the most influential Jewish families. Thracians had served in

712-622: A calamitous end in 1683 when Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha led a huge army to attempt a second Ottoman siege of Vienna in the Great Turkish War of 1683–1699. The final assault being fatally delayed, the Ottoman forces were swept away by allied Habsburg, German, and Polish forces spearheaded by the Polish king John III Sobieski at the Battle of Vienna . The alliance of the Holy League pressed home

890-574: A constitutional monarchy. However, following the disastrous Balkan Wars , the CUP became increasingly radicalized and nationalistic, leading a coup d'état in 1913 that established a one-party regime. The CUP allied with the German Empire hoping to escape from the diplomatic isolation that had contributed to its recent territorial losses; it thus joined World War I on the side of the Central Powers . While

1068-494: A coup, but he did see the need for military mobilization. In 1883, a German military mission under General Baron Colmar von der Goltz arrived to train the Ottoman Army, leading to the so-called "Goltz generation" of German-trained officers, who played a notable role in the politics of the empire's last years. From 1894 to 1896, between 100,000 and 300,000 Armenians living throughout the empire were killed in what became known as

1246-666: A dream not to report back to Herod. Similarly, Joseph was warned in a dream that Herod intended to kill Jesus, so he and his family fled to Egypt. When Herod realized he had been outwitted, he gave orders to kill all boys of the age of two and under in Bethlehem and its vicinity. Joseph and his family stayed in Egypt until Herod's death, then moved to Nazareth in Galilee to avoid living under Herod's son Archelaus . Most modern biographers of Herod, and some biblical scholars, dismiss Matthew's story as

1424-491: A fairly modern conscripted army , banking system reforms, the decriminalization of homosexuality, the replacement of religious law with secular law, and guilds with modern factories. The Ottoman Ministry of Post was established in Istanbul in 1840. American inventor Samuel Morse received an Ottoman patent for the telegraph in 1847, issued by Sultan Abdülmecid , who personally tested the invention. The reformist period peaked with

1602-545: A figure that vastly exceeded the number of Muslim children in school at the time, who were further hindered by the amount of time spent learning Arabic and Islamic theology. Author Norman Stone suggests that the Arabic alphabet, in which Turkish was written until 1928 , was ill-suited to reflect the sounds of Turkish (which is a Turkic as opposed to Semitic language), which imposed further difficulty on Turkish children. In turn, Christians' higher educational levels allowed them to play

1780-487: A folk legend attributes them to the two architects whom Suleiman commissioned to construct the Old City walls. According to legend, when Suleiman saw that the architects had left Mount Zion and the tomb of King David outside of the enclosure, he ordered them executed. However, in deference to their impressive achievement, he had them buried inside the walls next to Jaffa Gate. In 1917, British general Edmund Allenby entered

1958-482: A king who entered the city's gates on a white horse, so to satisfy the emperor's vanity and avoid the fate foretold by legend, a breach was made in the wall rather than allow him to ride through a gate. As the demolished wall segment was standing inside the citadel moat, a portion of the moat was filled in, creating the ramp that allowed the Emperor to access the breach and enter the city on his horse (or in his carriage). This

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2136-408: A large palace, a race track, service quarters, and a monumental building whose function is still a mystery. Perhaps, says Ehud Netzer, who excavated the site, it is Herod's mausoleum . Next to it is a pool, almost twice as large as modern Olympic-size pools . On May 7, 2007, an Israeli team of archaeologists of Hebrew University, led by Netzer, announced they had discovered the tomb. The site

2314-503: A larger role in the economy, with the rise in prominence of groups such as the Sursock family indicative of this. In 1911, of the 654 wholesale companies in Istanbul, 528 were owned by ethnic Greeks. In many cases, Christians and Jews gained protection from European consuls and citizenship, meaning they were protected from Ottoman law and not subject to the same economic regulations as their Muslim counterparts. The Crimean War (1853–1856)

2492-424: A later period, which added significantly to its height. The site contains important archaeological finds dating back 2,700 years, and is a venue for benefit events, craft shows, concerts, and sound-and-light performances. In 1907 a clock was placed on the roof of the gate, and in 1908 an ornate clock tower was built on top of Jaffa Gate historical gate tower. Apart from serving the developing business district in

2670-447: A literary device. Contemporary non-biblical sources, including Josephus and the surviving writings of Nicolaus of Damascus (who knew Herod personally), provide no corroboration for Matthew's account of the massacre, and it is not mentioned in the Gospel of Luke . Classical historian Michael Grant states "[t]he tale is not history but myth or folk-lore", while Peter Richardson notes that

2848-664: A major center for its trade, contributing to its continued prosperity throughout the seventeenth and much of the eighteenth century. Under Ivan IV (1533–1584), the Tsardom of Russia expanded into the Volga and Caspian regions at the expense of the Tatar khanates. In 1571, the Crimean khan Devlet I Giray , commanded by the Ottomans, burned Moscow . The next year, the invasion was repeated but repelled at

3026-845: A massive expansion project on the Temple Mount . In addition to fully rebuilding and enlarging the Second Jewish Temple , he artificially expanded the platform on which it stood, doubling it in size. Today's Western Wall formed part of the retaining perimeter wall of this platform. In addition, Herod also used the latest technology in hydraulic cement and underwater construction to build the harbor at Caesarea Maritima . While Herod's zeal for building transformed Judea, his motives were not selfless. Although he built fortresses ( Masada , Herodium , Alexandrium , Hyrcania , and Machaerus ) in which he and his family could take refuge in case of insurrection, these vast projects were also intended to gain

3204-718: A mixed response from the Jewish populace. Although Herod considered himself king of the Jews, he let it be known that he also represented the non-Jews living in Judea, building temples for other religions outside of the Jewish areas of his kingdom. Many Jews questioned the authenticity of Herod's Judaism on account of his Idumean background and his infamous murders of members of his family. However, he generally respected traditional Jewish observances in his public life. For instance, he minted coins without human images to be used in Jewish areas and acknowledged

3382-669: A new aristocracy from practically nothing, he has still been criticized by various historians. His reign polarizes opinion among historians, some viewing his legacy as evidence of success, and some viewing it as a reminder of his tyrannical rule. While Herod the Great is described in the Christian Bible as the co-ordinator of the Massacre of the Innocents , the remainder of the Biblical references to

3560-540: A proposal that has received strong criticism from major Israeli archeologists. Macrobius (c. 400 CE), one of the last pagan writers in Rome, in his book Saturnalia , wrote: "When it was heard that, as part of the slaughter of boys up to two years old, Herod, king of the Jews, had ordered his own son to be killed, he [the Emperor Augustus] remarked, 'It is better to be Herod's pig [Gr. hys] than his son' [Gr. hyios]". This

3738-514: A sense of Turkish nationalism. In this period, the Ottoman Empire spent only small amounts of public funds on education; for example, in 1860–1861 only 0.2% of the total budget was invested in education. As the Ottoman state attempted to modernize its infrastructure and army in response to outside threats, it opened itself up to a different kind of threat: that of creditors. As the historian Eugene Rogan has written, "the single greatest threat to

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3916-453: A severe famine that occurred in 25 BCE. Although he made many attempts at conforming to traditional Jewish laws, there were more instances where Herod was insensitive, which constitutes one of the major Jewish complaints of Herod as highlighted in Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews . In Jerusalem, Herod introduced foreign forms of entertainment, and erected a golden eagle at the entrance of

4094-514: A vassal of the Roman Empire , expected to support the interests of his Roman patrons. Nonetheless, just when Herod obtained leadership in Judea, his rule faced two threats. The first threat came from his mother-in-law Alexandra, who sought to regain power for her family, the Hasmoneans, whose dynasty Herod had overthrown in 37 BCE (see Siege of Jerusalem ). In the same year, Cleopatra married

4272-454: A victory over the Ottoman fleet at the Battle of Lepanto (1571), off southwestern Greece; Catholic forces killed over 30,000 Turks and destroyed 200 of their ships. It was a startling, if mostly symbolic, blow to the image of Ottoman invincibility, an image which the victory of the Knights of Malta over the Ottoman invaders in the 1565 siege of Malta had recently set about eroding. The battle

4450-431: A wife, Doris, and a young son, Antipater , and chose therefore to banish Doris and her child. Herod and Sosius, the governor of Syria, at the behest of Mark Antony, set out with a large army in 37 BCE and captured Jerusalem , Herod then sending Antigonus for execution to Mark Antony. From this moment, Herod took the role as sole ruler of Judea and the title of basileus (Βασιλεύς, "king") for himself, ushering in

4628-521: Is documented by Josephus , who writes, "And the body was carried two hundred furlongs , to Herodium, where he had given order to be buried." Professor Ehud Netzer , an archaeologist from the Hebrew University , read the writings of Josephus and focused his search on the vicinity of the pool and its surroundings. An article in the New York Times states, Lower Herodium consists of the remains of

4806-706: Is located at the exact location given by Josephus, atop tunnels and water pools, at a flattened desert site, halfway up the hill to Herodium , 12 km (7.5 mi) south of Jerusalem. The tomb contained a broken sarcophagus but no remains of a body. Not all scholars agree with Netzer: in an article for the Palestine Exploration Quarterly , archaeologist David Jacobson ( University of Oxford ) wrote that "these finds are not conclusive on their own and they also raise new questions." In October 2013, archaeologists Joseph Patrich and Benjamin Arubas also challenged

4984-645: Is no such marker today. Jaffa Gate was inaugurated in 1538 as part of the rebuilding of the Old City walls by Suleiman the Magnificent . In 1898, a breach was made through the wall connecting the citadel with the gate tower that constituted the Jaffa Gate, ahead of German Emperor Wilhelm II 's visit. Rumours have it that the Kaiser insisted on entering the city mounted on his white horse, or, according to some, in his carriage. Local legend said that Jerusalem would be ruled by

5162-579: Is sometimes referred to as Herod's Temple. Today, only the four retaining walls remain standing, including the Western Wall . These walls created a flat platform (the Temple Mount) upon which the Temple was then constructed. Herod's other achievements include the development of water supplies for Jerusalem, building fortresses such as Masada and Herodium , and founding new cities such as Caesarea Maritima and

5340-641: The 1948 Arab–Israeli War , Israeli forces fought hard to connect the Jewish Quarter of the Old City with Israeli-held western Jerusalem by controlling the Jaffa Gate. Israeli forces were not able to gain control of the gate until the Six-Day War in 1967. In 2000, Pope John Paul II came through Jaffa Gate to the Old City during his visit in Israel in the Holy Year. Inside Jaffa Gate is a small square with entrances to

5518-618: The Anatolian Beyliks . One of these, in the region of Bithynia on the frontier of the Byzantine Empire, was led by the Turkish tribal leader Osman I ( d. 1323/4), a figure of obscure origins from whom the name Ottoman is derived. Osman's early followers consisted of Turkish tribal groups and Byzantine renegades, with many but not all converts to Islam. Osman extended control of his principality by conquering Byzantine towns along

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5696-684: The Augusteum , a temple dedicated to Augustus. Herod's most famous and ambitious project was the expansion of the Second Temple in Jerusalem which was undertaken so that he would "have a capital city worthy of his dignity and grandeur", and with this reconstruction Herod hoped to gain more support from the Jews. Recent findings suggest that the Temple Mount walls and Robinson's Arch may not have been completed until at least 20 years after his death, during

5874-510: The Balkans by the mid-14th century, transforming their petty kingdom into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed II , which marked the Ottomans' emergence as a major regional power. Under Suleiman the Magnificent (1520–1566), the empire reached the peak of its power, prosperity, and political development. By

6052-458: The Battle of Molodi . The Ottoman Empire continued to invade Eastern Europe in a series of slave raids , and remained a significant power in Eastern Europe until the end of the 17th century. The Ottomans decided to conquer Venetian Cyprus and on 22 July 1570, Nicosia was besieged; 50,000 Christians died, and 180,000 were enslaved. On 15 September 1570, the Ottoman cavalry appeared before

6230-702: The Bosporus Strait made it difficult to conquer. In 1402, the Byzantines were temporarily relieved when the Turco-Mongol leader Timur , founder of the Timurid Empire , invaded Ottoman Anatolia from the east. In the Battle of Ankara in 1402, Timur defeated Ottoman forces and took Sultan Bayezid I as prisoner, throwing the empire into disorder. The ensuing civil war lasted from 1402 to 1413 as Bayezid's sons fought over succession. It ended when Mehmed I emerged as

6408-642: The Bulgarian Tsardom of Vidin in 1396, regarded as the last large-scale crusade of the Middle Ages , failed to stop the advance of the victorious Ottomans. As the Turks expanded into the Balkans, the conquest of Constantinople became a crucial objective. The Ottomans had already wrested control of nearly all former Byzantine lands surrounding the city, but the strong defense of Constantinople's strategic position on

6586-583: The Cape of Good Hope in 1488 initiated a series of Ottoman-Portuguese naval wars in the Indian Ocean throughout the 16th century. Despite the growing European presence in the Indian Ocean, Ottoman trade with the east continued to flourish. Cairo, in particular, benefitted from the rise of Yemeni coffee as a popular consumer commodity. As coffeehouses appeared in cities and towns across the empire, Cairo developed into

6764-621: The Christian Quarter (on the left), Muslim Quarter (straight ahead) and the Armenian Quarter (to the right, past the Tower of David ). A tourist information office and shops line the square. The entrance to the Muslim Quarter is part of the suq (marketplace). The gate's location is determined by the city's topography. It stands at the point where the valley followed by Jaffa Road meets

6942-534: The Constitution of the Ottoman Empire and brought in multi-party politics with a two-stage electoral system ( electoral law ) under the Ottoman parliament . The constitution offered hope by freeing the empire's citizens to modernise the state's institutions, rejuvenate its strength, and enable it to hold its own against outside powers. Its guarantee of liberties promised to dissolve inter-communal tensions and transform

7120-808: The Great Northern War of 1700–1721). Charles XII persuaded the Ottoman Sultan Ahmed III to declare war on Russia, which resulted in an Ottoman victory in the Pruth River Campaign of 1710–1711, in Moldavia. After the Austro-Turkish War , the Treaty of Passarowitz confirmed the loss of the Banat, Serbia, and "Little Walachia" (Oltenia) to Austria. The Treaty also revealed that the Ottoman Empire

7298-534: The Greek revolt (1821–1829) that ultimately ended with the formal independence of Greece in 1830. It was a costly enterprise for Muhammad Ali, who had lost his fleet at the Battle of Navarino in 1827. Thus began the first Egyptian–Ottoman War (1831–1833) , during which the French-trained army of Muhammad Ali, under the command of his son Ibrahim Pasha , defeated the Ottoman Army as it marched into Anatolia , reaching

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7476-769: The Greeks declared war on the Sultan. A rebellion that originated in Moldavia as a diversion was followed by the main revolution in the Peloponnese , which, along with the northern part of the Gulf of Corinth , became the first parts of the Ottoman Empire to achieve independence (in 1829). In 1830, the French invaded the Deylik of Algiers . The campaign that took 21 days, resulted in over 5,000 Algerian military casualties, and about 2,600 French ones. Before

7654-469: The Habsburg and Russian empires. The Ottomans consequently suffered severe military defeats in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, culminating in the loss of both territory and global prestige . This prompted a comprehensive process of reform and modernization known as the Tanzimat ; over the course of the 19th century, the Ottoman state became vastly more powerful and organized internally, despite suffering further territorial losses, especially in

7832-399: The Hamidian massacres . In 1897 the population was 19   million, of whom 14   million (74%) were Muslim. An additional 20   million lived in provinces that remained under the sultan's nominal suzerainty but were entirely outside his actual power. One by one the Porte lost nominal authority. They included Egypt, Tunisia, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Lebanon. As

8010-541: The Herodian dynasty and ending the Hasmonean Dynasty . Josephus reports this as being in the year of the consulship of Agrippa and Gallus (37 BCE), but also says that it was exactly 27 years after Jerusalem fell to Pompey, which would indicate 36 BCE. Cassius Dio also reports that in 37 "the Romans accomplished nothing worthy of note" in the area. According to Josephus, Herod ruled for 37 years, 34 of them after capturing Jerusalem. As some believe Herod's family were converts to Judaism, his religious commitment

8188-434: The Iberian Union . The Ottomans were holders of the Caliph title, meaning they were the leaders of Muslims worldwide. The Iberians were leaders of the Christian crusaders, and so the two fought in a worldwide conflict. There were zones of operations in the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean , where Iberians circumnavigated Africa to reach India and, on their way, wage war upon the Ottomans and their local Muslim allies. Likewise,

8366-405: The Jordan River ; and Herod's sister Salome I , who was given a toparchy including the cities of Jabneh , Ashdod , and Fasayil (Phasaelis) . Herod was born around 72 BCE in Idumea , south of Judea. He was the second son of Antipater the Idumaean , a high-ranking official under ethnarch Hyrcanus II , and Cypros, a Nabatean princess from Petra , in present-day Jordan . Herod's father

8544-489: The Köprülü era (1656–1703), effective control of the Empire was exercised by a sequence of grand viziers from the Köprülü family. The Köprülü Vizierate saw renewed military success with authority restored in Transylvania, the conquest of Crete completed in 1669, and expansion into Polish southern Ukraine , with the strongholds of Khotyn , and Kamianets-Podilskyi and the territory of Podolia ceding to Ottoman control in 1676. This period of renewed assertiveness came to

8722-451: The Oriental Crisis of 1840 . Muhammad Ali had close relations with France , and the prospect of him becoming the Sultan of Egypt was widely viewed as putting the entire Levant into the French sphere of influence. As the Sublime Porte had proved itself incapable of defeating Muhammad Ali, the British Empire and Austrian Empire provided military assistance, and the second Egyptian–Ottoman War (1839–1841) ended with Ottoman victory and

8900-472: The Sakarya River . A Byzantine defeat at the Battle of Bapheus in 1302 contributed to Osman's rise. It is not well understood how the early Ottomans came to dominate their neighbors, due to the lack of sources surviving. The Ghaza thesis popular during the 20th century credited their success to rallying religious warriors to fight for them in the name of Islam , but it is no longer generally accepted. No other hypothesis has attracted broad acceptance. In

9078-477: The Spanish garrison of Castelnuovo on the Adriatic coast ; the successful siege cost the Ottomans 8,000 casualties, but Venice agreed to terms in 1540, surrendering most of its empire in the Aegean and the Morea . France and the Ottoman Empire, united by mutual opposition to Habsburg rule, became allies. The French conquests of Nice (1543) and Corsica (1553) occurred as a joint venture between French king Francis I and Suleiman, and were commanded by

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9256-454: The Treaty of Nasuh Pasha , which ceded the entire Caucasus, except westernmost Georgia, back into the possession of Safavid Iran . The treaty ending the Cretan War cost Venice much of Dalmatia , its Aegean island possessions, and Crete . (Losses from the war totalled 30,985 Venetian soldiers and 118,754 Turkish soldiers.) During his brief majority reign, Murad IV (1623–1640) reasserted central authority and recaptured Iraq (1639) from

9434-497: The Turkish Empire , was an imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe , West Asia , and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Central Europe , between the early 16th and early 18th centuries. The empire emerged from a beylik , or principality , founded in northwestern Anatolia in c.  1299 by the Turkoman tribal leader Osman I . His successors conquered much of Anatolia and expanded into

9612-473: The "two Herods of the Bible" are all ascribed to Herod Antipas , Herod the Great's son. Upon Herod's death in 4 BCE, the Romans divided his kingdom among three of his sons and his sister: his son Herod Antipas received the tetrarchy of Galilee and Peraea . Other family members of Herod the Great include Herod's son Herod Archelaus who became ethnarch of Judea, Samaria , and Idumea ; Herod's son Philip who became tetrarch of territories north and east of

9790-408: The 1898 breach in the city wall at Jaffa Gate, on its southern side and near the Bezalel Pavilion, was the so-called "Sultan's Sabil ", built in 1900 or shortly before that. It, too, was removed in 1921 by the British authorities. The Bezalel Pavilion near Jaffa Gate was a tin-plated wooden structure with a jagged roof and tower, built in 1912 as a shop and showroom of the Bezalel School of Arts . It

9968-444: The 20th year of Tiberius (34 CE), which implies his accession as 4 BCE. Some scholars support the traditional date of 1 BCE for Herod's death. Yet others support 1 CE for the probable date of Herod's death. Filmer, for example, proposes that Herod died in 1 BCE, and that his heirs backdated their reigns to 4 or 3 BCE to assert an overlapping with Herod's rule, and bolster their own legitimacy. Based on

10146-402: The 4 BCE date include the assertion that there was not nearly enough time between the eclipse on March 13 and Passover on April 10 for the recorded events surrounding Herod's death to have taken place. In 66 CE, Eleazar ben Hanania compiled the Megillat Taanit , which contains two unattributed entries for cause of festivity: 7 Kislev and 2 Shevat. A later Scholion (commentary) on

10324-406: The Arabic name ʿUthmān ( عثمان ). In Ottoman Turkish , the empire was referred to as Devlet-i ʿAlīye-yi ʿO s mānīye ( دولت عليه عثمانیه ), lit.   ' Sublime Ottoman State ' , or simply Devlet-i ʿO s mānīye ( دولت عثمانيه‎ ), lit.   ' Ottoman State ' . The Turkish word for "Ottoman" ( Osmanlı ) originally referred to the tribal followers of Osman in

10502-486: The Balkan Peninsula during the Congress of Berlin , and in return, Britain assumed the administration of Cyprus in 1878. Britain later sent troops to Egypt in 1882 to put down the Urabi Revolt (Sultan Abdul Hamid II was too paranoid to mobilize his own army, fearing this would result in a coup d'état), effectively gaining control in both territories. Abdul Hamid II was so fearful of a coup that he did not allow his army to conduct war games, lest this serve as cover for

10680-445: The Balkans . Osman's son, Orhan , captured the northwestern Anatolian city of Bursa in 1326, making it the new capital and supplanting Byzantine control in the region. The important port of Thessaloniki was captured from the Venetians in 1387 and sacked. The Ottoman victory in Kosovo in 1389 effectively marked the end of Serbian power in the region, paving the way for Ottoman expansion into Europe. The Battle of Nicopolis for

10858-402: The Balkans, where a number of new states emerged. Beginning in the late 19th century, various Ottoman intellectuals sought to further liberalize society and politics along European lines, culminating in the Young Turk Revolution of 1908 led by the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), which established the Second Constitutional Era and introduced competitive multi-party elections under

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11036-420: The British Post Office and Town Hall ; this British-built tower was itself ultimately demolished in 1934. The British authorities attempted to recreate the historical aspect of the 16th-century city walls and gates and considered the clock tower to be an unaesthetic, disfiguring addition. As part of the same general plan, all recent buildings set against the city walls and gates were demolished as well. Outside

11214-446: The Conqueror , reorganized both state and military, and on 29 May 1453 conquered Constantinople , ending the Byzantine Empire. Mehmed allowed the Eastern Orthodox Church to maintain its autonomy and land in exchange for accepting Ottoman authority. Due to tension between the states of western Europe and the later Byzantine Empire, most of the Orthodox population accepted Ottoman rule, as preferable to Venetian rule. Albanian resistance

11392-444: The Constitution, called the Kanûn-u Esâsî . The empire's First Constitutional era was short-lived. The parliament survived for only two years before the sultan suspended it. The empire's Christian population, owing to their higher educational levels, started to pull ahead of the Muslim majority, leading to much resentment. In 1861, there were 571 primary and 94 secondary schools for Ottoman Christians, with 140,000 pupils in total,

11570-400: The Damascus Gate. The clock tower was built of limestone quarried (a minor quarry activity) from the nearby Zedekiah's Cave . It stood 13 feet tall, and was topped by four clock faces, oriented to the cardinal compass points. The eastern and western faces showed official time (European time) while the northern and southern faces showed the local ''alaturka'' time  [ de ] . Above

11748-482: The French invasion the total population of Algeria was most likely between 3,000,000 and 5,000,000. By 1873, the population of Algeria (excluding several hundred thousand newly arrived French settlers) had decreased to 2,172,000. In 1831, Muhammad Ali of Egypt revolted against Sultan Mahmud II due to the latter's refusal to grant him the governorships of Greater Syria and Crete , which the Sultan had promised him in exchange for sending military assistance to put down

11926-407: The French press going against this demolition. The Kaiser verbally opposed the Turkish initiative, to which the German ambassador to the Porte sent a soothing written reply to Berlin, reassuring his monarch that this was just the implementation of long-standing infrastructure plans. Just inside the gate, behind an iron grating on the left, lie two tombs. These belong to two Ottoman-era notables, but

12104-514: The Great ( c.  72  – c.  4 BCE ) was a Roman Jewish client king of the Herodian kingdom of Judea. He is known for his colossal building projects throughout Judea . Among these works are the rebuilding of the Second Temple in Jerusalem and the expansion of its base —the Western Wall being part of it. Vital details of his life are recorded in the works of the 1st century CE Roman–Jewish historian Josephus . Despite Herod's successes, including single-handedly forging

12282-405: The Iberians passed through newly-Christianized Latin America and had sent expeditions that traversed the Pacific to Christianize the formerly Muslim Philippines and use it as a base to attack the Muslims in the Far East . In this case, the Ottomans sent armies to aid its easternmost vassal and territory, the Sultanate of Aceh in Southeast Asia. During the 1600s, the world conflict between

12460-664: The Islamic clergy successfully objected under the grounds of theodicy . In 1754 the artillery school was reopened on a semi-secret basis. In 1726, Ibrahim Muteferrika convinced the Grand Vizier Nevşehirli Damat Ibrahim Pasha , the Grand Mufti , and the clergy on the efficiency of the printing press, and Muteferrika was later granted by Sultan Ahmed III permission to publish non-religious books (despite opposition from some calligraphers and religious leaders). Muteferrika's press published its first book in 1729 and, by 1743, issued 17 works in 23 volumes, each having between 500 and 1,000 copies. In North Africa, Spain conquered Oran from

12638-413: The Janissary revolted . Selim's efforts cost him his throne and his life, but were resolved in spectacular and bloody fashion by his successor, the dynamic Mahmud II , who eliminated the Janissary corps in 1826. The Serbian revolution (1804–1815) marked the beginning of an era of national awakening in the Balkans during the Eastern Question . In 1811, the fundamentalist Wahhabis of Arabia, led by

12816-429: The Jewish and non-Jewish people of his kingdom had to be balanced with satisfying Augustus' aim to spread the culture, architecture and values of Rome throughout his empire. The sway of Augustus and the Roman Empire on the policy led to the use of Romanized construction throughout Herod's Kingdom. An example of Herod's architectural expansion of Judea in devotion to Rome can be seen with the third temple he commissioned,

12994-573: The Jewish armies since the Hasmonean dynasty, while the Celtic contingent were former bodyguards of Cleopatra given as a gift by Augustus to Herod following the Battle of Actium . The Germanic contingent was modeled upon Augustus's personal bodyguard, the Germani Corporis Custodes , responsible for guarding the palace. Herod undertook many colossal building projects. Around 19 BCE, he began

13172-684: The Judean throne from his uncle with the help of the Parthians . Herod fled to Rome to plead with the Romans to restore Hyrcanus II to power. The Romans had a special interest in Judea because their general Pompey the Great had conquered Jerusalem in 63 BCE , thus placing the region in the Roman sphere of influence. In Rome, Herod was unexpectedly appointed King of the Jews by the Roman Senate. Josephus puts this in

13350-515: The Magnificent (1520–1566) captured Belgrade in 1521, conquered the southern and central parts of the Kingdom of Hungary as part of the Ottoman–Hungarian Wars , and, after his historic victory in the Battle of Mohács in 1526, he established Ottoman rule in the territory of present-day Hungary and other Central European territories. He then laid siege to Vienna in 1529, but failed to take

13528-667: The Megillat Taanit attributes the 7 Kislev festivity to king Herod the Great's death (no year is mentioned). Some scholars ignore the Scholion and attribute the 2 Shevat date instead to Herod's death. Augustus respected the terms of Herod's will, which stipulated the division of Herod's kingdom among three of his sons. Augustus recognised Herod's son Herod Archelaus as ethnarch of Judea, Samaria, and Idumea from c.  4 BCE  – c.  6 CE Augustus then judged Archelaus incompetent to rule, removed him from power, and combined

13706-473: The Old City through the Jaffa Gate, giving a speech at the nearby Tower of David. Allenby entered the city on foot in a show of respect for the city and a desire to avoid comparison with the Kaiser's entry in 1898. In 1944 the British demolished the row of houses erected against the outer face of the city wall leading down to Jaffa gate from the north, in an attempt to preserve Jerusalem's historic vistas. During

13884-473: The Ottoman Caliphate and Iberian Union was a stalemate since both were at similar population , technology and economic levels. Nevertheless, the success of the Ottoman political and military establishment was compared to the Roman Empire , despite the difference in size, by the likes of contemporary Italian scholar Francesco Sansovino and French political philosopher Jean Bodin . In the second half of

14062-680: The Ottoman Empire gradually shrank, 7–9   million Muslims from its former territories in the Caucasus, Crimea , Balkans, and the Mediterranean islands migrated to Anatolia and Eastern Thrace . After the Empire lost the First Balkan War (1912–1913), it lost all its Balkan territories except East Thrace (European Turkey). This resulted in around 400,000 Muslims fleeing with the retreating Ottoman armies (with many dying from cholera brought by

14240-406: The Ottoman Empire was once thought to have entered a period of decline after the death of Suleiman the Magnificent, modern academic consensus posits that the empire continued to maintain a flexible and strong economy, society and military into much of the 18th century. However, during a long period of peace from 1740 to 1768, the Ottoman military system fell behind those of its chief European rivals,

14418-557: The Ottoman admirals Hayreddin Barbarossa and Dragut . France supported the Ottomans with an artillery unit during the 1543 Ottoman conquest of Esztergom in northern Hungary. After further advances by the Turks, the Habsburg ruler Ferdinand officially recognized Ottoman ascendancy in Hungary in 1547. Suleiman died of natural causes during the siege of Szigetvár in 1566. Following his death,

14596-532: The Ottoman economy, and used its position to ensure that European capital continued to penetrate the empire, often to the detriment of local Ottoman interests. The Ottoman bashi-bazouks suppressed the Bulgarian uprising of 1876, massacring up to 100,000 people in the process. The Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878) ended with a decisive victory for Russia. As a result, Ottoman holdings in Europe declined sharply: Bulgaria

14774-547: The Ottomans were said to be declining, although this has been rejected by many scholars. By the end of Suleiman's reign, the Empire spanned approximately 877,888 sq mi (2,273,720 km ), extending over three continents. The Empire became a dominant naval force, controlling much of the Mediterranean Sea . The Empire was now a major part of European politics. The Ottomans became involved in multi-continental religious wars when Spain and Portugal were united under

14952-488: The Roman Empire was a major factor in enabling him to maintain his authority over Judea. There have been mixed interpretations concerning Herod's popularity during his reign. In The Jewish War , Josephus characterizes Herod's rule in generally favorable terms, and gives Herod the benefit of the doubt for the infamous events that took place during his reign. However, in his later work, Jewish Antiquities , Josephus emphasizes

15130-637: The Roman leader Antony. Recognizing Cleopatra's influence over Antony, Alexandra asked Cleopatra for aid in making Aristobulus III the High Priest. As a member of the Hasmonean family, Aristobulus III might partially repair the fortunes of the Hasmoneans if made High Priest. Alexandra's request was made, but Cleopatra urged Alexandra to leave Judea with Aristobulus III and visit Antony. Herod received word of this plot, and feared that if Antony met Aristobolus III in person he might name Aristobulus III King of Judea. This concern induced Herod, in 35 BCE, to order

15308-624: The Russian Empire (2 November 1914) and its allies France (5 November 1914) and the British Empire (5 November 1914) declared war on the Ottoman Empire. Also on 5 November 1914, the British government changed the status of the Khedivate of Egypt and Cyprus , which were de jure Ottoman territories prior to the war, to British protectorates . Herod the Great Herod I or Herod

15486-644: The Russian intervention, Sultan Mahmud II could have faced the risk of being overthrown and Muhammad Ali could have even become the new Sultan. These events marked the beginning of a recurring pattern where the Sublime Porte needed the help of foreign powers to protect itself. In 1839, the Sublime Porte attempted to take back what it lost to the de facto autonomous, but de jure still Ottoman Eyalet of Egypt , but its forces were initially defeated, which led to

15664-546: The Russians. After this treaty the Ottoman Empire was able to enjoy a generation of peace in Europe, as Austria and Russia were forced to deal with the rise of Prussia . Educational and technological reforms came about, including the establishment of higher education institutions such as the Istanbul Technical University . In 1734 an artillery school was established to impart Western-style artillery methods, but

15842-617: The Safavids. The resulting Treaty of Zuhab of that same year decisively divided the Caucasus and adjacent regions between the two neighbouring empires as it had already been defined in the 1555 Peace of Amasya. The Sultanate of Women (1533–1656) was a period in which the mothers of young sultans exercised power on behalf of their sons. The most prominent women of this period were Kösem Sultan and her daughter-in-law Turhan Hatice , whose political rivalry culminated in Kösem's murder in 1651. During

16020-601: The Temple's construction. The Sadducees, who were closely associated with priestly responsibilities in the Temple, opposed Herod because he replaced their high priests with outsiders from Babylonia and Alexandria, in an effort to gain support from the Jewish Diaspora. Herod's outreach efforts gained him little, and at the end of his reign anger and dissatisfaction were common amongst Jews. Heavy outbreaks of violence and riots followed Herod's death in many cities, including Jerusalem, as pent-up resentments boiled over. The scope of

16198-614: The Temple, which suggested a greater interest in the welfare of Rome than of Jews. Herod's taxes garnered a bad reputation: his constant concern for his reputation led him to make frequent, expensive gifts, increasingly emptying the kingdom's coffers, and such lavish spending upset his Jewish subjects. The two major Jewish sects of the day, the Pharisees and the Sadducees , both showed opposition to Herod. The Pharisees were discontented because Herod disregarded many of their demands with respect to

16376-508: The Turks, but was again defeated at the Second Battle of Kosovo in 1448. According to modern historiography, there is a direct connection between the rapid Ottoman military advance and the consequences of the Black Death from the mid-fourteenth century onwards. Byzantine territories, where the initial Ottoman conquests were carried out, were exhausted demographically and militarily due to

16554-524: The advantage of the defeat at Vienna, culminating in the Treaty of Karlowitz (26 January 1699), which ended the Great Turkish War. The Ottomans surrendered control of significant territories, many permanently. Mustafa II (1695–1703) led the counterattack of 1695–1696 against the Habsburgs in Hungary, but was undone at the disastrous defeat at Zenta (in modern Serbia), 11 September 1697. Aside from

16732-564: The al-Saud family, revolted against the Ottomans. Unable to defeat the Wahhabi rebels, the Sublime Porte had Muhammad Ali Pasha of Kavala , the vali (governor) of the Eyalet of Egypt , tasked with retaking Arabia, which ended with the destruction of the Emirate of Diriyah in 1818. The suzerainty of Serbia as a hereditary monarchy under its own dynasty was acknowledged de jure in 1830. In 1821,

16910-475: The assassination of Aristobulus, ending this first threat to Herod's throne. The marriage of 37 BCE also sparked a power struggle between Roman leaders Octavian, who would later be called Augustus , and Antony . Herod, owing his throne to Rome, had to pick a side, and he chose Antony. In 31 at Actium, Antony lost to Octavian, posing a second threat to Herod's rule. Herod had to regain Octavian's support if he

17088-615: The attempt succeeds; for example, in the 12th-century Eadwine Psalter . Other medieval dramatizations, such as the Ordo Rachelis , follow Josephus' account. Josephus stated that Herod was so concerned that no one would mourn his death that he commanded a large group of distinguished men to come to Jericho, and he gave an order that they should be killed at the time of his death so that the displays of grief that he craved would take place; his brother-in-law Alexas and his sister Salome did not carry out this wish. Most scholarship concerning

17266-485: The autonomous Deylik of Algiers . The Bey of Oran received an army from Algiers, but it failed to recapture Oran ; the siege caused the deaths of 1,500 Spaniards, and even more Algerians. The Spanish also massacred many Muslim soldiers. In 1792, Spain abandoned Oran, selling it to the Deylik of Algiers. In 1768 Russian-backed Ukrainian Haidamakas , pursuing Polish confederates, entered Balta , an Ottoman-controlled town on

17444-563: The backing of Rome, but the Sanhedrin condemned his brutality. When yet a private man, Herod had determined to punish Hyrcanus the Hasmonean king, who had once summoned Herod to stand trial for murder, but Herod was restrained from doing so by the intervention of his father and his elder brother. In 41 BCE, the Roman leader Mark Antony named Herod and his brother Phasael as tetrarchs . They were placed in this role to support Hyrcanus II. In 40 BCE Antigonus , Hyrcanus' nephew, took

17622-476: The base of the tower are believed to have been built by king Herod , in memorial of his brother, and was formerly named the Tower of Phasael ( Hebrew : מגדל פצאל ). During the Jewish war with Rome, Simon bar Giora made the tower his place of residence. Of the original tower itself, some sixteen courses of the original stone ashlars can still be seen rising from ground level, upon which were added smaller stones in

17800-585: The belief that the room atop the Herodian tower stump represented the "private chamber" or "prayer room" of Prophet Dawud, which is specifically mentioned in the Quran ( Surah 38. Sad , Ayah 21). In Islam , King David is known as the Prophet Dawud. The Crusaders , who rebuilt the citadel to the south of Jaffa Gate, also built a gate behind the present location of Jaffa Gate, calling it " David's Gate ". Like

17978-446: The birth of Jesus , a group of magi from the East visited Herod to inquire the whereabouts of "the one having been born king of the Jews", because they had seen his star in the east (or, according to certain translations, at its rising) and therefore wanted to pay him homage. Herod, as King of the Jews, was alarmed at the prospect of a usurper. Herod assembled the chief priests and scribes of

18156-631: The border of Bessarabia in Ukraine, massacred its citizens, and burned the town to the ground. This action provoked the Ottoman Empire into the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774 . The Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca of 1774 ended the war and provided freedom of worship for the Christian citizens of the Ottoman-controlled provinces of Wallachia and Moldavia. By the late 18th century, after a number of defeats in

18334-637: The century after Osman I, Ottoman rule had begun to extend over Anatolia and the Balkans . The earliest conflicts began during the Byzantine–Ottoman wars , waged in Anatolia in the late 13th century before entering Europe in the mid-14th century, followed by the Bulgarian–Ottoman wars and the Serbian–Ottoman wars in the mid-14th century. Much of this period was characterised by Ottoman expansion into

18512-448: The city of Kütahya within 320 km (200 mi) of the capital, Constantinople. In desperation, Sultan Mahmud II appealed to the empire's traditional arch-rival Russia for help, asking Emperor Nicholas I to send an expeditionary force to assist him. In return for signing the Treaty of Hünkâr İskelesi , the Russians sent the expeditionary force which deterred Ibrahim Pasha from marching any further towards Constantinople. Under

18690-443: The city triumphally . The breach and the ramp leading to it now allow cars to access the Old City from the west. The L-shape of the historical gateway was a classical defensive measure designed to slow oncoming attackers, with its outer gate oriented in the direction of Jaffa Road , from which travellers including pilgrims arrived at the end of their journey from the port of Jaffa . Both the Jaffa Gate and Jaffa Road are named after

18868-645: The city wall at the upper end of the Transversal Valley, which bisects the Old City in a roughly west–east direction, between the northwest ridge and the southwest hill known as Mount Zion . Inside the city, there are two streets today that follow the Transversal Valley eastward, down into the Central or Tyropoeon Valley and end at the Temple Mount : David Street, continued by the Street of the Chain. The Transversal Valley with

19046-611: The city. In 1532, he made another attack on Vienna, but was repulsed in the siege of Güns . Transylvania , Wallachia and, intermittently, Moldavia , became tributary principalities of the Empire. In the east, the Ottoman Turks took Baghdad from the Persians in 1535, gaining control of Mesopotamia and naval access to the Persian Gulf . In 1555, the Caucasus became partitioned for

19224-660: The civil strife, Austria-Hungary officially annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908. The last of the Ottoman censuses was performed in 1914 . Despite military reforms which reconstituted the Ottoman Modern Army , the Empire lost its North African territories and the Dodecanese in the Italo-Turkish War (1911) and almost all of its European territories in the Balkan Wars (1912–1913). The Empire faced continuous unrest in

19402-462: The clock faces was a bell and the crescent-and-star symbol of Ottoman rule. The Turkish clock tower was knocked down by the British in 1922 – for aesthetic reasons, although some believe it was rather meant as a measure to push forward the Westernisation of Palestine, starting with timekeeping. The clock itself was re-erected on a modern, less decorated tower at the then- Allenby Square near

19580-408: The coins of Herod's sons Steinmann and Young argue that Herod's sons antedated their reigns to 6 BCE before Herod's death so that their reigns cannot be used to argue for a 4 BCE date for Herod's death. In Josephus' account, Herod's death was preceded by first a Jewish fast day (10 Tevet 3761/Sun 24 Dec 1 BCE), a lunar eclipse (29 Dec 1 BCE) and followed by Passover (27 March 1 CE). Objections to

19758-518: The conquest by Pompey in 63 BCE. Herod overthrew the Hasmonean Antigonus in a three-year-long war between 37 and 34 BCE, ruled under Roman overlordship until his death c.  4 BCE , and officially passed on the throne to his sons, thus establishing his own, so-called Herodian dynasty . Herod was granted the title of "King of Judea" by the Roman Senate . As such, he was

19936-487: The date of Herod's death follows Emil Schürer 's calculations, which suggest that the date was in or around 4 BCE; this is three years earlier than the previous consensus and tradition (1 BCE). Two of Herod's sons, Archelaus and Philip the Tetrarch, dated their rule from 4 BCE, though Archelaus apparently held royal authority during Herod's lifetime. Philip's reign would last for 37 years, until his death in

20114-476: The disturbances sparked hopes that the Jews of Judea might some day overthrow the Roman overlords, hopes reawakened decades later in the outbreak of the First Jewish–Roman War in 66 CE. The relationship between Herod and Augustus demonstrates the fragile politics of a deified Emperor and a King who ruled over the Jewish people and their holy lands. As they interacted, Herod's desire to satisfy both

20292-582: The eastern and southern frontiers by defeating Shah Ismail of Safavid Iran , in the Battle of Chaldiran . Selim I established Ottoman rule in Egypt by defeating and annexing the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt and created a naval presence on the Red Sea . After this Ottoman expansion, competition began between the Portuguese Empire and the Ottomans to become the dominant power in the region. Suleiman

20470-514: The empire into a more harmonious place. Instead, this period became the story of the twilight struggle of the Empire. Members of Young Turks movement who had once gone underground now established their parties. Among them " Committee of Union and Progress ", and " Freedom and Accord Party " were major parties. On the other end of the spectrum were ethnic parties, which included Poale Zion , Al-Fatat , and Armenian national movement organised under Armenian Revolutionary Federation . Profiting from

20648-624: The empire was able to largely hold its own during the conflict, it struggled with internal dissent, especially the Arab Revolt . During this period, the Ottoman government engaged in genocide against Armenians , Assyrians , and Greeks . In the aftermath of World War I , the victorious Allied Powers occupied and partitioned the Ottoman Empire, which lost its southern territories to the United Kingdom and France . The successful Turkish War of Independence , led by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk against

20826-566: The enclosures of Cave of the Patriarchs and Mamre in Hebron . He and Cleopatra owned a monopoly over the extraction of asphalt from the Dead Sea, which was used in shipbuilding. He leased copper mines on Cyprus from the Roman emperor. Herod's reign over Judea is recorded in the Gospel of Matthew , which describes an event known as the Massacre of the Innocents . According to this account, after

21004-531: The end of the Caucasian Wars , 90% of the Circassians were ethnically cleansed and exiled from their homelands in the Caucasus, fleeing to the Ottoman Empire, resulting in the settlement of 500,000 to 700,000 Circassians in the Ottoman Empire. Crimean Tatar refugees in the late 19th century played an especially notable role in seeking to modernise Ottoman education and in first promoting both Pan-Turkism and

21182-515: The end of the seventeenth century, and instead the word increasingly became associated with the Greek population of the empire, a meaning that it still bears in Turkey today. In Western Europe, the names Ottoman Empire, Turkish Empire and Turkey were often used interchangeably, with Turkey being increasingly favoured both in formal and informal situations. This dichotomy was officially ended in 1920–1923, when

21360-480: The first time between the Safavids and the Ottomans, a status quo that remained until the end of the Russo-Turkish War (1768–1774) . By this partitioning as signed in the Peace of Amasya , Western Armenia , western Kurdistan , and Western Georgia fell into Ottoman hands, while southern Dagestan , Eastern Armenia , Eastern Georgia , and Azerbaijan remained Persian. In 1539, a 60,000-strong Ottoman army besieged

21538-456: The fourteenth century. The word subsequently came to be used to refer to the empire's military-administrative elite. In contrast, the term "Turk" ( Türk ) was used to refer to the Anatolian peasant and tribal population and was seen as a disparaging term when applied to urban, educated individuals. In the early modern period , an educated, urban-dwelling Turkish speaker who was not a member of

21716-410: The gate tower and the citadel/Tower of David. Photographs from circa 1870 to 1890 show that originally the city wall was continuous at that point, although the wall segment between the citadel and the gate tower was much lower, because a moat ran around the citadel, and the city wall at that point was constructed from the bottom of the moat up. Therefore, even though the overall height of that wall segment

21894-601: The gate, Bab el-Khalil , literally "Gate of the Friend", refers to Abraham , "the beloved of God". Since by tradition the burial site of Ibrahim/Abraham is in Hebron, whose Arabic name is el-Khalil, so the Arabic name for the Jaffa Gate translates as " Hebron Gate ". The Hebrew name Hebron derives from the term חבר haver, “friend”. In medieval times the Arabs called this gate Bab Mihrab Dawud , or " Gate of David's Chamber or Sanctuary ", on

22072-503: The gate, from fighting in the 1948 Arab–Israeli war , were preserved. Infrastructure work beside Jaffa Gate also uncovered an ancient aqueduct dating from the 2nd or 3rd century AD. Gates 1. Jaffa 2. Zion 3. Dung 4. Golden 5. Lions 6. Herod 7. Damascus 8. New ( Double, Single, Tanners ' ) Al-Mawazin Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire ( / ˈ ɒ t ə m ə n / ), also called

22250-473: The identification of the tomb as that of Herod. According to Patrich and Arubas, the tomb is too modest to be Herod's and has several unlikely features. Roi Porat, who replaced Netzer as excavation leader after the latter's death, stood by the identification. The Israel Nature and Parks Authority and the Gush Etzion Regional Council intend to recreate the tomb out of a light plastic material,

22428-438: The independence of the Middle East" in the 19th century "was not the armies of Europe but its banks". The Ottoman state, which had begun taking on debt with the Crimean War, was forced to declare bankruptcy in 1875. By 1881, the Ottoman Empire agreed to have its debt controlled by the Ottoman Public Debt Administration , a council of European men with presidency alternating between France and Britain. The body controlled swaths of

22606-409: The last Venetian stronghold in Cyprus, Famagusta. The Venetian defenders held out for 11 months against a force that at its peak numbered 200,000 men with 145 cannons; 163,000 cannonballs struck the walls of Famagusta before it fell to the Ottomans in August 1571. The Siege of Famagusta claimed 50,000 Ottoman casualties. Meanwhile, the Holy League consisting of mostly Spanish and Venetian fleets won

22784-491: The late 16th and early 17th centuries. With the Empire's population reaching 30 million people by 1600, the shortage of land placed further pressure on the government. In spite of these problems, the Ottoman state remained strong, and its army did not collapse or suffer crushing defeats. The only exceptions were campaigns against the Safavid dynasty of Persia, where many of the Ottoman eastern provinces were lost, some permanently. This 1603–1618 war eventually resulted in

22962-423: The loss of the Banat and the temporary loss of Belgrade (1717–1739), the Ottoman border on the Danube and Sava remained stable during the eighteenth century. Russian expansion , however, presented a large and growing threat. Accordingly, King Charles XII of Sweden was welcomed as an ally in the Ottoman Empire following his defeat by the Russians at the Battle of Poltava of 1709 in central Ukraine (part of

23140-409: The man himself. Modern critics have described him as "the evil genius of the Judean nation", and as one who would be "prepared to commit any crime in order to gratify his unbounded ambition." His extraordinary spending spree is cited as one of the causes of the serious impoverishment of the people he ruled, adding to the opinion that his reign was exclusively negative. Herod's religious policies gained

23318-459: The military-administrative class typically referred to themselves neither as an Osmanlı nor as a Türk , but rather as a Rūmī ( رومى ), or "Roman", meaning an inhabitant of the territory of the former Byzantine Empire in the Balkans and Anatolia. The term Rūmī was also used to refer to Turkish speakers by the other Muslim peoples of the empire and beyond. As applied to Ottoman Turkish speakers, this term began to fall out of use at

23496-499: The moat also had to be filled in for the purpose. The Tower of David is an ancient citadel located near the Jaffa Gate entrance to the Old City of Jerusalem . Built to strengthen a strategically weak point in the Old City's defenses, the citadel that stands today was constructed during the 2nd century BCE and subsequently destroyed and rebuilt by, in succession, the Christian , Muslim , Mamluk , and Ottoman conquerors of Jerusalem. The strong bulwarks still seen today surrounding

23674-439: The need for greater numbers of Ottoman infantry equipped with firearms, resulting in a relaxation of recruitment policy. This contributed to problems of indiscipline and outright rebelliousness within the corps, which were never fully solved. Irregular sharpshooters ( Sekban ) were also recruited, and on demobilisation turned to brigandage in the Celali rebellions (1590–1610), which engendered widespread anarchy in Anatolia in

23852-421: The new conditions of the seventeenth century and remain powerful, both militarily and economically. Historians of the mid-twentieth century once characterised this period as one of stagnation and decline, but this view is now rejected by the majority of academics. The discovery of new maritime trade routes by Western European states allowed them to avoid the Ottoman trade monopoly. The Portuguese discovery of

24030-404: The newly established Ankara -based Turkish government chose Turkey as the sole official name. At present, most scholarly historians avoid the terms "Turkey", "Turks", and "Turkish" when referring to the Ottomans, due to the empire's multinational character. As the Rum Sultanate declined in the 13th century, Anatolia was divided into a patchwork of independent Turkish principalities known as

24208-408: The occupying Allies, led to the emergence of the Republic of Turkey in the Anatolian heartland and the abolition of the Ottoman monarchy in 1922, formally ending the Ottoman Empire. The word Ottoman is a historical anglicisation of the name of Osman I , the founder of the Empire and of the ruling House of Osman (also known as the Ottoman dynasty). Osman's name in turn was the Turkish form of

24386-402: The people and asked them where the "Anointed One" (the Messiah , Greek: Ὁ Χριστός , ho Christos ) was to be born. They answered, in Bethlehem , citing Micah 5:2 . Herod therefore sent the magi to Bethlehem, instructing them to search for the child and, after they had found him, to "report to me, so that I too may go and worship him". However, after they had found Jesus, they were warned in

24564-406: The plague, which facilitated Ottoman expansion. In addition, slave hunting was the main economic driving force behind Ottoman conquest. Some 21st-century authors re-periodize conquest of the Balkans into the akıncı phase , which spanned 8 to 13 decades, characterized by continuous slave hunting and destruction, followed by administrative integration into the Empire. The son of Murad II, Mehmed

24742-400: The port of Jaffa , from which the Prophet Jonah embarked on his sea journey and pilgrims debarked on their trip to the Holy City. Now the name Jaffa Road is only used for the city street going through the city of Jerusalem outside the historical Old City, while the multi-lane modern road further connecting it westwards with Tel Aviv-Yafo is part of Israel Highway 1 . The Arabic name for

24920-414: The presence of a priest. There is some speculation as to whether or not these baths were actual mikvehs as they have also been identified as stepped frigidaria or Roman cold-water baths; however, several historians have identified these baths as a combination of both types. While it has been proven that Herod showed a great amount of disrespect toward the Jewish religion, scholar Eyal Regev suggests that

25098-441: The presence of these ritual baths shows that Herod found ritual purity important enough in his private life to place a large number of these baths in his palaces despite his several connections to gentiles and pagan cults. These baths also show, Regev continues, that the combination of the Roman frigidaria and the Jewish mikvehs suggests that Herod sought some type of combination between the Roman and Jewish cultures, as he enjoyed

25276-520: The provinces of Samaria, Judea proper, and Idumea into Iudaea province . This enlarged province was ruled by a prefect until the year 41 CE. As to Herod's other sons, Herod Antipas was tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea from Herod's death to 39 CE when he was deposed and exiled; Philip became tetrarch of territories north and east of the Jordan, namely Iturea , Trachonitis , Batanea , Gaulanitis , Auranitis and Paneas , and ruled until his death in 34 CE. The location of Herod's tomb

25454-401: The purity of Jewish tradition and the comfort of Roman luxury simultaneously. However, he was also praised for his work, being considered the greatest builder in Jewish history, and one who "knew his place and followed [the] rules." What is left of his building ventures are now popular tourist attractions in the Middle East. It is very probable that Herod had more children, especially with

25632-421: The reign of Herod Agrippa II . In the 18th year of his reign (20–19 BCE), Herod rebuilt the Temple on "a more magnificent scale". Although work on out-buildings and courts continued for another 80 years, the new Temple was finished in a year and a half. To comply with religious law, Herod employed 1,000 priests as masons and carpenters in the rebuilding. The finished temple, which was destroyed in 70 CE,

25810-411: The restoration of Ottoman suzerainty over Egypt Eyalet and the Levant . By the mid-19th century, the Ottoman Empire was called the " sick man of Europe ". Three suzerain states – the Principality of Serbia , Wallachia and Moldavia – moved towards de jure independence during the 1860s and 1870s. During the Tanzimat period (1839–1876), the government's series of constitutional reforms led to

25988-502: The sanctity of the Second Temple by employing priests as artisans in its construction. Along with holding some respect for the Jewish culture in his public life, there is also evidence of Herod's sensitivity toward Jewish traditions in his private life: around 40 ritual baths or mikvehs were found in several of his palaces. These mikvehs were known for being used during this time in Jewish purity rituals in which Jewish people could submerge themselves and purify their bodies without

26166-467: The sixteenth century, the Ottoman Empire came under increasing strain from inflation and the rapidly rising costs of warfare that were impacting both Europe and the Middle East. These pressures led to a series of crises around the year 1600, placing great strain upon the Ottoman system of government. The empire underwent a series of transformations of its political and military institutions in response to these challenges, enabling it to successfully adapt to

26344-427: The soldiers), and 400,000 non-Muslims fled territory still under Ottoman rule. Justin McCarthy estimates that from 1821 to 1922, 5.5   million Muslims died in southeastern Europe, with the expulsion of 5   million. The defeat and dissolution of the Ottoman Empire (1908—1922) began with the Second Constitutional Era , a moment of hope and promise established with the Young Turk Revolution . It restored

26522-443: The start of the 17th century, the Ottomans presided over 32 provinces and numerous vassal states , which over time were either absorbed into the Empire or granted various degrees of autonomy. With its capital at Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul ) and control over a significant portion of the Mediterranean Basin , the Ottoman Empire was at the centre of interactions between the Middle East and Europe for six centuries. While

26700-410: The stones used for the rest of the Old City walls, the stones of Jaffa Gate are large, hewn, sand-colored blocks. The entryway stands about 20 feet (6.1 meters) high, and the wall rises another 20 feet above that. Adjacent to the old gate tower (the 1538 Jaffa Gate proper, which is used only by pedestrians), is a wide breach in the wall, through which the roadway passes. This breach is located between

26878-429: The story's absence from the Gospel of Luke and the accounts of Josephus "work[s] against the account's accuracy". Richardson suggests that the event in Matthew's gospel was inspired by Herod's murder of his own sons. Jodi Magness has said that "many scholars believe that the massacre of the innocents never occurred, but instead was inspired by Herod's reputation". Others, such as Paul Maier, suggest that since Bethlehem

27056-422: The street. In 2010, the Israel Antiquities Authority completed a two-month restoration and cleaning of Jaffa Gate as part of a $ 4 million project begun in 2007 to renovate the length of the Old City walls. The clean-up included replacing broken stones, cleaning the walls of decades of car exhaust, and reattaching an elaborate Arabic inscription erected at the gate's original dedication in 1593. Bullet fragments in

27234-562: The sultan and restored Ottoman power. The Balkan territories lost by the Ottomans after 1402, including Thessaloniki, Macedonia, and Kosovo, were later recovered by Murad II between the 1430s and 1450s. On 10 November 1444, Murad repelled the Crusade of Varna by defeating the Hungarian, Polish, and Wallachian armies under Władysław III of Poland and John Hunyadi at the Battle of Varna , although Albanians under Skanderbeg continued to resist. Four years later, John Hunyadi prepared another army of Hungarian and Wallachian forces to attack

27412-511: The support of the Jews and improve his reputation as a leader. Herod also built Sebaste and other pagan cities because he wanted to appeal to the country's substantial pagan population. In order to fund these projects, Herod utilized a Hasmonean taxation system that heavily burdened the Judean people. Nevertheless, these enterprises brought employment and opportunities for the people's provision. In some instances, Herod took it upon himself to provide for his people in times of need, such as during

27590-438: The taxes of that region for the Roman Senate , and he met with success in ridding that region of bandits. Antipater's elder son, Phasael , served in the same capacity as governor of Jerusalem . During this time the young Herod cultivated a good relationship with Sextus Caesar , the acting Roman governor of Syria, who appointed Herod as general of Coelesyria and Samaria , greatly expanding his realm of influence. He enjoyed

27768-403: The terms of the Convention of Kütahya , signed on 5 May 1833, Muhammad Ali agreed to abandon his campaign against the Sultan, in exchange for which he was made the vali (governor) of the vilayets (provinces) of Crete , Aleppo , Tripoli , Damascus and Sidon (the latter four comprising modern Syria and Lebanon ), and given the right to collect taxes in Adana . Had it not been for

27946-434: The two streets separates the city into a northern and a southern half, with the Christian and Muslim Quarters to the north, and Armenian and Jewish Quarters to the south. Jaffa Gate is heavily used by pedestrians and vehicles alike. In the early 2000s (decade), the road straddling the gate was moved further west and a plaza constructed in its stead to connect Jaffa Gate with the soon-to-be-built Mamilla shopping mall across

28124-461: The tyrannical authority that many scholars have come to associate with Herod's reign. Herod's despotic rule has been demonstrated by many of his security measures aimed at suppressing the contempt his people, especially Jews, had towards him. For instance, it has been suggested that Herod used secret police to monitor and report the feelings of the general populace toward him. He sought to prohibit protests, and had opponents removed by force. He had

28302-401: The upper part of the Hinnom Valley , it was meant to be one of approximately one hundred such clock towers built throughout the Ottoman Empire in 1900 in celebration of the 25th year of rule of Sultan Abdul Hamid II ; but because of the high cost of 20,000 francs and the poverty of the city, the money was not raised in time, and the clock tower was not completed until 1908. The clock mechanism

28480-466: The wars with Russia, some people in the Ottoman Empire began to conclude that the reforms of Peter the Great had given the Russians an edge, and the Ottomans would have to keep up with Western technology in order to avoid further defeats. Selim III (1789–1807) made the first major attempts to modernise the army , but his reforms were hampered by the religious leadership and the Janissary corps. Jealous of their privileges and firmly opposed to change,

28658-458: The year of the consulship of Calvinus and Pollio (40 BCE), but Appian places it in 39 BCE. Herod went back to Judea to win his kingdom from Antigonus. Toward the end of the campaign against Antigonus, Herod married the granddaughter of Hyrcanus II, Mariamne (known as Mariamne I), who was also a niece of Antigonus. Herod did this in an attempt to secure his claim to the throne and gain some Jewish favor. However, Herod already had

28836-410: The years leading up to World War I , including the 31 March Incident and two further coups in 1912 and 1913 . The Ottoman Empire entered World War I on the side of the Central Powers and was ultimately defeated. The Ottoman participation in the war began with the combined German-Ottoman surprise attack on the Black Sea coast of the Russian Empire on 29 October 1914. Following the attack,

29014-436: Was a descendant of Eleazar Maccabeus (Auran) of the Hasmoneans. Herod rose to power largely through his father's good relations with the Roman general and dictator Julius Caesar , who entrusted Antipater with the public affairs of Judea. Herod was appointed provincial governor of Galilee in c.  47 BCE , when he was about either 25 or 28 years old ( Greek original : "15 years of age"). There he faithfully farmed

29192-400: Was a major obstacle to Ottoman expansion on the Italian peninsula. In the 15th and 16th centuries, the Ottoman Empire entered a period of expansion . The Empire prospered under the rule of a line of committed and effective Sultans . It flourished economically due to its control of the major overland trade routes between Europe and Asia. Sultan Selim I (1512–1520) dramatically expanded

29370-421: Was a reference of how Herod, as a Jew, would not kill pigs, but had three of his sons, and many others, killed. According to contemporary historians, Herod the Great "is perhaps the only figure in ancient Jewish history who has been loathed equally by Jewish and Christian posterity", depicted both by Jews and Christians as a tyrant and bloodthirsty ruler. The study of Herod's reign includes polarizing opinions on

29548-437: Was a smaller town, the slaughter of about a half dozen children would not have warranted a mention from Josephus. Herod died in Jericho , after an unidentified but excruciatingly painful, putrefying illness, known to posterity as "Herod's Evil". Josephus states that the pain of his illness led Herod to attempt suicide by stabbing, and that the attempt was thwarted by his cousin. In some much later narratives and depictions,

29726-482: Was by descent an Edomite; his ancestors had converted to Judaism . Herod was raised as a Jew. Strabo , a contemporary of Herod, held that the Idumaeans, whom he identified as of Nabataean origin, constituted the majority of the population of western Judea, where they commingled with the Judaeans and adopted their customs. This is a view shared also by some modern scholarly works which consider Idumaeans as of Arab or Nabataean origins. According to Josephus, Herod

29904-405: Was delivered by the famous Dent company of London, the creators of the clockwork of Big Ben . Seven such clock towers were erected in what are now Israel and the Palestinian Territories – in Safed , Acre , Haifa , Nazareth , Nablus , Jerusalem , and Jaffa . The fact that the Jaffa Gate in Jerusalem was selected for the clock tower indicates the gate's importance at the time, even more than

30082-415: Was designed specifically for tourists and passersby on their way to and exiting the Old City. The pavilion was demolished six years after it was erected. After the destruction of Jerusalem and the killing or enslavement of its Jewish population by the Roman Empire in 132 CE, Emperor Hadrian had the city rebuilt as a Roman city called Aelia Capitolina , and a tall pillar in the plaza inside the Damascus Gate

30260-414: Was established as an independent principality inside the Ottoman Empire; Romania achieved full independence; and Serbia and Montenegro finally gained complete independence, but with smaller territories. In 1878, Austria-Hungary unilaterally occupied the Ottoman provinces of Bosnia-Herzegovina and Novi Pazar . British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli advocated restoring the Ottoman territories on

30438-484: Was far more damaging to the Ottoman navy in sapping experienced manpower than the loss of ships, which were rapidly replaced. The Ottoman navy recovered quickly, persuading Venice to sign a peace treaty in 1573, allowing the Ottomans to expand and consolidate their position in North Africa. By contrast, the Habsburg frontier had settled somewhat, a stalemate caused by a stiffening of the Habsburg defenses. The Long Turkish War against Habsburg Austria (1593–1606) created

30616-409: Was on the defensive and unlikely to present any further aggression in Europe. The Austro-Russian–Turkish War (1735–1739), which was ended by the Treaty of Belgrade in 1739, resulted in the Ottoman recovery of northern Bosnia , Habsburg Serbia (including Belgrade), Oltenia and the southern parts of the Banat of Temeswar ; but the Empire lost the port of Azov , north of the Crimean Peninsula, to

30794-554: Was one of many other large projects undertaken across the Land in his honour. Contemporaneous accounts of the Emperor's entry, and the Ottoman authorities' destruction of the wall adjacent to the Jaffa Gate, were written by David Yellin , a contributor to the Hebrew-language newspaper Ha-Melitz , in his regular column titled "Letters from Jerusalem", on a number of occasions (e.g., 3 Tamuz, 5658, Hebrew equivalent of June 23, 1898; "middle of Av, 5658" – roughly end of July, 1898; and 28 Elul, 5658 – September 15, 1898). There were voices in

30972-423: Was part of a long-running contest between the major European powers for influence over territories of the declining Ottoman Empire. The financial burden of the war led the Ottoman state to issue foreign loans amounting to 5   million pounds sterling on 4 August 1854. The war caused an exodus of the Crimean Tatars , about 200,000 of whom moved to the Ottoman Empire in continuing waves of emigration. Toward

31150-477: Was presumably the same as the rest of the city wall's, therefore providing a similar level of protection from invaders, the top of the wall segment only reached about two metres above the moat, a much lower elevation than both the adjacent city wall and citadel. The breach was made by the Ottoman authorities ahead of Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany's visit to the city and allowed him and his retinue to comfortably enter Jerusalem riding on horses and in carriages. Part of

31328-410: Was questioned by some elements of Jewish society. When John Hyrcanus conquered the region of Idumaea (the Edom of the Hebrew Bible ) in 140–130 BCE, he required all Idumaeans to obey Jewish law or to leave; most Idumaeans thus converted to Judaism, which meant that they had to be circumcised , and many intermarried with the Jews and adopted their customs. While Herod publicly identified himself as

31506-402: Was the starting point for measurements to other cities, as indicated in the mosaic Madaba Map . This pillar appears to have fallen or been demolished during the Byzantine period. In the 20th century, the plaza outside the Jaffa Gate served the same purpose. During the British Mandate for Palestine , a marker outside the doorway served as the zero point for distances to and from Jerusalem. There

31684-456: Was to keep his throne. At Rhodes in 31 BCE, Herod, through his ability to keep Judea open to Rome as a link to the wealth of Syria and Egypt, and ability to defend the frontier, convinced Octavian that he would be loyal to him. Herod continued to rule his subjects as he saw fit. Despite the autonomy afforded to Herod in his internal reign over Judea, restrictions were placed upon him in his relations with other kingdoms. Herod's support from

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