Magnificent century & Love in chains

💌 Details of the famous painting of “Roxelana” by Italian artist, Tiziano Vecelli, circa 1515-1550.

Hürrem Sultan, or “Roxelana”, was the only legitimate wife of the famous Ottoman sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent — thus, she became the most influential woman in Ottoman history. Of Ruthenian origin, she was known for her bright auburn hair and profound love of and interest in poetry, which captured the sultan’s eyes and saw her rising from the status of concubine to that of founder of an era known as the “Sultanate of women”.

Under the pen name of “Muhibbi”, the sultan composed the following poem for his beloved wife:

(💌) “Throne of my lonely niche, my wealth, my love, my moonlight.

My most sincere friend, my confidant, my very existence, my sultan, my one and only love.

The most beautiful among the beautiful...

My springtime, my merry faced love, my daytime, my sweetheart, laughing leaf...

My plants, my sweet, my rose, the only one who does not distress me in this world...

My Constantinople, my Caraman, the earth of my Anatolia,

My Badakhshan, my Baghdad and Khorasan

My woman of the beautiful hair, my love of the slanted brow, my love of eyes full of mischief...

I’ll sing your praises always

The Ottoman Imperial Harem

❝ The imperial harem was much like the household harem, only more extensive and with a more highly articulated structure. In our period, the head of the harem was the mother of the reigning sultan. The queen mother exercised authority over both family members — royal offspring; the consorts of the sultan, who might themselves acquire considerable power; and unmarried or widowed princesses — and the administrative hierarchy of the harem. [...] as the more astute and well informed of European observers commented, the imperial harem was more like a nunnery in its hierarchical organization and the enforced chastity of the great majority of its members.❞   — Leslie P. Peirce, The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire