SULTAN MEHMED ÇELEBİ HAN

Father : Sultan Bayezid Han
Mother : Devlet Hatun
Date of Birth : 1387
Accession to the Throne : 1413
Death : May, 1421

He was either eleven of fourteen years old at the battle of Ankara. At the period of Interregnum that ensued after the victory of Timur, the sons of Bayezid fell apart, each claiming the right to be his successor. At the end of a long drawn-out and strenuous struggle, and after overcoming Emir Süleyman and also Musa Çelebi, who had taken refuge in Wallace, Mehmet Çelebi declared himself sovereign in the year 810 A.H. (1408 A.d.) and minted coins in his own name.

Mehmed’s life was spent in battles and internal feuds. He made campaigns in Roumelia and he reunited the Ottoman State, which had become split, joining the Anatolian and Roumelian provinces under the same flag once again. Historians have compared him to Prophet Noah, who gave mankind a new lease of life after the Great Flood.

He was tall and slender with a broad chest and long neck. His complexion was of a rosy white hue and he had dark brown eyes, a ram-nose and a well-proportioned chin. Mehmed I was a brave, self-controlled and wise ruler. He had fleshy and strong hands, the look of a hawk and the bearing of a lion.

He had plain silk brocade coiled and wound around the gold embroidered üsküf. Only the upper part of teh üsküf was to be seen; the lower part lay concealed below the folds of the turban. His “kaftan”s (a loose, long robe) were made of richly woven tissue.