80) Asia Minor to Turkey Written by Rainer: rainer.lehrer@yahoo.com Learn languages (via Skype): Rainer: + 36 20 549 52 97 or + 36 20 334 79 74

------------------------------

Asia Minor to Turkey On the border between Europe and Asia, limited in the north by the Black Sea, in the south by the Mediterranean, in the west by the Aegean Sea and in the east by the Taurus Mountains, it was a passage area for races, peoples and cultures of various kinds for thousands of years. The Neanderthals and later 80 - 100,000 years ago the Cro-Magnon (homo sapiens = the name for the first modern man) came to Europe via this land bridge. While the Minos culture developed on Crete, the Hittites, who belonged to the Indo-European language family, inhabited the area between the Taurus and the Mediterranean, that is, today's eastern Turkey, and engaged in vast trade with the Egyptians. Some earthquakes, drought, poor harvests, and the Sea Peoples brought the end of the Bronze Age to this region in the 13th century BC. In the Taurus Mountains Zarathustra developed his religion, which divides the world into two powers: a good one and an evil one. Later the Chinese should adopt this worldview in their Ying and Yang. The Greeks founded colonies on the western coast and the Phoenicians in the north, on the Black Sea. However, we still don't know much about the interior of the country. It was only the Persians who took over and built the longest road from Babylon to the Aegean Sea. They brought not only war to the Greeks, but also their culture and Zarathustra. Then the Celts came and went to Ireland, Spain, robbed Rome, pillaged Delphi, others got lost in Asia Minor. Alexander the Great, the Macedonian king, was next. Here he drove the Persian troops before him. When the empire collapsed after his death, a power vacuum with many smaller princedoms, such as that of the Armenians, developed in this area. The Romans incorporated it into their economic cycle and pervaded it with roads and a long period of calm began with a relative economic boom. It was only the Arabs and their holy war that brought a little movement into this lukewarm well-being. From the 10th to the 13th century, 4 powers took their turns again and again: the Byzantine Empire, Arab caliphates, Christian crusader princedoms and Turkish tribes. These Turkish peoples in particular were just waiting for their opportunity to establish a state there. Byzantium was able to push them back again and again until the end of the 14th century, and in 1453 this last bastion of Christian faith in the eastern Mediterranean fell. At that time, there was hardly anyone in Europe who was particularly interested in it, and some were even glad about it. Venice because it had lost its commercial competitor, Rome because it thought it was now the only representative of the Christian religion. It was only after centuries, in retrospect, that one discovered that this state on the Bosporus, or Hellespont, like a plug, had previously prevented the Turks from invading Europe. And now, they came, made Constantinople their center and expanded power in all directions, from the Crimea to Vienna, from Sicily to Egypt and to Persia. Only mountain ranges, bad weather conditions in winter and better equipped and organized fortresses such as Vienna or the Polish and German castles were able to slow down or even stop this storm. They overran everything as far as Vienna, without significant resistance. And that's how it remained until the 18th century. The Ottoman Empire had grown too big. So far, she had lived on conquests and raids, but now the distances had become too vast. When the Sultan's army gathered in Istanbul in April and then set out, it would already take 3 to 4 months to get to the Carpathian Basin. There, she first had to reorganize the previous conquests and only then was able to advance further. By the time the border was reached, it had become colder again, which made it necessary to withdraw. At that time, acts of war could not be waged in winter. At the time of the First World War, the Ottoman Empire was only called the sick man of Europe. She had lost everything until after World War II. And even today, some ethnic groups, such as the Kurds, want to separate from this state. Turkey is only preserved in her current form with the active support of the U.S.A. and the European Union. It is currently the bridge between the Islamic world and European culture, a strategic base for Americans in the Middle East, shaken by internal tensions, between religious fanaticism and historically misinterpreted nationalism. Back to list!

-----------------------------------------------

--------------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------

---------------------------------------------------

Back to Hungarian portal! Back to English portal! Back to German portal! Back to Spanish portal! Back to French portal! Back to Russian portal!