Bayezid II

The Eight monarch and Sultan of the Ottoman Dynasty (1481-512)

Bayezid II was born in 1447 in Dimetoka, Northern Greece. As the oldest son of Mehmed II the Conqueror, Bayezid ascended the Ottoman throne in 1481. Like his father, he was a protector and promoter of western and eastern culture. Throughout his reign, Bayezid engaged in numerous campaigns to conquer the Venetian-held despotate of Peloponnesia (Morea), accurately defining this region as a key strategic region to future Ottoman naval power in the Eastern Mediterranean. The last of these wars ended in 1501 with Bayezid II in control of the main fortresses in the region.

Bayezid‘ II’s biggest concern during his reign was the struggle with his younger brother Prince Cem, who claimed the throne in several occasions with some help from the remaining Turcoman notables of the Empire. The prince was later captured by the Knights of Saint John. Eventually the Knights handed Cem over to Pope Innocent VIII. The Pope thought of using Cem as a tool to drive the Ottoman Turks out of Europe, but as a new Crusade failed to be organized, the unfortunate Ottoman prince died in the Italian peninsula.

Cem’s Rebellion Cem was the younger brother of Sultan

Bayezid II. At the death of Sultan Mehmed II, Bayezid was the governor of north-central Anatolia (Sivas, Tokat and Amasya), and Cem ruled the province of newly-acquired Karaman.

The grand vizier Mehmed Pasha sent two messengers to the brothers immediately after the death of the Sultan. But the messenger sent to Cem had been caught on the way by the supporters of Bayezid, and Cem learned of his father's death later than his elder brother.

Bayezid had the favour of the devşirme, and, Cem was the candidate of the remaning Turcoman notables in the Empire.

Shortly after the death of Mehmed II, Janissaries assassinated the Grand Vizir Mehmed Pasha who would be in favour of Cem.

Because they were a standing army, the Janissaries could mobilize support for their candidate immediately, while bringing together armed support from the Turcoman notables took more time for Prince Cem.

Prince Bayezid arrived at Istanbul on May 21, 1481 and was declared Sultan by a great support of the devşirme bureaucracy and janissaries.

Only six days later Prince Cem captured the city of Inegöl on the road to Istanbul with a small army.

Sultan Bayezid II sent an army under the command of one of his viziers to defeat and kill his brother. On May 28, 1481, Cem defeated Bayezid's army and he declared himself Sultan of Anatolia and Bursa his capital.

AttentionThis declaration could start a new period of interregnum in the Ottoman history!

Cem proposed his older brother to divide the empire into two, he reigning on the Anatolian lands and Bayezid on Rumelia.

Bayezid rejected the proposal and as response marched on Bursa. The decisive battle between the two sons of Mehmed II took place near the town Yenişehir. Prince Cem’s troops lost the battle and the defeated prince fled with his family to Cairo, the capital of the Mameluke Empire.

In Cairo, Prince Cem received a letter from Bayezid II, offering Cem one million akças (Ottoman silver coin) in order to dissuade him from competing for the throne. Cem rejected the offer and in 1482 he launched another campaign in Anatolia.

On May 27, 1482 he besieged Konya but was soon forced to withdraw to Ankara. He wanted to retreat with his remaining forces to the Mameluke realms again but his reatreat path was cut off by the Ottoman imperial troops.

Meanwhile, Pierre d'Aubusson, the Grand Master of the Knights of St. John invited Prince Cem to the island of Rhodes controlled bt the Order and which had survived an Ottoman siege in 1480.

On June 1482, he went there as a guest, but the Knights betrayed him making the Ottoman prince a prisoner. Afterwards, Prince Cem was sent to France, the origin land of the Order.

Sultan Bayezid sent a messenger to France and requested that Prince Cem remains there as a political prisoner.

Bayezid II agreed to pay an annual of 45,000 gold pieces for his brother's “expenses”.

Pope Innocent VIII intended to organize a new crusade using Prince Cem but the European monarchies were reluctant for a new Crusade. The Pope also offered the Ottoman prince to convert to Christianity but he rejected. Prince Cem became a useful tool for the Papacy anyway, because whenever Bayezid II intended to launch a military campaign against the Catholic powers of Europe, the Pope would threaten to release the Ottoman throne claimant.

Cem died in Capua (north of Naples) on February 25, 1495. His body was returned to the Ottoman lands in 1499 and was buried in Bursa.

Bayezid II was a different sort of monarch from the sultans who preceded him. He was deeply religious, a reluctant warrior – nevertheless he was also a warrior – preferring generally peace to conquest.

The three campaigns of his reign were against Moldavia, the Mamelukes who ruled in Syria and Egypt, and, the Venitian maritime power in Esatern Mediterranean.

Fighting against Moldavia in 1484 and against the kingdom of Poland in 1496-1498, Bayezid II managed to conquer the Black Sea coastal region of Moldavia and territories to north, thus bringing the Ottoman Empire’s border beyond the Danube.

So, the Ottoman territorial possessions now reached to the borders of its vassal, the Crimean Khanate and the Christian powers of Europe were cut off from the Black Sea. Its trade was completely in Ottoman hands now.

Bayezid II’s war against the Mamelukes was an inclonclusive one, however. He fought against this mighty militarist Muslim state for six years between the years of 1485-1491 with no resulting changes in borders.

In another war against Venice from 1499 to 1503, the Ottoman forces only managed to take Lepanto (İnebahtı) and some Venitian fortresses in the Morean peninsula.

However, more importantly, in the prelude of and during this war thay started to develop a new and powerful war fleet in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Rebellions in the east, such as that of the Shi’ite Turcomans, created a considerable concern during much of Bayezid's reign and were often backed by the Shah of Persia, Shah Ismail (the founder of the Safavide dynasty in Persia), who was eager to promote Shi'ism to undermine the authority of the Ottoman state. Ottoman authority in Anatolia was indeed seriously threatened during this period, and at one point Bayezid's grand vizier, Ali Pasha, was killed in battle against rebels.

Bayezid II also sent out the Ottoman navy under the command of Ottoman admirals Kemal and Burak Reis to Spain in 1492 to safely bring Sepharad Jews and Andalousian Muslims, who were fleeing the “Spanish Inquisition”, to Ottoman lands.

On September 14, 1509, Istanbul was devastated by an earthquake. Bayezid's final years saw a succession battle between his sons Selim and Ahmed (there was also a third one).

Prince Ahmed, the older of the two claimants had won a battle against the Safavides in Eastern Anatolia and now marched on Istanbul to exploit his triumph. Fearing for his safety, Selim staged a revolt in Thrace but was defeated by Bayezid II and forced to flee to Crimea in 1511. At this point, Bayezid II developed fears that Prince Ahmed might in turn kill him to gain the throne and refused to allow his son to enter Istanbul.

Prince Selim returned from Crimea and, with support from the Janissaries and devşirme bureaucracy, defeated and killed his brother Prince Ahmed.

Bayezid II then had to abdicate the throne in favour of his only and ferocious son on April 25, 1512. He departed for retirement in his birth place Demotika, but he died along the way, and is buried next to the Bayezid Mosque named after him in Istanbul.

Selim I “The Ferocious”

The Ninth Monarch and Sultan, the First Caliph of the Ottoman Dynasty (Sultan 1512-1520, Caliph of Muslims 1518-1520)

Prince Selim victorious over his brother Ahmed dethroned his father Beyazid II in 1512.

He signalled his accession by putting his survivng brother and nephews to death. This was after the custom of his grandfather Fatih Mehmed II. There had been short civil wars between his father Bayezid and his uncle Cem, and between Selim himself and his brother Ahmed.

Later to keep his sons from treating him as he had treated his father and to ensure an orderly succession to the throne, Selim I had all shis sons but one, Süleyman, murdered.

Selim I was the antithesis of his father, Bayezid II. He preferred to spend his time on campaign, away from his capital Istanbul. He was a capable and ruthless general. He face successfully the ideological and political threat posed by the Safavide Persia and conquered the vast Mameluk Empire during his reign.

During his reign, Selim I attacked and destroyed the Mameluke Sultanate at the battles of “Marj Dabiq (Mercidabık in Turkish) and al-Raydaniyya (Ridaniye in Turkish), which led to the annexation of Syria, Palestine and Egypt to the Ottoman Empire.

He also extended Ottoman power to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. When Egypt and her Arabian provinces were taken from the Mamelukes, he announced himself to be the Khadim ul Haremeyn, "The Servant of The Two Holy Shrines", instead of Hakim ul Haremeyn, "The Ruler of The Two Holy Shrines".

The Shrines refer to the “Great Mosque” in Mecca and the “Mosque of the Prophet” in Medina, the holiest places in Islam together with Jerusalem (Al Kuds).

Selim I also claimed to be the Caliph (the successor of the Prophet Muhammed); the "guardian of Islam", considered to be the chief civil and religious ruler of all Muslims, both Shi'ite and Sunni.

Selim I had also been determined on war with Persia, in 1514 whose ruler Shah Ismail I claimed to be caliph as well. The campaign which followed was a victory for Selim I at the “Battle of Caldiran”, whose firmness and courage overcame the insubordination of the Janissaries, mostly from the Bektashi sect. The other main reason for the victory was the extensive use of firearms by the Ottoman army in front of the traditional Turcoman cavalrymen of the Safavide army.

After Selim I became master of the holy cities of Islam and captured Egypt along with the person of Al-Mutawakkil III, the last Caliph of the AbbasidE dynasty who resided there, Selim I convinced him to formally surrender the title of caliph as well as its outward emblems, the sword and the mantle of the prophet.

After Selim's return from his Egyptian campaign, he was preparing an expedition against Rhodes when he was overtaken by sickness and died in the ninth year of his reign because of a skin enfection. He was about fifty-five years of age.

Although a ruthless chieftain, he was also a poet and wrote with the nickname “Mahla Selimi” In one of his poems, he wrote: "the whole world does not form a sovereignty vast enough for one monarch."