Nilüfer Hatun

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In this Ottoman Turkish style name, the given name is Nilüfer, the title is Hatun, and there is no family name.
Nilüfer Hatun
The sarcophagos of Nilüfer Hatun is located inside the türbe (Mausoleum), of Orhan Ghazi in Bursa
Valide Hatun of the Ottoman Empire
Tenure1362 – 1363
SuccessorGülçiçek Hatun
Diedc. 1363
Bursa, Ottoman Sultanate
Burial
Orhan Gazi Tomb, Bursa
ConsortOrhan
IssueMurad I
DynastyOttoman
ReligionOrtodox Christian (birth)
Sunni Islam (conversion)

Nilüfer Hatun (Ottoman Turkish: نیلوفر خاتون, water lily, called also Lülüfer Hatun or Ülüfer Hatun, died c.1363[1]), was a concubine of Orhan, the second Ottoman sultan, and the mother of Murad I, Orhan's successor. She was the first Christian slave origin woman to became the mother of an Ottoman Sultan.

Biography[edit]

Nilüfer Hatun was a slave concubine of Greek origins, who entered in Orhan's harem in 1325. The following year, she bore Orhan a son, the future Murad I.[2][3][4] After 1331, she was transferred to Iznik together with her son.[4]

In March 1362, Orhan died and was succeeded as sultan by Nilüfer's son Murad I. Nilüfer thus became the first woman of Christian slave origins to be the mother of an Ottoman sultan and the first Valide Hatun of the Ottoman Empire.[4][5][6]

During his lifetime, Nilüfer commissioned the construction of an imaret, an hammam, a caravanserai and eighteen other buildings for various uses, especially charitable.[4]

The date of Nilüfer's death is not known with certainty and is variously estimated between 1363[1] and 1383.[4][6] She died in Bursa and was buried in the same city, in the Orhan's türbe.[3][4][6]

In 1388, Murad I commissioned the build the Nilüfer Hatun Imaret, at Iznik, dedicated to his mother's memory and financed by her waqf inheritance. Originally a convent for dervishes, it was restored in 1950 and opened to the public in 1960 as the Iznik Museum.[7]

Issue[edit]

By Orhan, Nilüfer had a son:[2][3][4]

  • Murad I (1326-1389). Sultan of the Ottoman Empire after his father.

Historical controversies[edit]

The traditional narrative on Nilüfer is extremely confusing and conflicting because, being the mother of a reigning sultan but of slave origins, subsequent historians took care to "ennoble" her, attributing origins and stories to her that were actually fictitious or concerning other consorts of Orhan, a process involving several Ottoman consorts over the centuries.[3]

An example of this is the way in which Nilüfer was described as a Byzantine noblewoman named Holofira, daughter of the tekfur of Bilecik,[4][6] a narrative that actually merges the stories of the Orhan's consorts Bayalun and Asporça: in fact, the abduction of Bilecik's daughter occurred in 1299, more than twenty years before Nilüfer's entry into the harem.[2][3][4][8][9][10] Likewise, tradition wrote that Nilüfer was the consort of Orhan whom ibn Battuta met in Bursa in 1331, while this woman was, again, Bayalun or Asporça.[3][11][12]

An other example is the fact that tradition attributed to Nilüfer the motherhood of Süleyman (1306-1357), the eldest and favorite of Orhan's sons and his presumptive heir until his death in 1357, in a hunting accident. In reality, Süleyman was the son of the consort Efendize Hatun and was born in 1306, twenty years before the appearance of Nilüfer in the harem and the birth of Murad I.[3][4]

See also[edit]

Notes and references[edit]

  1. ^ a b Pazan, İbrahim (2007). "Nilüfer Hatun". Padişah anneleri (in Turkish). Babıali Kültür Yayıncılığı. ISBN 978-9944-118-31-6.
  2. ^ a b c Alderson, Anthony Dolphin (1956). The Structure of the Ottoman Dynasty. Clarendon Press. pp. 83, 165 n4.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Peirce, Leslie P. (1993). The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire. Oxford University Press. pp. 33–35. ISBN 978-0-19-508677-5.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j "NİLÜFER HATUN". TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (in Turkish). Retrieved 2024-05-08.
  5. ^ "VÂLİDE SULTAN". TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (in Turkish). Retrieved 2024-05-08.
  6. ^ a b c d www.akademya.biz. sicill-i.osmani (in Turkish). p. 32.
  7. ^ "NİLÜFER HATUN İMARETİ". TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi (in Turkish). Retrieved 2024-05-08.
  8. ^ Aşıkpaşazade (2008). Âşık Paşâzade tarihi (in Turkish). Mostar. p. 54. ISBN 978-605-101-018-2.
  9. ^ Lowry, Heath W. (2012-02-01). The Nature of the Early Ottoman State [153]. State University of New York Press. ISBN 978-0-7914-8726-6.
  10. ^ Goodwin, Godfrey (2006). The Private World of Ottoman Women [32]. Saqi. ISBN 978-0-86356-745-2.
  11. ^ Alderson, p.165
  12. ^ Sakaoğlu, Necdet (2008). Bu mülkün kadın sultanları: vâlide sultanlar, hâtunlar, hasekiler, kadınefendiler, sultanefendiler (in Turkish). Oğlak Yayıncılık. pp. 38–40. ISBN 978-975-329-623-6.

Further reading[edit]

  • Yavuz Bahadıroğlu, Resimli Osmanlı Tarihi, Nesil Yayınları (Ottoman History with Illustrations, Nesil Publications), 15th Ed., 2009, ISBN 978-975-269-299-2 (Hardcover).
Ottoman royalty
New title Valide Hatun
1362 – 1363 		Succeeded by
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