The ninth ruler of the Ottoman Empire, Selim of the First Yavuz, also known as Grozny, had four sons (one of them subsequently took the throne) and several daughters. Suleiman the Magnificent or Fair (Kanuni, the Lawyer) became famous for his aggressive campaigns and passionate love for his wife of Ukrainian origin, Haseki Alexandra Anastasia Lisowska. One of the sisters of this famous ruler was Shah Sultan, whose biography is increasingly interested in the public. After all, the Turkish historical series, which tells about the events of that era and is very popular among residents of Eastern Europe, tells about almost all members of the Ottoman family who took part in politics, as well as in palace and harem intrigues. Sisters of the Sultan played an important role in this. And our heroine, apparently, was very successful in this.
So what do we know about Shah Sultan? The biography of this woman is known to us mainly from the chronicles of the Ottoman Empire. She was born in 1509. Her mother was the famous Aisha Hafsa, who herself belonged to the clan of the padishahs and was a nee aristocrat. Since her mother lived almost constantly until the death of her husband in the city of Manisa, the princess herself was born there. Her childhood passed in this province, and at the age of 14 she already became the wife of one of the closest pupils of the Sultan’s harem, who is known to us as Lutfi Pasha. Shah Sultan, whose biography was not very well studied during this period, lived in a marriage in the province. She had two daughters. Various sources call their names: Esmehan Baharnaz and Nezlihan Sultan. Her husband came to Istanbul and became a member of the Sofa in 1539. Then Shah Sultan herself was able to move to the capital, which she very much desired. She helped her husband in every possible way to make a career at court. Historians report that the princess tried to influence her brother and in this she competed with his wife, Roksolana-Alexandra Anastasia Lisowska. These attempts to intervene in politics and its biography is interesting.
Shah Sultan, like her mother, as well as many women of that time, did not at all intend to come to terms with the role of an exemplary wife and teacher of children. Women themselves wanted to determine the fate of empires, although they did not always succeed. An ambitious princess, inspired by the example of her mother, who was actually co-ruler of Suleiman Kanuni for a long time, Shah Sultan expected her husband to help her plan. Thanks to her, in the same 1539, Lutfi Pasha became the Great Vizier of the state, since his predecessor Ayaz, the protege of Haseki Alexandra Anastasia Lisowska, died due to the plague epidemic. However, the rule of Lutfi Pasha did not last long, only two years. On the one hand, he is known for his marital infidelity, and on the other, for ostentatious Puritanism. One of the Turkish historians, Murat Barbacci, reports that Lutfi Pasha decided to fight prostitution in Istanbul and very cruelly, “so that others would be dissuasive,” punished one priestess of love, ordering her genitals to be burned. The outraged Shah Sultan began to reproach her husband. He completely forgot that she was from the Ottoman clan and gave her a slap in the face.
The biography of Shah Huban Sultan allows us to see what happened between the spouses next. The enraged princess ordered her personal guard to beat her husband, and then went to complain to his brother. Suleiman immediately removed from his post a lot of imagined Pasha, his wife divorced him, and he was exiled to the distant province of Dimetoku. Lutfi Pasha only saved his life because Shah Sultan did not want her daughters to grow up without a father (at least nominally). The princess, having remained free, took up charity work, as was the case with wealthy Turkish aristocrats in those days. For example, in Istanbul you can still see the mosque, which bears her name and the construction of which she financed. Its architect was the talented Sinan, author of the Blue Mosque. She died in 1572, having outlived her mother by 28 years.
According to legend, the princess asked to bury herself with the valid, but this tomb could not be found for a long time. But in April of this year in Turkey, with a thorough examination of the mausoleum of Aisha Hafsa, the grave of Shah Sultan was discovered. The biography, the cause of death and the details of the life of the princess, of course, cannot be thoroughly restored from historical sources in everything. However, we can say that this woman is one of the brightest personalities of the truly “Magnificent Century”, when people tried to become masters of their own destiny.