Alexandra Anastasia Lisowska Sultan, whose biography is known to many people in Europe and even more popular in the Slavic world, was born in Western Ukraine. This happened in the small settlement of Rogatin at the very beginning of the 16th century. The astute reader, probably already guessed that the article will focus on the famous Roksolana. Exactly! Life Alexandra Anastasia Lisowska Sultan - biography of Roksolana. As she was known in the East and in the West, respectively.
Khurem Sultan. Biography: A Slave Story
To our days, there is little evidence of the early life of this woman. According to records of available sources that somehow cover this issue, it is known that the future wife of the Sultan was born in the family of an Orthodox priest. Actually, this is almost everything that is known about her childhood. Interestingly, different sources do not even agree on what her real name was, calling her either Alexandra or Anastasia. The future Alexandra Anastasia Lisowska Sultan, whose biography, as we already see, is full of dark spots, was stolen during one of the regular Tatar raids. Soon she was presented as a concubine to the Turkish prince Suleiman, who was then at the post of sultan governor in Manisa. Obviously, this happened a couple of years before the accession of Suleiman, which happened in 1520.
Khurem Sultan. Biography: Monarch's wifeQuickly enough, the concubine of the freshly baked Sultan managed to become her beloved wife, and already in 1521 she bore him a son, Mehmet. Slavyanka achieved significant success in her own education, in fact becoming over time, according to sources, Suleiman's chief adviser in public affairs. Roksolana's favoritism caused jealousy on the part of the other wife of the Sultan - Mahidevran - and their fierce rivalry for many years. Repeatedly written sources mention literally about fights between these women, with scratched faces and torn dresses. However, not only jealousy was the cause of cruel intrigue in the palace. A considerable role here was played by the ambition of the Slav. The fact is that her son, Shehzade Mehmet (and especially the second son - Selim), was not the firstborn of the Sultan and did not have a formal right to inherit. The son of that same Mahidevran, Mustafa, born in 1515, was considered to be the eldest offspring and future sultan at that time.
Roksolana, a woman raised in milder Slavic conditions, was less docile and more intelligent and educated than her competitor, which ultimately allowed her to succeed in her son becoming the heir to the imperial throne. Years of hostility and mutual slander led to the fact that Mustafa became governor of the Sultan in Manisa, where his mother Mahidevran went with him. In fact, this meant the exile of one of the Sultan's wives. And a few years later, rumors began to spread in the empire that Mustafa was preparing a military coup against his father. Accused of conspiracy, he was executed in 1553. This finally opened the way to power for one of the offspring of the Slav. Mehmet never became a sultan, he died in 1543, but the next ruler was Selim.
Khurem Sultan. Biography: cause of death
For more than forty years, Roksolana was the wife of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent. She managed to gain the fame of the most wise and educated woman of the Muslim world, as well as the dangerous and cruel wife of the ruler. She spent the last years of her life in the palace, dying a natural death in the spring of 1558 (some sources speak of 1662).