Osman's Dream: A History of the Ottoman Empire Review
I finished reading Osman’s Dream: A History of the Ottoman Empire by Caroline Finkel in early 2026. It primarily covered the political history of the Ottoman Empire, but did so in a very comprehensive, if somewhat dry, manner.
It wasn’t the most enjoyable read in the world, but I did find it interesting, partially because it’s an interesting topic that spans hundreds of years until modern times and the history of the Ottoman Empire has shaped much of the world we live in today.
But I also found it interesting to read, in part, because of my background. Speaking from my perspective as growing up hearing a lot of conservative Sunni Arab voices in my community, the Ottoman Empire is very much held up as a standard that we should try to return to, suggesting that, implicitly, these individuals prioritize a form of political organization that emphasizes the primacy of Sunni Islam, rather than using the shared Arab ethnicity/language as the basis for a nation.
The Ottoman Empire is probably idealized for the following reasons:
· It was the last time a country based on an Islamic government had military parity (or superiority) with “Western”/European/Christian nations.
· It was the last time a caliphate was present in a meaningful way, and it had greater longevity than most (any?) prior caliphates, lasting about 500 years.
· As a result, it did a better job uniting the Islamic World than any other entity since the height of the Abbasid caliphate.
· It was the entity that finally toppled the Roman Empire, and then had Greece within its borders for hundreds of years, and both the Roman Empire, and Ancient Greece before it, are considered the progenitors of Western civilization.
· It should be mentioned that when people think of the “Golden Age” of Islam, this predates the Ottoman Empire and occurred under the Abbasids, which is when most of Western Europe had relatively small and primitive forms of political organization, and Eastern Europe was dominated by a failing Byzantine Empire, while the Middle East and North Africa were flourishing under the Abbasid Caliphate. The Ottoman Empire existed at a time when there were European political entities that rivaled it in power and sophistication.
I’m not going to try to summarize a very dense and thick book here, however, these were some interesting observations I took away from reading this book:
· It is very detailed and gives a comprehensive narrative of political events affecting the Ottoman Empire, but its focus is very much on the political. If that's something you're interested in, this is a great book for that.
· There was a significant period of time when the Ottoman Empire was the strongest power in Europe/Middle East, and it seems like starting in the 18th or late 17th century they started to slip relative to other European powers.
· It was an Empire that started in Anatolia, and through fighting (in particular defeating the Mamluks) took over much of the Islamic World. What I found interesting is that for much of its history, the official policy of the Ottoman Empire towards its neighbors was one of unconcealed hostility. They framed themselves as the righteous representatives of Islam, and by fighting and conquering the territories and populations of their neighbors, they were bringing more people and territories into the Islamic fold. So they were very war-like and aggressive with their neighbors for much of their history, until they started to become relatively weaker than some of their neighbors starting in ~18th century.
· To perhaps a greater extent than any Islamic Empire before, it was very much a multinational, multiethnic, and multireligious Empire. Given the Islamic nature of the government and the nationalist wave that was hitting Europe in the 19th century, this played a large role in the Ottoman Empire falling apart. Other, stronger European powers would at different times use the excuse that they were protecting individuals from a specific religion and a specific ethnic group as a reason to attack the Ottomans and take Ottoman territory. These groups might launch their own rebellions for independence movements, or alternatively support the invading armies against the Ottomans.
· The author posits that efforts within the Ottoman Empire to modernize and catch up with other European powers in the 19th century (a lot of which had to do with overall liberalization) were stymied by 3 things: the dichotomies between Muslim and non-Muslim, men and women, and master and slave that were all codified within the religion.
· Interestingly, while exceptions occurred from time to time in their long history, the Ottomans were not particularly harsh to their non-Muslim populations. They were forced to pay an additional tax, could not be involved in certain (the majority) of governmental positions, and could not serve in the army. However, this meant Muslims had to serve in the government and the army, while non-Muslims were disproportionately able to pursue more lucrative trades. Non-Muslims were thus, often, financially better off than their Muslim counterparts, and couple that with the hazards of working in the army, the proportion of the Muslim population was actually decreasing over time as the Ottoman Empire entered he 19th and 20th centuries.
· It was fascinating (and a little pathetic) the extent to which the sultans were at the mercy of the whims of the janissaries (akin to the Roman Praetorian Guard). It is a recurring theme throughout history that despotic/authoritarian governments have to go out of their way to keep their power base happy, particularly their power base within the armed forces. However, as a result there were multiple instances throughout the history of the Ottoman Empire when leaders of a revolt within branches of the military had more power than the sultans themselves, and the sultans would have to bend over backwards to placate them.
· This may sound obvious, but hearing what I did while growing up, I think subconsciously I expect some degree of greater virtuosity in the behavior of Ottoman leaders compared to other historical figures and other historical government, but that is simply not the case. They weren’t particularly more heinous or evil, but they were just like any other powerful figures who were interested in increasing and maintaining their power, and the fact that they were Muslims did not ameliorate that.
· There is a significant contrast between the behavior of the sultans and the ruling class compared to Islamic principles they purported to uphold. For example, it was customary for much of the duration of Ottoman Empire to annihilate the siblings and their families of the new sultan during succession to eliminate any possible rivals for power. The existence of the harem also seems to run counter to the focus on chastity that Islam places on its supplicants. Use of alcohol was very common throughout the Empire. To me, it serves as another example of religion being used as a tool by the ruling class to control the populace, while they live free of its restrictions.
Perhaps the most interesting section of the book to me, was the events surrounding World War I and the immediate aftermath of World War I. It was during this time that the Ottoman Empire, in its defeat, was dismantled. The book doesn’t go into a lot of detail about how the Middle East was carved up, but this moment is often regarded as the basis for many of the problems in the Middle East: the borders drawn, almost at random, by British and French diplomats carving up the Middle East into their own spheres of influence. Interestingly, Anatolia itself was almost carved up as well, with significant portions of it to be given to Greece. It was members of the Turkish military, the most famous of which is Mustafa Kemal, who led Turkish forces in several years of fighting to preserve Anatolia as the basis for a Turkish state, and played a large role in disrupting “Western” plans for states in the Caucasus (for an example, look up Woodrow Wilson’s plans for different states in the Middle East and the Caucasus). There were also huge movements of people during this time period, where ~ 20% of the population in Anatolia was non-Muslim prior to World War I, and due to the conflicts and movement of people to different regions as new nations were being formed, post-war Anatolia was 90%+ Muslim. Thus, the fragmentation of the Ottoman Empire was not simply a redrawing of invisible lines into new nations, but rather a fundamental change in the nature of the populations that occupied a given area.