Gülbahar Hatun (mother of Bayezid II)
Concubine of Mehmed II and mother of Bayezid II
Gülbahar Hatun(Ottoman Turkish: گل بہار خاتون; died in 1492) was a concubine of Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II, and mother and Valide Hatun of Sultan Bayezid II.
Early life
The Ottoman inscription (vakfiye) describes her as Hātun binti Abdullah (daughter of Abdullah), which means that she was a Christian slave converted to Islam. Various sources attribute, Albanian, Greek, Serbian or French origins to her, but contemporary ambassadors' reports, for example the Venetian Iacopo de Promontorio-de Campis' notes in 1475 report that Prince Bayezid's mother was an Albanian slave. The attribution of a Greek origin arose from the confusion with the homonymous Gülbahar Hatun mother of Selim I, who is believed to have been a Greek slave originally from Pontus. According to Shuteriqi, Gülbahar may have been a daughter of Gjergj Arianiti and Maria Muzaka, however this theory is not supported by modern historians.
She was likely a Christian slave concubine who converted to Islam.
Consort
Gülbahar entered in Mehmed's harem in 1446, when he was still a prince and the governor of Manisa. She had two children, a daughter, Gevherhan Hatun, born in 1446, who married Ughurlu Muhammad in 1474, and a son, Şehzade Bayezid (the future Bayezid II), born around in 1447–1448 in Demotika
In 1451, after Mehmed's accession to the throne, she followed him to Edirne. According to Ottoman tradition, all princes were expected to work as provincial governors as a part of their training. In 1455 or 1456, Bayezid was appointed the governor of Amasya, and Gülbahar accompanied him, where the two remained until 1481, except for in 1457, when she came to Constantinople, and attended her son's circumcision ceremony.
Gülbahar was apparently quite concerned about the future of her son, and related to that, her own properties.
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