Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm
Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Manky Listener discretion advised. On the
Speaker 1: twenty second of December sixteen o three, the Ottoman Imperial
Speaker 1: Council assembled for an ordinary administrative meeting in the capital
Speaker 1: of Istanbul. The Sultan's Grand Vizier, a man named Kassim Pasha,
Speaker 1: oversaw these regular meetings, directing the official business and foreign
Speaker 1: policy of an empire which reigned as far as Mecca
Speaker 1: and Algier's Budapest and Cairo. There was really no other
Speaker 1: imperial competitor putting up much of a threat. The Habsburgs
Speaker 1: remained far to the north, The Safavids in Persia were
Speaker 1: captain Czech for now and and while there may have
Speaker 1: been a rebellion or two among the ranks of the
Speaker 1: Ottoman Empire's peasant fighters, the Imperial Council had their own
Speaker 1: means of brutally ruthlessly disbanding them. To the Grand Vizier,
Speaker 1: God seemed to cast his divine light upon the Ottomans.
Speaker 1: Just as Kasim Pasha set the meeting in motion, a
Speaker 1: royal secretary from the inner courtyard of the took copy
Speaker 1: palace burst into the room, still gasping for breath. All
Speaker 1: the servant could do was point toward the letter he
Speaker 1: was holding in his hand, a letter that seemed to
Speaker 1: come from the Sultan himself. Kasimpasha snatched the letter from
Speaker 1: the servant's hands and began reading, but he could barely
Speaker 1: make out any of the words. Was this a joke,
Speaker 1: certainly not. It had all of the markings of an
Speaker 1: official royal correspondence. All the vizier could read with certainty
Speaker 1: was the word babam my father had the Sultan gone mad?
Speaker 1: His father had died eight years ago. Frustrated with the letter,
Speaker 1: Kasim Pasha passed it to a senior secretary of the
Speaker 1: Imperial Council, who finally was able to divine meaning from
Speaker 1: the chicken scratch. It read, you, Cassim Pasha, my father
Speaker 1: is gone by God's will, and I have taken my
Speaker 1: seat on the throne. You had better keep the city
Speaker 1: in good order. Should sedition arise, I will behead you.
Speaker 1: Maybe God's divine light had missed this part of the palace.
Speaker 1: Kasim Pasha had only ever been a loyal adviser and
Speaker 1: administrator to Sultan Mehmed. Why would Sultan Mehmed test him
Speaker 1: like this, sending him such a strange message. Kasimpasha immediately
Speaker 1: wrote the Chief Eunuch of the Imperial Harem, one of
Speaker 1: the highest offices of the Palace, for his take on
Speaker 1: the strange letter. All he got in response was a
Speaker 1: solemn decree come to the audience hall of the Sultan.
Speaker 1: Immediately as the vizier walked through the inner chamber, everything
Speaker 1: began to make sense. Sitting upon the throne was not
Speaker 1: Sultan Mehmed but his son, a thirteen year old boy
Speaker 1: named Ahmed. What stunned kasim Pasha the whole city, in fact,
Speaker 1: wasn't just that the youngest sultan to ever reign had
Speaker 1: seized the throne, but more astonishingly, that so much had
Speaker 1: been kept secret, Sultan Mehmed's illness, his death, his intention
Speaker 1: that his son Ahmed should come to the throne without
Speaker 1: any bloodshed at all. Even the Imperial Council hadn't known
Speaker 1: about any of it. Kasimpasha ordered a hasty enthronement ceremony
Speaker 1: to be conducted within the palace. The new Sultan's throne
Speaker 1: was erected before a lavish gait. The royal clerics and
Speaker 1: advisers assembled for an oath swearing, But the entire time
Speaker 1: everyone kept glancing at the young sultan's only other brother,
Speaker 1: his half brother really, and only a child himself, a
Speaker 1: boy named Mustafa Kasim Pasha, and the rest of the
Speaker 1: palace likely expected that Ahmed becoming sultan meant death for Mustafa.
Speaker 1: Even though Mustafa at this point may have been no
Speaker 1: older than four years old, no one in the city
Speaker 1: could have forgotten the former sultan's barbaric slaughter of his
Speaker 1: own brothers as a way of securing the dynasty. Why
Speaker 1: wouldn't Mehmed's son Ahmed kill his own brother, the boy
Speaker 1: who might one day usurp his throne. Many noble blood
Speaker 1: episodes begin with a murder, an assassination, may be a poisoning.
Speaker 1: This episode is about an act of mercy. Mustafa was
Speaker 1: technically spared, but what does it mean to be spared
Speaker 1: when the rest of your life is written by others.
Speaker 1: Mustafa is rarely mentioned in scholarship on the Ottoman Empire,
Speaker 1: yet there are few other lives of the period that
Speaker 1: show so plainly that even future Ottoman sultans could not
Speaker 1: master their own circumstances. Because Mustafa would go on to
Speaker 1: become sultan, although he could not have known that that
Speaker 1: day as a child watching his half brother's enthronement ceremony.
Speaker 1: If that was to be a day of glory for
Speaker 1: the Odduennce Empire, it was a glory that Mustapha would
Speaker 1: never truly be able to baskin dead or alive. I'm
Speaker 1: Danish schwartz, and this is noble blood. According to a
Speaker 1: long standing tradition, officially codified in fourteen fifty one, Ottoman
Speaker 1: princes were expected to battle one another for the throne
Speaker 1: upon the death of their father, the Sultan. In the
Speaker 1: eyes of the court and the public, these were tests
Speaker 1: of divine grace, who had the mandate or devlet to
Speaker 1: rule every generation. Fratricidal wars spilled the blood of all
Speaker 1: potential heirs, minus the winning prince, whose progeny would carry
Speaker 1: out yet another round of merciless massacres. Every brother was
Speaker 1: a threat. When Ahmed and Mustapha's grandfather took the Ottoman
Speaker 1: throne in fifteen seventy four, he had his five brothers strangled.
Speaker 1: When their father, Sultan Mehmed, took the throne in fifteen
Speaker 1: ninety five, he had his nineteen brothers strangled some of
Speaker 1: them were as young as nine. According to one popular myth,
Speaker 1: paranoid about word spreading of the rather unsportsmanlike nature of
Speaker 1: this competition, the Sultan killed the very servants who had
Speaker 1: carried out the executions. Of course, no one in Istanbul
Speaker 1: needed to know the gruesome details to understand that those
Speaker 1: executions meet something of a mockery of what was supposed
Speaker 1: to be, in theory, at least, a noble tradition. In
Speaker 1: what world did strangling children prove one's right to rule?
Speaker 1: Historians and ambassadors from the period recall a shadow casting
Speaker 1: all over the city as nineteen coffins streamed into the
Speaker 1: Hya Sophia in descending size. The trauma from that massacre
Speaker 1: may have contributed to the new sultan, Ahmed decision to
Speaker 1: keep his half brother Mustapha alive after he took the
Speaker 1: throne in sixteen o three. In all likelihood, the Imperial
Speaker 1: council decided to keep the younger print around in case
Speaker 1: anything unexpected happened to Ahmed. One ambassador wrote that the
Speaker 1: teenage sultan was quote of white complexion and displayed a
Speaker 1: weak constitution. Only three months after his coronation, Ahmed contracted
Speaker 1: a frightful bout of smallpox that almost broke the nearly
Speaker 1: three hundred year line of Ottoman succession, but the disease
Speaker 1: luckily passed without severely harming the boy. It was commonly
Speaker 1: understood that Mustapha was, if anything, an insurance policy on
Speaker 1: the true air, and he would be an insurance policy
Speaker 1: that the Imperial Court wouldn't need as soon as Ahmed
Speaker 1: could produce progeny of his own. The boy king had
Speaker 1: to prove his virility before he could ever think of
Speaker 1: executing his brother, and the first step to that was circumcision.
Speaker 1: Ahmed was the first Ottoman ruler to be circumcised after
Speaker 1: he had already ascended to the throne. Normally, for any prince,
Speaker 1: circumcision entailed a lavish ceremony that symbolized a boy's transition
Speaker 1: into manhood and therefore political and sexual maturity. In the
Speaker 1: cold winter of sixteen o four, ahmed ceremony was likely
Speaker 1: a little less public and a little more restrained. The
Speaker 1: festival took place in the Palace Harem, where performers treated
Speaker 1: the court to staged plays, fireworks, and splendid musical arrangements.
Speaker 1: To many, the circumcision festivities felt more like a consolation
Speaker 1: than a reflection of the empire's splendor. Here was a
Speaker 1: young boy who was often ill, a boy who was
Speaker 1: of course childless, and worst of all, was a novice
Speaker 1: when it came to imperial administration. For all of the
Speaker 1: inefficiencies and bloodshed of the Ottoman succession system before Ahmed,
Speaker 1: it did have the advantage of sending young princes to
Speaker 1: provinces as a way of training them for future rule
Speaker 1: if they made it that far. Of course, Ahmed and
Speaker 1: Mustapha's father, Mehmed, was sent to the nearby city of
Speaker 1: Menisa for over ten years before he was invited to
Speaker 1: Istanbul to attempt to claim the sultanate. In that time,
Speaker 1: he established an administration of trusted viziers Anders, which he
Speaker 1: then brought to the Ottoman capital. When he became sultan,
Speaker 1: Ahmed didn't have the luxury of a decade of preparation.
Speaker 1: The court now was beset with factions opportunistic enemies raiding
Speaker 1: Ottoman border towns, and the fate of the empire itself
Speaker 1: hung in the balance at this point. Sometime around sixteen
Speaker 1: oh four, Mustafa nearly disappears from our sources. What we
Speaker 1: know with certainty is that Sultan Ahmed's imperial council locked
Speaker 1: Mustafa away in a heavily guarded part of the palace,
Speaker 1: a set of private chambers that the servants referred to
Speaker 1: as the cage. We can also presume that perpetual isolation
Speaker 1: from the outside world laid a heavy burden on the prince,
Speaker 1: not to mention that royal fraturessie was, up to this
Speaker 1: point a normal expectation that Mustapha certainly understood from his
Speaker 1: gilded palace. Right after Ahmed gained the throne, a Venetian
Speaker 1: ambassador caught a glimpse of Mustafa as a toddler and
Speaker 1: wrote that he was nurtured like an innocent little sheep
Speaker 1: who must soon go to the butchers. The specter of
Speaker 1: execution loomed over Mustafa's entire existence. Meanwhile, Sultan Ahmed occupied
Speaker 1: himself with restoring his vulnerable empire as soon as he
Speaker 1: could shake off the influence of his mother and his tutor.
Speaker 1: For the last decade, a faction from the empire's very
Speaker 1: own soldiers turned to banditry in the provinces, angered by
Speaker 1: the sparse pay given for their services. A new round
Speaker 1: of revolts had flared up in sixteen o five, which
Speaker 1: the fifteen year old Ahmed, eager to prove himself, wanted
Speaker 1: to crush with the might of his army. His mother
Speaker 1: wouldn't allow it, but when she died later that year
Speaker 1: from a drawn out illness, Ahmed left her mourning ceremony
Speaker 1: early for a military campaign, as though God were punishing
Speaker 1: the teenage sultan for his hubris. Ahmed suffered from a
Speaker 1: horrifying fever and he was forced to return from the
Speaker 1: front lines. His viziers would handle the campaign for the
Speaker 1: time being. Maybe that was for the best. Ahmed's reign
Speaker 1: would come to be best known for the work he
Speaker 1: did within the capital city itself, which might never have
Speaker 1: happened had he been busy out crushing rebels in the provinces.
Speaker 1: The Sultan Ahmed Mosque, known the world over as the
Speaker 1: Blue Mosque, is considered the crowning jewel of oddoman architecture
Speaker 1: and the second most famous building in Istanbul, only after
Speaker 1: the higha Sophia. For that project, Ahmed recruited the help
Speaker 1: of a new court favorite, the powerful chief Eunuch Mustafa
Speaker 1: Aga in the Ottoman Imperial court. The chief Unik served
Speaker 1: a particularly powerful rule. Eunichs traditionally attended to the women
Speaker 1: of the Imperial Harem, but over the years the role
Speaker 1: expanded into advising the Sultan as well. The chief eunich
Speaker 1: of Ahmed's reign was named Mustafa Aga. I know his
Speaker 1: name is also Mustafa, but he's different from the Mustafa.
Speaker 1: Our story is about the sultan half brother away in
Speaker 1: his cage. Anyway, Mustafa Aga, the eunuch, had nearly unlimited
Speaker 1: access to the private apartments of the Sultan, access to
Speaker 1: the Queen mother and the mothers of the Sultan's heirs.
Speaker 1: In that capacity, he controlled the flow of people and
Speaker 1: information through the palace, influencing Ahmed for his own benefit
Speaker 1: and leveraging a vast network of allies and patrons to
Speaker 1: carry out the Sultan's commands. He was a trusted ally
Speaker 1: and a master schemer. When Ahmed wanted to clear the
Speaker 1: site next to the Hia Sophia for his own ambitious
Speaker 1: mosque project, it was Mustafa Aga who found funding, who
Speaker 1: negotiated with the powerbrokers of the city, and who oversaw
Speaker 1: the construction. To this day, a verse of sixteen lines
Speaker 1: is etched into the side of the blue mosque. Eight
Speaker 1: lines celebrate Sultan Ahmed for his piety and judgment, and
Speaker 1: the other eight lines honor Mustafa Aga as though he
Speaker 1: were the Sultan's equal. Most importantly, for our story, Mustafa
Speaker 1: Aga curried so much favor with the Sultan that Ahmed
Speaker 1: even entrusted him with the supervision of his heirs. By
Speaker 1: the time the Blue Mosque was erected in sixteen seventeen,
Speaker 1: Ahmed had at least fifteen living children and eight male heirs.
Speaker 1: His two oldest sons, Osman and Mehmed, were the healthy,
Speaker 1: viable successors that the empire needed so desperately for the
Speaker 1: line of succession to remain intact. Technically, Ahmed no longer
Speaker 1: needed to keep his younger half brother, Mustafa alive. Why then,
Speaker 1: did execution never come From ages four to nineteen, Mustafa
Speaker 1: lived a severely secluded life and remained all but a
Speaker 1: mystery to the people of Istanbul. Historians don't agree on
Speaker 1: why Mustapha was allowed to live after the births of
Speaker 1: Ahmed's sons, but they do have their theories. One theory
Speaker 1: is that Ahmed's favorite consort, Kosam Sultan, the mother of
Speaker 1: Ahmed's second oldest son, recognized that her son's chances of
Speaker 1: survival as the second oldest son didn't look good. If
Speaker 1: the Sultan's brother Mustafa were killed, that would continue the
Speaker 1: tradition of fratricide. And if the beloved firstborn prince Osmond
Speaker 1: took the throne, that would mean fratricide for her son,
Speaker 1: the second son, Mehmed. It's possible that Kosam Sultan influenced
Speaker 1: Ahmed to keep Mustapha alive and thereby secure her own
Speaker 1: son's safety by breaking the tradition of fratricide. Another possibility
Speaker 1: lies with the Islamic jurists, whose interpretation and administration of
Speaker 1: Sharia law kept the power of the sultan in zech
Speaker 1: These jurists were already weary of familial executions during the
Speaker 1: reign of Ahmed and Mustafa's father, and for the Grand
Speaker 1: Mufti Asad, the chief jurist of the empire, keeping Mustafa
Speaker 1: alive served as a point of leverage in case Ahmed
Speaker 1: did anything that upset him and his faction of Islamic elites,
Speaker 1: they could, let's say, dethrone this particular sultan without risking
Speaker 1: the complete collapse of the institution. Finally, one last theory
Speaker 1: is that Mustafa was simply mad. He was deemed too
Speaker 1: mentally unfit to be considered a serious contender for the throne,
Speaker 1: and so there would be no point in executing him.
Speaker 1: This is by far the most commonly cited theory explaining
Speaker 1: Mustafa's survival, but notice how it conflicts with the other two.
Speaker 1: Was Mustafa too mad to rule? Or was he just
Speaker 1: mad enough for a court faction to keep under their
Speaker 1: control should Ahmed disappoint them. Whatever the reasons for his service,
Speaker 1: Mustafa outlived his older brother in sixteen seventeen, a grave
Speaker 1: stomach ailment, probably Typhus, consumed the already weak Sultan Ahmed.
Speaker 1: Ahmed's death was a contingency that an inner court faction
Speaker 1: led by the Grand Mufti Asad, had already accounted for.
Speaker 1: Asad was the first to hear of the Sultan's death
Speaker 1: on the night of November twenty first, when he immediately
Speaker 1: convened with other major statesmen to finalize the details of succession.
Speaker 1: This wouldn't be difficult, would it. Ahmed had two viable
Speaker 1: heirs of his own, and could therefore resume the long
Speaker 1: standing tradition of passing the sultanate to his sons, who
Speaker 1: would then compete for the throne. The chief eunuch Mustafa
Speaker 1: Aga certainly advocated for that position, after all, he had
Speaker 1: essentially raised the boys himself. But according to Asad's contrived
Speaker 1: interpretation of ancient law, Osman and Mehmed, the two sons,
Speaker 1: then aged fourteen and thirteen, were too young for the sultanate,
Speaker 1: never mind that Ahmed himself had been only thirteen when
Speaker 1: he was enthroned. No, the Grand Mufti proclaimed in the
Speaker 1: Secret Council only the nineteen year old Mustafa had the
Speaker 1: mandate to rule. The next morning, the forlorn brother of
Speaker 1: Ahmed emerged from his cage after fifteen years in captivity.
Speaker 1: In a twist of fate, Mustapha was now a sultan,
Speaker 1: but not necessarily a free man. The same court that
Speaker 1: had propelled him into power could just as easily stuff
Speaker 1: him back into the recesses of palace chambers. Mustapha Tufah's
Speaker 1: sovereignty would come with a heavy price. As in all
Speaker 1: succession crisses, the coronation had winners and losers. On the
Speaker 1: winning side was the Grand Mufti Asad and his faction
Speaker 1: of jurists, who felt more confident about their power over
Speaker 1: the new sultanate. Joining their ranks of winners was Mustafa's mother,
Speaker 1: Halime Sultan, who had been locked away in took copy
Speaker 1: palace just like her son, but who now emerged into
Speaker 1: a position of conspicuous power. On the losing side was
Speaker 1: the chief eunuch, Mustafa Aga, who had spent more than
Speaker 1: a decade preparing Osman and Mehmed for rule, no doubt,
Speaker 1: a rule that would be amenable to his interests, only
Speaker 1: to be sidelined in the last moment by the once
Speaker 1: insurance policy half brother. Mustafa, and of course Prince Osman
Speaker 1: felt he had been betrayed as the true heir to
Speaker 1: the throne. This succession was abnormal by all accounts. It
Speaker 1: was the first time that the brother of the sultan
Speaker 1: and not a viable son, inherited the throne. Mustapha Aga
Speaker 1: began organizing a coup against Sultan Mustafa almost immediately. He
Speaker 1: called upon an ally in the navy named Ali Pasha,
Speaker 1: who could leverage his connections with Ottoman merchants to sow
Speaker 1: discontent in Mustafa and support for jan Osman. Getting the
Speaker 1: public on his side was another matter. The public had
Speaker 1: to be convinced that Mustafa was incompetent. Established law dictated
Speaker 1: that a sultan needed to be old enough to rule,
Speaker 1: but it also dictated that he needed to be of
Speaker 1: sound mind. The French ambassador to the Imperial Palace recorded
Speaker 1: in one of his letters that Mustafa Aga was disseminating
Speaker 1: or at least magnifying rumors about Mustafa's supposed madness. According
Speaker 1: to one rumor, the sultan embarrassed his viziers during audiences
Speaker 1: as he wouldn't stop unraveling their turbans and yanking their beards.
Speaker 1: Another rumor claimed Mustafa would throw money to birds and
Speaker 1: fish when he sailed upon the Bosphorus. Mustafa AGA's vicious
Speaker 1: rumor mill presents us with a predicament, how do we
Speaker 1: separate fact from fiction? If so many of the sources
Speaker 1: we have on Sultan Mustafa are colored by the obviously
Speaker 1: biased campaign the chief Eunuch was waging to discredit the
Speaker 1: new monarch? Is there a chance Sultan Mustafa wasn't nearly
Speaker 1: as mad as history made him out to be. There
Speaker 1: is no doubt that Mustafa wasn't treated the same as
Speaker 1: other sultans before him. The coins minted during his reign
Speaker 1: still bear the face of his older brother and his father.
Speaker 1: But then again, Mustafa may not have ruled long enough
Speaker 1: for the coins to change design. We also know that
Speaker 1: while most royal correspondents was handled by a male counselor,
Speaker 1: Mustapha's letters were strangely drafted by a female slave from
Speaker 1: the Harem who doubled as Mustapha's tutor. Then again, Ahmed
Speaker 1: didn't allow Mustapha to have any contact with others, with
Speaker 1: the exception of female servants and his own mother back
Speaker 1: when he was imprisoned. We have evidence to support the
Speaker 1: idea that Mustapha was an active participant in his administration.
Speaker 1: He's reported to have taken great interest in inspecting Istanbul's
Speaker 1: arsenal and docs. French ambassador wrote that Mustafa even contemplated
Speaker 1: leading a campaign against the Sephavids. It's also worth noting
Speaker 1: that Mustapha had been imprisoned in the palace for fifteen
Speaker 1: important developmental years. What manifested as madness might have been
Speaker 1: the consequences of that isolation. Either way, for all of
Speaker 1: the chief Eunuch's insistence on discrediting the monarch in the
Speaker 1: public eye, his campaign may have actually had the unintended
Speaker 1: consequence of suggesting that the new Sultan was in fact
Speaker 1: a holy man. Throughout the pre modern world, madness and
Speaker 1: holiness converged in unexpected ways. The thirteenth century mystic Saint
Speaker 1: Francis of Assisi honored those that lived as fools in
Speaker 1: the eyes of men, but sages in the eyes of God.
Speaker 1: The sixteenth century Teresa of Avila gained a noise we're
Speaker 1: miss renown for her visions of Christ and bouts of
Speaker 1: religious ecstasy. Some of Istanbul's populace saw elements of Mustapha's
Speaker 1: madness as proof of his divinity. They referred to him
Speaker 1: as belli or saint. An English diplomat to the Ottoman
Speaker 1: Empire had the following choice words for the new sultan.
Speaker 1: He is esteemed a holy man that hath visions and
Speaker 1: angelic speculations. In plain terms, between a madman and a fool.
Speaker 1: None of these alternative accounts of the sultan mattered in
Speaker 1: the court politics that slowly pointed in mustapha AGA's favor.
Speaker 1: For the first couple months of Sultan Mustapha's reign, the
Speaker 1: only major statesman pushing for Osmond taking the throne had
Speaker 1: been the Chief Eunuch and his naval Admiral Ali Pasha.
Speaker 1: But when news broke that Mustafa planned on replacing the
Speaker 1: existing Grand Vizier with his own brother in law, the
Speaker 1: Imperial Council swerved in favor of a coup. Mustafa Aga
Speaker 1: struck a deal with the elite army corps in the city,
Speaker 1: the janissaries to swear fealty to Osmon in return for
Speaker 1: a generous shipment of Buyan. Assad, once devoted to Mustafa's cause,
Speaker 1: resigned himself to accepting Osmond's inevitable ascension. On the morning
Speaker 1: of Monday, February twenty sixth, sixteen eighteen, the Chief Eunuch
Speaker 1: guided the Sultan to a remote, suspiciously familiar apartment of
Speaker 1: the palace, making up some excuse along the way. We
Speaker 1: can only speculate what it must have felt like when
Speaker 1: Sultan Mustafa realized he was being led back to the cage.
Speaker 1: Mustapha Aga politely asked the Sultan to wait inside before
Speaker 1: he exited the room, and had a servant lock the
Speaker 1: door from the outside. With Mustapha locked away, all of
Speaker 1: the court swore allegiance to the fourteen year old Osmon,
Speaker 1: and not a peep of outcry was heard in the city.
Speaker 1: Mustapha's reign had lasted a little under three months. Osmond
Speaker 1: and his allies in court promptly began erasing Osmond's uncle's
Speaker 1: short rule from memory, part of the reason we know
Speaker 1: so little about Mustapha in the first place. One courtier
Speaker 1: referred to the reign of Mustapha as the false dawn
Speaker 1: before Osmond's real dawn. Sultan Osmon was much like his
Speaker 1: father Ahmed. He was extraordinarily pious, so much so that
Speaker 1: he opted for simple, ascetic attire over the lavish robes
Speaker 1: of his predecessors. He even went so far as to
Speaker 1: take up legal wives instead of traditional concubines, and he
Speaker 1: banned the consumption of tobacco, a wicked weed introduced by
Speaker 1: the English, which was, according to Osman, corrupting the souls
Speaker 1: and minds of his subjects Ahmed may have built a
Speaker 1: mosque that recalled the heavens, but Osmon was purifying the
Speaker 1: soul of his empire. Osmond was also purifying his court
Speaker 1: of competitors. Before heading into a campaign against the Polish,
Speaker 1: he executed his own half brother, Mehmed, but once again
Speaker 1: he kept Mustapha alive, as though his uncle no longer
Speaker 1: posed a threat after being so severely discredited and dethroned.
Speaker 1: When Osmon returned from war, dissatisfied with the conduct of
Speaker 1: his troops, he made covert plans to reform the army
Speaker 1: with mercenaries he hired from the South, the very same
Speaker 1: mercenaries who had rebelled against his father, Sultan Ahmed. Rumors
Speaker 1: spread like wildfire, as did contempt within the Janissary Corps.
Speaker 1: Not only was Osmond planning on sidelining the beating heart
Speaker 1: of the Empire's military, he was going to staff his
Speaker 1: new army with former traders. The Sultan made up some
Speaker 1: excuse to begin his recruitment expedition, proclaiming that he was
Speaker 1: going to take pilgrimage to Mecca in the auspicious year
Speaker 1: of sixteen twenty two. Except no sultan before Osman ever
Speaker 1: issued plans to take Haj. Even the mufties the religious
Speaker 1: jurists of the city begged the young Sultan not to leave,
Speaker 1: knowing full well he was headed on a collision course
Speaker 1: with the Janissary Corps. Sure enough, the city's troops gathered
Speaker 1: outdid the Hya Sophia. As Sultan Osman prepared to leave.
Speaker 1: They decried Osman's betrayal and demanded that the monarch both
Speaker 1: stay put in the city and execute his closest advisers.
Speaker 1: Osman agreed to remain in Istanbul, but he scoffed at
Speaker 1: the idea of killing any of his viziers. Enraged, the
Speaker 1: crowd turned into a mob, entering the palace, seizing Mustapha
Speaker 1: from his cage and forcing all of the courtiers they
Speaker 1: could find to swear allegiance to the man they now
Speaker 1: proclaimed was sultan again. As the story goes, the former
Speaker 1: Sultan Osman disguised himself amidst the chaos and fled to
Speaker 1: the chambers of the janissary's commanders, where, in a poor
Speaker 1: attempt to work out a deal, he was assassinated in
Speaker 1: the first regicide the Empire had ever seen. The Janissaries,
Speaker 1: the jurists, and the people had just had enough. A
Speaker 1: messenger brought the severed ear of Osman to Mustafa as
Speaker 1: proof of just that. A little over three years after
Speaker 1: he had been deposed in favor of his nephew, Mustafa
Speaker 1: returned to the throne again. The first act of his
Speaker 1: second reign was to execute all the conspirators who were
Speaker 1: responsible for Osman's death, But it seems that quick act
Speaker 1: of justice wasn't enough to settle Mustapha's mind. He wept
Speaker 1: before his courtiers for the most unexpected reasons. He had
Speaker 1: bouts of bliss, followed by episodes of rage. It said
Speaker 1: that the Sultan often woke up in the dead of night,
Speaker 1: calling out to his nephews to relieve him of this burden.
Speaker 1: What burden? The burden of being sultan? The burden of
Speaker 1: surviving Osman's regicide caused an uproar across the empire. The
Speaker 1: governor of one province in what is now northeast Turkey
Speaker 1: led a revolt against the janissaries. Meanwhile, Polish troops took
Speaker 1: advantage of the instability and raided border towns. When Mustafa
Speaker 1: supposedly called for the execution of Ahmed's seven remaining heirs,
Speaker 1: young children no older than twelve, the Imperial Council finally
Speaker 1: dethroned him. Four months after being put upon the throne
Speaker 1: a second time, Mustafa returned to his cage, this time
Speaker 1: for good. He passed the hours, days, seasons another sixteen
Speaker 1: years within his ornate prison, until he died in sixteen
Speaker 1: thirty nine, around the age of forty. Historians regularly described
Speaker 1: Mustafa as a sort of puppet, controlled by the jurists,
Speaker 1: the janissaries, and his own family. But if the events
Speaker 1: of Mustafa's life were any indication, he wasn't alone. Every
Speaker 1: Ottoman sultan after Ahmed had less power to execute the
Speaker 1: royal competitors, for one, but also to impose their will
Speaker 1: upon the janissaries or to ignore the word of the clergy.
Speaker 1: Mustafa was not really unique as a puppet. Rather, there
Speaker 1: were just so many more players who could pull the strings.
Speaker 1: Royals could be brought out to dance and then stuffed
Speaker 1: back into the closet, from whence they came, not quite dead,
Speaker 1: but never quite alive. That's the story of Sultan Mustafa.
Speaker 1: But keep listening after a brief sponsor break, to hear
Speaker 1: a little bit more about another of the Sultan's brothers.
Speaker 1: There's one nasty little detail we've left out of the
Speaker 1: already tormented life of Mustafa, namely the fact that he
Speaker 1: had a full brother named Mohmed, whom Mustapha never actually
Speaker 1: got the chance to meet. In fifteen ninety six, when
Speaker 1: the Austrians invaded the part of modern day Hungry, then
Speaker 1: ruled by the Ottomans, Mustapha's father, Mehmed, saddled up for retaliation.
Speaker 1: It was typical for sultans to lead, or at least
Speaker 1: pretend to lead their armies into battle as a way
Speaker 1: of signifying their own right to rule. Mehmed undoubtedly felt
Speaker 1: that pressure. But after reaching Hungary and catching wind of
Speaker 1: an Austrian army some fifty five thousand men strong, the
Speaker 1: king wished to disband his forces and scamper back to Istanbul.
Speaker 1: His advisers pushed him to stay, and he relented, but
Speaker 1: in the middle of the battle itself, Mehmed again wanted
Speaker 1: to flee. His army didn't have that choice. The Austrian
Speaker 1: troops drove the Ottomans back to their camps, and then
Speaker 1: they began plundering the tents. Distracted by the promise of treasure,
Speaker 1: the Austrians never saw all the Ottoman horse groomers, cooks,
Speaker 1: and royal attendants assembling themselves into a makeshift fighting force.
Speaker 1: Shocked and disheveled, the Austrians were driven back by an
Speaker 1: army wielding ladles and hammers. Of course, Sultan Mehmed took
Speaker 1: credit for the miraculous victory in Hunger. He returned to
Speaker 1: Istanbul at the head of a triumphant procession, marching to
Speaker 1: the roaring applause of the people. Despite the fact that
Speaker 1: he played no real important role in the victory, to
Speaker 1: the people of Istanbul, to the army, and even to
Speaker 1: his own sons, he was a hero. His son, Mahmud,
Speaker 1: then fifteen years old, implored his father to send him
Speaker 1: on a similar expedition, this time against the Sephovid threat
Speaker 1: to the east. After all, it was customary for the
Speaker 1: sultan to send his sons to the provinces to gain
Speaker 1: experience on the battlefield. Sultan Mehmed, however, couldn't seepass his
Speaker 1: own paranoia. Was this a customary right or an attempt
Speaker 1: at usurping power from the father? Rumor spread that Mahmud
Speaker 1: planned to take his father's throne. The king called upon
Speaker 1: the Grand Mufti, the leading Islamic daist in the empire,
Speaker 1: to see if he could secure legal sanction to execute
Speaker 1: his son. The Grand Mufti wouldn't entertain an audience on
Speaker 1: the matter, so the king went to the second most
Speaker 1: powerful jurist in Istanbul, and while that Mufti wasn't particularly
Speaker 1: pleased about the circumstances, he relented to the Sultan's wishes.
Speaker 1: An English diplomat in Istanbul at the time recorded the
Speaker 1: exchange between king and cleric in a report. In this council,
Speaker 1: the Mufti was of the opinion by their law without witness,
Speaker 1: the prince Mahammud could not be put to death. Yet,
Speaker 1: perceiving that nothing but his death would satisfy the father,
Speaker 1: the Mufti condescended and gave sentence that it's better that
Speaker 1: the son were deprived of his life than the father
Speaker 1: live in fear and jealousy. It was decided. The Sultan
Speaker 1: received his stamp of approval, ordered his son beaten into confession,
Speaker 1: and finally executed him in the same way he had
Speaker 1: executed nineteen brothers at the hands of mute servants who
Speaker 1: could never tell a lie nor tell the truth. When
Speaker 1: the Sultan died only six months later, the very death
Speaker 1: that started this episode, when his son Ahmed would take
Speaker 1: the throne, They say it was because of the immense
Speaker 1: grief he felt at the loss of his son. That
Speaker 1: seems too convenient for a story about royal tragedy. After all,
Speaker 1: Mehmed was no alien to the execution of close family members.
Speaker 1: A letter from a Venetian diplomat in Istanbul gives us
Speaker 1: a more likely explanation. It was probably the plague or
Speaker 1: maybe a stroke. Noble Blood is a production of iHeart
Speaker 1: Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky. Noble Blood
Speaker 1: is created and hosted by me Dana Schwort, with additional
Speaker 1: writing and researching by Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Mira Hayward,
Speaker 1: Courtney Sender, and Lori Goodman. The show is edited and
Speaker 1: produced by Noemi Griffin and rima Il Kahali, with supervising
Speaker 1: producer Josh Thain and executive producers Aaron Manke, Alex Williams,
Speaker 1: and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows.