Rüstem Pasha (; ; 1505 – 10 July 1561) was an Ottoman statesman who served as Grand Vizier to Sultan Süleyman the Magnificent. Rüstem Pasha is also known as Damat Rüstem Pasha (the epithet damat meaning 'son-in-law' ) as a result of his marriage to the sultan's daughter, Mihrimah Sultan, in 1539. He is regarded as one of the most influential and successful grand viziers of the Ottoman Empire.
Rustem Pasha was taken as a child to Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul), where he built a military and bureaucratic career. On 26 November 1539, he married Mihrimah Sultan, the daughter of Sultan Suleiman I and his wife Hurrem Sultan. His brother Sinan Pasha was an Ottoman grand admiral.
Early life
Rustem is referred to as a Bosniak by Tayib Osman-zade Ahmed, author of Hadikatul vuzara and the Turkish encyclopedia Kamus-ul-alam. He is also referred to as a Bosniak by the Turkish historiographer Mustafa Âlî, although other sources suggest different Croatian, Bosnian or Serbian birthplaces. In a diplomatic contact with Antun Vrančić he called his maternal language as Croatian indicating his Croatian origin.
Wherever he was born, Rustem Pasha was a man of very humble origins. He was forcibly recruited through the Devşirme system from Christian parents in the Balkans and brought to Constantinople as a child. There he studied in the Enderun, an institute for the education/indoctrination of talented boys. By the time they graduated, the boys were able to speak, read and write at least three languages, were able to understand the latest developments in science and finance and were able to excel in military leadership as well as in close combat skills. It was a perfect start for a career in the military or officialdom.
An extremely ambitious man, Rüstem owed the success of his career to the support of Hurrem Sultan, the wife of Sultan Süleyman the Magnificent. In 1526, he took part in the Battle of Mohacs as a silahdar (a weapon bearer in an elite cavalry division of the Ottoman army). A few years later he advanced to mirahur-i evvel ağa (chief supervisor of the sultan's stables) and then rikab-dar (the stirrup holder when the sultan mounted his horse). The mirahur accompanied the Sultan during his travels, so the Süleyman knew Rüstem for a long time before he appointed him - possibly inspired by Hürrem - to be tutor to his sons. In making this decision, he was surely influenced by Rüstem's character. Most historical sources describe Rüstem as a calm and reasonable man with a keen intellect, who always kept a cool head, and who was devoted to his ruler.
Political career
Rüstem Pasha was a sanjak bey who was promoted to become Beylerbey of Diyarbakir. By the time he married Mihrimah Sultan, he was already a vizier. Süleyman the Magnificent appointed him grand vizier for the first time in 1544 but in 1553 he was dismissed, only to recover the position in 1555 and hold on to it until his death in 1561.
As a diplomat, Rüstem initiated many trade agreements with European countries and India. His biggest success was the agreement, signed in 1547, with King Ferdinand I and the Emperor Charles V, which confirmed, without firing a shot, the western border of the Ottoman Empire for more than fourteen years. Ferdinand renounced his claim to the Kingdom of Hungary and agreed to pay a tax of 30,000 gold ducats a year to the Ottoman treasury. The Emperor's ambassador Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq wrote that Charles tried to revise the unfavourable agreement, several times but that Rüstem always resisted. Rüstem also worked on the agreement with the Safavids, which, in 1544, ended the long-standing Ottoman-Safavid wars, and secured the eastern borders of the Ottoman Empire.
In 1536 Süleyman had his grand vizier Pargalı Ibrahim Pasha executed for complicated reasons (for example, he used a seal saying 'Sultan Ibrahim' and retained most of the confiscated property of Süleyman's 'minister of finance' İskender Çelebi, whose execution he ordered, etc.). Ibrahim was replaced with Ayas Mehmed Pasha, followed in turn by Lütfi Pasha and Hadım Suleiman Pasha. Rüstem Pasha became Grand Vizier eight years after Ibrahim's death.