My World in Prose

Hurrem Haseki Sultan, also known as Khourrem or Roxelana, was the wife of Suleiman the Magnificent. She was said to be a cheerful, high-spirited, intelligent and influential woman. For years, she was the heroic figure to which most women in Europe and Asia looked up to. Roxelana had achieved in her brief life of little significance up to that moment, what no woman had ever before been able to accomplish in the centuries before her. She transformed from being captured in war and turned into a slave, to being sold to the Süleyman’s Harem as a concubine and ultimately becoming the Sultan’s wife.

It is believed that Roxelana was born under the name Aleksandra Lisovaka in in the town of Rohatyn located 68 km south east of Lviv, the capital city of Galicia which was then part of Poland. Little is known about her life prior to arriving in Istanbul. What is known is that she was the daughter of a Ukranian Orthodox priest. She was referred to as the “laughing one” and had great story telling abilities. She was also considered to be very beautiful for the time. She was captured in the 1520s by Crimean Tartars during a routine raid in the region and taken as a slave to Kaffa and later resold in Istanbul to the Süleyman’s Harem.

Once Roxelana was in the harem, she quickly won the notice of the Sultan. He took an immediate liking to her; historians say the fixation was mutual. When she arrived there were already four existing chief concubines and approximately three hundred other lower ranking concubines. Roxelana was one of the many lower ranking concubines in the harem. Of the four chief concubines, the Sultana Gulfem “Rose of Spring”, bore the heir to the Ottoman throne; Mustafa. Noticing the Sultan’s preference for Roxelana as he would have her accompany him in public on several occasions, Gulfem violently attacked her.

Seeing how enraged Suleyman was over the attack, Roxelana took the opportunity to convince the Sultan to have them banished. Under the guise that the heir to the throne had to train (traditional training: Sancak Beyliği) to eventually succeed his father, in 1534 Gulfem and her son Mustafa were banished to Mahidevran to the provincial capital of Manisa. Up until this point she was still simply his concubine. But she had gone from being a simple slave to a concubine amongst many; only to soon stand out above the rest. This for a Christian captive and woman of her era was a huge feat.

The removal of Gulfem was essentially the door that swung wide open to give way to the rest of her future. The French historian Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle wrote in the 18th century the book, “The removal of Gulfem was essentially the door that swung wide open to give way to the rest of her future. The French historian, Fontenelle’s Dialogues of the dead, in three parts. Dialogues of the antients, The antients with the moderns, The moderns. Translated from the French by the late John Hughes The second edition.” Not only did it have the longest book title ever known to mankind but it narrates in detail how Roxelana wittingly converted to Islam, used the religion to withhold sexual favors from the Sultan unless properly married and then eventually achieving what she had set out to do from the onset.  He resisted for three days but in the end, she was freed as a slave and legally became his wife; making the Sultan the first Ottoman emperor to ever legally have married.

She gave him five children of which her son Selim would eventually inherit the empire but only after Gulfem’s son Mustafa had been mysteriously strangled. It was rumored that he valued her opinion and gave her an active role and say in his political affairs. The tradition was that once imperial heirs became of age, they were sent away along with their biological mother to prepare to succeed the throne. Suleyman was so enamored with Roxelana that he couldn’t bare the thought and allowed her to remain at court with him for the rest of her life. In 1558, Roxelana passed eight years before her great love. She dedicated her life to her soul mate, her children, several charitable works and charities. She was a pioneer in the betterment and empowerment of women in her time. He and they loved her for it. And in 1566, the enslaved young Ukraine girl’s son became the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire.