“Napoleon’s strategy is to fight Tsar Alexander in the north while the Turks and Persians attack Russia from the south. We’ll first crush Prussia, then Russia, and then march through Russia and Persia to India, stripping England of its richest colony. Then Bonaparte can reorganize the world. This great work starts with us, here in Constantinople.”
“I’m always happy to give advice,” I said. “Rarely taken, though.”
Sebastiani pointed across the water to Topkapi Palace. “Selim is beset by his own governors. Some are defecting to the Russian side in hopes of becoming more independent. Other pashas refuse to send troops or taxes. The sultan has tried military reform by creating a New Army, but this is bitterly resented by the Janissaries, who view modernization as a threat to their haughty privileges. It would require them to fight foreigners instead of preying on their own people. The sultan desperately needs to modernize, but every attempt is opposed by reactionaries.”
“The Turks seem blind to their own interests,” Caleb said.
“This is an empire that banned printing when it appeared in 1515, and a city where a mob destroyed an astronomical observatory in 1586. The best artists are believed to be those who slavishly copy works hundreds of years old. The Muslims, once the world’s leaders in learning, now fear that knowledge blocks the path to God. The result is ignorance, weakness, and frustration. Who knows when the Janissary guard will beat its cauldrons with its spoons?”
“Cauldrons and spoons?”
“The traditional call for revolt. The Janissaries were originally recruited from Christian slaves boys who were forcibly converted to Islam. The idea was that a slave army, indoctrinated from youth, would be more loyal to the sultan than the feuding Turks themselves. Food was critical to the morale of the slave army, and so their symbols became the soup kettle and the wooden spoon. The latter is carried by officers as a badge of rank.”
“A spoon is more practical than a scepter.”
“But the Janissaries have deteriorated from invincible infantry to an obsolete gang of extortionists. Selim struggles. He’s a mild man of the harem, a musician instead of a warrior.”
“We’re here to train his New Army?” I clarified.
“If we can win the sultan’s trust. Historically, one of the ways to get his ear is through his women. The most powerful person in Topkapi Palace is usually the sultan’s mother, called the valide or ‘mother’ sultan, but she’s died. We need new allies in the harem.”
“I’d volunteer to go recruiting, having a certain knack with the ladies. But I assume you mean this Aimée du Buc de Rivéry.”
“The only harem guests are women, which makes your wife key to our diplomatic scheme. Astiza is the one person in our delegation who Nakshedil can talk to, and thus Astiza is the one who can best press French interests. First we will present our own diplomatic credentials. Then Astiza will continue our efforts behind the secret screens of the harem.”
“As a guest and not a slave.”
“Yes. Who, in advising one side, will undoubtedly gain the enmity of rivals in the palace.”
CHAPTER 28
The key to influencing human behavior is to understand it, and the key to understanding Constantinople was remembering that the Ottomans thrived on their inconsistency between what was said and what was done.
I quickly observed that the citizenry flouted the Muslim prohibition against alcohol with a fondness for arak, a colorless, aniseed-flavored spirit called lion’s milk. The imams frowned on coffee, but their followers flocked to coffee houses for cups as thick as syrup. There they took turns at rows of water pipes to smoke banned tobacco, hashish, and opium, the latter as commonly grown as wine in nearby Anatolia. As Franklin warned, many a man thinks he is buying pleasure when he is really selling himself to it.
Sex was no different. The religion forbade prostitution, but rural village men—denied what Europeans would consider ordinary female company before marriage—routinely came to the city’s strumpets to slate desire and gain experience. The Turks condemned homosexuality, but attractive young soldiers and slaves were routinely seduced or raped. The society prized masculinity, yet Selim spent nearly all his time with five hundred harem women and their eunuchs. Sultans no longer rode to war.
Selim’s servants were infidel slaves, since Muslims were forbidden to enslave each other, and yet any sultan was in essence a captive of these same servants. He depended on domineering Janissaries for defense and domestic slaves for protection, food, comfort, advice, and love. The sultan was perhaps the richest man on earth, but spent almost his entire life in a harem and gardens no bigger, and little brighter, than a prison.
We Europeans were infidels too, and yet increasingly employed for military and scientific advice. The sultan insisted we adhere to Oriental pomp, and yet he secretly wore Western clothes, hired Italian artists to paint landscape frescos in his palace, and sat on European furniture.
In sum, there was enough hypocrisy to make me feel right at home. The gap between ideal and practice yawned as wide in Constantinople as in Washington, Paris, London, or St. Petersburg. By forbidding everything, the Muslims had to allow everything. By expecting piety, they turned a blind eye to vice. By shutting away women, a man could defer to them without public embarrassment.
Winning the whispers of women was key. The ambassador explained that the Ottoman Empire had sidestepped the typical wars of royal succession by insisting that the sultan’s heirs come from the closed world of the harem, removing false claims of paternity and the temptation of outside pashas to vie for the throne. The competition was instead extremely intimate, as the sultan’s sexual favorites conspired to elevate their sons. The mother of a new sultan achieved enormous influence, while the offspring of losing harem women were often executed. This ‘valide sultan’ was almost a monarch in her own right. What man doesn’t listen to his mother, even when she began as a concubine?
Now harem politics was shifting. Selim’s mother was dead and Selim’s closest female friend—and his father’s sexual favorite—had taken Mama’s place in the harem hierarchy. This was the Martinique beauty Aimée, captured by pirates nineteen years ago, cousin to the Empress Josephine, and the same age as Selim. The two had been companions since their teen years. She had her own son, Mahmud, fathered by Selim’s father, and thus Selim was Mahmud’s half-brother. Aimée’s son was a possible heir to the throne, but only if her pro-French policy proved successful.
My brother had left us in Transylvania to glean this gossip and plot how to use it to our advantage. Caleb used his Napoleonic connections to get word to Sebastiani of our talents, and used Sebastiani to alert the Ottoman court to my wife’s interesting background. Aimée, who avidly devoured news of the outside world, had immediately invited Astiza.
“But first I must present my ambassadorial credentials,” Sebastiani told Caleb and me. “You’ll accompany my entourage and serve as an example of the military expertise Constantinople can expect from a French alliance.”
“Caleb has commanded ships,” I said, “but I’m more of a consultant than a professional soldier. Go-between. Hanger-on. Skirmisher.”
“As well as gambler, thief, rogue, and dilettante, yes, yes, I know. But the Turks need not know. You worked with Gaspard Monge in Egypt, who has reformed French artillery. You’re known the inventors and savants Fulton, Berthollet, and Cuvier. You can shoot, and have mastered Franklin’s electricity. I’ve told the Turks you throw thunderbolts! Accordingly, you’re going to be our artillery expert until a real one gets here. We’ll give you a colonel’s uniform while Caleb, in captain’s garb, advises the navy.”
“We’ve been promoted, brother!”
“I do have a knack for pretending to be knowledgeable,” I admitted.
“A man can rise,” the ambassador agreed, “by being a parrot.”
I’d also keep eyes and ears open for this long-lost Trojan pallad
ium or any other precious gewgaw or knickknack that might be lying about. If I couldn’t be a Russian noble I’d be a French colonel and Turkish general. I still didn’t trust Caleb, but had to admit he’d given my family another chance. My brother seemed to want to make amends.
Selim’s chief astrologer had to be the one to choose the date of Sebastiani’s audience with the sultan, but brewing war meant the stars didn’t wait long to align. A summons was tendered and we rehearsed the pomp as if practicing for a wedding. We woke on the appointed day to the usual muezzin cries calling the faithful to dawn prayers, sleepily assembled in the embassy, and marched for the harbor. We had servants to lug the obligatory presents, an escort of smug Janissary guards, a priest and imam to guide us spiritually, and a secretary to take notes. Critical though she might be, Astiza was not invited. Muslim ceremonies were a boys’ affair.
We marched past the Arsenal where the raw ribs of half-completed warships of French design jutted from a dry dock. “Fastest and most agile in the world,” Caleb noted. “But will they be ready in time?” Then we were ferried across the Golden Horn to the vizier’s dock below the palace walls. On shore we waited in a large gazebo that the Turks call a kiosk, imbibing morning sweets and coffee. A horse was brought round from the royal stables so that Sebastiani could follow the diplomatic custom of riding up the palace hill and the rest of us trailed on foot to the procession kiosk, where we were met by Grand Vizier Ibrahim Hilmi Pasha, the tenth grand vizier of Selim III’s turbulent reign. This pompous character was attired in a scarlet and gold robe, silver slippers, and a white turban fronted by a spray of peacock feathers. Slaves held large umbrellas with golden ribs and sapphire-studded handles to shade him and a dozen other splendiferous ministers.
Sebastiani had his own brass and braid, I posed in my colonel’s uniform, and Caleb was costumed like a French navy captain. Taken together, our assembly was bright enough for an Italian opera or a Mummer’s parade.
The palace is a quadrangle nearly half a mile long, narrowing as it extends from the city to Seraglio Point. This city in miniature includes kitchens, stables, a mint, a treasury, a hospital, the offices of government, reception rooms, barracks, page schools, gardens, and the harem. Topkapi was additionally crowded this particular day with three thousand Janissaries who’d come for their quarterly pay, which was an excuse to show us Ottoman military might.
We were ushered through the Imperial Gate to the first courtyard, a thousand feet long and five hundred feet wide. Soldiers were squeezed with horses, mules, supply carts, and even a forlorn elephant in one dusty corner. A French-speaking Muslim guide appeared to point out a former Christian church turned armory and the fountain used to clean the blades of the Palace Executioner.
“These are the pedestals for severed heads,” he said without emotion, as if every respectable palace had some. A couple long-rotting examples were on display, presumably to keep us on best behavior. “Beyond we have the dormitory for Carriers of Silver Water Vessels, and next to it the house of The Straw Weavers. Here, the mint, there the gate to the water stables.”
“Yes, yes,” the grand vizier said impatiently. “On to the divan.”
Our entourage proceeded through the Middle Gate, which was flanked by two octagonal towers with steeple roofs. The second courtyard was less than half the length of the first. It, too, was jammed, this time by Janissary soldiers in still formation, both the men and the courtyard’s cypress trees in trim angular ranks. The slave warriors were beardless, unlike most Muslim men, but sported great drooping mustaches that fell as far as their chests. Their sashes held pistols and knives, their colorful jackets reached to the knees of their bloused pants, and their mitered felt hats, called börks in Turkish, were topped with intricate embroidery that flopped over in back to shade their neck. Some had pikes, some swords, and others muskets inlaid with mother-of-pearl. They stood so quiet that we could hear the insects in the trees.
In the far corner was the Hall of the Divan, a single-story domed building with colonnaded porch and a backing steeple called the Tower of Justice. Inside was a cool and pleasing chamber for the Ottoman cabinet, with tiled walls, plentiful windows, and gentle breeze. I noticed one peculiar grilled window up high on a wall. “The sultan sometimes observes from behind that screen,” the interpreter whispered. “Always remember, he may judge you.”
I resolved not to scratch or yawn.
Much protocol ensued that was designed to both flatter the new diplomat and yet make clear that he ranked well below the sultan and his ministers. We bowed and stood at attention while Sebastiani kissed the hem of the vizier’s robe and perched on a low stool, as was custom. The ambassador had warned us that one arrogant French predecessor had refused to unbuckle his sword in the sultan’s presence and been ignored for the next decade, so we were under strict instructions not to turn our back, make hand gestures, address Selim’s ministers, or speak above a whisper to each other.
Now came payday. Sacks of piasters, florins, ducats, and francs were brought to the room and given to gruff Janissary officers, who in turn went outside and distributed them to their waiting soldiers in what seemed to be an interminable ceremony. The lesson to the Janissaries was plain: This is where your pay comes from, so defend your sultan with your life. The lesson to us was that the Ottomans had sufficient coin to support formidable armies.
Next, Sebastiani formally asked to be presented to the sultan that afternoon, the ambassador and the vizier traded empty compliments, and we sat cross-legged on the floor while huge silver trays were carried in with lunch. There were so many delicious dishes that I was reminded of Franklin’s quip, “I saw few die of hunger, of eating a hundred thousand.” We ate in dead silence. After an hour slaves removed the food, we were dressed in ceremonial robes called kaftans, and we paraded to the domed Gate of Felicity.
Unlike the first two military gates, this one had architectural grace. Two fountains flanked it, and its guards were white eunuch slaves with silver spears, ivory-butted pistols, and hippopotamus hide whips. “After a long-ago power struggle, the white eunuchs were confined to the gate and the black eunuchs gained the privilege of serving inside the harem,” Sebastiani murmured. “The blacks, with the ear of the women, have far more power.”
The third courtyard seemed almost deserted compared to the first two, its periphery a shady colonnade and its middle occupied by the throne room. Gates led to the palace gardens and harem and so I glanced around for a girl or two, but so far hadn’t seen a single female. The guide did point out the treasury.
“Lots of gold and jewels?”
“Fabulous books, precious carpets, and bolts of silk.”
Too heavy to make off with.
The throne room had the same grace as the divan, its interior swirling with arabesques and carved flowers. The Islamic décor had been supplemented with Italian landscapes. Water tinkled in small fountains, and thick carpets of wool and silk were cast across the marble floor. The air was heady with incense. Latticed windows cast spears of dramatic light through its smoke. The Grand Turk sat on a raised platform that looked like a four-poster bed without a canopy, his golden perch draped with jeweled cloth.
While character might improve a face, and dissolution ruin it, we mostly abide with the looks we’re born with. Selim was a pleasant-enough fellow, but not one to inspire awe. His skin seemed delicate, his features soft, his eyes large and trusting, and his mouth mild. Like all sultans he had a long beard dyed fiercely black, and his robes shimmered with precious threads and stones. Atop his head was an enormous jeweled turban with an aigrette of heron feathers. It looked heavy.
His courtiers were stiff as statues. There was a gigantic negro called the Chief Black Eunuch who ran the harem, and other servants with titles like The Sword-Bearer, The Master of the Wardrobe, The Chief Stirrup-Holder, The Head of the Privy Chamber, and so on. The general, or Aga, who headed the Janissaries and the Admiral of the Navy
stood shoulder to shoulder with The Chief Turban Winder, The Keeper of Nightingales, and The Chief Tent Pitcher, who probably hadn’t had much to do for several centuries.
All were solemn as stone.
Somewhat peculiar were a line of dwarves and a rank of meek-looking servants behind them. Caleb noticed my look. “I read that the dwarves are considered amusing slaves,” he murmured, “and the mutes and blinded carry messages with the assurance they won’t whisper what they can’t say, or read what they can’t see.”
Two black doorkeepers led Sebastiani forward, holding him under his arms as both a sign of respect and as a precaution against any visitor who might be a secret assassin. The ambassador was led about like a marionette to three different places, bowed three times at each, kissed the hem of the sultan’s cloak, and finally stood back while his official deposition and credentials were read aloud in Turkish. These were passed to the admiral, who passed them to the grand vizier, who passed them to the throne. The grand vizier then spoke for Selim, welcoming us through the translator.
The sultan gravely nodded.
That signal meant it was present time. Sebastiani’s gifts were unpacked and paraded like the haul from an upscale wedding. Included were gold trays, silver flatware, China plates, silver candlesticks, a chafing dish, a jeweled clock in the shape of a rooster, and a jeweled cavalry saber. The sultan was studiously impassive, receiving it all as his due.
And that was usually the end, the ambassador receding until called upon for specific negotiations. This time, however, Selim startled his entire court by limply raising a hand and asking a question. Ministers jerked as if jolted.
“Is your emperor going to fight Russia?” Sebastiani was asked.
The envoy carefully phrased his answer, knowing that Selim would be well informed and mustn’t be lied to. “We’ve recently signed a treaty of friendship with St. Petersburg after our victory at Austerlitz,” he said, “but the tsar is courting Prussia, which angers France. The situation is very fluid, which is why Napoleon seeks friendship. Your enemies may become ours.”
The Trojan Icon (Ethan Gage Adventures Book 8) Page 23
