Deck 26: The Muslim Empires

Question 1

Which of the following was NOT one of the early modern Islamic empires?

A) Ottoman
B) Safavid
C) Abbasid
D) Mughal

Answer 1

Abbasid

Question 2

Which of the following does NOT represent a similarity among the three Muslim early modern empires?

A) All were derived from Turkic nomadic cultures of the central Asian steppe.
B) Each empire was based on religion and its society was oriented toward domination of the mullahs.
C) All dynasties depended on effective use of firearms on the battlefield and in siege warfare.
D) Support of the bureaucracies and military was drawn from taxes levied on the peoples of the agrarian societies that each conquered and ruled.

Answer 2

Each empire was based on religion and its society was oriented toward domination of the mullahs.

Question 3

Prior to the Mongol invasions of their empire, the Abbasid dynasty was dominated by

A) the Ozbeg Turks.
B) Timur-i-Lang.
C) the Seljuk Turks.
D) the West.

Answer 3

the Seljuk Turks.

Question 4

The original base of the Ottoman Turks was

A) Mesopotamia.
B) Syria.
C) the Balkans.
D) Anatolia.

Question 5

The Ottomans conquered Constantinople and ended the Byzantine Empire in

A) 1245.
B) 1337.
C) 1453.
D) 1519.

Question 6

Which of the following statements concerning Ottoman naval power is most accurate?

A) The Ottoman Empire never developed a navy, thus was unable to control the Mediterranean or challenge the growing naval supremacy of the West.
B) Powerful Ottoman gally fleets captured major island bases in the eastern Mediterranean, but were unable to prevent western advances in the Indian Ocean.
C) The Ottoman Empire was sufficiently powerful at sea that until the 18th century it was able to maintain not only dominance of the eastern Mediterranean but also to monopolize the Indian Ocean.
D) The Ottomans retained their naval dominance in the Indian Ocean, but almost immediately lost all of their Mediterranean possessions.

Question 7

The Janissaries were

A) religious leaders under the control of the Ottoman state.
B) powerful members of the warrior aristocracy within the Ottoman Empire who dominated regional administration.
C) slave troops of the Ottoman forcibly conscripted as adolescents from conquered territories.
D) eunuchs from the royal family charged with care of the imperial harem.

Question 8

What permitted the Janissaries to gain a position of prominence in the Ottoman Empire?

A) Their control of artillery and firearms gave them prominence over the aristocratic Turkish cavalry.
B) Their control of the bureaucracy made them indispensible to the operation of the empire.
C) As members of the royal family, they had access to the sultans.
D) They rapidly gained control of the mosques of the Ottoman Empire and were able to define religious orthodoxy.

Question 9

The head of the Ottoman central bureaucracy was the

A) vizier.
B) dhimmi.
C) eunuch.
D) Caliph.

Question 10

What was the principle of succession within the Ottoman Empire?

A) Like earlier Islamic dynasties, the Ottoman Empire lacked a principle of succession, a fact that led to protracted warfare among prospective successors.
B) Succession within the Ottoman Empire was based on primogeniture, that is, the oldest son automatically succeeded the previous sultan.
C) Like the early Islamic administration of the orthodox caliphs, the successions within the Ottoman Empire was elective.
D) Ottoman sultans selected their successors prior to their death and elevated them as co-rulers.

Question 11

One of the most beautiful of the Ottoman mosques of Constantinople was the

A) Taj Mahal.
B) Kahil Jibran.
C) Saffah.
D) Su_¨leymaniye.

Question 12

What did the Ottomans do to Constantinople following its fall in 1453?

A) The Ottomans destroyed the city and moved their capital to Sophia.
B) The original city remained, but in a much reduced condition that the Ottomans did little to restore.
C) Soon after its conquest, the Ottoman sultan undertook the restoration and beautification of Constantinople.
D) The Ottomans rapidly abandoned Constantinople to the leaders of the Orthodox Church who were responsible for its restoration and the construction of significant churches.

Question 13

In what way were the artisans of Constantinople similar to their counterparts in the West?

A) They had begun to form a proletariat
B) Like their counterparts in medieval European towns, the artisans were organized into guilds
C) In the capital city of the Ottoman Empire, artisans were free of governmental supervision
D) Like the earlier West, craft production was limited and there were few independent artisans

Question 14

What was the chosen language of the Ottoman court?

A) Greek
B) Arabic
C) Persian
D) Turkish

Question 15

How did the Ottoman dynasty compare to other ruling families?

A) The Ottoman dynasty lasted for over 600 years , a feat matched by no other ruling family.
B) The Ottoman dynasty was among the most long -lasting in history, surviving for over 200 years, exceeded only by the Chinese dynasties.
C) Due to the lack of a principle of succession, the Ottomans endured constant dynastic change with individual families surviving only for decades.
D) Because the Ottoman succession was elective, it is misleading to think of the sultans as a single dynasty.

Question 16

Which of the following was NOT a cause for the decline of the Ottoman Empire?

A) Local officials began to retain increasing amounts of revenue for their own purposes.
B) Oppressive demands of local officials caused the peasantry to abandon their holdings and flee.
C) The ability of individual sultans to rule declined.
D) The addition of European military technology such as light artillery made the Janissaries so powerful that they could challenge the authority of the sultan.

Question 17

On the sea, the Ottoman galleys were eclipsed by Western naval power as early as the

A) 14th century.
B) 15th century.
C) 16th century.
D) 17th century.

Question 18

What European nation first threatened the Ottoman monopoly of trade with east Africa and India?

A) Spain
B) Portugal
C) England
D) France

Question 19

Which of the following was NOT a result of the Ottoman loss of monopoly over the Indian trade?

A) Spices carried by Europeans around Africa enriched the Ottomans? Christian rivals.
B) Direct carriage of eastern goods to ports in the West implied loss of revenues in taxes in Muslim trading centers.
C) Military setbacks revealed the obsolescence of the Muslim fleets.
D) Bullion caused by a negative balance of trade flowed out of the Ottoman empire to the West.

Question 20

Which of the following groups represented such extreme conservatism within the Ottoman Empire that reform was frustrated?

A) Janissaries
B) Artisans
C) Merchants
D) Sultans

Question 21

Which of the following represents a difference between the origins of the Ottomans and the Safavids?

A) The Safavids originated from a Turkish nomadic group
B) The Safavids represented a highly militant strain of Islam
C) The Safavids were originally frontier warriors
D) The Safavids represented the Shi?ite strain of Islam

Question 22

The center of the Safavid Empire was the modern-day state of

A) Syria.
B) Iraq.
C) Jordan.
D) Iran.

Question 23

The Safavid dynasty had its origins in the 14th century in a family devoted to what variant of Islam?

A) Sunnite
B) Ismaili
C) Sufi
D) Sikh

Question 24

In what year was the first Safavid declared shah?

A) 1453
B) 1501
C) 1553
D) 1722

Question 25

Followers of the Safavids? followers were called

A) Red Heads.
B) Yellow Turbans.
C) the White Lotus Society.
D) the Red Hand.

Question 26

The first Safavid Shah was

A) Abbas the Great.
B) Suleyman the Great.
C) Akbar.
D) Isma´?il.

Question 27

Why was the battle of Chaldiran in 1514 so important?

A) The battle established the military supremacy of the Safavids over the Ottomans and marked the end to eastern expansion of the Ottoman Empire.
B) The Safavids were dealt a devastating defeat that checked the westward advance of Shi?ism and decimated the ranks of the Turkic warriors who had built the Safavid Empire.
C) The combined armies of the Safavids and Ottomans defeated the Mughal armies and ended the policy of expansion undertaken by the Mughal emperors of India.
D) The defeat of the Safavids by a Western army reduced the Islamic Empire to economic dependency on the West and military inferiority to the other Muslim empires.

Question 28

The Safavid Empire reached its greatest extent under Shah

A) Suleyman the Great.
B) Tahmasp I.
C) Abbas the Great.
D) Ismail.

Question 29

What was the status of the Turkic chiefs under the Safavid shahs?

A) Unlike the Ottomans, the Turkish cavalrymen were driven from the Safavid Empire.
B) The former Turkish warriors were replaced entirely by the indigenous Persian nobility who formed a mercenary military force.
C) Like the Ottomans, the Turkish chiefs were gradually transformed into a warrior nobility with assigned villages and peasant labor.
D) The former Turkish nomads were reduced to slavery, but still composed the foundation of the Safavid military.

Question 30

After Chaldiran, the official language of the Safavid Empire became

A) Turkish.
B) Persian.
C) Arabic.
D) Hindi.

Question 31

The capital of the Safavid Empire under Abbas the Great was

A) Tabriz.
B) Baghdad.
C) Mosul.
D) Isfahan.

Question 32

How did the Savafid economy compare to that of the Ottomans?

A) Only the Ottoman sultans actively sought to encourage handicraft production and trade in their empire.
B) The Ottoman Empire benefitted in the short run from non-Muslim traders (Christians and Jews) who had extensive contacts with overseas empires that the Safavid empire lacked.
C) The Safavid Empire made a more concerted and successful attempt to enlarge its market economy, particularly by attracting merchants from the West.
D) The Safavid economy, because of the geographical location of the empire, was oriented exclusively toward the East and had no contact with Western merchants.

Question 33

What led to the rapid demise of the Safavid Empire?

A) Like the Ottoman Empire, the lack of a principle of succession led Abbas the Great to eliminate all capable rivals, leaving no capable ruler following his death.
B) The Safavid defeat at the battle of Panipat at the hands of a Russian army stripped the empire of its military forces just as pressure from outside enemies increased.
C) The collapse of the Safavid economy in the 18th century diminished the revenues of the empire to the point that the central government could no longer function.
D) The successful conquest of the Ottoman Empire overextended the Safavid resources, so that the central government became increasingly inefficient.

Question 34

The immediate successor of the Safavid dynasty in Persia was

A) Babur the Great.
B) Akbar the Great.
C) Suleyman the Great.
D) Nadir Khan Afshar.

Question 35

The founder of the Mughal dynasty was

A) Timur.
B) Akbar.
C) Babur.
D) Nadir Khan Afshar.

Question 36

Where was Babur born?

A) India
B) France
C) China
D) Central Asia

Question 37

Which of the following descriptions of the accomplishments of Babur is NOT accurate?

A) He was a fine military strategist and fierce fighter who went into battle alongside his troops.
B) He wrote one of the great histories of India and was a fine musician.
C) He reformed the ineffective Lodi bureaucracy to create a streamlined administration.
D) He was a fine musician and designed gardens for his new capital at Delhi.

Question 38

Which of the following statements most accurately characterizes the reign of Humayan?

A) Humayan was able to build on the reforms of his father and enjoyed one of the most stable and prosperous reigns of the Mughal dynasty.
B) Humayan completed the task of crushing opposition to the Mughal dynasty during the first 20 years of his reign, but settled into dissolute behavior later in his life.
C) Despite the seeming stability of Babur?s reign, his son Humayan was exiled by 1540 and forced to fight to restore the Mughal rule.
D) Humayan was assassinated shortly after his accession and the Mughal dynasty was briefly replaced by a Hindu family.

Question 39

Which of the following statements concerning the reign of Akbar is NOT accurate?

A) He personally oversaw the building of the military and administrative system
B) He patronized the arts
C) He extended the Mughal conquests in central and northern India
D) He attempted to purify Islam by removing Hindu influences

Question 40

What was the critical feature of Akbar?s new religion, the Din-i-Ilahi?

A) It attempted to blend elements of the many faiths with which he was familiar as a means of reconciling Hindus and Muslims.
B) It sought to purify the Islamic faith and remove Hindu influences by adopting many of the Sufi teachings already extant in India.
C) Like the Safavids to whom early members of the Mughal dynasty fled in exile, Akbar adopted militant Shi?ism.
D) Although it retained the formal appearance of Islam, the popular aspects of the new religion were almost entirely Buddhist.

Question 41

What was the outcome of the Din-i-Ilahi?

A) Accepted by Hindus who benefitted from the lenient policies of Akbar, the new religion was rejected by the Muslims.
B) Accepted by Muslims who saw it as a means of cementing the authority of the Mughals over the traditional Hindu rulers, the new religion was rejected by Hindus.
C) The new religion was widely accepted during Akbar?s lifetime and became the state religion of the Mughal Empire.
D) By Akbar?s death in 1605, the Din-i-Ilahi was rejected by both Muslims and Hindus.

Question 42

Which of the following statements concerning the economy of the Mughal Empire is most accurate?

A) Unlike the other Muslim empires, the Mughals successfully banned European merchants from their markets.
B) The Mughal Empire produced nothing of value to the West, but served as a conduit of products from southeastern Asia much in demand among the Europeans.
C) European traders brought products from throughout Asia to exchange for the subcontinent?s famed cotton textiles.
D) The Indian markets of the Mughals were flooded with Western products.

Question 43

What was the state of the Mughal dynasty at the outset of the reign of Aurangzeb?

A) Although the cultural level of the empire had declined, the administrative reforms of Shah Jahan renewed the spirit of the empire.
B) The status of women in the Mughal Empire was higher than at the beginning of the dynasty.
C) The Mughal bureaucracy remained efficient and effective, but the military had lapsed into technological conservatism.
D) The Mughal bureaucracy was bloated and corrupt, the army was backward in weaponry and tactics, and the peasants and artisans had seen living standards fall.

Question 44

What were the goals of Aurangzeb?

A) He wished to retreat from militant programs of his predecessors in order to emphasize the Buddhist program of pacifism and withdrawal from the things of this world.
B) He was determined to extend Mughal control over the whole of the Indian subcontinent and believed it was his duty to purify Indian Islam.
C) He was insistent on introducing Western culture and Western technology to the conservative Mughal empire.
D) As a devout Hindu, Aurangzeb wished to rid the empire of Muslim traditions.

Question 45

What was the impact of Aurangzeb?s religious policies?

A) Aurangzeb?s religious policies gravely weakened the internal alliances between Hindus and Muslims and disrupted the social peace that Akbar had established.
B) Aurangzeb?s religious policies succeeded in removing Buddhism from India.
C) The emperor succeeded in reestablishing the political and social dominance of the Hindu majority in India.
D) Aurangzeb?s introduction of Christianity to India began the process by which millions of Indians were converted to the new religion and provided an entry for Western commerce.

Question 46

What was the state of the Mughal Empire following Aurangzeb?s death in 1707?

A) The Mughal Empire had shrunken so much during Aurangzeb?s reign that the dynasty controlled only Bengal.
B) The empire included more territory than ever before and there was greater religious homogeneity than earlier in the reign.
C) The empire was far larger than earlier, but control and state revenues passed increasingly to regional lords who gave little more than tribute payments to the emperors.
D) The empire collapsed in the face of a Safavid invasion from the Indus river valley.

Question 47

Which of the following statements concerning the relationships of the Muslim empires to the West is NOT accurate?

A) None of the Islamic emperors systematically monitored technological advances in Europe.
B) Key tax revenues and merchant profits were drained off by the rise of European trading empires in Asia.
C) The absence of minority peoples within the empires left them without commercial and cultural contacts with the West.
D) Muslim scholars continued to take little interest in European learning.

Question 48

Where is the Taj Mahal?

A) Egypt
B) Turkey
C) India
D) Iran

Question 49

Compare and contrast the basic structure of the three Islamic empires.

Question 50

Discuss the social and political organization of the Ottoman Empire.

Question 51

Compare and contrast the causes for decline and collapse in each of the Islamic early modern empire.

Question 52

Compare and contrast the social and political organization of the Safavids to that of the Ottomans.

Question 53

How did the religious complexion of Mughal India differ from that of the other Islamic empires? What impact did religious diversity have on the Mughals?