Mothers of Mehmed the Conqueror's children
.:Nichol:.
Conqueror and his time (Bollingen Series XCVI, Princeton)", an English
translation of Franz Babinger's 1953 work, "Mehmed der Eroberer und
seine Zeit".
On pages 11 and 12, a quick bit on Mehmed's shadowy mother is found:
"The identity of the child's [Mehmed's] mother is still shrouded in
darkness. Nowhere is her old family name recorded. Named in no
inscription that has thus far come to light, she is mentioned only in
the deed of a pious foundation, fragments of which have been
preserved, but there simply as Hatun bint Abdullah, 'the distinguished
lady, daughter of Abdullah.' Her own name is not given, while the name
given to her father, Abdullah -- as converts were always called --
attests clearly her non-Moslem origin. At the time the document was
written she was living in Bursa, presumably where she died. There she
was apparently known as 'the lady' (Hatun), while her tomb is
popularly known as the Hatuniya türbe. Later she was called Huma Hatun
after hüma, the bird of paradise of Persian legend. (Xerxes' mother
had also borne this name.) According to a tradition that has not yet
been substantiated, she was an Italian woman named Stella (Estella).
Since in those days this name was customary only among Jews and is
merely a translation of the Persian name Esther -- i.e. stella, 'star'
-- one might be tempted to conclude that Mehmed's mother was a Jewess.
It is curious to note that according to the Old Testament, the Jewess
Esther was the second wife of Ahasuerus, that is, Xerxes, king of the
Persians."
On his son and successor, Bayezid, I found this on page 51: "In
January 1448 a son was born to Mehmed Çelebi in Thracian Dimotika, by
a slave girl named Gülbahar. The boy was given the name of Bayezid and
was later (1481) to mount the Ottoman throne as the second sultan of
this name. There is no doubt that this union was beneath Mehmed's
station: Gülbahar bint Abdullah, whom Turkish legend subsequently
transformed into a 'daughter of the king of France', was a Christian
slave of Albanian origin."
The second son gets a briefer mention on page 61: "It was probably at
this time (1450/51) that Mehmed had a second son, Mustafa Çelebi, who
was to be his favorite. Of the mother we know only that she was alive
in 1474 when her son died; this rules out Sitt Hatun. It may have been
Bayezid's mother Gülbahar, or another wife, Gülşah Hatun, of whom
we know only that she was buried in her own türbe near Bursa."
For his other son, Djem, Babinger has this to say: "On December 22,
1459, a third son was born to born to Mehmed. This was Sultan Cem,
whose romantic and adventuous career was to be a source of interest to
the courts of Europe long after his father's death and until his own,
far from home, in Capua in southern Italy, a victim of slow poison
(February 25, 1495). Most historians claim that his mother was a
Serbian princess, but that cannot be proved. According to more
credible sources, she was a Moslem bearing the Turkish name of Çiçek
Hatun."
On the mysterious Korkud, Babinger is silent, though he does mention a
"Prince Korkut", son of Bayezid II. I also could find nothing on
Mehmed's daughter Gavkharkhan.
.:Nichol:.
William Addams Reitwiesner
>The second son gets a briefer mention on page 61: "It was probably at
>this time (1450/51) that Mehmed had a second son, Mustafa Çelebi, who
>was to be his favorite. Of the mother we know only that she was alive
>in 1474 when her son died; this rules out Sitt Hatun. It may have been
>Bayezid's mother Gülbahar, or another wife, Gülşah Hatun, of whom
>we know only that she was buried in her own türbe near Bursa."
Mustafa's mother was Gulsah, not Gulbahar. Mustafa and Bayezid were
half-brothers. See A. D. Alderson, *The structure of the Ottoman Dynasty*
[Oxford: Clarendon, 1956], Table XXVII, for further details.
>On the mysterious Korkud, Babinger is silent, though he does mention a
>"Prince Korkut", son of Bayezid II. I also could find nothing on
>Mehmed's daughter Gavkharkhan.
Geverhan was a daughter of Gulbahar, and thus Bayezid's full sister. She
married Ugurlu Mehmed Pasha, Emir of the Aq-Koyunlu (d. 1477) and mother by
him of Ahmed Gode, Emir from 1497-1498.
William Addams Reitwiesner
wr...@erols.com