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 Suleiman
I (Ottoman Turkish:
سليمان Sulaymān, Turkish: Süleyman; formally Kanuni Sultan Süleyman
in Turkish) (November 6, 1494 – September 5/6, 1566), was the tenth
and longest‐serving Sultan of the Ottoman
Empire, reigning from 1520 to 1566. He is known in the West as
Suleiman the Magnificent and in the Islamic world, as the Lawgiver
(in Turkish Kanuni; Arabic: القانونى, al‐Qānūnī),
deriving from his complete reconstruction of the Ottoman legal
system. Within the empire, Suleiman was known as a fair ruler and an
opponent of corruption. As well as being a capable goldsmith and
distinguished poet, Suleiman was also a great patron of artists and
philosophers, overseeing the golden age of the Ottoman Empire's
cultural development.
Suleiman was considered one of the
pre‐eminent
rulers of 16th century Europe. Under his leadership, the Ottoman
Empire became among the worlds' foremost powers. Suleiman personally
led Ottoman armies to conquer Belgrade, Rhodes, and most of Hungary,
laid the Siege of Vienna, and annexed most of the Middle East and
huge territories in North Africa as far west as Algeria. For a short
period, Ottomans achieved naval dominance in the Mediterranean Sea,
Red Sea, and Persian Gulf. The Ottoman Empire continued to expand
for a century after his death.
 Suleiman
was born in Trabzon in modern day Turkey, probably on November 6,
1494. At the age of seven, he was sent to study science, history,
literature, theology, and military tactics in the schools of the
Topkapı Palace in Istanbul. As a young man, he befriended Ibrahim, a
slave who would later become one of his most trusted advisers.
From the age of seventeen, young
Suleiman was appointed as the governor of first Kaffa (Theodosia),
then Sarukhan (Manisa) with a brief tenure at Edirne (Adrianople).
Upon the death of his father, Selim I (1512–20), Suleiman entered
Istanbul and acceeded to the throne as the tenth Ottoman Sultan. An
early description of Suleiman was provided by the Venetian envoy
Bartolomeo Contarini a few weeks following his accession. Venetians
wrote down their descriptions of the new sultan and their
predictions of what his reign might mean to Europe. Contarini
observes: "He is twenty‐five
years of age, tall, but wiry, and of a delicate complexion. His neck
is a little too long, his face thin, and his nose aquiline. He has a
shade of a mustache and a small beard; nevertheless he has a
pleasant mien, though his skin tends to pallor. He is said to be a
wise Lord, fond of study, and all men hope for good from his rule."
Some historians claimed that
Suleiman, in his youth, had an admiration for Alexander the Great as
he wanted very much to learn how he had managed to unite the peoples
of the east and the west. He was influenced by Alexander's vision of
building a world empire that would encompass the east and the west,
creating a drive for his subsequent military campaigns in Asia and
in Africa, as well as in Europe.
 Upon
succeeding his father, Suleiman began a series of military
conquests, first putting down 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. Its capture was vital in
eliminating the Hungarians who following the defeats of the Serbs,
Bulgars and Byzantines, remained the only formidable force who could
block further Ottoman gains in Europe. Suleiman encircled Belgrade
and began a series of heavy bombardments from an island in the
Danube. With a garrison of only seven hundred men, and receiving no
aid from Hungary, Belgrade fell in August 1521.
News of the conquest of one of
Christendom's major strongholds spread fear across Europe. As the
ambassador of the Holy Roman Empire to Istanbul was to note,
The capture of Belgrade was at the
origin of the dramatic events which engulfed Hungary. It led to the
death of King Lewis, the capture of Buda, the occupation of
Transylvania, the ruin of a flourishing kingdom and the fear of
neighbouring nations that they would suffer the same fate…
The road to Hungary and Austria laid
open, but Suleiman diverted his attention to the Eastern
Mediterranean island Rhodes whose proximity to Asia Minor and the
Levant had posed a perennial problem to Ottoman interests. In the
summer of 1522, taking advantage of the navy he inherited from his
father, Suleiman dispatched an armada of some four hundred ships
whilst personally leading an army of 100,000 across Asia Minor to a
point opposite the island. Following a siege of five months with
brutal encounters, Rhodes capitulated and Suleiman allowed the
Knights of Rhodes to depart, forming their new base in Malta.
As relations between Hungary and the
Ottoman Empire deteriorated, Suleiman resumed his campaign in
Eastern Europe and on August 29, 1526, he defeated Louis II of
Hungary (1516–26) at the Battle of Mohács. In its wake, Hungarian
resistance collapsed and the Ottoman Empire became the pre‐eminent
power in Eastern Europe. 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 while he
scarcely tasted the sweets of life and royalty."
Following the collapse of the
Hungarian kingdom, a power struggle ensued. Some Hungarian nobles
proposed that Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria (1519–64), who was
ruler of neighbouring 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. However, other nobles turned to the nobleman John Zápolya,
who was supported by Suleiman, and who remained unrecognized by the
Christian powers of Europe. A three‐sided
conflict ensued as Ferdinand moved to assert his rule over as much
of the Hungarian kingdom as he could, resulting in a three‐way
partition of the Kingdom by 1541: Suleiman claimed most of present‐day
Hungary, known as the Great Alföld, and after eliminating the threat
of the rebellious Stephen Maylad, he had Zápolya's family installed
as rulers of the independent principality of Transylvania, as a
vassal state of the Empire. Ferdinand claimed "Royal Hungary",
including present‐day
Slovakia, western Croatia, and adjacent territories, temporarily
fixing the border between the Habsburgs and the Ottomans.
Under Charles V and his brother
Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, the Habsburgs occupied Buda and took
Hungary. As a result, in 1529, Suleiman once again marched through
the valley of the Danube and reoccupied Buda and in the following
autumn laid siege to Vienna. It was to be the Ottoman Empire's most
ambitious expedition and the apogee of its drive towards the West.
With a reinforced garrison of 20,000 men, the Austrians would
inflict upon Suleiman his first defeat and sow the seeds of a bitter
Ottoman‐Hapsburg
rivalry which lasted until the 20th century. A second attempt to
conquer Vienna failed in 1532, with Suleiman retreating before
reaching Vienna. In both cases, the Ottoman army was plagued by bad
weather (forcing them to leave behind essential siege equipment) and
was hobbled by the overstretched supply lines. In 1537, an army of
25,000 men was sent to capture Corfu but was unsuccessful.
Regardless of the defeat, Suleiman
had assured the Ottoman Empire a powerful role in the political
landscape of Europe.
As Suleiman stabilized his European
frontiers, he now turned his attention to the ever present threat
posed by the Shi'a Safavid dynasty of Persia (Iran). Two events in
particular were to precipitate a recurrence of tensions. First, Shah
Tahmasp had the Baghdad governor loyal to Suleiman killed and
replaced with an adherent of the Shah, and second, the governor of
Bitlis had defected and sworn allegiance to Safavids. As a result,
in 1533, Suleiman ordered his Grand Vizier Ibrahim Pasha to lead an
army into Asia where he retook Bitlis and occupied Tabriz without
resistance. Having joined Ibrahim in 1534, Suleiman 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. The following year,
Suleiman and Ibrahim made a grand entrance into Baghdad, with its
commander surrendering the city, cementing Suleiman as the leader of
the Islamic world and the legitimate successor to the Abbasid
Caliphs.
Attempting to defeat the Shah once
and for all, Suleiman embarked upon a second campaign between
1548–1549. Just as in the previous attempt, Shah Tahmasp I avoided
confrontation with the Ottoman army and instead chose to retreat,
torching Azerbaijan in the process and exposing the Ottoman army to
the harsh winter of the Caucasus. Suleiman abandoned the campaign
with temporary Ottoman gains in Tabriz and the Azerbaijan region of
Iran, and a lasting presence in the province of Van, and some forts
in Georgia.
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
considerable gain. In 1554, a settlement was signed which was to
conclude Suleiman's Asiatic campaigns. It included the return of
Tabriz, but secured Baghdad, lower Mesopotamia, the mouths of the
river Euphrates and Tigris, as well as part of the Persian Gulf. The
Shah also promised to cease all raids into Ottoman territory.
Having consolidated his conquests on
land, Suleiman was greeted with bad news that the fortress of Koroni
in Morea 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. Thus recognizing the need
to re‐assert the navy's
pre‐eminence 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 re‐building
the Ottoman fleet, to the point where the Ottoman navy equaled in
number all those of the other Mediterranean countries put together.
In 1535, Charles V won an important 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
make an alliance with Suleiman, both of whom shared a mutual rivalry
with Charles. In 1538, the Spanish fleet was defeated at the Battle
of Preveza by Barbarossa, securing the eastern Mediterranean for the
Turks for 33 years until the defeat at the Battle of Lepanto in
1571.
East of Morocco, huge territories of
North Africa were annexed. The Barbary States of Tripolitania,
Tunisia, and Algeria became autonomous provinces of the Empire, and
served as the leading edge of Suleiman's conflict with Charles V,
whose attempt to drive out the Turks failed in 1541. The piracy
carried on thereafter by the Barbary pirates of North Africa
remained part of the wars against Spain, and the Ottoman expansion
was associated with naval dominance for a short period in the
Mediterranean Sea. Ottoman navies also controlled the Red Sea, and
held the Persian Gulf until 1554, when their ships were defeated by
the navy of the Portuguese Empire. The Portuguese would continue to
contest Suleiman I's forces for control of Aden, in present‐day
Yemen.
Francis I was persuaded to sign a
peace treaty with Charles V in 1538, however he again allied himself
with the Suleiman in 1542. In 1543, Charles allied himself with
Henry VIII of England and forced Francis to sign the Truce of Crepy‐en‐Laonnois.
Charles signed a humiliating treaty with Suleiman to gain some
respite from the huge expenses of the war. In 1544, when Spain
declared war on France, the French King Francis asked for help from
Suleiman. He then sent a fleet headed by Barbarossa who was
victorious over the Spaniards, and managed to retake Naples from
them. Suleiman bestowed on him the title of Beyler Beyi (Commander
of Commanders). One result of the alliance was the fierce sea duel
between Dragut and Andrea Doria, which left the northern
Mediterranean European and the southern Mediterranean in Islamic
hands.
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. In 1565 they
invaded, starting the Great Siege of Malta, which began on May 18
and lasted until September 8, and is portrayed vividly in the
frescoes of Matteo Perez d'Aleccio in the Hall of St. Michael and
St. George. At first the battle looked to be a repeat of the one on
Rhodes, with most of the cities destroyed and about half the Knights
killed in battle, but a relief force from Spain entered the battle,
resulting in the loss of 30,000 Ottoman troops.
Whilst Sultan Suleiman was known as
the "Magnificent" in the West, he was always Suleiman Kanuni or "The
Lawgiver" to his own Ottoman subjects. As Kinross notes, "Not only
was he a great military campaigner, a man of the sword, as his
father and great‐grandfather
had been before him. He differed from them in the extent to which he
was also a man of the pen. He was a great legislator, standing out
in the eyes of his people as a high‐minded
sovereign and a magnanimous exponent of justice". The overriding law
of the empire was the Shari'ah, or Sacred Law, which as the divine
law of Islam was outside of the Sultan's powers to change. Yet an
area of distinct law known as the Kanuns (canonical legislation) was
dependent on Suleiman's will alone, covering areas such as criminal
law, land tenure and taxation. He collected all the judgments that
had been issued by the nine Ottoman Sultans who preceded him. After
eliminating duplications and choosing between contradictory
statements, he issued a single legal code, all the while being
careful not to violate the basic laws of Islam. It was within this
framework that Suleiman sought to reform the legislation to adapt to
a rapidly changing empire.
Suleiman gave particular attention to
the plight of the Rayas, Christian subjects who worked the land of
the Sipahis. His Kanune Raya, or “Code of the Rayas” reformed the
law governing levies and taxes to be paid by the Rayas, raising
their status beyond serfs to the point Christian serfs would migrate
to Turkish territories to benefit from the reforms. Furthermore,
Suleiman enacted new criminal and police legislation, prescribing a
set of fines for specific offences, as well as reducing the
instances requiring death or mutilation. In the area of taxation,
taxes were levied on various goods and produce, including animals,
mines, profits of trade, import and export duties. In addition to
taxes, officials who had fallen into disrepute were likely to have
their land and property confiscated by the Sultan.
Education was another important area
for the Sultan. Schools attached to mosques and funded by religious
foundations provided a largely free education to Muslim boys in
advance of the Christian countries of the time. In his capital,
Suleiman increased the number of mektebs (primary schools) to
fourteen, teaching children to read, write as well as the principles
of Islam. Children wishing further education could proceed to one of
eight medresses (colleges), offering studies in grammar, syntax,
logic, metaphysics, philosophy, tropics, stylistics, geometry,
astronomy, and astrology. Higher medresses provided education of
university status, whose graduates became imams or teachers.
Educational centers were often one of many building surrounding the
courtyards of mosques, others included libraries, refectories,
fountains, soup kitchens and hospitals for the benefit of the
public.
When the Kanun laws attained their
final form, the code of laws became known as the kanun‐i
Osmani, or the "Ottoman laws". Suleiman's legal code was to last
more than three hundred years.
 Under
Suleiman's patronage, the Ottoman empire entered the golden age of
its cultural development. Hundreds of imperial artistic societies
(called the Ehl‐i Hiref,
"Community of the Talented") were administered at the Imperial seat,
the Topkapı Palace. After an apprenticeship, artists and craftsmen
could advance in rank within their field and were paid commensurate
wages in quarterly annual installments. Payroll registers that
survive testify to the breadth of Suleiman's patronage of the arts,
the earliest of documents dating from 1526 list 40 societies with
over 600 members. The Ehl‐i
Hiref attracted the empire's most talented artisans to the Sultan's
court, both from the Islamic world and recently conquered
territories in Europe, resulting in a blend of Islamic, Turkish and
European cultures.
Suleiman himself was an accomplished
poet, writing in Persian and Turkish under the nom de plume "Muhibbi"(or
the Gracious One). Some of Suleiman's verses have become Turkish
proverbs, including the likes of the well‐known
"Everyone aims at the same meaning, but many are the versions of the
story," and "In this world a spell of good health is the best
state". In addition to Suleiman’s own work, great names dominated
the literary sphere under Suleiman’s rule, including Fuzuli, Baki
and many others. The historian E.J.W Gibb notes "at no time, even in
Turkey, was greater encouragement given to poetry than during the
reign of this Sultan."
The people think of wealth and
power as the greatest fate,
But in this world a spell of
health is the best state.
What men call sovereignty is a
worldly strife and constant war;
Worship of God is the highest
throne, the happiest of all estates.
—For the throne (Saltanat) by
Suleiman
Suleiman also became renowned for
sponsoring a series of monumental architectural developments within
his empire. The Sultan sought to turn Istanbul into the center of
Islamic civilization by a series of projects, including bridges,
mosques, palaces and various charitable and social establishments.
The greatest of these was built by the Sultan's chief architect,
Mimar Sinan, under whom Ottoman architecture would reach its zenith.
Sinan became responsible for over three hundred monuments through
the empire, including his two masterpieces, the Selimiye and
Süleymaniye mosques. Building activities were not limited to
Istanbul however, Suleiman also restored the Dome of the Rock in
Jerusalem and the Jerusalem city walls (which are the current walls
of the Old City of Jerusalem), renovated the Kaaba in Mecca and
constructed a complex in Damascus. He also issued a firman, formally
denouncing blood libel against the Jews. In doing this, he set a
precedent that was followed by emperors after him, including the
firman against the Damascus affair.
Suleiman
was very much infatuated with Hurrem Sultan, a harem girl of
Ruthenian origin. In the West, foreign diplomats taking notice of
the palace gossip about her, called her "Russelazie" or "Roxolana",
referring to her Slavic origins. The daughter of an Orthodox
Ukrainian priest, she was captured and rose through the ranks of the
Harem to become Suleiman's favorite wife. Breaking with 300 years of
Ottoman tradition followed by subsequent Sultans, Suleiman married
Hurrem Sultan in a formal ceremony, making her the first former
slave to gain legitimacy as the Sultan's legal wife, to the
astonishment of many observers both in the Empire and in Europe. He
also allowed Hurrem Sultan to remain with him at court for the rest
of her life, breaking another tradition that when imperial heirs
come to their age, they would be sent along with the imperial
concubine who bore them to govern remote provinces of the Empire,
never to return unless their progeny succeeded to the throne.
Under his pen name, Muhibbi, he
composed this poem for Roxolana:
"Throne of my lonely niche, my
wealth, my love, my moonlight.
My most sincere friend, my
confidant, my very existence, my Sultan
The most beautiful among the
beautiful…
My springtime, my merry faced
love, my daytime, my sweetheart, laughing leaf…
My plants, my sweet, my rose, the
one only who does not distress me in this world…
My Istanbul, my Caraman, the earth
of my Anatolia
My Badakhshan, my Baghdad and
Khorasan
My woman of the beautiful hair, my
love of the slanted brow, my love of eyes full of mischief…
I'll sing your praises always
I, lover of the tormented heart,
Muhibbi of the eyes full of tears, I am happy."
Pargalı İbrahim
Pasha was the boyhood friend of Suleiman. Ibrahim was originally
Greek Orthodox and when young was educated at the Palace School as a
devshirme. As the Sultan's male favorite, he shared Suleiman's
quarters and his tent while at home and on campaign. Suleiman made
him the royal falconer, then promoted him to first officer of the
Royal Bedchamber. Eventually, Ibrahim Pasha became the Grand Vizier
in 1523 and commander‐in‐chief
of all the armies. Suleiman also conferred upon Ibrahim Pasha the
honor of beylerbeyi of Rumelia, granting Ibrahim authority over all
Turkish territories in Europe, as well as command of troops residing
within them at times of war. According to a 17th century chronicler,
Ibrahim had asked Suleiman not to promote him to such high
positions, fearing for his safety, to which Suleiman replied that
under his reign no matter what the circumstance, Ibrahim would never
be put to death.
Yet Ibrahim would eventually fall
from grace with the Sultan. During his thirteen years as Grand
Vizier, his rapid rise to power and vast accumulation of wealth had
made Ibrahim many enemies among the Sultan's court. Reports had
reached the Sultan of Ibrahim's imprudence committed during a
campaign against the Persian Safavid empire, in particular his
adoption of the title serasker sultan was seen as a grave affront to
Suleiman. Suleiman's suspicion of Ibrahim was worsened in a quarrel
between the latter and the Minister of Finance Iskender Chelebi. The
dispute ended in the disgrace of Chelebi on charges intrigues
against the Sultan, with Ibrahim convincing Suleiman to sentence the
Minister to death. Before his death however, Chelebi's last words
were to accuse Ibrahim of conspiracy against the Sultan. Since these
were his dying words, Suleiman became convinced of Ibrahim's
disloyalty and on March 15, 1536, Ibrahim's lifeless body was
discovered in the Topkapi palace.
Suleiman's two
wives had borne him eight sons, four of whom survived past the
1550s. They were Mustafa, Selim, Bayezid, and Cihangir. Of these,
only Mustafa was not Hurrem Sultan's son, but rather belonged to
Gülbahar Sultan "Rose of Spring" and preceded Hurrem's children in
the order of succession. Hurrem was aware that should Mustafa
succeed he would have his brothers strangled, who were all her sons.
Yet Mustafa was recognised as the most talented of all the brothers
and was supported by Pargalı İbrahim Pasha, who was by this time
Suleiman's Grand Vizier. Ambassador Busbecq would note "Suleiman has
among his children a son called Mustafa, marvelously well educated
and prudent and of an age to rule, since he is 24 or 25 years old;
may God never allow a Barbary of such strength to come near us",
going on to talk of Mustafa's "remarkable natural gifts".
In power struggles apparently
instigated by Hurrem, Suleiman had Ibrahim murdered and replaced
with her sympathetic son‐in‐law,
Rustem Pasha. By 1552, the campaign against Persia had begun, with
Rustem appointed commander‐in‐chief
of the expedition, it was here where intrigues against Mustafa were
to begin. Rustem sent one of Suleiman's most trusted men to report
that since Suleiman was not at the head of the army, the soldiers
thought the time had come to put a younger prince on the throne,
whilst spreading rumors that Mustafa had proved receptive to the
idea. Angered by what he felt was Mustafa's plans to claim the
throne, the following summer Suleiman summoned Mustafa to his tent,
stating he would “be able to clear himself of the crimes he was
accused of and would have nothing to fear if he came”.
Mustafa was confronted with either
appearing before his father and possibly being killed, or refusing
to attend and be accused of betrayal. In the end, Mustafa chose to
enter his father's tent, confident the support of the army would
protect him. Busbecq who claims to have received an account from an
eyewitness, describes Mustafa’s final moments as follows:
“Mustafa entered, the drama
commences, and he was seized on very side. But the prince, in the
moment he believed would be his last, regained his strength and was
animated with heroic courage. …Mustafa’s ardent desire to live and
reign made him invincible, although alone against them all; the
result of the combat was still uncertain, but Suleiman, on the other
side impatient for success, raised his head above the hanging and
saw this mutes were ready to succumb; his fears were greatly
increased and he looked menacingly at them, his eyes full of anger,
and filled with cruelty at the lack of courage…They instantly threw
themselves on Mustafa for a second time, knocked him straight down
and snatched his life from him”
The two surviving brothers, Bayezid
and Selim were given command in different parts of the empire.
Within a few years however, civil war broke out between the brothers
and their loyal forces. With the aid of his fathers troops, Selim
defeated Bayezid in Konya in 1559, clearing the path for Selim's
succession to the throne. It was not until 1566 however, that
Suleiman would enter his final year. Having set out from Istanbul to
command an expedition to Hungary, Suleiman would die on September 5
1566, two nights before an Ottoman victory at the Battle of
Szigetvar, in Hungary. The Sultan's body was returned to Istanbul
and with full honors buried in the grounds of Süleymaniye Mosque,
near the tomb of Roxelana.
At the time of Suleiman's death, the
Ottoman Empire was among the world's foremost powers, if not the
most, possessing unrivalled military strength, economic riches and
territorial extent. Suleiman's conquests' had seen the major Muslim
cities (Mecca, Medina, Jerusalem, Damascus, and Baghdad), many
Balkan provinces (up to today's Austria), and most of North Africa
fall under the control of the empire. His expansion towards Europe
had provided the Ottoman Turks with 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 ambassador
Busbecq would warn 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”
Suleiman's
legacy was not only a military one however. The French traveller
Monsieur de Thevenot a century later bears witness to the "strong
agricultural base of the country, the well being of the peasantry,
the abundance of staple foods, and to the pre-eminence of
organization in Suleiman's government". His administrative and legal
reforms which saw him named the Law Giver ensured the empires
survival long after his death, something which "took many
generations of decadent heirs to undo".
Through his personal patronage,
Suleiman also presided over the Golden Age of the Ottoman Empire,
representing the pinnacle of the Ottoman Turks' cultural achievement
in the realm of architecture, literature, art, theology and
philosophy. Today, the skyline of the Bosphorus and other former
Ottoman provinces are still adorned with the architectural works of
Mimar Sinan. Of these, the Süleymaniye Mosque is the final resting
place of Suleiman and Hurrem Sultan who are buried in separate domed
mausoleums attached to the mosque.
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