borgiapope: History Week Meme | Day 3: one woman → Mahpeyker Kösem Sultan “Whil
History Week Meme|Day 3: one woman → Mahpeyker Kösem Sultan
“While Hurrem was the woman of the Ottoman dynasty best know in Europe, it is Kösem who is remembered by Turks as the most powerful. Kösem’s career was similar to that of Hurrem in important respects. She had a large number of children and may have ultimately become the sultan’s only sexual partner. She was the mother of sultans Murad IV and İbrahim, of the prince Kasım, and perhaps of the prince Süleyman; her daughters include Ayşe, Fatma, Hanzade, and perhaps Gevherhan, whose husbands she relied on in her political dealings. In 1612 the Venetian ambassador Simon Contarini described Kösem as a woman of “beauty and shrewdness, and furthermore … of many talents, she sings excellently, whence she continues to be extremely well loved by the king … Not that she is respected by all, but she is listened to in some matter and is the favorite of the king, who wants her beside him continually….” According to Cristoforo Valier in 1616, Kösem was the most powerful of the sultan’s intimate associates: “she can do what she wishes with the King and possesses his heart absolutely, nor is anything ever denied to her.” Contarini noted, however, that Kösem “restrains herself with great wisdom from speaking [to the sultan] too frequently of serious matters and affairs of state.” Her circumspection was probably aimed at avoiding the displeasure of the sultan, who was determined to avoid giving the appearance of being dominated by a woman, as his father had been.
Unlike Hurrem, Kösem’s greatest influence occurred not as haseki but as valide sultan. She held this position for twenty-eight years during the reigns of her sons Murad IV and İbrahim and the early years of the reign of her grandson Mehmed IV. It is even possible that Kösem played a role in the transformation of the succession system: the Venetian ambassador stated that she lobbied to spare Mustafa the fate of fratricide with the ulterior goal of saving her own sons from the same fate. Like Hurrem, Kösem is blamed for acting to preserve her own power rather than that of the sultan or of the dynasty. It is certainly worth noting that the two women of the dynasty to suffer the harshest judgment by history had two things in common: the absence of a valide sultan during most of their career as haseki and an unusually large number of sons. What appears to have earned them their unsavory reputation was their power to influence that fate of the empire by favoring one of their sons over another. As we have seen, the political heritage of the Ottomans viewed the succession as a domain governed by divine will.” - Leslie P. Peirce; The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire
