Episode 314: Peerless Among Princes

In the early sixteenth century there emerged upon the world stage a cast of royal characters that could almost persuade the most hardened social historian to read Thomas Carlyle’s On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History. In Europe were Francis I of France, Henry VIII of England, and Charles V, King of Spain and Holy Roman Emperor. In Russia ruled Ivan IV, also known as Ivan the Terrible;  in India Babur and Akbar, founders of the Moghul Dynasty;  and in Persia the Savafid rulers Shah Ismail and Shah Tahmasb. As my guest writes, all of these monarchs “resorted to warfare as an instrument of empire building…sought to establish control over their own elites and aristocracies… paid particular attention to creating and maintaining a multilayered reputation as ruler, patron, soldier, [and] statesman… [and] sought to establish central control over religious matters during a time of intense theological debates and spiritual anxieties. They were also acutely aware of each other, and they openly competed among themselves for control of land and resources and for prestige.”

In their geographical midst was one to whom all looked, against whom all compared themselves, and with whom nearly all of them competed in the game of kingdoms. This was Süleyman, the ruler of the Ottoman Empire, known to contemporaries as “the Grand Turk”, and ever after as “the Magnificent.” In all the endeavours of his contemporaries, he at the very least matched them, and he usually excelled.

Peerless Among Princes: The Life and Times of Sultan Süleyman is a fascinating new biography of this towering figure, a study not only of his life but of his time. Its author Kaya Şahín is with us today; he is Associate Professor of History at Indiana University, where he also serves in the Department of Central Eurasian Studies and Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures

For Further Investigation

Some of the European side of this story has previously been discussed in Episode 166, a conversation with Catherine Fletcher about the Italian Renaissance; and in Episode 149, which focused on the history of Eastern Europe, a history that is unimaginable without the presence of the Ottoman Empire. The following books are suggested by Kaya, some with his comments.

Cornell H Fleischer, Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: The Historian Mustafa Ali (1541-1600)
Leslie Peirce, Empress of the East: How a European Slave Girl Became Queen of the Ottoman Empire: "a biography of Suleyman’s wife."
John Julius Norwich, Four Princes: Henry VIII, Francis I, Charles V, Suleiman the Magnificent and the Obsessions that Forged Modern Europe: "not a work of academic scholarship, but an open-minded treatment of Suleyman together with the other royal figures of the period."
Suleymanname: The Illustrated History of Suleyman the Magnificent, edited by Esin Atil.
Erdem Çipa, The Making of Selim: Succession, Legitimacy, and Memory in the Early Modern Ottoman World: "a study on Süleyman’s father."
Emine Fetvaci, Picturing History at the Ottoman Court: "although mostly dealing with a period following Süleyman’s death, it is a terrific study of Ottoman visual culture, book arts, history-writing, etc."
Nikolay Antov, The Ottoman 'Wild West': The Balkan Frontier in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries: "a solid treatment of Ottoman expansion in the Balkans as well as the issue of conversion to Islam, etc."
Christopher Markiewicz, The Crisis of Kingship in Late Medieval Islam: Persian Emigres and the Making of Ottoman Sovereignty: on new Ottoman notions of sovereignty.