00:00 In 1352, the Ottomans landed in Europe and would go on to conquer Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia, and eventually Constantinople, forever changing the world.

05:29 The rise of the Ottomans can be attributed to the influx of Turkic-speaking nomads and the migration of Turkic speakers fleeing Genghis Khan, who settled in an already splintered and unstable Anatolia in the 13th century.

10:37 The rise of the Ottomans was facilitated by the fluid and competitive political environment of Anatolia, where different religious and ethnic groups coexisted and engaged in conflicts, allowing for the emergence of Osman, the founder of the Ottoman dynasty, who initially ruled a small-scale empire in northwestern Anatolia before his son, Orhan, expanded their control to major urban centers and absorbed the Muslim Emirate of Qureshi.

15:41 The Ottomans' success in expanding their territory and adopting new practices and institutions can be attributed to their flexibility, access to poorly defended Byzantine territory, and the religiously sanctioned war of Holy War, or Gaza, which drew Turks westward and gave them access to experienced warriors.

21:11 The Ottoman Empire was shaped by the Ghazi tradition of holy war, which emphasized expanding the abode of Islam and gaining converts, and allowed for flexibility in alliances and cooperation with Christians.

26:05 The concept of crusading was fluid and changed over time, with the wider definition being closer to how people actually understood it at the time, and it had a major influence on medieval society, politics, culture, and religion, shaping the lives of even those who never participated in a crusade.

31:02 Crusading in the 14th century shifted from focusing on the Holy Land to other regions, such as the Eastern Baltic and Spain, and became more integrated into chivalric culture, with knights seeking divine favor by fighting against pagans and other enemies, leading to the collision between Western knighthood and the expanding Ottoman Empire.

36:01 As the Ottoman Empire faced internal strife and external threats, it established a unique inheritance and dynastic structure where Ottoman territory was indivisible and each surviving heir had an equal chance at becoming the Sultan, leading to civil wars and fratricidal assassinations.

41:07 The Ottomans established a unique slave-based household system that formed the foundation for their bureaucracy and military, including the highly disciplined Janissaries, and their advanced record-keeping and logistics allowed them to effectively organize long campaigns and specialize in siege warfare, setting them apart from other Turkmen polities in the region.

45:46 The Ottomans controlled a large territory in the Balkans, including parts of Serbia and northern Greece, and were seen as a force to be reckoned with, prompting Philip the Bold of Burgundy to organize a crusade against them, which ultimately turned into a showcase of Burgundian power rather than a practical military force.

50:27 The French and Burgundian crusaders, after charging through the Ottoman cavalry and breaking through the defensive barricades, were ultimately surrounded and captured by the Ottomans, resulting in a catastrophic defeat with thousands dead or taken prisoner.

55:09 The defeat at Nicopolis dealt a lethal blow to crusading in the East, leading to a decline in enthusiasm for the project and no major crusading effort against the Ottomans for nearly 50 years, effectively ending the 300-year-old tradition of French knights traveling to the East, while Beyzit's crushing victory marked the rise of the Ottomans as a dangerous empire with ambitions in both Anatolia and Europe, poised to finish off the Byzantines and confirm their status as the great power of the region, until the warlord Timur Link, Tamerlane, arrived on the scene.