Suleiman the Magnificent and the codification of Ottoman law

Date

1520 to 1566 (reign of Suleiman)

Category

Politics & governance

Region

Ottoman Empire

Era

Early Modern

Significance

Sultan Suleiman I ruled from 1520 to 1566, presiding over the political, military and cultural zenith of the Ottoman Empire. Known in the West as the Magnificent, his own subjects called him Kanuni, the Lawgiver.

Working with his chief jurist Ebussuud Efendi, Suleiman collected, pruned and harmonised the secular decrees, the kanun, of his predecessors into a single coherent code governing taxation, land tenure and criminal matters, carefully aligned so as not to violate Islamic sharia. This kanun-i Osmani provided an administrative framework that endured for centuries. His reign also saw a flowering of Ottoman arts and architecture, epitomised by the great imperial mosques of Mimar Sinan such as the Süleymaniye in Istanbul. Through legal reform, conquest from Hungary to the Arab lands, and naval power across the Mediterranean, Suleiman shaped the institutions and self-image of the Ottoman state at the height of its power.

Empires active in 1520 to 1566 (reign of Suleiman)

• Songhai Empire
  1464 CE to 1591 CE
• Ming Dynasty
  1368 CE to 1644 CE
• Inca Empire
  1438 CE to 1533 CE
• Aztec Empire
  1428 CE to 1521 CE
• Ottoman Empire
  1299 CE to 1922 CE
• Solomonic dynasty
  1270 CE to 1974 CE

Related politics & governance events

• Selim I conquers the Mamluk Sultanate and the holy cities
  January 1517
• Peace of Westphalia ends the Thirty Years' War
  October 1648
• The English Reformation: Henry VIII's Act of Supremacy
  1534
• The New Laws and the debate over the encomienda
  20 November 1542
• The Peace of Augsburg
  25 September 1555
• Akbar's religious tolerance and administrative reforms
  1564 (jizya abolished); 1582 (Din-i Ilahi)

Essential reading

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  1501
• Cocoliztli Epidemic of 1545 to 1548
  1545 to 1548
• Kingdom of Kongo converts to Christianity under Nzinga a Nkuwu (João I)
  3 May 1491
• Bayinnaung forges the largest empire in Southeast Asian history
  1565

Further reading

Osman's Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire

The wider story

Osman's Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire

Caroline Finkel

The standard readable single-volume Ottoman history.

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