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Early History from 1453 to 1839

The 1453 fall of Constantinople to Sultan Mehmed II forced Greek scholars to flee to Italy with original manuscripts of Plato and Aristotle. Johannes Gutenberg’s 1450 invention of movable type reduced book costs by 80 percent, allowing 300,000 copies of Martin Luther’s works to circulate by 1520. These technological and intellectual shifts transitioned Europe from the Middle Ages into the Early Modern period. The 1839 Edict of Gülhane later signaled the start of Ottoman modernization by guaranteeing property rights to all subjects regardless of their religion.