Süleyman, who ruled the Ottoman Empire between 1520 and 1566, was a globally recognized figure during his lifetime. His domain extended from Hungary to Iran, and from the Crimea to North Africa and the Indian Ocean. While he was engaged in bitter rivalries with the Catholic Habsburgs in Europe and the Shiite Safavids in the Middle East, he also presided over a multilingual and multireligious empire that promised peace and prosperity to its subjects.
Behind the public façade of might and glory, Süleyman led a complicated life. He grew up with an overbearing father whose legacy was both an advantage and a burden. Defying established practice, he married a concubine named Hürrem. Towards the end of his life, he had to overcome both debilitating sickness and the agitations of his sons to remain on the throne.
Around Peerless among Princes, the first scholarly biography of Süleyman in English since 1944, we will discuss Süleyman’s achievements as well as his failures, the world he and his contemporaries lived in, and their legacies.
Kaya Şahin is Professor of History and the Executive Associate Dean of the Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies at Indiana University. After receiving his PhD in History from the University of Chicago, he taught at Northwestern, Tulane, and Indiana. He is the author of Empire and Power in the Reign of Süleyman: Narrating the Sixteenth-Century Ottoman Empire and Peerless among Princes: The Life and Times of Sultan Süleyman. He published articles on apocalypticism, bureuacracy, early modern Orientalism, crosscultural encounters, and ceremonies and rituals. He is currently working on a new book, provisionally entitled Empire, Ritual, Masculinity: Circumcision Celebrations for Ottoman Princes, 1457-1582.
