The island of Crete was the last Greek region to be subjugated by the Ottoman Turks, falling after a long and bloody war that lasted from 1645 to 1669. Following the example of mainland Greece, the island rose against Ottoman domination in 1821 but, despite some early successes, the struggle made little or no progress for three years. No major urban centre was captured by the insurgents, who were restricted to the possession of two forts of limited importance - those of Kisamos and Gramvousa. The presence of a solid Muslim population - almost half the population were Tourkokritikoi (i.e. Turco-Cretans), most of whom sided with the sultan - was certainly one of the reasons for this situation. Another factor in this was the isolation of the island, on account of its distance from the main theatre of the revolution, to overcome which, ‘special commissioners’, unacquainted with local conditions and characteristics, were sent from Greece. Finally, the lack of a fleet of any size accounts for the Cretans' failure to counter the steady arrival of Ottoman reinforcements. With the aid of the Egyptians, who landed on Crete in 1822 and 1823, long before Ibrahim Pasha's intervention in the Peloponnese, the uprising was quickly restricted to the western provinces, where it smouldered until it was finally extinguished.