Kara Mustafa Pasha

The Ottoman northern frontier in the seventeenth century, where Kara Mustafa Pasha led his early campaigns.

Born to Albanian parents[1][2] in Merzifon, Mustafa was educated in the household of Köprülü Mehmed Pasha and married into the powerful Köprülü family.[3] In 1659, he became governor of Silistria and subsequently held a number of important posts. Within ten years, he was acting as deputy for his brother-in-law, the grand vizier Köprülüzade Fazıl Ahmed Pasha when absent from the Sultan's court.[3]

He served as a commander of ground troops in a war against Poland, negotiating a settlement with Jan Sobieski in 1676 that added the province of Podolia to the empire. The victory enabled the Ottomans to transform the Cossack regions of the southern Ukraine into a protectorate. When his brother-in-law Köprülü Fazıl Ahmed Pasha died that same year, Mustafa succeeded him as grand vizier.[3]

Kara Mustafa led several successful campaigns into Ukraine, attempting to shore up the position of the Cossack state of Right-Bank Ukraine, then an Ottoman vassal. He established Ottoman garrisons in many of Ukraine's cities, and conquered the traditional Cossack capital of Chyhyryn, which had been under Russian occupation.[4]

Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha

In 1683, he launched a campaign northward into Austria in a last effort to expand the Ottoman Empire after more than 150 years of war. By mid-July, his 100,000-man army had besieged Vienna (guarded by 10,000 Habsburg soldiers), following in the footsteps of Suleiman the Magnificent in 1529. By September, he had taken a portion of the walls and appeared to be on his way to victory.

But on 12 September 1683, a Polish army under King Jan Sobieski took advantage of dissent within the Ottoman military command and poor disposition of his troops, winning the Battle of Vienna with a devastating flank attack led by Sobieski's Polish Winged Hussars. The Ottomans retreated into Hungary, much of which was subsequently conquered by the Habsburgs and their Holy League allies.

The defeat cost Mustafa his position, and ultimately, his life. On 25 December 1683, Kara Mustafa was executed in Belgrade at the order of Mehmed IV. He suffered death by strangulation with a silk cord, which was the method of capital punishment inflicted on high-ranking persons in the Ottoman Empire. His last words were, "Am I to die?" and "As God pleases."[3]

Kara Mustafa Pasha's strangulation by a silk cord on 25 December 1683.

The Foundation of Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Pasha was one of the largest foundations ever founded both in Ottoman Empire and Turkey. According to the official records, it was last managed by the descendants of Kara Mustafa Pasha. The last few managers of the foundation were Mustafa Pasha's descendant Ahmed Asım Bey (born 1844), his son Mehmed Nebil Bey (born 1888) (also known as Merzifonlu Karamustafaoğlu or Merzifonlu Karamustafapaşaoğlu), and his son, the Turkish painter Doğan Yılmaz Merzifonlu Karamustafaoğlu, better known as Yılmaz Merzifonlu (1928–2010), until 1976. The "Merzifonlu Karamustafaoğlu" family name ended with the marriage of Yılmaz Merzifonlu's only daughter, Abide Tuğçe Mit.[5] Kara Mustafa Pasha's family and descendant tree can be found via Turkey's Directorate General of Foundations.[6]

Kara Mustafa Pasha's legacy in modern Turkey is mixed. Whereas historians describe him either as a capable tactician or reckless commander, Kemal Atatürk held a sympathetic view of the man. It is said that, while attending a lecture at an Ankara institution in 1933, at which a professor spoke disparagingly of Kara Mustafa Pasha, Atatürk spoke up in favour of Kara Mustafa, arguing that marching an army of 173,000 men from Constantinople to Vienna, the "cathedral of Europe", was a colossal undertaking for any commander, and that the only other person who came close to such a feat was Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent himself.

In the 2012 Polish and Italian historical drama film September Eleven 1683 about the Battle of Vienna, Kara Mustafa Pasha is portrayed by Italian actor Enrico Lo Verso.

• Köprülü era of the Ottoman Empire
• Köprülü family
• List of Ottoman Grand Viziers

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Kara Mustafa Pasha.

• Olnon, Merlijn (2003). "'A Most Agreeable and Pleasant Creature'? Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Paşa in the Correspondence of Justinus Colyer (1668-1682)". Oriente Moderno. 22 (New Series): 649–669.