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Ottoman control and the Hungarian challenge to northern Ottoman lands was greatly diminished. The next problem Suleyman had to deal with was the island of Rhodes, in the Mediterranean. Since the early 1300s, it had been occupied by the Knights Hospitaller, a remnant of the Crusades. Because of its vital position in the heart of the Ottoman-controlled Mediterranean Sea, the Knights of Rhodes were capable of regularly disrupting trade within the empire. Ships travelling from Egypt to Anatolia were especially vulnerable to attacks from Rhodes. This harassment led to Suleymans decision to dislodge the Knights Hospitaller from Rhodes in 1522. Suleyman assembled over 100,000 troops and the massive navy he inherited from Sultan Selim for the task. He personally led the siege of Rhodes, which lasted from June to December of 1522. Eventually, the Knights were unable to hold on, despite their extensive fortifications and surrendered. Having removed the threat from Rhodes, Suleyman let the Knights relocate to Italy and added Rhodes to the Ottoman Empire.
Administrative Reforms
It may seem as though the focus of Sultan Suleymans reign was military expansion. However, the major military campaigns of Suleymans reign all occurred within his first ten years in power. After this, the focus of his reign was administrative reforms and working to strengthen the internal affairs of the empire. Perhaps Suleymans greatest accomplishment and the one he is most remembered for is his reform of the
legal code. The Ottoman legal code had two facets. The first was the Shariah, the unchanging divinely ordained laws according to Islamic tradition, which is derived from the Quran and the actions of Prophet Muhammad . The second was the laws dictated by the sultan of the time, known as Kanuns. These sultanate laws covered aspect of life not explicitly covered by the Shariah, such as taxes, police regulation, and other day to day affairs of the empire.
During the reigns of the previous nine sultans, from Osman to Selim, hundreds of Kanuns had accumulated, and the legal code was getting to be almost impossible to use. Because of this, Suleyman set out to organize all the previously issued laws. He worked personally with the grand mufti of the empire, the Shaykh al-Islam, Ebussuud Efendi, to go through all the laws, and determine if they contradicted the Shariah or other Kanuns. By removing any anti-Islamic laws and laws that repeated or contradicted each other, Suleyman and Ebussuud Efendi managed to The Suley maniy e Mosque as seen f rom the Galata T ower formulate an effective and simplified code of laws, known as the Kanun-i Osmani (The Ottoman Laws) that served the Ottoman Empire for the next 300 years. For this, Suleyman was given the nickname Kanuni, meaning lawgiver. Taxes were also a point of interest for Suleyman. In the Kanun-i Osmani, he made sure to relieve taxes on many of his subjects, particularly Christian peasants. Much of the population of the Ottoman Empire at this time was Christian, and keeping their loyalty and happiness was a priority for Suleyman. By relieving them of some taxes, the financial status of Christian peasants in the empire greatly improved. In fact, since the taxes on Christians in the Muslim Ottoman Empire were lower than the taxes on Christians in Christian Europe, many Christian Europeans migrated into the Ottoman Empire during Sultan Suleymans reign, preferring to live under a Muslim leader than Christian ones.
Legacy
Sultan Suleyman is considered to be one of the most successful Ottoman sultans in history. His reign was marked by the maximum territorial size of the empire, just and orderly laws, and a cultural and educational golden age. The monuments of Suleymans artistic patronage dot Istanbuls landscape today. The ehzade Mosque and Suleymaniye Mosques were built by Mimar Sinan at the request of Sultan Suleyman in Istanbul. Today they stand as lasting legacies of his golden age reign over the largest and most powerful Muslim empire of the 16th century.
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Khan, Muhammad. The Muslim 100. Leicestershire, United Kingdom: Kube Publishing Ltd, 2008. Print. Ochsenwald, William, and Sydney Fisher. The Middle East: A History. 6th. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2003. Print.