Muhammad Ali
Leader of Egyptian modernization in the early nineteenth century. He ruled Egypt as an Ottoman governor, but had imperial ambitions. His descendants ruled Egypt until overthrown in 1952.
Janissaries
Infantry, originally of slave origin, armed with firearms and constituting the elite of the Ottoman army from the fifteenth century until the corps was abolished in 1826. See also devshirme. (p. 526, 675)
Serbia
The Ottoman province in the Balkans that rose up against Janissary control in the early 1800s. After World War II the central province of Yugoslavia. Serb leaders struggled to maintain dominance as the Yugoslav federation dissolved in the 1990s. (p. 676)
Tanzimat
'Restructuring' reforms by the nineteenth-century Ottoman rulers, intended to move civil law away from the control of religious elites and make the military and the bureacracy more efficient. (p. 678)
Crimean war
Conflict between the Russian and Ottoman Empires fought primarily in the Crimean Peninsula. To prevent Russian expansion, Britain and France sent troops to support the Ottomans.
extraterritoriality
The right of foreign residents in a country to live under the laws of their native country and disregard the laws of the host country. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, European and American nationals living in certain areas of Chinese and Ottoman cities were granted this right.
Slavophiles
Russian intellectuals who thought that Russia should retain its own spirit and tradition and avoid westernization; Assassinated Alexander II in 1881 (stopped his reforms)
pan-slavism
Movement among Russian intellectuals in the second half of the nineteenth century to identify culturally and politically with the Slavic peoples of eastern Europe.
decembrist revolt
abortive attempt by army of officers to take control of Russian government upon death of Alexander I
opium war
War between Britain and the Qing Empire that was, in the British view, occasioned by the Qing government's refusal to permit the importation of opium into its territories. The victorious British imposed the one-sided Treaty of Nanking on China. (p. 684)
bannermen
Hereditary military servants of the Qing Empire, in large part descendants of peoples of various origins who had fought for the founders of the empire. (p. 684)
Treaty of nanking
Treaty that concluded the Opium War. It awarded Britain a large indemnity from the Qing Empire, denied the Qing government tariff control over some of its own borders, opened additional ports of residence to Britons, and ceded Hong Kong to Britain.
treaty ports
Cities opened to foreign residents as a result of the forced treaties between the Qing Empire and foreign signatories. In the treaty ports, foreigners enjoyed extraterritoriality. (p. 685)
most-favored-nation status
A clause in a commercial treaty that awards to any later signatories all the privileges previously granted to the original signatories. (p. 686)
taiping rebellion
The most destructive civil war before the twentieth century. A Christian-inspired rural rebellion threatened to topple the Qing Empire., A Christian-inspired rural rebellion threatened to topple the Qing Empire. Leader claimed to be the brother of Jesus. <-- Hong Xiuquan