Paul Wittek

Paul Wittek
circa 1938
Born	(1894-01-11)11 January 1894 Baden bei Wien, Cisleithania, Austria-Hungary
Died	13 June 1978(1978-06-13) (aged 84) Eastcote, England, United Kingdom
Nationality	Austrian
Academic background
Alma mater	University of Vienna
Thesis	Die Entstehung der Zenturienordnung. Studie zur ältesten römischen Sozial- und Verfassungsgeschichte (1920)
Influences	Ahmet Refik Altınay, Vasilij Bartolʹd, Stefan George, Mehmet Fuat Köprülü, Friedrich Kraelitz [de], Johannes Heinrich Mordtmann [de], Max Weber[1]
Academic work
Discipline	History Oriental studies
Sub-discipline	Ottoman studies
Institutions	School of Oriental and African Studies
Doctoral students	Victor Louis Ménage
Notable students	Peter Charanis, Stanford J. Shaw, Elizabeth Zachariadou
Main interests	early Ottoman history
Notable works	The Rise of the Ottoman Empire (1938)
Notable ideas	Ghaza thesis

Paul Wittek (11 January 1894, Baden bei Wien — 13 June 1978, Eastcote, Middlesex) was an Austrian Orientalist and historian. His 1938 thesis on the rise of the Ottoman Empire, known as the ghazi thesis, argues that the driving force behind Ottoman state-building was the expansion of Islam. Until the 1980s, his theory was the most influential and dominant explanation of the formation of the Ottoman Empire.