French-Ottoman relations during the reign of Sultan Mahmud I 1730- 1754

Abstract

After the French-Ottoman relations went through a period of military confrontation, it was represented by France entering the European alliances that were taking place in Europe against the Ottoman Empire, and the last of the two fights between them was France's quest for the help of the Benedictine Republic in its struggle with the Ottomans in 1499 and three years later It entered a new space when the peace was held in 1503, and the state of calm in their relations continued until it entered a new phase during the reign of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent (1520 - 1566) at a time when France was living in a state of political conflicts with some western countries, as the king of Furnace was sent Saint François I (1515 - 1547) envoy to the Ottoman Sultan in 1535 calling for an alliance treaty between the two countries in order to take advantage of the power of the Ottoman Empire to limit the ambitions of some of the kings of Europe, so that the Treaty (French Ottoman Concessions) was signed in 1536, Because of the Ottoman threat to the European kingdoms, France quickly ignored its relations with the Ottoman Empire and organized into European powers against it, but when France felt the danger of some European countries over its sovereignty, it quickly resorted to a request to renew its relations with the Ottoman Empire .With the arrival of Sultan Mahmud I to power (1730 - 1754), the conditions that France was going through called for rapprochement with the Ottoman Empire due to France's refusal to submit to the control of the emperors of the Holy Roman Empire that ruled from the Habsburgs of the Christian world, which plunged it into conflicts. Political and military with some Western countries and on the other hand, with the aim of renewing the French concessions system during the period between the years 1730-1740, at a time when the conditions in which the Ottoman Empire was living were formed from a state of weakness to its desire to get close to France in order to obtain political and diplomatic support During its wars on the Western fronts, as well as gaining technical expertise in the field of organizing the army according to advanced Western systems and with the aim of manufacturing modern weapons based on French expertise, especially in the field of artillery development and the establishment of a military engineering school by taking advantage of the capabilities of some experts such as Alexandre Count de Bonival (1675 - 1747), so the period of the rule of Sultan Mahmud I was one of the best periods of time that the Ottoman Empire was living in during the period of weakness that it was going through throughout its history.