Erken D nem Osmanl Tarihi “Kara Bir Delik / A Black Hole” Mi?” Osmanl Devletinin Kurulu u “Gazi/Gaza” deolojisi le lgili Tart malar/// Is the Early Ottoman History “A Black Hole?”: Discussions About The Foundation of the Ottoman Empire and Gazi/Gaza Concepts

Since the beginning of the 20th century, conflicting arguments have been made about the origins, development and characteristics of the Ottoman Empire, which started as a small border country. In his “Foundation of Ottoman Empire”, published in 1916, Herbert Adams Gibbs claims that the state is built by mixed nation of people from Turkish pagan and Greek Christian roots. According to Gibbons, roots of the Ottoman Empire should be searched referring to the European elements rather than Asian Turkish ones. In 1935, M. Fuat K prülü contradicted Gibbons by claiming that Ottoman Empire mainly belongs to Turkish and Muslim elements. In 1937, Paul Wittek rejects K prülü’s claim about Ottomans’ connection to Oguz Kay tribe. Wittek argues that the foundations of the empire would not base on a tribe. According to him, this foundation bases on the concept of Gaza, or the holy war against the neighboring Christian world. M. Fuat K prülü’s opinions are supported and extended further by Halil nalc k’s new claims. Among several other factors, nalc k always considers gaza factor as a historical fact and stresses that jihad or gaza continues to be the leading dynamic of the ottomans till the end of the 17thcentury. He expresses this idea by saying; “Gaza is the leading factor for the progress of Ottomans in Asia and Europe.”Turkologist like Ronald C. Jenings, Colin mber, Hungarian Turkologist Gyula Kaldy-Nagy, inasi Tekin, Colin Heywood and Heath Lowry reject the gaza thesis. English Historian Colin Imber takes the discussions about the subject one step further and calls the ottoman history until the last quarter of the 15th century as “a black hole.” Using new claims by modern Turkish historians such as Feridun M. Emecen and Mehmet z, this study will try to evaluate these approaches to the Ottoman history that name the period from the foundation to the early empire as “a dark period.”