The Grand Turk: Sultan Mehmet II - Conqueror of Constantinople and Master of an Empire (24 page)

Raiders under Malkoçoğlu Bali Bey, the Ottoman commander at Smederova in northern Serbia, crossed the Danube on 6 February 1474 and penetrated deep into Hungary, plundering and killing before they withdrew with all the captives they could handle. At the beginning of June a horde of Turkish horsemen from Bosnia raided into Croatia and penetrated as far as southern Austria, before withdrawing with their captives. On 22 June a force of 20,000 Turks made their way into Venetian territory in Friuli, at the head of the Adriatic, plundering and killing before they departed. The Venetians were forced to raise a militia of 60,000 together with 500 cavalrymen to defend Friuli against future Turkish incursions.

Another mounted Turkish horde crossed the Danube from Serbia into Hungary in August and penetrated as far as the river Koros in Transylvania before they were driven back by a Hungarian force. The constant Turkish threat forced King Matthias Corvinus to conclude a truce with King Casimir IV of Poland and to interrupt his war with Bohemia.

The Ottoman fleet whose construction had been reported to the Signoria was not directed towards Venice, as they expected, but against the Genoese colony of Kaffa (Feodosiya) in the Crimea, where a struggle for succession in the Tatar khanate gave Mehmet an opportunity to intervene.

The Tatars were Ottoman vassals, but had special status because their ruling dynasty claimed direct descent from Genghis Khan. The Tatars living in and around Kaffa were governed by an official of their own race known as a
tudun
, who the Khan of the Crimea appointed after consultation with the Genoese
Ufficio della Campagna
. When the
tudun
Marmak died in 1473 he was succeeded by his brother Eminek. But Marmak’s widow tried to have her son Sertak appointed as his father’s successor, and a bitter dispute ensued. The Genoese committee consulted Mengli Giray, Khan of the Crimean Turks, who at first agreed to accept Sertak, but then changed his mind to name his own favourite, Kirai Mirza.

1. Mehmet II, portrait attributed to Sinan Bey, c. 1480

2a. Mehmet II and a youth who may be Prince Jem, portrait attributed to Gentile Bellini

2b. Mehmet II, portrait attributed to Constanza da’Ferrara

3a. Rumelι Hisarι (right) and Anadolu Hisarι (left) on the Bosphorus

3b. The Theodosian walls leading down to the Golden Horn

4a. The original Mosque of the Conqueror dominating the skyline above the Golden Horn

4b. Topkapι Sarayι above the point at the confluence of the Bosphorus and the Golden Horn

5. Kapalι Çarşι, the Covered Bazaar

6a. The Golden Horn viewed from the cemetery of Eyüp

6b. Yedikule, the Castle of the Seven Towers

7. Interior of Haghia Sophia as a mosque

8a. Court and fountain of Haghia Sophia