ERTOGHRUL, father of Usman, the founder of the Turkish empire. He was the leader of a little band, a frag-rnent of a tribe of Oghuz Turk, which, under Ertoglu-ul's father, Suliman Shah, had left their settlements in Khora.san, arid so journed for a time in Armenia. After a few years they left this country also, and were follow ing the course of the Euphrates towards Syria, when their leader was accidentally drowned in that river. The great part of the tribe then dispersed ; but a little remnant of it followed two of Suliman's sons, Ertoghrul and Dunclar, who determined to seek a dwelling-place in Asia Minor, under the Seljuk Turk, Ala-ud-Din, sultan of Iconium. The adversaries, f rom whose superior f orce t hey delivered Ala-nd-Diu, were a host of Mongols, the dead liest enemies of the Turk race. Ala-ud-Din, in gratitude for this eminent service, bestowed on Ertoghrul a principality in Asia Minor, near the frontiers of the Bithynian province of the Byzan tine emperors. The rich plains of Saguta along the left bank of the river Sakaria, and the higher district on the slopes of the Ermeni mountains, became now the pasture-grounds of the father of Othman. The t,own of Saguta or Stegut was his
also. Here he and the shepherd-warriors who had marched with him from Khorasan rind Armenia, dwelt as denizens of the land. Erto glirul's force of fighting men wa.s largely recruited by the best and bravest of the old inhabitants, who became his subjects ; and still more advan tageously by numerous volunteers of kindred origin to his own. The Turk race lutd been exten sively spread through Lower Asia long before the titne of Ertoghrul. Quitting their primitive abodes on the upper steppes of the Asiatic continent, tribe after tribe of that martial family of nations had poured down upon the rich lands and tempt ilig wealth of the southern and western regions, when the power of the early khalifs had decayed like that of the Greek emperors.