In the meanwhile, Sokollu gave the order to return to Constantinople and the caravan travelled back with only a handful of peopleknowing that the Sultan had passed away. The Grand Vizier even went so far as to have the body embalmed as they travelled and Sokollu carried on the daily duties of the court while he anxiousl awaited the message that Selim was in Constantinople. For three whole weeks he kept up the pretence until finally the message came that Selim was in the City and Sokollu then assembled the army and informed them that the Sultan was dead, Selim was his successor and most importantly was awaiting them in Constantinople with substantial gifts for all.

Suleiman's Final Journey

The Golden Age of Suleiman had finally come to an end after nearly 50 years on the throne and he has been generally acknowledged to be the finest of the Ottoman Sultans. The Christian world breathed a sigh of relief at his passing ---to them he was indeed " The Scourge of Heaven "--- but the Christian world never saw the statesman and politician which led to his people calling him "The Lawgiver". They also never saw until recently the magnificent mosque which he had been building during his times in Constantinople and the Suleymaniye Mosque dominates today's Istanbul skyline and is to my mind a finer monument than all the battles which occupied much of his time.

One of the great paradoxes of Suleiman's reign was that although he was the greatest of the Ottoman Sultans and consolidated Ottoman rule throughout the world, inadvertently he was the architect of its eventual downfall. His love for Roxelana blinded him to her machinations and Selim the Sot who succeeeded Suleiman was only the first of many Sultans who were with one or two exceptions, totally unfit for their high office.

As the years went by, the Janissaries came to involve themselves so much in the affairs of state that they lost completely their original raison d'etre and the once elite fighting force became effete and ineffective. Stratford Canning, British ambassador to Turkey summed it up perfectly; " They had become the masters of the government, the butchers of their sovereigns and a source of fear to all but the enemies of their country".

Their demise was brought about by a sequence of events that were as strange as they were devastating and once again a slave of the Seraglio was deply involved. Captured by corsairs whilst returning to Martinique { her cousin, Josephine, the future Empress of France, was her best friend } Aimee Dubucq de Rivery was resilient enough to adapt to her new life in the harem and pragmatic enough to realise her chances of returning home were almost nil. A former convent girl, Aimee was nicknamed The Beautiful One and soon attracted the attention of Sultan Abdul Hamid and in 1783 she gave birth to her son, Mahmud. After theusual political intrigues and several attempts on his life Mahmud eventually became Sultan { there are shades of Roxelana here } and proved to be an intelligent and capable ruler. There were however, many who made life difficult for him due in the main to his background, not as the son of a slave but as the son of a Christian slave. Not last of the thorns in his side were the Janissaries who objected to anything and everything associated with his rule and Mahmud realized that their elimination was fundamental to his own and any future Sultan's existence. Patiently and over many years Mahmud worked to bring about their downfall and during those years he gathered around him a personal army of 14,000 highly trained and loyal soldiers, led by an officer who worshipped the Sultanate ; his name was Kara Djehennem but he was always referred to as " Black Hell".