Who was Suleiman the Magnificent? Information about the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent biography, life story, accomplishments and significance.
Suleiman the Magnificent; (1494-1566), known as the Magnificent or the Lawgiver, was the 10th ruler of the Ottoman Empire.
Suleiman (Solyman; Turkish Süleyman) was born on Nov. 6, 1494, in Trabzon (Trebizond), where his father, the future Sultan Selim I, was provincial governor. In 1509, Suleiman was appointed to the governorship of Kefe (Feodosia) in the Crimea, where he remained until Selim acceded to the throne in 1512. He was then transferred to the province of Manisa (Magnesia) in western Anatolia, from which he was summoned to assume the throne on Oct. 1, 1520, after his father’s death.
Suleiman’s reign began in the euphoria of invincibility that had been created by the brilliant military successes of Sultan Selim. He inherited from his father an empire extending from the Danube to the Euphrates and including the whole littoral of North Africa as far west as Morocco. His, too, was a reign of ceaseless military activity, though his greatest achievement was the coherent organization he imposed on this unstable accumulation of territories.
Source: wikipedia.org
Early Campaigns
Suleiman’s first major campaign was launched against the Hungarian king Louis II in 1521, and resulted in the capture of Belgrade. The following year he drove the Knights of St. John (the Hospitalers) from Rhodes, securing the routes of the eastern Mediterranean from their harassment. Early in 1526 he formed an alliance with the French king Francis I against the Habsburg emperor Charles V, as a consequence of which another Ottoman campaign into Hungary was undertaken in the same year. In the battle that took place on the Plain of Mohacs on Aug. 29, 1526, King Louis lost his life, and his army was routed.
The Turks held Budapest for a time, but it was not finally incorporated into the empire until 1529 in the course of the campaign against Austria that ended with the unsuccessful siege of Vienna. After another incursion into Habsburg territories in 1532, which failed in its object of enticing Charles V into a showdown battle, Suleiman concluded a treaty with Austria. Its real purpose was to allow Suleiman time to deal with the problems of his eastern provinces.
Dissension in the East
The dissident feudal military element in Anatolia that had been suppressed in the reign of Selim I took advantage of Suleiman’s preoccupation with Europe to signal their disenchantment with the Ottomans. Thus they participated again in local dervish revolts in favor of the heretical Shiite Safavid power in Persia. In 1534, with an intimidating show of military might, Suleiman’s forces crossed Anatolia. Having entered Azerbaijan, the army proceeded southward and at the beginning of December entered Baghdad, which with all its environs was formally absorbed into the empire.
Spectacular though this success was, it did not eliminate the fundamental disaffection of the eastern provinces. In 1548-1549 another campaign had to be led against Tabriz, and again in 1553-1555 against Nakhichevan. On neither occasion did the Safavids give battle, and the peace that was concluded in 1555 left most of the basic problems unresolved.
Naval Prowess
In the Mediterranean, however, the might of Ottoman naval power under the famous admiral Barbarossa (Khair ed-Din), the governor of Algeria, had with a steady, if uneven, attrition worn away the domination of Spain, Venice, and Genoa. The corsair ships that had always infested the North African coast, sailing under the protection of the sultan, now pursued their traditional piracy for the imperial purpose. The corsairs could enjoy a hitherto unknown impunity, since their harbors and hinterlands were held for them by Janissary troops. Although Tunis fell to Charles V in 1535, the defeat inflicted on his famous admiral Andrea Doria off Preveza in the Ionian Sea in 1538 left the balance of sea power so firmly in Ottoman hands that in 1540 Venice found it politic to sue for peace.
The only serious frustration of Suleiman’s ambition to turn the Mediterranean into an Ottoman lake came with his failure to capture Malta in 1565. The naval expedition sent against the Portuguese in India in 1538, although unsuccessful, firmly established Ottoman power in the Red Sea and in the ports of South Arabia.
Challenge in Central Europe
Yet it was as a Danubian power that Suleiman faced his greatest challenge, and, with the incorporation of the whole of central Hungary into the empire in 1541, it was here that his successes were most consequential to Europe. Habsburg efforts to regain these territories were unremitting. Even after the Habsburgs had apparently renounced their claims in this region by a treaty in 1547, their intrigues to get control of the Ottoman protectorate of Transylvania kept the frontier lands in permanent turmoil.
Although they again were forced to accept the same terms by a new treaty in 1562, the Habsburgs took advantage of any distraction in other parts of the Ottoman Empire to renew their intrigues. It was actually in the course of a punitive expedition he was leading against Szigetvar that Suleiman died on Sept. 7, 1566. He was succeeded by his son Selim II.
Suleiman’s Legacy
Served by capable viziers and a trained bureaucracy, Suleiman synthesized an empire sprawling over three continents into a semblance of organic unity, splendid in its achievement, even if it was to prove but transitory. The wealth that his victories created in the empire was to fertilize a cultural flowering with which many of the immortal names of Turkish art, literature, and architecture are still associated. The Siileymaniye Mosque he had built for him by the architect Sinan in Istanbul, in which he is buried, is among the world’s most sublime examples of religious architecture. The university attached to it was an expression of his own respect for learning. A poet of modest ability himself, he encouraged the creation of what was to become the classical style of Ottoman poetry. In his reign, too, historical writing underwent a marked development, establishing new standards for prose composition.
His love for his harem favorite Hurrem (Roxelana), who wished to secure the succession for her own son Selim, induced Suleiman to order the death of two other sons, thereby setting a precedent for the nefarious harem politics of later reigns.
