Yahyapaşazade Bali Bey
Yahyapaşazade Bali Bey | |
|---|---|
| Nickname | Küçük |
| Born | Bali Before 1470 |
| Died | 1527 Ottoman Empire |
| Allegiance | Ottoman Empire |
| Rank | bey, sanjakbey |
| Relations | Yahyapaşaoğlu family |
Yahyapaşazade Bali Bey[a] (fl. 1485–d. 1527) was an Ottoman general and governor, notably serving as the sanjakbey of Smederevo.
Early life
Bali was the son of Yahya Pasha (d. 1509[1] or after July 1511[2]), and he had six younger brothers, one of whom was Mehmed.[3] The family was based in Skopje.[4] Yahya Pasha was an esteemed Ottoman statesman who served as beylerbey of Anatolia and Rumelia.[5] Yahya was the patriarch and first Islamized member of the family.[6] The family did not belong to the Malkoçoğlu family.[1] The family had no royal blood; his father remarried a daughter of Sultan Bayezid II, Aynışah (also her second marriage), but none of Yahya's sons were from this marriage.[3] The birth year of Bali is unknown.[3] The oldest mention of him is from 1485.[3]
Career
Bali is mentioned in 1485 as a ziamet-holder in Bosnia.[3] He is next mentioned as the commander (soubashi) of the Yürüks, a peasant military unit in the Balkans (Rumelia).[3] In 1498 he accompanied Malkoçoğlu Bali Bey's invasion of Poland, from where he gained much loot.[7] At this time he was a sanjakbey of one of the Rumelian sanjaks, but it is unclear which.[7] In 1504 he was the bey of the liva of Kyustendil.[7] In 1506 he was the sanjakbey of Avlona.[7] In 1509 he was the governor of Silistra.[7] Between August and October 1811 he was appointed the sanjakbey of Nicopolis.[7] He married a granddaughter of Bayezid II.[1] In the dynastic struggle between Bayezid II and Selim, Bali played both sides, but supported Selim in the end.[8] In late 1513 he was appointed the sanjakbey of Smederevo, the most important frontier district.[9] In this post, he had direct command over operations against the Kingdom of Hungary.[9] In 1515 he destroyed John Zapolya at Avala.[9] In small interruptions, he was reassigned to Iskenderiyye (1518–20), Bosnia (1521) and Vidin (1523–24), but most of his career was as the sanjakbey of Smederevo.[9] In 1520–21, he was closely involved in Sultan Suleyman's change of war policy from the east to the west.[10]
Bali had a prominent role in the Siege of Belgrade (1521) and the Battle of Mohacs (1526).[1]
He died some time between February and April 1527.[1] He was buried in a turbe near Smederevo, which still existed into the 19th century.[1] Following his death, his younger brother Mehmed served as sanjakbey of Smederevo.[11]
His contemporaries had negative descriptions of him, and he had several complaints on him at the Porte.[1]
Annotations
- ^ His patronymic is also spelt Yahyapaşaoglu,[12] Yahya Paşaoglu and Yahyapaşa-oğlu.[11] He was known during his lifetime in Hungarian sources as Küçük ("small"), perhaps to distinguish him from the other, "great" Malkoçoğlu Bali Bey.[3][1] Also known as Serbo-Croatian: Bali-beg Jahjapašić.[13]
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h Fotić 2001, p. 439.
- ^ Fodor 2019, pp. 60–61.
- ^ a b c d e f g Fodor 2019, p. 61.
- ^ Fodor 2019, p. 59.
- ^ Fodor 2019, p. 60.
- ^ Fotić 2001, p. 438.
- ^ a b c d e f Fodor 2019, p. 62.
- ^ Fodor 2019, pp. 62–63.
- ^ a b c d Fodor 2019, p. 63.
- ^ Fodor 2019, p. 64.
- ^ a b Fotić 2001.
- ^ Fodor 2019, p. 68.
- ^ Bojanić 1985.
Sources
- Fodor, Pál (2019). "Wolf on the Border: Yahyapaşaoğlu Bali Bey (?-1527)". In Fodor, Pál; Kovács, Nándor Erik; Péri, Benedek (eds.). Şerefe. Studies in Honour of Prof. Géza Dávid on His Seventieth Birthday. Budapest: Research Centre for the Humanities, Hungarian Academy of Sciences. pp. 57–87.
- Fotić, Aleksandar (2001). "YAHYAPAŞA-OĞLU MEHMED PASHA'S EVKAF IN BELGRADE". Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae. 54 (4). Akadémiai Kiadó: 437–452. ISSN 0001-6446. JSTOR 23658314 – via Academia.edu.
- Bojanić, D. (1985): Požarevac u XVI veku i Bali-beg Jahjapašić. Istorijski časopis Vol. XXXII, pp. 49-77