The Ottoman Railroad That Collapsed an Empire

The Last Caliph: How Turkey Abolished the Caliphate in 1924

After the Ottoman Empire collapsed and the Treaty of Lausanne was signed, Mustafa Kemal faced a final decision: what to do with the caliphate itself. This episode follows the abolition of the caliphate in March 1924, the exile of the last caliph Abdülmecid II, and the debate within Turkey's Grand National Assembly over whether Islam needed a political figurehead. We discuss the role of the caliphate during the war, the rivalry between Ankara and Istanbul, and how a single vote in a small Ankara chamber ended a 1,300-year-old institution. Along the way, we touch on the caliphate's symbolic power in the Muslim world, the protests in India and Egypt, and the quiet last words of a caliph who spent his remaining days painting in a Paris suburb. #OttomanEmpire #Caliphate #Abolition #MustafaKemalAtatürk #AbdülmecidII #TurkishWarOfIndependence #TBMM #Islam #1924 #Ankara #Istanbul #LausanneTreaty #IndianKhilafatMovement #Exile #FexingoHistory #History #MiddleEast #Turkey Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo [https://buymeacoffee.com/fexingo]

How the Allied Occupation of Istanbul Ended the Ottoman Empire

In November 1918, weeks after the Mudros Armistice, Allied warships sailed into the Bosphorus and began a military occupation of Istanbul that would last nearly five years. Lucas and Luna explore how British, French, and Italian forces controlled the Ottoman capital, dissolved the parliament, and arrested nationalist leaders. They discuss the role of General Harrington, the sultan's collaboration, the rise of the Karakol resistance network, and how the occupation galvanized support for Mustafa Kemal's Ankara government. The episode also covers the final Allied evacuation in October 1923, just days before the Republic was proclaimed. Featuring details on the Allied High Commission, the 1920 raid on Parliament, and the silent struggle over the city's future. A story of imperial collapse and national rebirth in the streets of Istanbul. #OttomanEmpire #Istanbul #AlliedOccupation #MudrosArmistice #MustafaKemal #TurkishWarOfIndependence #GeneralHarrington #Karakol #SultanMehmedVI #SevresTreaty #Occupation #Resistance #LausanneTreaty #History #FexingoHistory #WorldWarI #MiddleEast #Turkey Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo [https://buymeacoffee.com/fexingo]

The Armenian Genocide and the End of the Ottoman Empire

In this episode, Lucas and Luna explore how the Armenian Genocide of 1915-1916 reshaped the Ottoman Empire's final years and its legacy. They discuss the Young Turk leadership under the Three Pashas—Talaat, Enver, and Djemal—and the systematic destruction of Ottoman Armenians. The conversation covers the Tehcir Law of May 1915, the role of the Special Organization (Teşkilat-ı Mahsusa), the deportation marches from cities like Erzurum and Van, and the foreign accounts from ambassadors such as Henry Morgenthau Sr. They also touch on the post-war trials in Constantinople and the assassination of Talaat Pasha by Soghomon Tehlirian. The episode ties the genocide to the empire's collapse—how mass violence and the loss of a major population contributed to the empire's disintegration and the rise of the Turkish Republic. #ArmenianGenocide #TehcirLaw #YoungTurks #TalaatPasha #EnverPasha #DjemalPasha #TeşkilatıMahsusa #HenryMorgenthau #SoghomonTehlirian #WWI #OttomanEmpire #Erzurum #Van #OperationNemesis #ConstantinopleTrials #History #FexingoHistory #MiddleEast Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo [https://buymeacoffee.com/fexingo]

The Ottoman Empire's Last Grand Vizier: Ahmet Tevfik Pasha

In the final days of the Ottoman Empire, as Allied warships anchored off Istanbul and the sultan prepared for exile, one man tried to hold the state together: Grand Vizier Ahmet Tevfik Pasha. This episode follows Tevfik Pasha's last, desperate year in power—from the collapse of the Paris Peace Conference negotiations in 1920, through the Allied occupation of the capital and the Greek advance into Anatolia, to his final resignation as the sultan fled aboard HMS Malaya. We explore his failed attempt to secure an independent Ottoman state at the Sèvres negotiations, his bitter rivalry with Mustafa Kemal's Ankara government, and his lonely defence of the caliphate in a world that had already decided the empire's fate. Along the way, we meet the last Ottoman cabinet as it met in a cramped palace room, the Allied high commissioners who dictated terms, and the men who ultimately chose nationalism over empire. This is the story of a loyal servant who arrived too late to save what he loved. #AhmetTevfikPasha #OttomanEmpire #GrandVizier #ParisPeaceConference #TreatyOfSevres #AlliedOccupation #Istanbul #MustafaKemal #AnkaraGovernment #LastOttomanCabinet #SultanMehmedVI #HMSMalaya #Gallipoli #MudrosArmistice #Caliphate #TurkishWarOfIndependence #FexingoHistory #History Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo [https://buymeacoffee.com/fexingo]

The Ottoman Empire's Last Census: Counting a Dying World

In 1914, the Ottoman Empire conducted its most ambitious census ever — a count that would become its last. This episode follows the story of that census: how Ottoman statisticians, police, and tax collectors fanned out across a crumbling empire to count every subject, from the Bedouin of the Syrian desert to the fishermen of the Aegean coast. We explore the surprising mechanics of the count — the lantern-lit village halls, the secret tallies of women (officially ignored but sometimes recorded), the manipulation of numbers in Constantinople to hide military losses. We meet the census director, Mehmed Cemaleddin Bey, and the German advisors who brought punch-card tabulation machines to Istanbul. The census reveals an empire of 18.5 million souls — but the war that began that same year would tear those numbers apart. We look at what the census tells us about the empire's demographics on the eve of destruction: the patchwork of Armenians, Kurds, Arabs, Turks, Greeks, and Jews; the literacy rates that shocked reformers; the tax districts that would later become borders. And we trace how the census data itself became a weapon — used to identify and target non-Muslim communities during the war. A quiet, bureaucratic story that speaks volumes about the empire's final years. #OttomanCensus1914 #MehmedCemaleddinBey #DüyunuUmumiye #OsmanlıNüfusu #MilletSistemi #TeşkilatıMahsusa #Tanzimat #İstatistik #PunchCard #ArmenianPopulation #KurdishTribes #ArabProvinces #WWI #MiddleEastHistory #OttomanEmpire #FexingoHistory #History #Bureaucracy Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo [https://buymeacoffee.com/fexingo]