The war over Tenedos had kept open the Straits, but it helped Murad in an inestimable degree to tighten the grip of the Osmanlis upon Thrace and Macedonia. The Italian republics thought no more of driving the Osmanlis out of Europe. From now on until they themselves see their possessions wrested from them and their commerce in the Levant ruined by the successors of Murad, the Venetians and Genoese are suitors for favours at the door of the tent of the Moslem conqueror. XI While the struggle between the Palaeologi and the Venetian war with Genoa and Hungary were strengthening Murad’s position in Europe, he began to turn his attention, for the first time since the expedition against Angora at the beginning of his reign, to the expansion of Ottoman authority in Asia Minor. The antipathy of the South Slavs for the Hungarians, the anarchy among the Serbians, the lack of leadership among the Bulgarians, and the civil strife in the Byzantine imperial family made the period from 1376 to 1381 peculiarly appropriate for initiating a movement against the emirates on the confines of his own state. Murad felt for the moment secure in Macedonia and Thrace. The inhabitants of the conquered countries could do nothing. There were no prospects of a crusade. Through the rapid increase of the Ottoman race during the first fifteen years in Europe, and through the vassalage of the Christian princes, which compelled them to furnish contingents for war, Murad now had money and soldiers to confront his nearer Anatolian rivals. In 1360, after the capture of Angora and the defeat of the Galatian village chiefs,[370] Murad did not lose his head. He was wise enough to fear an attack on Kermian. Now he had only to threaten, thanks to the prestige and actual power he had gained in Europe. The emir of Kermian was too prudent to risk a war with the son of the rival whom he had despised. In order to preserve his independence and at the same time his pride, he agreed to give his daughter in marriage to Bayezid. The territories which Murad coveted, and was ready to try to take by force, went with her as her marriage portion. It was a munificent dot. The western and northern part of Kermian became Ottoman. The most important city in the new territory was Kutayia, the ancient Cotýaeum, a strategic point of great value. Its remarkable citadel of countless towers is still standing.