World history concepts · AP World History: Modern
Gunpowder empires
Also called: Islamic gunpowder empires
Gunpowder empires: Land-based empires, especially the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal, that expanded and consolidated power using firearms and artillery in the early modern period.
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What it means
From the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries, these empires used gunpowder weapons to conquer territory and centralize authority. They developed sophisticated bureaucracies and used religion, art and architecture to legitimize rule.
The term is a historians' label; scholars debate how much gunpowder alone explains their success compared with administration and diplomacy.
Example
The Ottomans used massive cannons in the siege of Constantinople in 1453.
On the exam
Gunpowder empires are a Unit 3 topic and frequent subjects of comparison LEQs.