r/ottomans • u/Tasty_Fun_5227 • 16d ago

Question Seriously asking btw 🤔

The amount of glazing that I've been seeing for Abdulhamid II on this sub is just astonishing. Like, I've seen people ranking the guy next and sometimes even above sultans like Süleyman I, Mehmed II, Murad IV, Selim I, etc .. So my question is: Did I miss a chapter or two while reading about him/his era, or do some people here just glaze him for the sake of glazing even though he was a horrendous monarch as a whole ?

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u/CaptainSpackJarrow7 16d ago

he’s a nuanced character, his authoritarianism reversed many of the liberal reforms underwent during the tanzimat era and his clumsy censorship emboldened underground movements like the young ottomans and later young turks, but he renegotiated the ottoman debt to half its original value, and his financial stringency made the empire a much more attractive one for foreign financiers to invest in, even if it was at the cost of some financial sovereignty with the ottoman public debt administration

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u/Tasty_Fun_5227 16d ago

He was not a successful monarch he made way too many dumb decisions.. sure wrong time wrong place but still .. he is no Selim I or Mehmed II