Suleiman the Magnificent
At the time of Suleiman's death, the Ottoman Empire was one of the world's foremost powers. Suleiman's conquests had brought under the control of the Empire major Muslim cities (such as Baghdad), many Balkan provinces (reaching present day Croatia and Hungary), and most of North Africa. His expansion into Europe had given the Ottoman Turks a powerful presence in the European balance of power. Indeed, such was the perceived threat of the Ottoman Empire under the reign of Suleiman that Austria's ambassador Busbecq warned of Europe's imminent conquest: "On [the Turks'] side are the resources of a mighty empire, strength unimpaired, habituation to victory, endurance of toil, unity, discipline, frugality and watchfulness ... Can we doubt what the result will be? ... When the Turks have settled with Persia, they will fly at our throats supported by the might of the whole East; how unprepared we are I dare not say." Suleiman's legacy was not, however, merely in the military field. The French traveler Jean de Thévenot bears witness a century later to the "strong agricultural base of the country, the well being of the peasantry, the abundance of staple foods and the pre-eminence of organization in Suleiman's government".
Sultanate of Women
In addition, Suleiman's reign famously marked the merging of the imperial harem into the palace and political sphere, as he became the first sultan to be officially married, to the woman later known as Hürrem Sultan. Though controversial even at the time, this act, combined with the centralization of the imperial dynasty, brought the women of the harem closer to real power than they had ever been. As the royal princes lost power from the loss of their governance, their wives and mothers gained significantly, using their prince's status and connections to influence court and imperial decisions. In the late 16th century, Murat III even moved his personal residence from the palace, where he had previously been surrounded by exclusively-male servants and courtiers, to the harem itself. Thus, by the turn of the 1600s, the wife and mother of the sultan became two of the most prominent and influential positions in government, in practice if not in law.