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Mehmed II, Mahomet
II[1] or Mohammed
II (Ottoman
Turkish: محمد
ثانى, Meḥmed-i
s̠ānī; Turkish: II.
Mehmed or Fatih Sultan Mehmet
Han Turkish
pronunciation: [ˈmeh.met];
30 March 1432 – 3 May 1481), best known
as Mehmed the
Conqueror (el-Fātiḥ, الفاتح),
was an Ottoman sultan who ruled first for a short time
from August 1444 to September 1446, and later from February 1451 to
May 1481. At the age of 21, he conquered Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) and brought an end to
the Eastern Roman Empire. Mehmed continued
his conquests in Anatolia with its reunification and in
Southeast Europe as far west as Bosnia. Mehmed is considered a hero in
modern-day Turkey and parts of the widerMuslim world. Among other things,
Istanbul´s Fatih district, Fatih Sultan Mehmet
Bridge and Fatih Mosque are named
after him.
Early reign[edit]
Accession of Mehmed II in
Edirne, 1451
Mehmed II was born on 30 March 1432, in Edirne, then the capital city of
the Ottoman state. His father was
Sultan Murad II (1404–51) and his
mother Hüma Valide Hatun, born in the town
of Devrekani, Kastamonu.
When Mehmed II was eleven years old he was sent to Amasya to govern and thus gain experience,
as per the custom of Ottoman rulers before his time. Sultan Murad
II also sent a number of teachers for him to study
under.[2] This
Islamic education had a great impact in molding Mehmet´s mindset
and reinforcing his Muslim beliefs. He was influenced in his
practice of Islamic epistemology by practitioners of science -
particularly by his mentor, Molla Gürani - and he followed their
approach. The influence of Akshamsaddin in Mehmed´s life became
predominant from a young age, especially in the imperative of
fulfilling his Islamic duty to overthrow the Byzantine empire by
conquering Constantinople.[3]
After Murad II made peace with the Karamanids in Anatolia in August 1444, he abdicated the
throne to his 12-year-old son Mehmed II.
In Mehmed II´s first reign, he defeated the crusade led
by János Hunyadi after the Hungarian
incursions into his country broke the conditions of the
truce Peace of Szeged. Cardinal Julian Cesarini, the representative of
the pope, had convinced the king of Hungary that breaking the truce
with Muslims was not a betrayal.[4] At
this time Mehmed II asked his father Murad II to reclaim the
throne, but Murad II refused. Angry at his father, who had long
since retired to a contemplative life in southwestern Anatolia,
Mehmed II wrote, "If you are the Sultan, come and lead your armies.
If I am the Sultan I hereby order you to come and lead my armies."
It was only after receiving this letter that Murad II led the
Ottoman army and won the Battle of Varna in 1444.
Murad II´s return to the throne was forced by Çandarlı Halil
Paşa, the grand vizier at the time, who was not
fond of Mehmed II´s rule, because Mehmed II´s
influential lala(royal teacher), Akşemseddin,
had a rivalry with Çandarlı.
Conquest of
Constantinople[edit]
When Mehmed II ascended the throne again in 1451 he devoted himself
to strengthening the Ottoman Navy, and made preparations for the
taking of Constantinople. In the narrow Bosporus Straits, the
fortress Anadoluhisarı had been
built by his great-grandfatherBayezid I on the Asian side; Mehmed
erected an even stronger fortress called Rumelihisarı on the
European side, and thus gained complete control of the strait.
Having completed his fortresses, Mehmed proceeded to levy a toll on
ships passing within reach of their cannon. A Venetian vessel
ignoring signals to stop was sunk with a single shot and all the
surviving sailors beheaded,[5] except
for the captain, who was impaled and mounted as a human scarecrow
as a warning to further sailors on the strait.[6]
Abu Ayyub al-Ansari, the companion
and standard bearer of Muhammad, had died during the
first Siege of
Constantinople (674–78). As Mehmed II´s army approached
Constantinople, Mehmed´s sheikh Akşemseddin.[7] discovered
the tomb of Abu Ayyub al-Ansari. After the conquest, Mehmed
built Eyüp Sultan Mosque at the site,
to emphasize the importance of the conquest to the Islamic world
and highlight his role as ghazi.[7]
In 1453 Mehmed commenced the siege of Constantinople with an army
between 80,000 to 200,000 troops and a navy of 320 vessels, the
bulk of them transports and storeships. The city was surrounded by
sea and land; the fleet at the entrance of the Bosphorus stretched
from shore to shore in the form of a crescent, to intercept or
repel any assistance for Constantinople from the sea.[5] In
early April, the Siege of
Constantinople began. At first, the city´s walls held off
the Turks, even though Mehmed´s army used the new Orban´sbombard, a giant cannon similar to
the Dardanelles Gun. The harbor of
the Golden Horn was blocked by
a boom chain and
defended by twenty-eight warships.
On 22 April, Mehmed transported his lighter warships overland,
around the Genoese colony of Galata, and into the Golden Horn´s
northern shore; eighty galleys were transported from the Bosphorus
after paving a route, little over one mile, with wood. Thus the
Byzantines stretched their troops over a longer portion of the
walls. About a month later, Constantinople fell, on 29 May,
following a fifty-seven day siege.[5] After
this conquest, Mehmed moved the Ottoman capital from Adrianople to
Constantinople.
When Mehmed stepped into the ruins of the Boukoleon, known to the Ottomans and
Persians as the Palace of the Caesars, probably built over a
thousand years before by Theodosius II, he uttered the famous
lines of Saadi:[9][10][11][12]
The spider
weaves the curtains in the palace of the Caesars
the owl calls the watches in the towers of Afrasiab.
After the conquest of Constantinople, Mehmed claimed the title
"Caesar" of the Roman Empire (Qayser-i Rûm),
based on the assertion that Constantinople had been the seat and
capital of the Roman Empire since 330 A.D.; and
whoever possessed the Imperial capital was the ruler of the
Empire.[13] The
contemporary scholar George of Trebizond supported
his claim.[14][15] The
claim was recognized by the Eastern Orthodox Church, but
not by the Catholic Church and most of, if
not all, Western Europe. Gennadius Scholarius, a staunch
antagonist of the West because of the Sack of
Constantinople committed by the Western Catholics led by
Latins and theological controversies between the two Churches, had
been enthroned the Ecumenical Patriarch
of Constantinople-New Rome with all the ceremonial
elements and ethnarch (or milletbashi) status by the
Sultan himself in 1454 A.D. and in turn Gennadius II recognized
Mehmed the Conqueror as successor to the throne.[16][17][18] Mehmed
also had a blood lineage to the Byzantine Imperial family; his
predecessor, Sultan Orhan I had married a Byzantine princess,
and Mehmed claimed descent from John Tzelepes
Komnenos.[19] He
was not the only ruler to claim such a title; Frederick III,
emperor of the Holy Roman Empire in Western
Europe, traced his lineage from Charlemagne, who had taken the title of
Roman Emperor when he was crowned by Pope Leo III in 800 –
although never recognized as such by the Byzantine
Empire.[citation
needed]
Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI died without
producing an heir, and had Constantinople not fallen to the
Ottomans he likely would have been succeeded by the sons of his
deceased elder brother. Those children were taken into the palace
service of Mehmed after the fall of Constantinople. The oldest boy,
renamed Has Murad, became a personal favorite of Mehmed and served
as Beylerbey (Governor-General) of the
Balkans. The younger son, renamed Mesih Pasha, became Admiral of the Ottoman
fleet and Sanjak-bey (Governor) of
the Province of Gallipoli. He eventually
served twice as Grand Vizier under Mehmed´s
son, Bayezid II.[20]
After the Fall of Constantinople, Mehmed would also go on to
conquer the Despotate of Morea in
the Peloponnese in 1460, and
the Empire of Trebizond in
northeasternAnatolia in 1461. The last two vestiges
of Byzantine rule were thus absorbed by the Ottoman Empire. The
conquest of Constantinople bestowed immense glory and prestige on
the country. There is some historical evidence that, 10 years after
the conquest of Constantinople, Mehmed II visited the site
of Troy and boasted that he had avenged
the Trojans by having conquered the Greeks
(Byzantines).[21][22][23]
Conquest of Serbia
(1454–1459)[edit]
Mehmed II´s first campaigns after Constantinople were in the
direction of Serbia, which had been an Ottoman vassal state since theBattle of Kosovo in 1389. The
Ottoman rulers had a connection with the Serbian Despotate: one
of Murad II´s wives was
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