Hadim Ibrahim Pasha

Hadim Ibrahim Pasha (Turkish: Hadım Ibrahim Paşa, meaning in English "Ibrahim Pasha the Eunuch") (1473 – 1562) [1] was a 16th-century Ottoman statesman.

Life

Born in the Sanjak of Bosnia, he became Chief White Eunuch of the Topkapı Palace Harem under Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent.[1] He was appointed Governor of Anatolia, and in 1544 was nominated fourth Vizier. In 1548-9, during the Second campaign of the Ottoman-Safavid War, he got the position of lieutenant Governor of Istanbul, reaching the rank of third Vizier.[2] Appointed second Vizier in 1553, after the assassination of the crown prince Şehzade Mustafa on behalf of the Sultan, he was sent by Suleyman - then stationing in Aleppo - to Bursa to strangle the son of Mustafa.[2] Appointed again lieutenant Governor of the Capital from 1553 to 1555, after the comeback of the Sultan to Istanbul he was forced to retire because of his old age.[2] Ibrahim Pasha died in 1562.[2] He followed a modest lifestyle and was among the few Court Eunuchs who enjoined unanimously a high reputation.[2]

Legacy

In 1551 he commissioned Court Architect (Turkish: Mimar) Sinan to erect his funerary mosque in Istanbul, in the neighborhood of the Gate of Silivri (Turkish: Silivrikapı).[2] On January 21, 1562, he established an endowment (Turkish: Waqf), which was entitled to administer several institutions in the western part of Istanbul. These were: his Friday mosque with an elementary school in the Silivrikapı neighborhood ; another school near Silivrikapı; a Byzantine church which he had converted into a mosque, with an attached medrese and an elementary school (also erected by Sinan) near the Isakapı Gate;[3] another elementary school near the Column of Arcadius and a water well for travellers outside Yenikapı Gate.[2] The endowment was to be financed through villages donated by the Sultan, fields, shops and mills in Rumelia, and buildings in Edirne and Istanbul.[2] The Waqf was administered by the Chief white eunuch of Topkapi.[2] The location of these establishments in sparsely settled neighborhoods along the Walls, where the population was predominantly Christian, shows his desire of pursuing a policy of islamization of the city.[2]

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References
  1. Necipoĝlu (2005), p.391
  2. Necipoĝlu (2005), p.392
  3. Müller-Wiener (1977), p. 118.

Sources
  • Müller-Wiener, Wolfgang (1977). Bildlexikon zur Topographie Istanbuls: Byzantion, Konstantinupolis, Istanbul bis zum Beginn d. 17 Jh (in German). Tübingen: Wasmuth. ISBN 978-3-8030-1022-3.
  • Necipoĝlu, Gulru (2005). The Age of Sinan: Architectural Culture in the Ottoman Empire. London: Reaktion Books. ISBN 978-1-86189-244-7.
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