Bayezid II

Bayezid II

Bāyezīd II (born December 3, 1447 in Dimotika , according to other sources * January 1448, † May 26, 1512 at Dimotika) was Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from May 19, 1481 to April 24, 1512 . Because of his religiosity he was nicknamed velī . He wrote poems under the poet's name ʿadlī ("the righteous").

Succession to the throne

Bayezid succeeded his father Mehmed II on the throne. To do this, he first had to win over the Janissaries through promises and bribes . This prerogative of the Janissary troops when a new sultan came to power would last for centuries.

Before he could take power, a long battle broke out with his brother Cem Sultan . In 1474 he became governor of Karaman after his older brother Mustafa . Bayezid defeated him in several battles and drove him to Egypt , which was a constant threat to the Ottomans under the Mamluks . Another attempt by Cems to beat Bayezid failed and he fled to the Knights of St. John in Rhodes . The Johanniter Grand Master Pierre d'Aubusson accepted a pension from Bayezid to keep him there. Western princes ( Charles VIII of France and Pope Innocent VIII ) soon put pressure on d'Aubusson to surrender Cem. After all, the prince was entrusted first to Charles VIII, then to the Pope. But as long as Cem lived he was a constant threat to the Sultan's rule and Bayezid wanted to change this in 1495:

"In order to get rid of [...] his brother, he sent the Kapıcıbaşı (ie the chief of the doorkeepers) Mustafa Beğ to Italy , so that he could dispose of him with poison under the pretext of delivering the annual payments promised by Bayezid for Cem Sultan, and Thanks to Mustafa's fate, the Bayezid successfully carried out this attack. "

- Anonymus Hanivaldanus

Bayezid II's order to execute the son of Cem (Oğuzhan; not named), addressed to a certain Iskender . Istanbul, Archives of the Topkapi Seraglio Museum (TSMA), No. E 11983/1

With other chroniclers this has not been proven, so that Bayezid's guilt for the death of Cem Sultan remains unproven. However, since the fratricide was institutionalized in the Osman house since Mehmed II, there is nowhere criticism of it. Bayezid's order to strangle Cem's son Oğuzhan, given at the end of 1482, is still in the archive of the Topkapi Seraglio Museum.

Reign

The language of the chancellery was changed from Greek to Ottoman, as the sultan's documents, especially foreign contracts, could only claim validity in Turkish. The contract with Venice from 1502 is now in the state archives there in two language versions, namely Venetian and Ottoman.

In 1484 he successfully waged war against the Principality of Moldova . His Akıncı also roamed in Albania and over Bosnia to Styria, consuming and making slaves. This only ended in 1495 with a peace treaty between the Sublime Porte and Hungary .

Kait Bay (also Qaid Bay) the Mamluk Sultan of Egypt, who had already granted Cem asylum, extended his sphere of influence northwards to Tarsus and Adana. In 1488 he won a great victory over the Ottomans and in 1491 a peace treaty was signed that lasted until after Bayezid's death.

When the Alhambra Edict was issued in Spain in 1492 , he accepted the Jews expelled from Spain and later from Portugal. Bayezid II is said to have said: "How foolish are the Spanish kings that they expel their best citizens and leave them to their worst enemies."

He launched an unsuccessful attack on Rhodes, made concessions to Venice for the sake of peace, and reduced the tribute demanded from Ragusa . But the threat in the Aegean Sea from the growing power of Venice, which Cyprus had appropriated in 1489 , prompted him to embark on a more serious undertaking. In 1499 he waged a war on the Morea (Peloponnese) with the Doge Republic, which ended in 1502 with the conquest of Lepanto , Modon , Coron and Navarino . Bayezid personally led the siege of Modon in 1500. A decisive factor in this victory was the newly armed navy, led by the former corsair captain Kemal Re'is .

Bayezid Mosque in Istanbul

Between 1501 and 1506 he had the Beyazit Mosque built in İstanbul.

In Persia, Şah Ismail , who founded the Safavid dynasty, came to power through the decisive battle of Shurur in 1502 . The final years of Bayezid's reign were disrupted by the spread of Shiite doctrine among the Turkmen tribes in Asia Minor and adjacent areas under the influence of the new Persian power. Persia also sought confrontation with the Ottoman Empire militarily. Bayezid's youngest son Selim wanted to use this in his favor.

Bayezid had designated Ahmed, the older son, as his successor. However, power struggles immediately began under the princes Ahmed, Korkud and Selim, who ruled the prince provinces in Anatolia. Admittedly, as a ten-year-old boy after Mehmed II's death, Korkud had been imperial administrator for his father in Istanbul until he arrived there. But the more energetic Selim attacked his father's troops with a Tatar army. Although he lost the battle, he was able to win the trust of the Janissaries who decided for him and against his brothers. Selim defeated Korkud and Ahmed and forced Bayezid to appoint him commander in chief of the army. On April 24, 1512 Bayezid II resigned and his son took over the throne as Selim I. A few days later, Bayezid died under unknown circumstances.

Western eyewitnesses

Andrea Gritti , later Doge of Venice : “His fleshy face and whole appearance make him appear neither hard nor terrifying, but deeply melancholy, superstitious and stubborn, not without avarice. It is said that he enjoys handicrafts such as stone-cutting, silver-working and turning, that he is a great connoisseur of astrology and theology and that he is an excellent archer. " (Written in Istanbul towards the end of 1503 about the then fifty-five year old Bayezid)

Chronicle of Anonymous Zoras: “So Sultan Bayezid was more inclined to peace than to war. He was a humble man, worshiped philosophy, and loved reading about the deeds of the emperors of the past. He was a good person by nature. "

literature

• Richard F. Kreutel: The pious Sultan Bayezid. The history of his rule (1481–1512) according to the old Ottoman chronicles of Oruç and Anonymus Hanivaldanus (= Ottoman historians. Volume 9). Styria, Graz / Vienna / Cologne 1978, ISBN 3-222-10469-7 .
• Hedda Reindl: Men around Bāyezīd. A prosopographical study of the epoch of Sultan Bāyezīds II (1481–1512). Schwarz, Berlin 1983, ISBN 978-3-922968-22-1 ( digitized version ).

Web links

Commons : Bayezid II.  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Tripota - Trier portrait database

Individual evidence

1. ^ Richard F. Kreutel: The pious Sultan Bayezid. The history of his rule (1481–1512) according to the old Ottoman chronicles of Oruç and Anonymus Hanivaldanus (= Ottoman historians. Volume 9). Styria, Graz / Vienna / Cologne 1978, ISBN 3-222-10469-7 , p. 289.
2. ↑ Sultan Bajazid's (i.e., Beyazit's) Mosque, Constantinople, Turkey . 1890-1900. Retrieved October 18, 2013.
3. ^ Richard F. Kreutel: The pious Sultan Bayezid. The history of his rule (1481–1512) according to the old Ottoman chronicles of Oruç and Anonymus Hanivaldanus (= Ottoman historians. Volume 9). Styria, Graz / Vienna / Cologne 1978, ISBN 3-222-10469-7 , p. 208.
4. ↑ On the person cf. Hedda Reindl: Men around Bāyezīd. A prosopographical study of the epoch of Sultan Bāyezīds II. (1481–1512) (= Islamic studies. Volume 75). Klaus Schwarz Verlag, Berlin 1983, ISBN 3-922968-22-8 (also dissertation, Ludwig Maximilians University Munich 1982), p. 244 a. E. ff., In particular p. 246, footnote 26.
5. ↑ German translation of the execution order by Hans Joachim Kissling: On the personnel policy of Sultan Bājezīd II. In the western border areas of the Ottoman Empire. In: Hans-Georg Beck, Alois Schmaus (Hrsg.): Contributions to research on Southeast Europe. On the occasion of the II. International Balkanology Congress in Athens 7.V. – 13.V.1970 (= contributions to knowledge of Southeast Europe and the Near East. Volume 10). Trofenik, Munich 1970, pp. 107-116 (109 footnote 3); Richard F. Kreutel: The pious Sultan Bayezid. The history of his rule (1481–1512) according to the old Ottoman chronicles of Oruç and Anonymus Hanivaldanus (= Ottoman historians. Volume 9). Styria, Graz / Vienna / Cologne 1978, ISBN 3-222-10469-7 , p. 280 f. Note 11.
6. ↑ Maria Pia Pedani Fabris, Alessio Bombaci (ed.): Inventory of the Lettere e Scritture Turchesche in the Venetian State Archives , Brill, 2010, p. XV.
7. ↑ Quoted from Georg Bossong : The Sephardi. Munich 2008, p. 57.
8. ^ Richard F. Kreutel: The pious Sultan Bayezid. The history of his rule (1481–1512) according to the old Ottoman chronicles of Oruç and Anonymus Hanivaldanus (= Ottoman historians. Volume 9). Styria, Graz / Vienna / Cologne 1978, ISBN 3-222-10469-7 , pp. 10-17.
9. ↑ Based on the original Italian text in Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall : History of the Ottoman Empire. Volume VI, p. 625.
10. ↑ vulgar Greek chronicle of the anonymous writer Zora: the life and deeds of the Turkish emperor. In the series Richard Franz Kreutel (Ed.): Ottoman historians. Volume 6, Verlag Styria, Graz / Vienna / Cologne 1971, p. 190.

predecessor	Office	successor
Mehmed II	Sultan of the Ottoman Empire 1481–1512	Selim I.