Can't Tell if Mary Sue or Just Name.

So this guy. Suleiman. His name is hard to spell. He is now named Sue, because his name is pronounced Sue-Lee-Man. Sueleeman. And he was a Sunni. No pun there.
And while the Renaissance and the reformation, Sue decided he’d take over the world. Or at least the Ottoman Empire. So you guys remember Istanbul was Constantinople? Yeah. It was the capital of the Ottoman Empire. And Sue was having a pretty nice time ruling the world, because his daddy left him a whole lotta everything. But like a good ruler, he was a greedy jerkface. That means he wanted more.
Now he had Greece. He had a little bit of Russia, and the Black Sea area, and the Bibley bits, and Turkey, and Egypt etc. etc. So like he had Oriental Avenue, St. James Place, Pennsylvania Avenue, and Boardwalk.
And suddenly Diet of Wyrms. All those people were all OHNOREFORMATIONS! So all of their cities were Sue’s for the takin’. So he took ‘em.
Sue was paying attention to the Mediterranean Sea. Whoever had the Ducky Sea (because it looks like a duck.) had control of the trade between Europe, Africa, and Asia. Sue decided he’d go after Rhodes, which was an island in the Ducky Sea. And Rhodes was the last Christian stronghold in the sea.
This doesn’t mean Sue wanted to kill all Christians. This means he wanted Rhodes because it was an amazing location. And the Knights living on the island were being pirates, and were just annoying.
So after Sue beat them in a long battle, he felt kinda bad. The Knights surrendered, and he allowed them to go with safety. He also showered the Grand Master with gifts and stuff. So he seems like a pretty good guy.
LOLNOPE.
Sue kept on pushing. Why? Because France was all “PLZATTACKSOUTHEUROPEPLZ.” And Francis, the King of France, was an enemy of Holy Roman Empire, because Spain was given the crown to Holy Roman Empire, and France sat back and pouted like a little boy. So he and HRE (it’s cumbersome to type Holy Roman Empire.) fought a lot.
Now Francis got in a bit of trouble with HRE. He called on Sue, and was like “PLZHELPMEPLZ.” and Sue was like “I’MONMYWAYPLZ.”
So he was on his way. He was planning on attacking Hungary anyways, so he just plowed on through her and went on. She probably could have not been thrown down, but everyone was fussin’ with each other and they weren’t very united.
And in comes Sue with a battle that lasted only an hour and a half. HE TOOK OVER NEARLY THE WHOLE COUNTRY IN AN HOUR AND A HALF. I COULD LEAVE MY HOUSE, WATCH A MOVIE, AND HUNGARY WOULD BE CAPTURED WHEN I GOT BACK.
So after this, Sue got a bit cocky. Because he took over Hungary in an hour and a half. And he decided to attack Vienna, the CAPITAL OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. So with 200,000 men, he marched on in. This freaked Europe out. Rumours started to spread that Sue was going to make everyone convert to Islam. Which wasn’t true. Why? Well, go look at Rhodes. He wasn’t all “OK KNIGHTS NOW BOW BEFORE THE MIGHTY SUE AND CONVERT MUHAHAHAHA MANIACAL LAUGH.” He didn’t really care. He was indifferent.
But they failed at taking Vienna. Twice. And then the third time, Sue went all out. He marched from Istanbul to Vienna in a parade, with a bunch of camels and horses and boys and stuff. So Prince Asue was in Vienna. But his parade was not welcome, because Vienna does not have streets and it just has rivers. Look.

But all the Europe rallied together and defeated Sue. He went home and cried himself to sleep that night.
Btu he got over it, because France still liked him. Well, of course France likes him, because France likes everyone. France loves everyone.
SUE LOOKED TO THE EAST.
And saw the Safavid Empire. He saw Persia. So he went in and jacked the Persia. Well, most of it, at least. He had Baghdad and a few pieces of other stuff. Persia and Sue kept on fighting, back and forth and back and forth. Hungary got involved again and asked Persia if they could politely beat Sue into the dust. Er, sand. I guess it’s sand over there. But you knowww~
But Sue could hold himself up from the west and the east, and it wasn’t really a problem. He moved on past Egypt, and he captured the city of Tunis. Two knees. This was a very nice move, because he now had the East side of the Ducky Sea. This was mostly due to a Pirate named Barbarossa, who was well known as a big fat bloodthirsty Greek bully. But whatever.
Sue and the Turks were a world powers through the Reformation. When he wasn’t expanding his kingdom, he was fancying it up.
Now Sue did some stuff which wasn’t very nice. He made a law that made it legal to KILL YOUR BROTHER IF YOU ARE NEXT IN LINE TO THE THRONE.
Now this happened anyways, but it was behind closed doors. The Ottoman Empire just made it legal.
So Sue wasn’t really a horrible evil I WILL KILL YOU ALL Muslim, but he had his faults. He wasn’t much different from his European counterparts, even though they saw him differently. The Enddd~!

(I don’t like ending on sweet notes like that. But hey. Whatever.)

A Long Long Time Ago, ALL THE DISNEY!

A LONG TIME AGO, IN A GALAXY FAR FAR AW-
Wait.
Ok, so, this was just a long time ago.
A LONG TIME AGO, JAKE GYLLENHAAL WAS-
Wait.
Ok, so, this was a long time ago. Before Jake Gyllenhaal.
A LONG TIME AGO, THERE WAS PERSIA.
After the days of Noah, there was a little paradise over near Mesopotamia which was all nice and stuff until the Persians got all up in thurr and was lyke “U MAD BRO?”
So they decided to be all original and rename the place “Persia”.
So y’all know Esther and Alexander the Great and Jake Gyllenhaal? Yeah. They were all from Persia. Except not all at the same time. BUT STILL.
So Persia has a really long history that we’re gonna stop right now because it’s complicated. Like bratty 12 year old girl Facebook relationships.
So we’re just gonna talk about two main peeps today. One was named Shiites. ... I’m gonna resist a joke there because if I don’t I will get my computer taken away for a long long time.
The others were called Sunnis.
But so stuff is still going on. Like, 38 minutes ago, there was a buncha Shiites trollin around and then some Sunnies came in and were like "NO." and then the Shiites were all "ASDFGHHJKL GET OUT." and the Sunnies were all "nope." and so they were killed.
BUT BACK TO BUSINESS.
So these weren’t exactly countries. These were divisions of Islam. After Mo’ (looong time since we talked about him specifically.) died, he wasn’t exactly a zombie to answer questions about Islam. Even though there WERE some mummiezombiemuslims, Mo’ was unable to make it to the deathday party. So there was some debate as to who should be the next Muslim leader. Some people thought that Abu should be the next leader. I don’t know who thought it would be a good idea to make a monkey a Caliph (which is the leader.) So the other people thought that it should be A guy named Ali. And whoever thought it would be a good idea to put Aladdin in disguise on the Caliph’s position is the Elephant that was actually Abu that Aladdin rode in that one scene.
So if you guys need a visual:
Sunnies:

Shiites:

Now that song will be stuck in my head all day. PRINCE ALIIII, FABULOUS HEEE, ALI ABABWAAAA~!
But so the two groups decided to just split up and be two different groups of Islam. It still spread though. LIKE BUTTER ON TOAST. LIKE A WILDFIRE. LIKE THE CHEESE TOUCH. LIKE... LIKE... SOMETHING ELSE THAT SPREADS.
So Islam spread in to Persia. It got all nice and reunited, and the Shiites ruled.
So the rules were canned Imans. Imans were a weird mix between Ipods and Walkmen that hipsters use so they look like cool hipster-thrift-store-vintage-hurr-durr.
Oh...
OH wait...
What was that?
Oh. Ok.
Nevermind. I spelled it wrong. It’s Imam.
So the first twelve Imams were considered to have supernatural powers and everyone thought they were without sins. Hurrdurr FAIL.
There was a guy named Ismail. He grew up learning about alla (no pun.) this stuff, but he didn’t want to grow up to be an Imam or a leader of a religious order or none’uh that jayazz. HE WANTED TO BE AN EMPEROR OF A GREAT EMPIRE. BAMBAMBAMBAA~! So he became a “Shah.”

This was a biiiig move. It changed Persia.... FOREVER! BAMBAMBAAAAM! (note: This is different from the “BAMBAMBAMBAA!”. The first is suspense music. The later is good happy trumpets.)
Ismail had created a new kind of government. He had a Theocracy, which is a government based on religion. And to this day, Persia (Now Iran, mind you.) is STILL the only country in the world based on the Shiite faith.
So the country was changed, but it was not exactly a fun time. There were still a bunch of Sunnits in the place, so they were forced to convert or die. Ismail hired a lot of people to do his dirty work for him, so they went out and killed a bunch of Sunnits and expanded the empire. Ismail made Tabriez the capital of Persia, and all was... uhm... pretty bad, actually.
AND THEN THE OTTOMAN TURKS WERE OVER HURR AND ISMAIL CAPTURED THEIR CITY BAGHDAD AND WUZ ALL “U MAD BRO?”
And ogurl.
So Ismail made a big name for himself with that buzznezz wif dah Turks and Baghdad.
But eventually Ismail, you know, died. His possible heirs weren’t exactly capable of ruling though. One switched his loyalty to the sunnies, one was too young to rule, one was blind, and one was insane.
So yeah. No good candidates here.
The Ottomans took back their city, and the empire shrunk.
AND THEN CAME A GOOD LEADER.
His name was Abbas, and he was a good ruler. In fact, he was a great ruler. In fact, his name was Abbas the Great. Hurrdurr.
He thought it would be a good idea to move the capital city AGAIN, so he moved it to Isfahan. It was in the middle of the Empire, and he covered it in art and pretty and rugs and tapestries and pretty shtuff. He opened trade with the English, selling them said rugs and tapestries, both of which are still popular today.
AND THEN ABBAS TOOK BAGHDAD BACK.
He pushed the borders back to where they were with Ismail.
But he had one tiny flaw.
Abbas was Senior Psycho, and he had one son killed, one son sent off to be raised somewhere else, and one son blinded. All in fear of one of them overthrowing him to take the throne, as he did his father!
BAM DAM DAAAAA.

SUDDENLY TURKS 2: REVENGE OF THE TURKS.

So some of you people have seen the 3rd Pirates of the Caribbean. I mean, you know, it was ok, but this isn’t a movie review blargh. But you know how they went off the edge of the world? Like this:

Yeah.
Well, some people legit believed that back then. (They still do today. The Flat Earth Society. 4srs.) They thought that there were big scary sea monsters and stuff if you went too far this or that way.

Ok.
But so these peeps were right next door to Spain. They were in Portugal, and they were some explorers.
So you can really appreciate this, you need to know what happened to other explorers. People had tried to go from Portugal ALL THE WAY down the coast of Africa, around it, and head over to India. 14 trips had been attempted, but, well....

Or:

But more likely:

Yeah. They were getting kinda close to the equator, and they weren’t used to really hot weather. So they started SPAZZIN!!1! and freaking out and they thought the sun was going to boil them.
lulz.
So why did they want to go to Africa and India anyway?
Well, they wanted a new trade route. BECAUSE SUDDENLY TURKS.

The Turks cut off trade routes to the East. Which means no moar silk. No moar spices. NO MOAR GEMS.
And spices were important. They didn’t have ‘fridgerators, so they spiced the meat to make it like beef jerky. Pepper was one of those more valued spices. In fact, it was almost as valuable as gold. Derp.
So the Portugal's also wanted to share the gospel with the Asians. More specifically, Prince Henry the Navigator, son of the King of Portugal, wanted to do that. DOOD, THESE GUYS ARE ORIGINAL WITH THEIR NAMES. Hmm.
Okbutso.
Henry was a super legit Christian. He wanted to convert Muslims, he was in a cool religious group, they didn’t take slaves (like a buncha other traders), and they wanted to stop the spread of Islam.
Well they sound like some nice people.
Henry wanted to travel to preach the gospel, so he joined up with some Astronomers, Shipbuilders, Map Makers, and a buncha peeps.
AND THEN THERE WAS A THIRD REASON.
They were trying to find a ~mysteriousss~ Christian king named Prester John. John supposedly owned kingdoms in India or Africa. A letter was received that pretty much said “OGURL I BE GETTIN TAKEN OVAR BY BARBARIANS.”
So I’m thinking dood probably didn’t really exist. Some kid probably wrote it up and dropped it in the mailbox to see where it’d end up. And then it spread through ALL OF EUROPE and everyone was looking for Prester John.
So there was another guy named Bartolomeu Dias... We’ll call him Bart.
So Bart was asked by King John II of Portugal to sail around Africa. The king paid for the ALL EXPENSE PAID VACATION~! He got three of the finest ships in Portugal, and sent Bart off.
So he got farther south than anyone had before. He and his men kept moving. Well, guess what?
THERE WERE NO MONSTERS. THERE WAS NO BOILING. THERE WAS NO END OF THE WORLD.
Failmode.
So a really bad storm came. For two whole weeks.
*sniffle*
BUT. THEY. LIVED.
After the storm was over, Bart still wanted to go for it.
He wanted to go up the east coast of Africa, but his men weren’t to hip on the idea.
Bart, sadly, gave in, and he went back to Portugal. This time, he maneuvered his ships close enough to the shore to see it. lulz.
So another explorer wanted to go around Africa. By this time, Portugal had another king. He was a good one, and gave the explorer, named De Gama, a few ships to sail him off.
So he brought a crew with him, and in that crew was Bart. Bart decided to come along, which was pretty cool. However, he ditched the guys about halfway there. ~And nobody knows why~
So the guys made it without any boiling water, end of the worlds, or sea monsters.
So they were pretty much kicked out of India because it was taken over by Muslims, and nobody wanted them there.

So they went back to Portugal, and everyone treated them like heroes.
Later, they went back to India, and they pretty much BROKE IN TO INDIA. They sank a Muslim ship that held THREE HUNDRED PILGRIMS GOING TO MECCA, and at that, India opened their trade routes.
So what about Bart?
Oh. Yeah. He drowned.
As for De Gama, he died in India. He was kinda an ambassador.
Uhm.
Well.
That was... Anti-climatic.

Zombierome~!

list goes on.
So we’re going to add another to the list~!
IVAN THE GREAT OF RUSSIA.
Originally, he was named Ivan III.
He was born in Russia, but it wasn’t exactly a country yet. The Mongols were ruling Russia.

NO. THAT’S WRONG.
They were the Tatar Mongols.

Butanyways.
They were feared. At the time, Batu Khan ruled over the Golden Hoard tribe. And thought the Russians were ruled by the Tatar Mongols, they had a prince. And his name was Ivan.
And he was not impressed with the Golden Hoard. He couldn’t care less. I mean, he was a Russian Prince. He didn’t really care. But he wanted to free Russia. Someone, someday, was going to revolt anyways.
So being that Ivan is called Ivan the Great, you might have figured out that he decided to get the revolt over with. The Mongols had been in Russia for over 240 years, so it was about time Russia got control again.
So Then Ivan freed Russia and everyone was happy the end~!
OK. Wait. Back up.
Back before Ivan freed Russia, something happened. He gained power. How does one go about doing that?
HE GOT MARRIED.
Do you think he just went out and picked up a lady?
Nooo.
He married a VERY important person. Her name was Sophia, and she was the niece of the last Byzantine Emperor.
Ogurl.
LET’S BACK UP SOME MORE.
So The Byzantine Empire. Middle Ages. The Byzantine Empire was actually the Easter Roman Empire, but that was cumbersome to write. So they called it the Byzantine Empire.
And the Byzantine Empire had a church. It was the Eastern Orthodox Church, and the western had the Holy Roman Church. Ok. So even though the Eastern Orthodox Church was different, it blended Church and State, just like the Holy Roman Church.



So when the Byzantine Empire collapsed, Sophia was the last person in the whole entire Royal Byzantine line.
AND SUDDENLY TURKS.

Ok. So Sophia had the remaining power of the Byzantine Empire and the power of the Eastern Orthodox Church.
So when Ivan got married, he got allathat power.



So Ivan appointed himself as the Protecter. Oooh... That sounds cool. Like a wrestling name or something. AND THEN THAT SONG IS LAYING IN THE BACKGROUND AND THE GUY GOES, “LADIES AND GENTLEMEN... THE PROTECTOR!” and then he comes out and-
Nevermind.
So we don’t know if he was a legit follower of Christ, but he took his position 4srs. He was like a crusader, because Mongols were Muslims, and he fought them off. He had a dream for a free Russia, and that’s what happened.
Sooo with Ivan married to Sophia, it was kinda like they were the eastern Roman Empire... In fact, that’s what Ivan thought.

So.
Russia was pretty proud. It was like a new Rome. A Rome that had been brought back from the dead. A ZOMBIE ROME.
Ivan was successful in leading Zombierome. He refused to pay tribute to the Golden Hoard. Sophia agreed with him on the bold move.
SO UNLIKE THE MONGOLS, THEY DECIDED TO NOT HAVE A WAR.
o-o
Ogurl.
So Ivan decided to call himself ruler of All Zombierome, and not just the little bit that he was ruling. He moved the capital to Moscow, and he had a bunch of buildings rebuilt. He actually brought in Italian architects to rebuild the Kremlin. Which was funny, because they were bringing back the Roman style.
Ivan dressed like a Byzantine emperor. He used the Byzantine Seal, which is a two headed eagle holding a sword and the Holy Hand Grenade. Oh, don’t believe me? You believed me about the Eagle on the blooming cactus eating a snake! Ok, well, here’s a picture of the seal:

...
Hold on.
...

YOU SEE! RIGHT THERE! IN HIS HAND!
Ok. But so.
Do you think everything was all peachy in Zombierome? Yeah! Totaly! Everything was aweso-
NO.
IT WASN’T GREAT.
Ivan got kinda brainpowerhungry. He deiced that he’d ditch his government pals and just used his own ideas.
...
FAILMODE: ON.
So he lessened the power of nobility because he decided it’d be a good idea to make a new class of land-owners. He gave land and power to his Armydoods. He decided to use the ABSOLUTELY PERFECT feudal system. He tweaked it a bit though. It became kinda like slavery, because they started trading their serfs. It wasn’t until 1861 that it ended. /lesob
And the serf class wasn’t little tiny. No. It was GIANORMOUS. They were entering the Dark Ages, unlike the rest of Europe. Well, Ivan wasn’t that horrible, and he wasn’t that great. He just kinda was. He was in the middle.
So even though we’re done with Ivan, we are NOT done with Russia. Soon, we will learn about his Grandon, whose nickname was not as lovely.
HE WAS...
IVAN. THE. TERRIBLEEE.

LOOK AT ME. LOOK AT THIS MAP. LOOK AT ME. LOOK AT THIS MAP.

Take a step into the TARDI- Errr, time machine.
We’ve been nearing the Renaissance , but we’re going to go a lot farther back.
PAUL.
Paul.
You know Paul, th-



...
no.
Paul the missionary. He went from city to city spreading the gospel. Ok. He went to Europe and Asia and Greece and all that good stuffz. Told about Jesus. What happened as a result of that?
Between his missionary journeys, he got in jail a lot. He wrote a lot of letters while he was in jail, though. SEVEN of the New Testament books are written by Paul and named after the cities he visited. He wrote more, but seven are named after the cities. Six of the seven cities are located in what later become known as the Ottoman empire.
During this time, The known world was, for the most part, the Roman Empire. Not the Holy Roman Empire, but the Roman Empire. Things were getting wack and crazy all up in there, and Christians were being persecuted, and a buncha bad stuff was going on. And then the roman empire was divided. Constantine come to the throne of the Western Roman Empire, and the capital was moved. And Constantine got all greedy and decided he’d go attack the Eastern Roman Empire. So he did and he got it. lulz.
Where’d he move the Capital? To Byzantium, which was known as Constantinople, which is now Istanbul. I don’t know why they changed it three times, but they did.
So after about a hundred years, everything went kuh-ploink and Rome fell. Inflation, taxation, Obam-BARBARIANS, and moving eventually made the entire country fall. But not in a day. I know it wasn’t built in a day, but it didn’t fall in a day either ._. This was around 476.
So almost A THOUSAND YEARS LATER is where we currently are. The Ottoman empire was pretty sweet, but they were mainly Islamic. So how did these six cities in the Ottoman empire fare? I’LL TELL YOU LATER.

So way back, Constantine made it a law that you couldn’t persecute Christians in the Edict of Milan. They were under HORRIBLE persecution, and Constantine was not too fond of that. Constantine wanted his empire to be strongly Christian.
So we’re going back again. We got Justinian and Theodora. They made Constantinople what it is/was/whatever. It was like a golden age.
AND THEN GENGHIS KHAN CAME.
And here we are at the Ottoman Turks. The Ottoman Turks used to be a little band of fugitives, led by a man named Ossman. He and his followers, the Ottomen, were on the run from our good buddy Genghis Khan. They were freakin’ smooth out and were running. Their place of refuge was with the among the... the... I don’t know how to spell it or say it. I’m not even going to try. BUT THERE WERE SOME TURKS. AND THEY WERE NEAR THE BLACK SEA. Which is over near Constantinople.
Ossman was not just gonna live with the Turks. He was going to CONQUER them. So he did.
FOR TEH LULZ.
And he did a good job. He declared himself Sultan of the Turks and he ruled over them. So Ossman moved the Turks over to the Europe side of the Black Sea. Check out your friendly neighborhood globe and you’ll see what I mean. Then they took over the Balkans. I have NO idea who these guys are. They were a group of countries that were named after the mountain range around Bulgaria and Yugoslavia.
LOOK AT ME. LOOK AT THIS MAP. LOOK AT ME. LOOK AT THIS MAP. THIS MAP IS THE MAP YOUR MAP HAS, BUT A LOT MORE DETAILED.

GREECE. IT’S ON THE MAP. ALBANIA. YOU SEE IT. BULGARIA. IT’S RIGHT THERE. TURKEY. LOOKS NOTHING LIKE ONE. MOST OF YUGOSLAVIA. AND SOME OF ROMANIA. THEY’RE IN OUR BALKAN PARTY. YUGOSLAVIA IS NOT A COUNTRY ANYMORE. THEY ARE UNINVITED TO OUR PARTY. IT IS NOT A NICE REGION TO BE IN. LOTSA WAR. LOTSA LOTSA WAR.
Back to the Ottomans, though. The Ottomans crossed into Europe and fought the Balkans. They found the Bulgarians and the Serbs. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out where the Bulgarians are from, and the Serbs were from Yugoslavia. The Turks were all “HEEEY, THESE GUYS AREN’T THAT MUCH DIFFERENT FROM USSS.” Well, except they had different religions. The Turks were Islamic and the Serbs and their Bulgarian buddies were Christian. And they had... Problems. The Ottomans brought their Islamic faith, and FORCED people to become Islamic or be heavily taxed. Christian cities fell because of this. Except for one city.
Except for CONSTANTINOPLE.
It had not been taken yet. Only one one sultan ever rose to the task, whose name was Mohammed. The second. Mo (not to be confused with Mohammed the First.) was an earth shaker. He had 150,000 soldiers to help him attack Constantinople, KNOWING that it was about 10 times the size of his opponents. For the lulz.
He had a big ship. It could not get through, because of a chain. So he just got a buncha little boats. And they pushed them across the land with logs and made like a conveyor belt. He had 70 bitty warships that they had positioned. Constantine the... Eleventh? Yeah. Constantine the Eleventh was pleading for help, but nobody came.
Awh.
So for about 54 days they fought back. Then it fell, and Constantine did too.
The Ottoman Turks renamed Constantinople. It is now called Istanbul.
And you see, when the Ottomans took over, the scientists, great thinkers, artists, and poets, fled. They were what made Constantinople great. But they caused the spread of genius throughout Europe, known as... -dramatic voice- THE RENNISANCE.
And as for the Ottomans, they kept at it and did well until, get this, 1918.
Wow.
And now, we part, and I leave you with something to help you remember, that it is, in fact, Istanbul and not Constantinople.