Suleiman the Magnificent

Early life Suleiman by Nakkaş Osman (painted in 1579) Suleiman was born in Trabzon on the southern coast of the Black Sea to Şehzade Selim (later Selim I ), probably on 6 November 1494, although this date is not known with absolute certainty or evidence. [ 1 ] His mother was Hafsa Sultan , a concubine convert to Islam of unknown origins, who died in 1534. [ 2 ] : 9  At the age of seven, Suleiman began studies of science, history, literature, theology and military tactics in the schools of the imperial Topkapı Palace in Constantinople . As a young man, he befriended Pargalı Ibrahim , a Greek slave who later became one of his most trusted advisers (but who was later executed on Suleiman's orders). [ 3 ] At age seventeen, he was appointed as the governor of first Kaffa (Theodosia), then Manisa , with a brief tenure at Edirne . Accession Upon the death of his father, Selim I (r. 1512–1520), Suleiman entered Constantinople and ascended to the throne as the tenth Ottoman sultan. An early description of Suleiman, a few weeks following his accession, was provided by the Venetian envoy Bartolomeo Contarini : The sultan is only twenty-five years [actually 26] old, tall and slender but tough, with a thin and bony face. Facial hair is evident, but only barely. The sultan appears friendly and in good humor. Rumor has it that Suleiman is aptly named, enjoys reading, is knowledgeable and shows good judgment." [ 2 ] : 2  ^ Lowry, Heath (1993). "Süleymân's Formative Years in the City of Trabzon: Their Impact on the Future Sultan and the City". In İnalcık, Halil; Cemal Kafadar (eds.). Süleyman the Second [i.e. the First] and His Time . Istanbul: The Isis Press. p. 21. ISBN   975-428-052-5 . ^ a b Fisher, Alan (1993). "The Life and Family of Süleymân I". In İnalcık, Halil; Kafadar, Cemal (eds.). Süleymân The Second [i.e. the First] and His Time . Istanbul: Isis Press. ISBN   9754280525 . ^ Barber, Noel (1973). The Sultans . New York: Simon & Schuster . p. 36. ISBN   0-7861-0682-4 .

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Military campaigns See also: List of campaigns of Suleiman the Magnificent Conquests in Europe See also: Ottoman wars in Europe and Islam and Protestantism Suleiman during the siege of Rhodes in 1522 Upon succeeding his father, Suleiman began a series of military conquests, eventually leading to a revolt led by the Ottoman-appointed governor of Damascus in 1521. Suleiman soon made preparations for the conquest of Belgrade from the Kingdom of Hungary —something his great-grandfather Mehmed II had failed to achieve because of John Hunyadi 's strong defense in the region. Its capture was vital in removing the Hungarians and Croats who, following the defeats of the Albanians , Bosniaks , Bulgarians , Byzantines and the Serbs , remained the only formidable force who could block further Ottoman gains in Europe. Suleiman encircled Belgrade on 28 August 1521, with 250,000 Turkish soldiers and over 100 ships. and began a series of heavy bombardments from an island in the Danube . [ 1 ] Belgrade was made the seat of the Pashalik of Belgrade (also known as the Sanjak of Smederevo), and quickly became the second largest Ottoman town in Europe at over 100,000 people, surpassed only by Constantinople . [ 2 ] The road to Hungary and Austria lay open, but Suleiman turned his attention instead to the Eastern Mediterranean island of Rhodes , the home base of the Knights Hospitaller . Suleiman built a large fortification, Marmaris Castle , that served as a base for the Ottoman Navy . Following a five-month siege , Rhodes capitulated and Suleiman allowed the Knights of Rhodes to depart. [ 3 ] The conquest of the island cost the Ottomans 50,000 [ 4 ] [ 5 ] to 60,000 [ 5 ] dead from battle and sickness (Christian claims went as high as 64,000 Ottoman battle deaths and 50,000 disease deaths). [ 5 ] Battle of Mohacs by Bertalan Székely As relations between Hungary and the Ottoman Empire deteriorated, Suleiman resumed his campaign in Central Europe, and on 29 August 1526 he defeated Louis II of Hungary (1506–1526) at the Battle of Mohács . The Hungarian army, encouraged by the nobility to engage prematurely, launched a frontal assault that collapsed under coordinated Ottoman counterattacks. King Louis and much of the Hungarian aristocracy were killed, resulting in the destruction of the royal army and the end of the Jagiellonian dynasty in Hungary and Bohemia. The aftermath saw the partition of Hungary between the Ottoman Empire , the Habsburg monarchy , and the Principality of Transylvania . The battle marked the beginning of sustained Ottoman–Habsburg wars and the decline of Hungary as an independent power. Upon encountering the lifeless body of King Louis, Suleiman is said to have lamented: "I came indeed in arms against him; but it was not my wish that he should be thus cut off before he scarcely tasted the sweets of life and royalty." [ 6 ] While Suleiman was campaigning in Hungary, Turkmen tribes in central Anatolia (in Cilicia ) revolted under the leadership of Kalender Çelebi . [ 7 ] Some Hungarian nobles proposed that Ferdinand , who was the ruler of neighboring Austria and tied to Louis II's family by marriage, be King of Hungary, citing previous agreements that the Habsburgs would take the Hungarian throne if Louis died without heirs. [ 1 ] : 52  However, other nobles turned to the nobleman John Zápolya , whom Suleiman supported. Under Charles V and his brother Ferdinand I, the Habsburgs reoccupied Buda and took possession of Hungary. Reacting in 1529, Suleiman marched through the valley of the Danube and regained control of Buda; in the following autumn, his forces laid siege to Vienna . This was to be the Ottoman Empire's most ambitious expedition and the apogee of its drive to the West. With a reinforced garrison of 16,000 men, [ 8 ] the Austrians inflicted the first defeat on Suleiman, sowing the seeds of a bitter Ottoman–Habsburg rivalry that lasted until the 20th century. His second attempt to conquer Vienna failed in 1532, as Ottoman forces were delayed by the siege of Güns and failed to reach Vienna. In both cases, the Ottoman army was plagued by bad weather, forcing them to leave behind essential siege equipment, and was hobbled by overstretched supply lines. [ 9 ] : 444  In 1533 the Treaty of Constantinople was signed by Ferdinand I, in which he acknowledged Ottoman suzerainty and recognised Suleiman as his "father and suzerain", he also agreed to pay an annual tribute and accepted the Ottoman grand vizier as his brother and equal in rank. [ 10 ] [ 11 ] [ 12 ] [ 13 ] [ 14 ] King John Sigismund of Hungary with Suleiman in 1556 By the 1540s, a renewal of the conflict in Hungary presented Suleiman with the opportunity to avenge the defeat suffered at Vienna. In 1541, the Habsburgs attempted to lay siege to Buda but were repulsed, and more Habsburg fortresses were captured by the Ottomans in two consecutive campaigns in 1541 and 1544 as a result, [ 1 ] In 1542, after Ferdinand's repeated sieges of Buda and Pest ,  Suleiman went to Edirne on 17 November 1542 to prepare for a new campaign and stayed there for a while. On 23 April 1543, he set out on another campaign against Hungary. On 8 August, after a two-week siege, Esztergom was captured by the Ottoman Empire. Within a few weeks, the cities of Siklós, Székesfehérvár and Szeged were also taken. Ferdinand and Charles were forced to conclude a humiliating five-year treaty with Suleiman. Ferdinand renounced his claim to the Kingdom of Hungary and was forced to pay a fixed yearly sum to the Sultan for the Hungarian lands he continued to control. Of more symbolic importance, the treaty referred to Charles V not as "Emperor" but as the "King of Spain", leading Suleiman to identify as the true "Caesar". [ 1 ] : 54  In 1552, Suleiman's forces laid siege to Eger , located in the northern part of the Kingdom of Hungary, but the defenders led by István Dobó repelled the attacks and defended the Eger Castle . [ 15 ] Siege of Szigetvár by Johann Peter Krafft , 1825 Suleiman, set out on his 13th expedition, Siege of Szigetvár on 1 May 1566, at the age of 72, after an absence of approximately 13 years. The Ottoman army, which arrived in Belgrade on 27 June and was joined by Sigismund Zapolya's forces, arrived in Szigetvár on 2 August. Suleiman arrived at the siege on 5 August and settled in his tent on a hill from which the siege could be seen. On 6 September, Suleiman died in his tent, one day before the fall of Szigetvár. His death was kept secret with great effort, with only the Sultan's innermost circle knowing of his demise. This was because the Ottomans feared that their soldiers would give up the battle if they knew that their leader had died, so his death was kept secret for 48 days. A courier was dispatched from the camp with a message for Suleiman's successor, Selim II . Ottoman–Safavid War Main articles: Ottoman–Safavid War (1532–55) , Ottoman–Persian Wars , and Habsburg–Persian alliance Miniature depicting Suleiman marching with an army in Nakhchivan , summer 1554 Suleiman's father had made war with Persia a high priority. At first, Suleiman shifted attention to Europe and was content to contain Persia , which was preoccupied by its own enemies to its east. After Suleiman stabilized his European frontiers, he now turned his attention to Persia, the base for the rival Shia Muslim faction. The Safavid dynasty became the main enemy after two episodes. First, Shah Tahmasp killed the Baghdad governor loyal to Suleiman, and installed his own man in his place. Second, the governor of Bitlis had defected and sworn allegiance to the Safavids. [ 1 ] : 51  As a result, in 1533, Suleiman ordered Pargalı Ibrahim Pasha to lead an army into eastern Asia Minor where he retook Bitlis and occupied Tabriz without resistance. Suleiman joined Ibrahim in 1534. They made a push towards Persia, only to find the Shah sacrificing territory instead of facing a pitched battle, resorting to harassment of the Ottoman army as it proceeded along the harsh interior. [ 16 ] In 1535 Suleiman made a grand entrance into Baghdad. He enhanced his local support by restoring the tomb of Abu Hanifa , the founder of the Hanafi school of Islamic law to which the Ottomans adhered. [ 17 ] Attempting to defeat the Shah once and for all, Suleiman embarked upon a second campaign in 1548–1549. As in the previous attempt, Tahmasp avoided confrontation with the Ottoman army and instead chose to retreat, using scorched earth tactics in the process and exposing the Ottoman army to the harsh winter of the Caucasus . [ 16 ] Suleiman abandoned the campaign with temporary Ottoman gains in Tabriz and the Urmia region, a lasting presence in the province of Van , control of the western half of Azerbaijan and some forts in Georgia . [ 18 ] Territorial expansion of the Ottoman Empire under Suleiman, (in red and orange) including Ottoman vassals . In 1553, Suleiman began his third and final campaign against the Shah. Having initially lost territories in Erzurum to the Shah's son, Suleiman retaliated by recapturing Erzurum, crossing the Upper Euphrates and laying waste to parts of Persia. The Shah's army continued its strategy of avoiding the Ottomans, leading to a stalemate from which neither army made any significant gain. In 1555, a settlement known as the Peace of Amasya was signed, which defined the borders of the two empires. By this treaty, Armenia and Georgia were divided equally between the two, with Western Armenia , western Kurdistan , and western Georgia (incl. western Samtskhe ) falling in Ottoman hands while Eastern Armenia , eastern Kurdistan, and eastern Georgia (incl. eastern Samtskhe) stayed in Safavid hands. [ 19 ] The Ottoman Empire obtained most of Iraq , including Baghdad, which gave them access to the Persian Gulf , while the Persians retained their former capital Tabriz and all their other northwestern territories in the Caucasus and as they were prior to the wars, such as Dagestan and all of what is now Azerbaijan . [ 20 ] [ 21 ] Campaigns in the Indian Ocean Main articles: Ottoman–Portuguese conflicts , 1548 capture of Aden , Ottoman expedition to Aceh , and Ottoman naval expeditions in the Indian Ocean Ottoman fleet in the Indian Ocean in the 16th century Ottoman ships had been sailing in the Indian Ocean since the year 1518. Ottoman admirals such as Hadim Suleiman Pasha , Seydi Ali Reis [ 22 ] and Kurtoğlu Hızır Reis are known to have voyaged to the Mughal imperial ports of Thatta , Surat and Janjira . The Mughal Emperor Akbar the Great himself is known to have exchanged six documents with Suleiman the Magnificent. [ 22 ] [ 23 ] [ 24 ] Suleiman led several naval campaigns against the Portuguese in an attempt to remove them and reestablish trade with the Mughal Empire . Aden in Yemen was captured by the Ottomans in 1538, in order to provide an Ottoman base for raids against Portuguese possessions on the western coast of the Mughal Empire. [ 25 ] Sailing on, the Ottomans failed against the Portuguese at the siege of Diu in September 1538, but then returned to Aden, where they fortified the city with 100 pieces of artillery. [ 25 ] [ 26 ] From this base, Sulayman Pasha managed to take control of the whole country of Yemen, also taking Sanaa . [ 25 ] With its strong control of the Red Sea , Suleiman successfully managed to dispute control of the trade routes to the Portuguese and maintained a significant level of trade with the Mughal Empire throughout the 16th century. [ 27 ] From 1526 until 1543, Suleiman stationed over 900 Turkish soldiers to fight alongside the Somali Adal Sultanate led by Ahmad ibn Ibrahim al-Ghazi during the Conquest of Abyssinia . [ 28 ] After the first Ajuran-Portuguese war , the Ottoman Empire would in 1559 absorb the weakened Adal Sultanate into its domain. This expansion furthered Ottoman rule in Somalia and the Horn of Africa . This also increased its influence in the Indian Ocean to compete with the Portuguese Empire with its close ally, the Ajuran Empire . [ 29 ] In 1564, Suleiman received an embassy from Aceh (a sultanate on Sumatra , in modern Indonesia ), requesting Ottoman support against the Portuguese. As a result, an Ottoman expedition to Aceh was launched, which was able to provide extensive military support to the Acehnese. [ 30 ] The discovery of new maritime trade routes by Western European states allowed them to avoid the Ottoman trade monopoly. The Portuguese discovery of the Cape of Good Hope in 1488 initiated a series of Ottoman-Portuguese naval wars in the Ocean throughout the 16th century. The Ajuran Sultanate allied with the Ottomans defied the Portuguese economic monopoly in the Indian Ocean by employing a new coinage which followed the Ottoman pattern, thus proclaiming an attitude of economic independence in regard to the Portuguese. [ 31 ] Mediterranean and North Africa See also: Franco-Ottoman alliance , Hayreddin Barbarossa , Italian War of 1542–1546 , and Great Siege of Malta Barbarossa Hayreddin Pasha defeats the Holy League under the command of Andrea Doria at the Battle of Preveza in 1538 France's King Francis I never met Suleiman, but they created a Franco-Ottoman alliance from the 1530s. Having consolidated his conquests on land, Suleiman was greeted with the news that the fortress of Koroni in Morea (the modern Peloponnese , peninsular Greece) had been lost to Charles V 's admiral, Andrea Doria . The presence of the Spanish in the Eastern Mediterranean concerned Suleiman, who saw it as an early indication of Charles V's intention to rival Ottoman dominance in the region. Recognizing the need to reassert naval preeminence in the Mediterranean, Suleiman appointed an exceptional naval commander in the form of Khair ad Din , known to Europeans as Barbarossa. Once appointed admiral-in-chief, Barbarossa was charged with rebuilding the Ottoman fleet. In 1535, Charles V led a Holy League of 26,700 soldiers (10,000 Spaniards, 8,000 Italians, 8,000 Germans, and 700 Knights of St. John) [ 5 ] to victory against the Ottomans at Tunis , which together with the war against Venice the following year, led Suleiman to accept proposals from Francis I of France to form an alliance against Charles . [ 1 ] : 51  Huge Muslim territories in North Africa were annexed. The piracy carried on thereafter by the Barbary pirates of North Africa can be seen in the context of the wars against Spain. The siege of Malta in 1565: arrival of the Turkish fleet, by Matteo Perez d'Aleccio In 1541, the Spaniards led an unsuccessful expedition to Algiers . In 1542, facing a common Habsburg enemy during the Italian Wars , Francis I sought to renew the Franco-Ottoman alliance . In early 1542, Polin successfully negotiated the details of the alliance, with the Ottoman Empire promising to send 60,000 troops against the territories of the German king Ferdinand, as well as 150 galleys against Charles, while France promised to attack Flanders , harass the coasts of Spain with a naval force, and send 40 galleys to assist the Turks for operations in the Levant. [ 32 ] In August 1551, Ottoman naval commander Turgut Reis attacked and captured Tripoli , which had been a possession of the Knights of Malta since 1530. In 1553, Turgut Reis was nominated commander of Tripoli by Suleiman, making the city an important center for piratical raids in the Mediterranean and the capital of the Ottoman province of Tripolitania . [ 33 ] In 1560, a powerful naval force was sent to recapture Tripoli, but that force was defeated in the Battle of Djerba . [ 34 ] Elsewhere in the Mediterranean, when the Knights Hospitallers were re-established as the Knights of Malta in 1530, their actions against Muslim navies quickly drew the ire of the Ottomans, who assembled another massive army in order to dislodge the Knights from Malta. The Ottomans invaded Malta in 1565, undertaking the Great Siege of Malta , which began on 18 May and lasted until 8 September, and is portrayed vividly in the frescoes of Matteo Perez d'Aleccio in the Hall of St. Michael and St. George. At first, it seemed that this would be a repeat of the battle on Rhodes, with most of Malta's cities destroyed and half the Knights killed in battle; but a relief force from Spain entered the battle, resulting in the loss of 10,000 Ottoman troops and the victory of the local Maltese citizenry. [ 35 ] ^ a b c d e f Imber, Colin (2002). The Ottoman Empire, 1300–1650 : The Structure of Power . New York: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN   978-0-333-61386-3 . ^ "The History of Belgrade" . Belgradenet.com. Archived from the original on 30 December 2008 . Retrieved 7 July 2009 . ^ Bunting, Tony. "Siege of Rhodes" . Encyclopedia Britannica . Retrieved 10 April 2018 . ^ Publishing, D. K. (2009). War: The Definitive Visual History . Penguin. ISBN   978-0756668174 – via Google Books. ^ a b c d Clodfelter, Micheal (2017). Warfare and Armed Conflicts: A Statistical Encyclopedia of Casualty and Other Figures, 1492–2015 (14th ed.). McFarland. ISBN   978-0786474707 – via Google Books. ^ Severy, Merle (November 1987). "The World of Süleyman the Magnificent". National Geographic . 172 (5). Washington, D.C.: National Geographic Society: 580. ISSN   0027-9358 . ^ Ciachir, N. (1972). "Soliman Magnificul" [Soliman the Magnificent]. Editura enciclopedică română . Bucharest. p. 157. {{ cite encyclopedia }} : CS1 maint: location missing publisher ( link ) ^ Turnbull, Stephen (2003). The Ottoman Empire 1326–1699 . New York: Osprey Publishing . p. 50. ^ Labib, Subhi (November 1979). "The Era of Suleyman the Magnificent: Crisis of Orientation". International Journal of Middle East Studies . 10 (4). London: Cambridge University Press: 435– 451. doi : 10.1017/S002074380005128X . ISSN   0020-7438 . S2CID   162249695 . ^ Bonney, Richard. "Suleiman I ("the Magnificent") (1494–1566)." Archived 8 August 2022 at the Wayback Machine The Encyclopedia of War (2011). ^ Somel, Selcuk Aksin. The A to Z of the Ottoman Empire. No. 152. Archived 8 August 2022 at the Wayback Machine Rowman & Littlefield, 2010. ^ Erasmus, Desiderius. The Correspondence of Erasmus: Letters 2635 to 2802 April 1532–April 1533. Vol. 19. Archived 26 December 2022 at the Wayback Machine University of Toronto Press, 2019. ^ Shaw, Stanford J., and Ezel Kural Shaw. History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey: Volume 1, Empire of the Gazis: The Rise and Decline of the Ottoman Empire 1280–1808. Vol. 1. Archived 8 August 2022 at the Wayback Machine Cambridge University Press, 1976. ^ Faroqhi, Suraiya N., and Kate Fleet, eds. The Cambridge History of Turkey: Volume 2, The Ottoman Empire as a World Power, 1453–1603. Archived 8 August 2022 at the Wayback Machine Cambridge University Press, 2012 ^ "István Dobó" . Encyclopaedia Britannica . ^ a b Sicker, Martin (2000). The Islamic World In Ascendancy : From the Arab Conquests to the Siege of Vienna . p. 206. ^ Burak, Guy (2015). The Second Formation of Islamic Law: The Ḥanafī School in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 1. ISBN   978-1-107-09027-9 . ^ "1548–49" . The Encyclopedia of World History . 2001. Archived from the original on 18 September 2002 . Retrieved 20 June 2020 – via Bartleby.com. ^ Mikaberidze, Alexander (2015). Historical Dictionary of Georgia (2nd ed.). Rowman & Littlefield. p. xxxi. ISBN   978-1442241466 . ^ The Reign of Suleiman the Magnificent, 1520–1566 , V.J. Parry, A History of the Ottoman Empire to 1730 , ed. M.A. Cook (Cambridge University Press, 1976), 94. ^ Mikaberidze, Alexander (2011). Conflict and Conquest in the Islamic World: A Historical Encyclopedia, Volume 1 . ABC-CLIO. p. 698. ISBN   978-1598843361 . ^ a b Özcan, Azmi (1997). Pan-Islamism: Indian Muslims, the Ottomans and Britain, 1877–1924 . Brill. pp. 11–. ISBN   978-90-04-10632-1 . Retrieved 30 September 2012 . ^ Farooqi, N. R. (1996). "Six Ottoman documents on Mughal-Ottoman relations during the reign of Akbar". Journal of Islamic Studies . 7 (1): 32– 48. doi : 10.1093/jis/7.1.32 . ^ Farooqi, Naimur Rahman (1989). Mughal-Ottoman relations: a study of political & diplomatic relations between Mughal India and the Ottoman Empire, 1556–1748 . Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli . Retrieved 30 September 2012 . ^ a b c Kour, Z. H. (2005). The History of Aden . Routledge. p. 2. ISBN   978-1-135-78114-9 . ^ İnalcik, Halil (1997). An economic and social history of the Ottoman Empire . Cambridge University Press. p. 326. ISBN   978-0-521-57456-3 . ^ History of the Ottoman Empire and modern Turkey by Ezel Kural Shaw p. 107 [1] Archived 26 December 2022 at the Wayback Machine ^ "similarities between louis xiv and suleiman the magnificent" . gymwp.app . Archived from the original on 16 May 2023 . Retrieved 16 May 2023 . ^ Clifford, E. H. M. (1936). "The British Somaliland-Ethiopia Boundary". Geographical Journal . 87 (4): 289– 302. Bibcode : 1936GeogJ..87..289C . doi : 10.2307/1785556 . JSTOR   1785556 . ^ Black, Jeremy (1996). The Cambridge Illustrated Atlas of Warfare: Renaissance to Revolution, 1492–1792, Volume 2 . Cambridge University Press. p. 17. ISBN   0-521-47033-1 . ^ Coins From Mogadishu, c. 1300 to c. 1700 by G.S.P. Freeman-Grenville, p. 36 ^ Setton, Kenneth Meyer (1976). The Papacy and the Levant, 1204–1571 . American Philosophical Society. ISBN   978-0871691613 – via Google Books. ^ A history of the Maghrib in the Islamic period Jamil M. Abun-Nasr p. 190 [2] ^ A History of the Ottoman Empire to 1730: chapters from the Cambridge history by Vernon J. Parry p. 101 [3] ^ Mitev, Georgi. "History of Malta and Gozo – From Prehistory to Independence" .

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Legacy See also: Ottoman decline thesis The Ottoman Empire at the time of the death of Suleiman I Burial place of Suleiman I at Süleymaniye Mosque Suleiman the Magnificent, Portolan of Jacopo Russo , c.1528 The formation of Suleiman's legacy began even before his death. Throughout his reign literary works were commissioned praising Suleiman and constructing an image of him as an ideal ruler, most significantly by Celalzade Mustafa, chancellor of the empire from 1534 to 1557. [ 1 ] : 4–5, 250  Later Ottoman writers applied this idealised image of Suleiman to the Near Eastern literary genre of advice literature named naṣīḥatnāme , urging sultans to conform to his model of rulership and to maintain the empire's institutions in their sixteenth-century form. Such writers were pushing back against the political and institutional transformation of the empire after the middle of the sixteenth century, and portrayed deviation from the norm as it had existed under Suleiman as evidence of the decline of the empire. [ 2 ] : 54–55, 64  Western historians, failing to recognise that these 'decline writers' were working within an established literary genre and often had deeply personal reasons for criticizing the empire, long took their claims at face value and consequently adopted the idea that the empire entered a period of decline after the death of Suleiman. [ 2 ] : 73–77  Since the 1980s this view has been thoroughly reexamined, and modern scholars have come to overwhelmingly reject the idea of decline, labelling it an "untrue myth". [ 3 ] Suleiman's conquests had brought under the control of the Empire major Muslim cities (such as Baghdad ), many Balkan provinces (reaching present day Croatia and Hungary), and most of North Africa. His expansion into Europe had given the Ottoman Turks a powerful presence in the European balance of power. Indeed, such was the perceived threat of the Ottoman Empire under the reign of Suleiman that Austria's ambassador Busbecq warned of Europe's imminent conquest: "On [the Turks'] side are the resources of a mighty empire, strength unimpaired, habituation to victory, endurance of toil, unity, discipline, frugality and watchfulness ... Can we doubt what the result will be? ... When the Turks have settled with Persia, they will fly at our throats supported by the might of the whole East; how unprepared we are I dare not say." [ 4 ] Suleiman's legacy was not, however, merely in the military field. The French traveler Jean de Thévenot bears witness a century later to the "strong agricultural base of the country, the well being of the peasantry, the abundance of staple foods and the pre-eminence of organization in Suleiman's government". [ 5 ] Even thirty years after his death, "Sultan Solyman" was quoted by the English playwright William Shakespeare as a military prodigy in The Merchant of Venice , where the Prince of Morocco boasts about his prowess by saying that he defeated Suleiman in three battles (Act 2, Scene 1). [ 6 ] [ 7 ] Through the distribution of court patronage, Suleiman also presided over a golden age in Ottoman arts, witnessing immense achievement in the realms of architecture, literature, art, theology and philosophy. [ 8 ] [ 9 ] Today the skyline of the Bosphorus and of many cities in modern Turkey and the former Ottoman provinces, are still adorned with the architectural works of Mimar Sinan . One of these, the Süleymaniye Mosque , is the final resting place of Suleiman: he is buried in a domed mausoleum attached to the mosque. Suleiman's marble portrait in the US Capitol Nevertheless, assessments of Suleiman's reign have frequently fallen into the trap of the Great Man theory of history. The administrative, cultural, and military achievements of the age were a product not of Suleiman alone, but also of the many talented figures who served him, such as grand viziers Ibrahim Pasha and Rüstem Pasha , the Grand Mufti Ebussuud Efendi , who played a major role in legal reform, and chancellor and chronicler Celalzade Mustafa, who played a major role in bureaucratic expansion and in constructing Suleiman's legacy. [ 10 ] : 542  In an inscription dating from 1537 on the citadel of Bender, Moldova , Suleiman the Magnificent gave expression to his power: [ 11 ] I am God's slave and sultan of this world. By the grace of God I am head of Muhammad's community. God's might and Muhammad's miracles are my companions. I am Süleymân, in whose name the hutbe is read in Mecca and Medina. In Baghdad I am the shah, in Byzantine realms the caesar, and in Egypt the sultan; who sends his fleets to the seas of Europe, the Maghrib and India. I am the sultan who took the crown and throne of Hungary and granted them to a humble slave. The voivoda Petru raised his head in revolt, but my horse's hoofs ground him into the dust, and I conquered the land of Moldovia. Suleiman, as sculpted by Joseph Kiselewski , is present on one of the 23 relief portraits over the gallery doors of the House Chamber of the United States Capitol that depicts historical figures noted for their work in establishing the principles that underlie American law . [ 12 ] ^ Cite error: The named reference Empire-Power was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ a b Howard, Douglas (1988). "Ottoman Historiography and the Literature of 'Decline' of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries". Journal of Asian History . 22 . ^ Cite error: The named reference decline was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Lewis, 10. ^ Ahmed, 147. ^ "The Merchant of Venice: Act 2, Scene 1, Page 2" . No Fear Shakespeare . SparkNotes. Archived from the original on 17 August 2018 . Retrieved 21 December 2016 . ^ "Shakespeare's Merchant: St Antony and Sultan Suleiman – The Merchant Of Venice – Shylock" . Scribd . ^ Cite error: The named reference atil24 was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Russell, John (26 January 2007). "The Age of Sultan Suleyman" . The New York Times . Retrieved 9 August 2007 . ^ Cite error: The named reference AG-BM-encyc was invoked but never defined (see the help page ). ^ Halil İnalcık (1973). The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age 1300–1600 . p. 41. ^ "Suleiman, Relief Portrait | Architect of the Capitol" . www.aoc.gov .

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