The Kadin - Bertrice Small [124]
Her sobs slowly abated, and, composing herself, she left the room saying to the guard outside the door, “The agha kislar is dead. See to the preparations for his burial.”
32
EARLY IN THE YEAR 1517, Selim’s army triumphed again. In Syria, near the town of Aleppo, the Turkish forces met and destroyed the army of the Mameluke ruler. The Ottoman artillery had improved, and the Egyptians, like the Persians before them, were taken by surprise.
Unopposed the sultan’s victorious armies swept across Syria, through Palestine, and into the Nile River Valley up to the gates of Cairo. Here, Selim arrogantly demanded that the Mameluke sultan relinquish his authority. He was refused as arrogantly. The Turks quickly battered their way into the city, where the Ottoman sultan promptly hanged the Egyptian ruler and his sons. Selim was at his fiercest, but his rage was not entirely due to his rival The campaign had cost him three more sons. Murad had been killed in Syria. Sarina’s only son, Bajazet, as well as his favorite second son, Mohammed, had fallen in the battle for Cairo. He had four living sons left. Selim was a born soldier, and his sons had followed him eagerly, yet he felt guilt at their loss. He had not raised them to fall in battle, yet it was an honorable death. Still, he was glad he did not have to face his wives with the news.
His grief was partially assuaged when his soldiers brought to him the last Abbasid caliph. The elderly man, found hiding in a cellar, was terrified of the Turkish ruler. Selim put his fears to rest by treating him kindly and with deference. Overwhelmed, the frail old man gratefully accepted the four plump, pretty Nubian ladies of middle years the sultan bestowed on him. A man of his many winters should be properly cared for, declared the sultan, and each of the caliph’s new slaves had a special talent One was a fine cook, another an excellent seamstress, the third skilled in simple medicine, and the last a good masseuse and teller of tales.
The old man was tenderly carried to the baths, where he was washed, barbered, perfumed, and presented with a new wardrobe. He was given choice living quarters and would, of course, return to Constantinople with the sultan, to live the remainder of his years in safety, luxury, and honor.
Six times daily, accompanied by Selim, whom he had taken to calling “my son,” he led the prayers to Allah. One wit among the soldiers remarked that the old fellow must have thought he had died and gone to Paradise.
In gratitude the caliph named Selim and the Ottoman rulers to follow him as his successors, thus transferring the title Defender of the Faith to the House of Osman.
The sultan was jubilant His territory now included Greece, the Balkans, a good part of Eastern Europe, all of Asia Minor down through Syria and Egypt and with it a good part of North Africa, as well as all Arabia, with its sacred cities of Mecca and Medina. His power was the greatest of any monarch in the world.
While he was in Egypt there came to Selim’s attention the feats of the Khair ad-Din, also known as Barbarossa, a pirate who was greatly feared. Khair ad-Din hated Christians, especially Spaniards, with all the fervor of a fanatic. They were infidels, decadent illiterate, weak—and worse, they had killed two of his brothers.
Taking command of his dead brothers’ ships, he harried the Spanish from Tunis to the Balearic Islands. Caught ferrying Moors from Spain to safety in Africa, he captured the attacking galleys and added them to his own fleet which also included several Papal ships, now rowed by their original crews.
At one point Khair