Chapter 14: Chapter 14: Cultures of Splendor and power, 1500-1780

Chapter 14: Cultures of Splendor and power, 1500-1780
• Trade and Culture
o In 1500, worlds most dynamic cultures were in Asia
 China and Islamic world is where spice and luxury trades first
flourished
• Rulers established political stability and centralized control
of taxation, law making, and military force
o Some societies found that contact, conquest and commerce undermined
indigenous cultural life
o For some groups, cultural flourishing was owed to benefits of burgeoning
world trade
 Allowed some rulers to consolidate wealth, administration, and
military power
• Rulers were eager to patronize arts as a way to legitimize
their power and reflect cultural sophistication
• In Europe, monarchs known as enlightened absolutists
restricted the clergy and nobility and hired loyal
bureaucrats who championed the knowledge of new age
o British monarchs weren’t absolutists because they
shared power with parliament but followed
monarchs of Europe
o Each society retained core aspects of its individuality
 Ruling classes disseminated values based on cherished classical
texts and long-established moral and religious principles
 Societies celebrated their achievements in politics, economics, and
culture with pride in their own heritages
• Culture in the Islamic world
o The Ottoman Cultural Synthesis
 By 16tg century, ottoman empire had rich culture that was blended
• Blend of ethnic, religious, and linguistic elements
• Cultural synthesis accommodated both the Sufis (stressed
contemplation and ecstasy through poetry, music, and
dance) and ultraorthodox ulama (stressed tradition and
religious law)
• Balanced interests of military men and administrators with
the clerics
 Religion and law
• As empire was getting diverse cultures and territories,
sultans realized that the sharia (Islamic holy law) wouldn’t
suffice because it was silent on many secular matters
• State needed comprehensive laws to bridge differences
among social and legal systems under its rule
• Mehmed II began reform
o Recruited young boys for training as bureaucrats or
military men instead of nobles

 Made them accountable directly to the sultan
therefore fashioning professional
bureaucracy with unswerving loyalty to the
ruler
• Suleiman the Magnificent and lawgiver was his successor
and continued work by compiling a legal code
o Address subjects rights and duties, proper clothing,
and how Muslims were to relate to non-Muslims
o Reconciled many differences between
administrative and religious laws
 Education
• Sophisticated educational system was key for empires
religious and intellectual integration and for its cultural
achievements
• Encouraged three educational systems that produced three
streams of talent
o Civil and military bureaucrats
o Ulama
o Sufi masters
o Administrative elite attended hierarchically
organized schools that culminated in the palace
schools at topkapi
 Graduates staffed civil and military
bureaucracy across the empire
o Religious
