Introduction

It is without doubt the height of folly to undertake a history ofOttoman warfare which spans more than a century of conflict, bridges early modern and modern-style military systems, and describes an evolution of an army from the Janissaries to the Regular Army (Nizamiye) of the Crimean War, especially as for most of the wars to be discussed, campaign histories from the Ottoman point of view are few and far between.1 To do so is also to fly in the face of a formidable body of historical studies which, with notable exceptions, have consistently overlooked the Ottomans as agents in their own development, generally attributed all military reform to French or Prussian assistance, and buried Ottoman military history under the carpet of European international relations.