Suleiman The Magnificent 1520 1566 (10 page)

ding of blood.—Word came to him, also, that the Knights were deeply discouraged. They too had lost heavily; their powder was running ominously short. Information kept reaching the Sultan, sometimes by blunted arrows with messages attached, discharged from the city into the Ottoman camp, sometimes from deserters who dropped from the walls, that the Knights would be willing to consider a surrender on terms satisfactory to themselves. On December 10, the defenders were delighted and amazed to see a white flag, indicative of a desire for parley, hoisted aloft over the Sultan's headquarters. They made haste to respond with another. Shortly afterwards two Turkish emissaries appeared with an official letter from Suleiman, requesting an interview with the Grand Master. The latter replied by despatching a Knight and a burgess of Rhodes to the Sultan's camp to learn what he had to propose.

Suleiman's terms were indeed generous. In return for the surrender and evacuation of Rhodes and the adjacent islands by the Knights, they were to be permitted to depart unmolested, taking with them all their transportable property, and such of the Greek population as desired to accompany them, while those who wished to remain were to be guaranteed undisturbed possession of their houses and property, complete religious liberty, and five years' exemption from tribute. When the Christian envoys returned, with the Sultan's proposals, to the city, the opinion in favor of their acceptance was almost unanimous. 21 Much weight was laid on Martinengo's professional verdict that the fortress was no longer defensible. A three-days' truce was accordingly arranged to settle details, but unfortunately it only served to bring about a reopening of hostilities. The most probable story is that the Grand Master, thinking that it might still be possible to persuade Suleiman to depart with his object

^Fontanus, Ad Adriamim Pont. M. Epistola, fol. a til verso.

yo Suleiman the Magnificent

unachieved, sent two Knights out to the seraskier, bearing a letter written a half-century earlier by Bayezid II to one of Villiers de L'Isle Adam's predecessors, in which the Knights were guaranteed the free possession of Rhodes as long as the House of Osman should rule over the Turks; that the seraskier promptly tore the letter in two and trampled it under foot, cut off the noses and ears of two soldiers whom he had newly captured, and sent them back to the Grand Master with a missive of insult and abuse. In any case, we know that Suleiman at once ordered the bombardment to be resumed. On December 18 the Turks broke through the Spanish bastion and established themselves for the first time inside the walls. The garrison had now reached the limits of its endurance. The prospect of long continued street-fighting was horrifying, and the Grand Master finally yielded to the clamor of the citizenry, who dreaded the fate of a town taken by storm. On December 21, he dispatched a Knight and two burgesses to the Sultan to arrange terms of surrender. The following is a free translation of the Latin document in which the ambassador of the Order announced the event to the government of France:

In the year 1522 from the Virgin birth, and in the papacy of Adrian VI, Suleiman the Emperor of the Turks, with a fleet of three hundred ships, and two hundred thousand soldiers, landed at Rhodes on the feast of St. John the Baptist. He blockaded the city until Christinas day by land and sea, pushing up to it mines to the number of 52, and throwing in all day and all night more than 85,000 balls of brass and stone of stupendous size. He had also assaulted it twenty times, when P. VHliers de L'Isle Adam, who, though he had received no supplies or reinforcements, had defended it with a few Knights with the utmost constancy and courage, and had killed a hundred and twenty thousand of the enemy, was at length overcome by time. Suleiman had overthrown the walls;

during forty days he had held the ground of the city for the space of a hundred and fifty paces in depth and width, and though obstinately eager for victory, he nevertheless proposed peace. The Grand Master acted towards him with the utmost prudence and magnanimity, and came to terms of surrender as follows:

"Suleiman stipulates that the Latin and Military Order shall leave the city and island of Rhodes within ten days: they shall withdraw their garrisons everywhere; he agrees that their departure shall be free and safe.

"P. Villiers de L'Isle Adam stipulates, in accordance with the opinion of the Common Council of the Latin Knights and soldiers and of the citizens of Rhodes, that any postponement of their departure shall be in the hands of the Latin and Military Order. On the departure of the Latin and Military Order, they shall have the right to carry away with them arms, weapons, engines of war, and all material of war from the fortresses. Those who remain in Rhodes shall be free from all payment of tribute for five years. They shall have the perpetual right to oifer service to Christ; they may build new churches if they please or repair old ones; they shall always be .permitted to have the care of their children.

"No one shall be forced to leave Rhodes against his will; and every one, both Latin and Greek, who does not at this time follow the Order, shall have the free and safe right to depart at any time within three years with all his property and household. Ships and supplies are to be furnished as far as Crete for the Order and its followers.

"Suleiman shall solemnly swear, in accordance with the ancestral customs and laws of his country, that these agreements shall forever be maintained, free from treachery or guile." 22

The account of the siege was biassed and inaccurate, and the terms of M the surrender as given were self-contradictory at points; but the Order had certainly put up a

^Charriere, I, 92-93.

masterly bit of "face-saving" for the benefit of Western Christendom.

Hostages were exchanged, and the bulk of the Ottoman army was withdrawn from the vicinity of the town; only a small body of the Janissaries was permitted to enter it to take possession. Unfortunately some freshly arrived troops got out of hand, forced their way into the city, profaned the churches and maltreated the inhabitants before order could be restored; but there is no evidence that Su-leirnan was in any way responsible for these outrages. On Christmas Day he made his own triumphal entry into Rhodes, and thereafter expressed a wish to see the Grand Master, who accordingly waited on him, but was kept for hours in attendance before he was invested with a robe of honor and admitted to the Sultan's presence. When at last the foes were face to face, they gazed at one another for a time in a silence which Suleiman was the first to break. He condoled with his adversary; he assured him that it was the lot of all princes to lose cities and realms, and praised his gallant defence. 23 A week later, on the eve of his departure, when the Grand Master came to kiss the Sultan's hand and offer him a present of four golden vessels, Suleiman assured his favorite, Ibrahim, that "it caused him great sorrow to be obliged to force this Christian in his old age to abandon his home and his belongings." 2 *

On January i, 1523, the Grand Master left Rhodes for-ever, with the last detachment of the Knights. Only 180 of them in all, and 1500 mercenaries and armed citizens, had survived to make their departure. Before they could reach Crete, a hurricane destroyed several of their smaller vessels, and forced many of the fugitives on the others to throw overboard their few remaining possessions. The governor of Crete received them kindly, and enabled them

23 Fontanus, De Bello Rhodio, fols. K i verso—K ii recto. 24 Hammer, V, 41.

to continue their journey to Sicily and Rome, where the Order acted as the guard at the conclave which elected Pope Clement VII For five years more they remained homeless; in 1528, a subsidiary branch of them was established in Tripoli; finally, in 1530, the Emperor granted them the islands of Malta and Gozzo, where we shall hear of them again. 25 Villiers de L'Isle Adam died at Malta in 1534.

Suleiman installed garrisons on Rhodes and the adjacent islands, and also at the continental outpost of the Order at Budrun. On January 6, 1523, he started back to Constantinople. In addition to his conquest of the great fortress, he had succeeded before his departure in getting hold of a son of the celebrated Prince Jem, the brother of Bayezid II, who had become a Christian and lived with the Knights. In accordance with the inexorable custom of the House of Osman, he and his children were promptly put to death. As no mention is made of the prince in the terms of the capitulation, and as it must have been evident that the Sultan would be most anxious to get possession of him, it would appear that the Grand Master had tacitly consented to give him up. If so, it is the only stain on his otherwise noble and heroic conduct. In the meantime formal notification of the great victory had been duly despatched to the chief officers and judges of the Empire, and also to its principal neighbors to the east and the west. Prominent among the congratulations which Suleiman received when he reached his capital at the end of the month were those sent him by the Shah of Persia and the government of Venice. Certainly the Sultan had done enough to shatter the delusions which Europe had fondly cherished two years before. He was not the "gentle lamb" which the Western powers had supposed him to be, but rather a mighty conqueror, who had brilliantly succeeded in two difficult and conspicuous

25 Cf. R. B. M., Ill, 295, 343 n.

undertakings which had defied all the efforts of his predecessors.

Rhodes had indeed been won at a frightful cost. Even if we accept the lowest Christian estimate of the Turkish losses, we find that they numbered ten times that of the defenders. Yet there are certain considerations which should constantly be borne in mind in connection with this and all the other Turkish military operations, and especially the Turkish sieges, of the period. They go far to explain what otherwise would be impossible to account for. In the first place, the bulk of the Ottoman armies still consisted of feudal Timariot cavalry, wellnigh useless in capturing fortresses. Moreover, this cavalry was really only available during the warmer months of the year. If they were kept in service till November, their horses died, and they either mutinied or melted away. In fact, it may be truthfully said that the entire Turkish army was essentially a summer force. The Sultan usually accompanied it on its campaigns; and the Sultan, who dominated every department of the Ottoman state, was obliged to go back, with his chief ministers, to Constantinople during the winter months, to deal with the problems of internal government. There appear to have been only three, or at most four, occasions, during his entire reign, when Suleiman was absent from the Porte at the Christian New Year. And when the Sultan returned to his capital, it was customary that his household troops should return with him. Of these the Janissaries were by far the most important, but the Janissaries, at Suleiman's accession, numbered a bare 12,000 men. Only a portion of them, moreover, can have been present at Rhodes. Three thousand, as we have already seen, had been left to garrison Belgrade; there were 500 more at Cairo; there must also have been small detachments at Constantinople, and in outposts recently con-

quered. What, then, was the Sultan's army composed of, when he landed at Rhodes, in the summer of 1522? A lot of feudal cavaky, whose usefulness steadily diminished; a nucleus of perhaps 8,000 Janissaries; some 30,000 topji, or regularly trained artillerymen; an enormous number of azabs, or lightly armed irregulars, who were only employed in time of war or for such duties as garrison work; and finally the hordes of Christian peasant captives who, as we have akeady seen, had been conveyed to the scene of action to dig trenches and parallels under fire. These last, and the azabs, were hurled forward in repeated attacks till the trenches were filled with their dead bodies—like the Germans at the Albert Canal in 1940—50 that at the right moment the Janissaries might be brought forward to launch the decisive attack. The system was callous and wasteful; but it is difficult to -see how Suleiman, in view of the resources at his disposal, could have adopted any other. In any case there can be no doubt that, in the eyes of the Sultan and his people, the glory and profit of the conquest of the "Stronghold of the Hellhounds" far outweighed any sacrifices it may have cost.

Mohacs

L/nring the three years that followed the capture of Rhodes, Suleiman was content to rest on his laurels, and we hear little or nothing of the clash of arms. In the annals of the court and administration the most noteworthy incident of this period wa,s the unprecedented rise of Ibrahim Pasha. He was by birth a Christian Greek, the son of a sailor from the town of Parga on the Ionian Sea. As a child he was carried off by pirates and sold to a widow at Magnesia, who had him carefully educated. From her he passed into the hands of Suleiman at the time of the latter's residence there as prince governor, and when his master came to the throne, Ibrahim was at once promoted to the post of grand falconer and chief of the corps of pages. As time went on, the Sultan became more and more attached to him, and heaped on him one mark of distinction after another. The favorite, who was one year older than his master, was handsome, very intelligent, and quickwitted. Besides Turkish, he knew Persian, Greek, and Italian; he played on the viol, and he delighted in the reading of history and romances. In 1523 Piri Pasha, the old Grand Vizir, who had already lost influence because he had opposed the expedition against Rhodes, was dismissed with a pension. The vacant dignity was conferred not, as men had expected, on the next vizir, Ahmed Pasha, who had been seraskier during the latter part of the siege, but on Ibrahim, who was also made beylerbey of Rumelia, that is, the chief governor of European Turkey. He lived

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on terms of the closest intimacy with his sovereign, often eating at the same table, and sleeping in the same tent. On June 22, 1524, he married a sister of the Sultan, and the wedding was celebrated with the utmost magnificence. 1 Too much importance, however, should not be attached to this particular mark of honor, of which there are many instances in Turkish history. Direct connection with the House of Osman was no insurance against danger and disgrace. Indeed, it was only four months later that Suleiman, as we have already seen, commanded the execution of his brother-in-law, the vizir Ferhad Pasha. Another distinction which Ibrahim received at the same time was far more impressive to the Oriental mind. The horse-tail, or old nomad standard (called the bunchuk), was the recognized emblem of dignity in office, and four horse-tails were ordinarily conferred with the rank of Grand Vizir; but Ibrahim, alone of those who filled the post in Ottoman annals, was granted no less than six, only one less than the Sultan himself. Ahmed Pasha could not bear to witness the success of his rival, and obtained for himself the post of governor of Egypt. There he soon rose in vengeful revolt, in the hope of making himself independent sovereign of the land. As Egypt had only recently been conquered, and the Mamelukes had been permitted to retain much power, the danger was serious; but Ahmed's efforts were foiled by a conspiracy among his own followers, and his severed head was sent back to Constantinople. Ibrahim was despatched to Egypt in the autumn of 1524 to restore order, and made his state entry into Cairo in the following March amid celebrations of unprecedented splendor.

1 The most recent authority on Ibrahim is Hester D. Jenkins, Ibrahim Pasha (New York: Columbia University, 1911). The arguments advanced therein (pp. 24-25) to prove that he was a eunuch seern to me wholly unconvincing; on the other hand it must be admitted that marriages of sultanas to eunuchs were not uncommon. Miss Jenkins thinks that "Ibrahim probably married the sister of Suleiman . . ." because "it had never been deemed advisable that the daughters of sultans should have male children."

j8 Suleiman the Magnificent

Meanwhile the Sultan busied himself with the government of his dominions and with the pleasures of the chase, to which at this period of his life he devoted almost as much time as did some of his Christian contemporaries. There is little to note in his relations with foreign powers. In 1521 Venice had obtained from him a valuable treaty, by which all her commercial privileges were maintained, and her bailo or representative at Constantinople was accorded a large measure of jurisdiction over his compatriots and permitted to hold office for three years. The republic, in return, was forced to pay an annual tribute of 10,000 ducats for the island of Cyprus, in recognition of an ancient Egyptian claim, and 500 for Zante. In December, 1523, an embassy arrived at Constantinople from Vassili Ivanovich, the Grand Prince of Moscow. Its object was to renew previous attempts to promote direct trade relations and particularly to induce the Sultan to forbid his vassals the Crimean Tatars from harrying the Muscovite territories; but the ambassador was able only to obtain meaningless expressions of general good will from the Turks, who saw no profit to themselves in granting anything more. In 15 2 5 the truce with Poland was renewed for another seven years. Evidently the vast majority of Suleiman's European neighbors were most anxious to keep the peace. With Persia, on the other hand, it was evident that the wars of Selim's day would sooner or later break forth afresh. When Shah Ismail died in 1524, Suleiman sent his successor Tahmasp a letter not of congratulation but of menace, couched in abusive terms of truly Oriental arrogance. 2 Many, in fact, believed that the military preparations which the Sultan had begun to order in the spring of 1525 were intended for a campaign to the eastward.

One of the chief causes that roused Suleiman to fresh military activity was the fractiousness of the Janissaries,

who rather expected a campaign every three years. It had taken some time for them to recover from their losses at Rhodes, but it would seem that Suleiman had already resolved to increase their numbers. We are told that the 12,000 whom he had inherited from his father had been raised to 20,000 by 1530. In any case it is clear that the entire body, both the veterans and the new recruits, became increasingly restless from inaction, and disgusted by their master's absorption in the pleasures of the chase. Finally, in March, 1525, they rose in revolt and plundered the houses of several of the chief officials. Suleiman dauntlessly faced the storm. When some of the mutineers forced their way into his presence, he slew three of them with his own hand; but he was finally forced to retreat when their comrades aimed their bows at him. 3 The disturbances were eventually quelled by a mixture of severity and largesse. The Agha of the Janissaries was put to death, as were also a number of his subordinates; others had their pay diminished; but 200,000 ducats were distributed to appease the soldiery. It was evidently essential that they be given employment as soon as possible. Ibrahim was recalled from Egypt, and preparations were made for another great campaign. The direction this new campaign was to take was probably partly due to French instigation. This, however, is a story by itself, which it will be more convenient to postpone till a later page. The immediately decisive factor was the state of Suleiman's relations with the kingdom of Hungary and the conditions that prevailed within it.

Hostilities between Hungary and the Turks had not ceased after the capture of Belgrade. While the Sultan was busy in other directions, his border governors continued to harass their enemies and succeeded in taking a number of fortresses. The victories, it is true, were not

8 Hammer, V, 62.

all on one side. In 1524 a force of some 15,000 akinji was completely defeated by Paul Tomori, the warlike archbishop of Kalocsa, who had been given the task of defending the frontiers of his country with the scantiest means. On this occasion the head of the Turkish commander was sent to Buda, where it was received with jubilation. In the following year Christopher Frangipani, a Hungarian noble descended from a well known Italian family which had immigrated thither many generations earlier, contrived to relieve the fortress of Jajce in Northern Bosnia, which had been besieged for some time and was in great straits. Suleiman needed no excuse for any declaration of war when he should choose to reopen the campaign. We can scarcely believe that the envoy whom he despatched to Buda in 1525 really expressed any earnest desire for peace. At any rate the Hungarians regarded him rather as a spy than as an ambassador and speedily sent him back; indeed, in the previous year, if we can trust one report that has come down to us, it would seem that the Sultan had already given them warning that he soon intended to make a fresh invasion. He was well informed of the hopeless confusion that reigned within their borders, and of the unlikelihood of their being rescued in their extremity by the West. Not only was there adequate excuse for an attack on Hungary; there was every probability that it would prove successful.

A great surge of patriotic enthusiasm had swept over the Hungarian kingdom when the loss of Belgrade was made known. At the next meeting of the Diet stern measures were taken to punish the cowards and the negligent, and enormous taxes were voted to pay for large forces of foreign mercenaries, whose aid was now recognized to be indispensable to the defence of the realm. It was one thing, however, to vote taxes, and quite another to collect them. The wave of Christian fervor which had been evoked by

the fall of Belgrade proved as evanescent as it had been intense, and almost no money came in. Hungary was divided between two factions: the "Court party," of the king and most of the magnates, and the "national party," supported by the mass of the lesser nobility, and led by John Zapolya, the almost independent voivode of Transylvania. King Louis, when he grew old enough to exercise royal authority, showed himself good natured, weak, and pleasure-loving, but in no way the man for such a crisis. On the eve of the Turkish invasion he was in the habit of rising at noon and spending the rest of the day in hunting. His wife Maria, the sister of Charles V and Ferdinand, was more energetic, but over-fond of the festivities to which all the money that could be had was devoted; moreover she and her German favorites were generally disliked as foreigners. Tomori was thus left to defend the frontiers as best he could. His few soldiers were continually on the verge of mutiny for lack of pay. Indeed, had it not been for timely contributions from the Pope, he could hardly have held his ground at all. As it was, he repeatedly asked to be relieved of his office. Obviously the Hungarians would be unable to defend themselves alone, and those who realized it clung blindly to the hope of foreign aid. Long and bitter experience should have taught them the futility of this. Everyone recognized their need and expressed his sympathy, but all had their own interests to look after first. Poland and Venice were quite unwilling to run any risk of turning the Turkish arms against themselves; they were too near. Henry VIII of England, on the other hand, was too far off. He appears to have promised funds, though it is doubtful if he ever sent them. Francis I, since the battle of Pavia, had completely reversed the traditional policy of his country, and was justly suspected of being in alliance with the Sultan. Pope Clement VII alone bestirred himself actively. He had already aided

the Hungarians with money, and now he sent them 50,000

ducats, the distribution of which was superintended by a zealous papal legate; but even Clement at this juncture was much more anxious to curb the Hapsburg power in the West than to defend the Danube lands against the Turk. There remained the two Hapsburg brothers, Charles and Ferdinand, whose interest in aiding Hungary was more immediate than that of any one else. Charles V had always recognized that one of the first of his many duties as the temporal head of Christendom was that of protecting it against the onslaught of Islam. At the time of the siege of Rhodes, when Pope Adrian VI had urged him to make peace with Francis in order that they might march together against the Moslems, he had always replied that before he could devote his energies to the protection of Christendom, which he constantly maintained to be his chief desire, it was essential for him to gain the victory over his Western rival. Since then fortune had favored him. In Spain, where he was now residing, all opposition had been crushed. In the Empire his brother Ferdinand was acting as his vicar. In Italy, his generals had won for him at Pa via (February 25, 1525) the most brilliant victory of the age. His defeated adversary, Francis I, had been sent a prisoner to Madrid, and had been obliged, before he was set free, to consent to a humiliating treaty (January 14, 1526) in which he conceded virtually everything which his victorious rival demanded. Yet Charles's path was still beset with difficulties. In spite of his continually increasing revenues from Mexico, he was always in financial straits. Francis had hardly got back to his own country before he broke the treaty which had been extorted from him in his captivity, and the next result of the Emperor's successes was the formation of the powerful League of Cognac between France, the Papacy, and the Italian states, to liberate Italy from his tutelage and