Ottoman Empire, empire created by Turkish tribes in Anatolia (Asia Minor) that grew to be one of the most powerful states in the world during the 15th and 16th centuries. The Ottoman period spanned more than 600 years from 1299 and came to an end only in 1922, when it was replaced by the Turkish Republic and varios successor states in southeastern Europe and the Middle East. At its height the empire encompassed most of southeastern Europe to the gates of Vienna, including present-day Hungary, the Balkan region, Greece, and parts of Ukraine; portions of the Middle East now occupied by Iraq, Syria, Israel, and Egypt; North Africa as far west as Algeria; and large parts of the Arabian Peninsula. The term Ottoman is a dynastic appellation derived from Osman I (Arabic: 'Uthman), the nomadic Turkmen chief who founded both the dynasty and the empire about 1300. The Ottoman legacy was important during the following years. It was men educated n Ere 10 the Ottoman system and brought up on the ideas of the reform movement who ran the affairs of the Turkish republic and were the political leaders in the Arab states. The movements of population and the conversions which had taken place under the empire left considerable problems for the successor states, notably with regard to the Muslims living in Balkan states. But the empire has been little studied or understood principally because its language was abandoned. Ottoman Turkish, for those who read it, remains a key, like Latin and Ancient Greek, to the study not only of an empire but of a distinctive civilization.

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