The Spanish and Ottoman Empires in the Mediterranean, 1714–1914

Abstract

After centuries as great powers, the Spanish and Ottoman Empires found themselves in decline by the early eighteenth century and suffered steady encroachment upon their territories from competing powers. Nevertheless, in the late eighteenth century, and again in the mid-nineteenth century, the two empires made vigorous efforts to assert themselves in North Africa. After initial successes, Istanbul and Madrid believed they could rebuild their former strengths. At the same time, they ended their centuries-long mutual hostility, and began to cooperate through treaties, trade, and diplomatic coordination. By the end of the nineteenth century, however, Spanish defeats in the Spanish American War and Ottoman losses in Egypt, Algeria, and elsewhere, ended this resurgence. Drawing on diplomatic records and other sources, this historical essay explores the parallel destinies of the Spanish and Ottomans up to the eve of World War I.

KEYWORDS:

• Barbary States
• Carlos III
• corsairs
• Isabel II
• Ottomans
• Spain

Notes

¹Tratado de Paz y Amistad entre S. M. Católica y S. M El Rey de Marruecos, April 26, 1860, in Colección de los Tratados, Convenios y Documentos Internacionales (Madrid: Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores, 1894), 151–155.

²Leopold Ranke, The Ottoman and Spanish Empires in the Sixteenth and Seventeen Centuries (London: Whittaker and Co., 1843), 1.

³Ranke, 2, 18, 20.

⁴Ranke, 97.

⁵Daniel Goffman, The Ottoman Empire and Early Modern Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 127.

⁶Paulino Toledo, Lepanto: el ultimo encuentro naval por la soberania mundial en el mediterraneo, in XIV.-XVI. Yüzyillarda Türk-Ispanyol Ilişkileri ve Denizcilik Tarihimizle Ilgili Ispanyol Belgelri (Las relaciones Turco-Españoles en los siglos XIV y XVI), Documentos Españoles relatives a la historia naval Otomana, trans. Muzaffer Arikan and Paulino Toledo (Ankara, Turkey: Deniz Kuvvetleri Komutanliği Karargah Basimevi, 1995).

⁷Özlem Kumrular, Las relaciones entre el Imperio Otomano y la Monarquía Católica entre los años 1520–1535 y el papel de los estados satellites (Istanbul: Editorial Isis, 2003), 14–15.

⁸Donald Quataert, The Ottoman Empire, 1700–1922 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 38–41.

⁹Archivo del Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores y de Cooperacion, Archivo General (AMAE), H1770. Correspondencia. Embajadas y Legaciones. Turquia. 1834–1840, Letter, November 5, 1840, Sultan Abdülmecid I to Queen Isabella II.

¹⁰Fernando Puell de la Villa, Historia del Ejéricto en España (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 2009), 65–66.

¹¹Miguel Ángel Ochoa Brun, Historia de la diplomacia española (Madrid: Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores, 2002), 148–149, 214, 265–266.

¹²Stanley and Barbara Stein, Apogee of Empire: Spain and New Spain in the Age of Charles III, 1759–1789 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003), viii, 23–24, 325–327.

¹³Emilio Garrigues, Un desliz diplomatic: la paz hispano-turca (Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1962), 25, 92–94, 121–124, 167–168, 172; Pablo Martín Asuero, ed., España-Turquía: del enfrentamiento al análisis mutuo (Istanbul: Editorial Isis, 2003), 255.

¹⁴Document. Fascio N. 3094–Tunisi. Regio Console. Diversi. 1840–1843. Raffaele della Vecchia, Impero Ottomano e Reggenza di Tunisi con inventario di documenti su Tunisi (1840–1860) conservati press l'Archivio di Stato di Napoli (Naples, Italy: Ministero della Pubblica Instruzione, 1991), 132–135; Quataert, 87.

¹⁵Document. Fascio N. 3095–Tunisi. Regio Console. Diversi. 1844–1847, in della Vecchia, 136–137.

¹⁶James Cortada, Spain and the American Civil War, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society Relations at mid-century, 1855–1868. v. 70, pt. 4, 1980, 3–8; José Luis Herrero, El ejército español en el siglo XIX (Madrid: Cuadernos para el Diálogo, 1975), 25; Germán Rueda Hernanz, Isabel II (Madrid: Arlanza, 2001), 213–214, 232; Daniel Headrick, Ejército y política en España (1866–1898) (Madrid: Editorial Tecnos, 1981), 34–35, 46–47, 49, 270–271, 273.

¹⁷Tratado de Paz y Amistad entre S. M. Católica y S. M. El Rey de Marruecos, April 26, 1860, in Colección de los Tratados, Convenios y Documentos Internacionales (Madrid: Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores, 1894), 151–155.

¹⁸Tratado de Comercio y Navegación entre S. M. Católica y El Emperador de los Otomanos con sus tarifas anejas, March 13, 1862, Colección de los Tratados, Convenios y Documentos Internacionales (Madrid: Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores, 1894), 324–337.

¹⁹Document. Fascio N. 3099–Tunisi. Regio Console. Diversi. 1859–1860, in della Vecchia, 157–158; Ochoa Brun, Historia de la diplomacia española, 206–207, 210, 265; AMAE, H1770, Letter, December 9, 1853, Minister of Foreign Affairs to Pio de Andres Garcia, Consul in Jerusalem; AMAE, H1774, Letter, September 29, 1860, Ottoman Foreign Minister to Gerardo de Souza, Consul in Istanbul, announcing closure of Legation in Madrid. Website, Embassy of the Republic of Turkey in Madrid, http://www.tcmadridbe.org/historia_embajada.htm. The Ottoman legation reopened in 1881.

²⁰Sumner Welles, Naboth's Vineyard: The Dominican Republic, 1844–1924, vol. I (New York: Paul Appel, 1966 [Reprint from 1926]), 226, 231, 238–140, 247–249.

²¹Jamie de Jesus Dominguez, La anexión de la República Dominicana a España, vol. I (Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic: Universidad Autonoma de Santo Domingo, 1979), 260, 262.

²²Agustín R. Rodríguez González, La Armada Española, la campaña del Pácifico, 1862–1871 (Madrid: Agualarga, 1999), 40–41, 89–106, 129.

²³AMAE, H1770, Letter, 30 April 1870, Juan de Dios Rojas, Consulate Istanbul to Spanish Foreign Ministry, “Informe sobre el comercio de Constantinopla y Puertos del Mar Negro.”.

²⁴AMAE, H1770, Letter, 28 February 1871, Juan de Dios Rojas, Consulate Istanbul to Spanish Foreign Ministry; H1775, letter, 6 November 1866, Conde de Xiquerra, Consul in Istanbul, to Spanish Foreign Ministry.

²⁵Pablo Martín Asuero, Estambul, el ejército otomano y los sefardíes en textos en español (Istanbul: Editorial Isis, 2003), 115.

²⁶Asli Cirakman, From the “Terror of the World” to the “Sick Man of Europe”: European Images of Ottoman Empire and Society from the Sixteenth Century to the Nineteenth (New York: Peter Lang, 2002), 3–5, 78, 164, 217.

²⁷della Vecchia, 6–8; M. Şükrü Hanioğlu, A Brief History of the Late Ottoman Empire, 44–48, 57–60; Comisión Española de Historia de las Relaciones Internacionales, Cuadernos de Historia de las Relaciones Internacionales (Madrid: CEHRI, 2001), 15–16.

²⁸Goffman, 192–193.

²⁹AMAE, H1770, letter, 26 May 1840, Antonio Lopez de Córdoba, Spanish Legation, Istanbul, to Evaristo Perez de Castro, Foreign Ministry, Madrid.

³⁰della Vecchia, 40, 41–45, 47–50; Hanioğlu, 9–10.

³¹della Vecchia, 9; Hanioğlu, 9.

³²Hanioğlu, 9–11.

³³AMAE, H1775, Letter, 4 May 1864, Pedro Sorela y Maury, Consul in Istanbul, to Spanish Foreign Ministry.

³⁴Hanioğlu, 121–123, 129–132.

³⁵Goffman, 233.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Wayne H. Bowen

Wayne H. Bowen is Professor and Chair of the History Department at Southeast Missouri State University. He is the author, most recently, of A Military History of Modern Spain, with Jose E. Alvarez (Praeger, 2007), and, based on his service as an Army Reserve officer, Undoing Saddam: From Occupation to Sovereignty in Northern Iraq (Potomac, 2007).