The Ottomans in the sixteenth century had taken Rhodes in the Dodecanese Islands (Dodekanisos), Naxos in the Cyclades, and Cyprus.

The Ottoman Empire by 1600 has reached the peak of its power and territorial control.

The wealth of conquest has spread corruption through the political system, vitiating the ability of the central government to impose order throughout the far-flung empire.

As the empire begins to weaken, Bosnia and Herzegovina become pawns in the struggle among Austria and Ottoman Turkey, and, eventually, Russia.