The Ottoman Empire, which at the time this map was drawn included much of the Balkans and the Middle East, used a version of the Turkish language written in a slightly modified Arabic script.

Why the Ottoman Empire rose and fell One of the greatest empires in history, the Ottomans reigned for more than 600 years before crumbling on the battlefields of World War I.

For an empire once so threatening to the outside world, the Ottomans remain today one of the least explored areas of global history: “the forgotten giant” as one Ottoman historian has called it.