Appendix 3 Chronology

1494 Suleiman is born to Prince Selim and Hafsa on 6 November, in Trabizon.

ca. 1505 Roxolana is born to Orthodox priest Havrylo and wife Leksandra Lisovsky in Rohatyn, Red Rus (Ruthenia).

1509 Suleiman is appointed governor of Bolu, in Anatolia.

1509-12 Suleiman is appointed governor of Kefe (Caffa; Kaffa),

in the Crimea.

1512 Selim I ascends to the throne.

1513 Suleiman is appointed governor of Manisa.

1515 Prince Mustafa is born to Mahidevran (Gulbahar/Gulbehar).

ca. 1515 Roxolana is abducted in one of the Tatar slave raids on Red Rus.

1520 Selim I dies on 22 September; Suleiman ascends to the throne on

30 September.

1521 Suleiman invades Hungary and captures Belgrade (29 August); Hurrem gives birth to her first son Mehmed (d. 1543).

1522 Suleiman captures Rhodes; the Knights of St. John flee to Malta; Hurrem gives birth to daughter Mihrimah (d. 1578) and son Abdullah (d. 1526).

1523 Ibrahim Pasha, close friend of Suleiman I, is appointed Grand Vizier.

1524 Ibrahim marries Suleiman’s sister, Hatice Sultan; Hurrem gives birth to son Selim (d. 1574).

1525 Hurrem gives birth to son Bayazid (d. 1561).

1526 Suleiman’s army destroys the Hungarian forces at Mohacs on the Danube; Venetian bailo Pietro Bragadino writes his report to the Senate, in which he lists Roxolana’s three sons (Selim, Morat, and Mamet)—the earliest mention of Roxolana in western diplomatic documents.

1529 Suleiman’s army besieges Vienna in September-October.

1530 Circumcision of Princes Mehmed and Mustafa on 27 May.

1531 Hurrem gives birth to son Jihangir (d. 1553).

1532 Suleiman’s Austrian campaign.

1533 Suleiman’s mother and valide sultan, Hafsa, dies.

1534 Mahidevran leaves the harem, following her son Mustafa to Manisa; Suleiman weds Hurrem in a legal ceremony.

1534-36 Suleiman’s Persian campaign against the Safavids.

1536 Grand Vizier Ibrahim Pasha is executed on 15 March.

1536 (or Hurrem moves the harem from Eskiserai to the Sultan’s Palace 1541) (Topkapi).

1538-39 Hurrem s chantable complex is built by Sinan in the Aksaray district of Istanbul.

1539 Hurrem’s daughter Mihrimah marries Rustem Pasha.

1541 Prince Mustafa is removed from Manisa and appointed governor of Amasia.

1543 Suleiman’s second Austrian campaign (the siege of Budapest); Hurrem’s eldest son and projected heir apparent, Mehmed, dies.

1544 Rustem Pasha is appointed Grand Vizier.

1545 Italian traveler Luigi Bassano da Zara describes the Turks’ hatred of Hurrem in his travelogue I costumi et i modi particolari della vita de Turchi.

1548-49 Suleiman’s second Safavid campaign.

1550 Roxolana is mentioned as Suleiman’s beloved wife in the chronicle, Michalonis Litvani de moribus tartarorum, litvanorum et moschorum, by Mikhalon Lituanus, the Lithuanian ambassador to the Crimea.

1550-57 Construction of the Suleymaniye mosque by Sinan.

1553-55 Suleiman’s third Safavid campaign.

1553 Prince Mustafa is strangled in Suleiman’s tent in Aleppo on

6 October; Jihangir dies shortly after Mustafa; Mustafa’s troops revolt; Rustem Pasha is dismissed from the post of Grand Vizier; anonymous report of Mustapha’s murder, “Relazione anonima della guerra di Persia dell’anno 1553,” is written from Aleppo and sent to Venice.

1554 Venetian bailo Domenico Trevisano writes his report of Mustapha’s murder; Suleiman’s third Safavid campaign; Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq arrives at the Sublime Porte as Ambassador of Emperor Ferdinand I.

1555 Rustem Pasha is reinstated in the position of Grand Vizier; Nicholas de Moffan’s pamphlet, Soltani Solymanni, Tvrcarum Imperatoris, horrendum facinus..., is published in Basel and is promptly translated into German, French, Spanish, and other languages.

1557 Hurrem’s endowment is built in the al-Sitt district of Jerusalem

1558 Hurrem dies on April 18; she is buried in a mausoleum near Suleymaniye.

1559 Civil war escalates between Selim and Bayazid; Bayazid and family flee to Persia.

1561 Bayazid and his sons are executed in Tabriz in September.

1562 Ambassador Busbecq leaves Istanbul for Europe.

1565 Unsuccessful siege of Malta by Suleiman’s forces.

1566 Suleiman dies during the siege of Szigetvar on 7 September; Selim II ascends to throne.

1571 Formation of the Holy League against the Turks; Selim II loses the Battle of Lepanto.