Macuncuzade Mustafa Efendi was an Ottoman

qadi A qadi (; ) is the magistrate or judge of a Sharia court, who also exercises extrajudicial functions such as mediation, guardianship over orphans and minors, and supervision and auditing of public works. History The term '' was in use from ...

and poet who wrote a

slave narrative The slave narrative is a type of literary genre involving the (written) autobiographical accounts of enslaved persons, particularly African diaspora, Africans enslaved in the Americas, though many other examples exist. Over six thousand such narra ...

about his captivity and enslavement in

Hospitaller Malta Hospitaller Malta, known in Maltese history as the Knights' Period (, ), was a '' de facto'' state which existed between 1530 and 1798 when the Mediterranean islands of Malta and Gozo were ruled by the Order of St. John of Jerusalem. It was for ...

between 1597 and 1600. Macuncuzade was born in

Constantinople Constantinople (#Names of Constantinople, see other names) was a historical city located on the Bosporus that served as the capital of the Roman Empire, Roman, Byzantine Empire, Byzantine, Latin Empire, Latin, and Ottoman Empire, Ottoman empire ...

in around the 1550s. He was appointed as qadi of

Paphos Paphos, also spelled as Pafos, is a coastal city in southwest Cyprus and the capital of Paphos District. In classical antiquity, two locations were called Paphos: #Old Paphos, Old Paphos, today known as Kouklia, and #New Paphos, New Paphos. It i ...

Ottoman Cyprus The Eyalet of Cyprus (, ''Eyālet-i Ḳıbrıṣ'') was an eyalet/province of the Ottoman Empire made up of the island of Cyprus, which was annexed into the Empire in 1571. The Ottomans changed the way they administered Cyprus multiple times. It ...

on 19 March 1597, and after being delayed for a month due to illness, he boarded a ship known as a ''karamürsel'' in order to make the journey to his new appointment from

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on 22 April. He was accompanied on this journey by his slave. In May, they encountered the Hospitaller fleet consisting of four

galley A galley is a type of ship optimised for propulsion by oars. Galleys were historically used for naval warfare, warfare, Maritime transport, trade, and piracy mostly in the seas surrounding Europe. It developed in the Mediterranean world during ...

s when they were around off Cyprus, and they were attacked. 30 men from the Ottoman ship lost their lives in the ensuing skirmish. The captain, Alaiyeli Mehmed Reis, then surrendered the ship and its remaining crew and passengers – including Macuncuzade and his slave – were captured by the Hospitallers. Macuncuzade wrote that they were taken on board a "Frenk ship captained by Sente Bin"; the latter is likely a reference to the French knight Fra Pierre de Rocquelaure de Saint-Aubin, who had previously commanded one of the Hospitaller galleys during the 1571

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. The Hospitaller galley squadron then spent another twenty days attacking other Muslim ships, and they captured another twelve ships and a total of 283 slaves before returning to their base in

Malta Malta, officially the Republic of Malta, is an island country in Southern Europe located in the Mediterranean Sea, between Sicily and North Africa. It consists of an archipelago south of Italy, east of Tunisia, and north of Libya. The two ...

. Upon their arrival, the captives were evaluated by a commission which set out a ransom amount according to each person's rank and status, and they were allowed to send letters to those who could pay their ransom in order to explain that they had been captured and to inform them of the amount required to secure their freedom. High-ranking Ottoman officials were typically ransomed directly by the sultanate, and Macuncuzade petitioned the

Valide sultan Valide Sultan (, lit. "Sultana mother") was the title held by the mother of a ruling sultan of the Ottoman Empire. The Ottomans first formally used the title in the 16th century as an epithet of Hafsa Sultan (died 1534), mother of Sultan Suleima ...

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in this regard. His ransom of 500 gold

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s was paid in late 1599, and it is possible that Macuncuzade's slave was released by the Hospitallers in exchange for a Christian slave. After securing his freedom, Macuncuzade left Malta in January 1600. Shortly after his release, he wrote a narrative entitled ''Baz Kest-i Hakiri-i Malta Sergiizess-i Esiri-i Malta'' based on notes and poems he had composed while imprisoned. A manuscript copy of it was made by a scribe named Omer in 1602, and the latter is preserved at the Hacı Selim Ağa Library in

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. Its text was published and translated in the 20th and 21st centuries, and it is regarded as an important primary source about the activities of the Hospitaller fleet and of

slavery in Malta Slavery () was practiced in Malta from classical antiquity to the early modern period, as was the case in many countries around the Mediterranean Sea. Sources dating back to when the islands were under Arab rule during the Middle Ages attest t ...

during the late 16th century.

References

{{Slave narrative 1550s births Year of death missing 16th-century civil servants from the Ottoman Empire 16th-century slaves 16th-century writers from the Ottoman Empire Qadis Slave owners from the Ottoman Empire Slaves in Hospitaller Malta Writers from Istanbul Writers of slave narratives

See also

References