33 Facts About Ali Janbulad

Ali Janbulad's rebellion, launched to avenge the execution of his uncle Huseyn ibn Janbulad by the commander Jigalazade Sinan Pasha in 1605, gained currency among northern Syria's Kurdish, Turkmen and Arab tribes and expanded to include local Syrian governors and chiefs, most prominently Fakhr al-Din Ma'n of Mount Lebanon and his erstwhile enemy Yusuf Sayfa Pasha of Tripoli.

Murad Pasha's campaign against Ali Janbulad was ostensibly directed against the Safavids to avoid Ali Janbulad's mobilization; the latter realized he was the grand vizier's target only when Murad Pasha's army routed his Celali allies in Cilicia and approached his north Syrian domains.

Ali Janbulad suppressed brigandage in the district and took part in the 1571 Ottoman conquest of Cyprus during the war with Venice.

Ali Janbulad belonged to a family of Kurdish tribal chieftains based in the Kurd-Dagh west of Kilis and Aleppo.

Ali Janbulad built at least one Sunni Muslim mosque in Kilis in 1562 before his governorship, and he or one of his family members built a bathhouse in the city.

Ali Janbulad participated in the 1578 Ottoman campaigns against the Safavids in Georgia and eastern Anatolia.

Ali Janbulad acted as a stand-in for his uncle Huseyn while the latter was fighting on the Safavid front.

Ali Janbulad had already established a reputation across Syria as "an experienced leader, an able, generous man" according to Griswold.

Ali Janbulad engaged in a six-month struggle against local opponents in northern Syria and became the unofficial power in Aleppo.

The Porte agreed to Yusuf's request to head a campaign against Ali Janbulad and promoted him to serdar of Damascus.

Ali Janbulad ordered a three-day plunder of the city's suburbs; to avoid Damascus experiencing the same fate, Yusuf and the Damascene authorities, led by the kadi, and local merchants bribed Ali Janbulad 125,000 gold piasters to withdraw.

Ali Janbulad agreed and further opened Damascus to free trade with foreign merchants.

Closer to his territorial power base Ali had the absolute loyalty of his Janbulad clan, followed by the Kurdish tribal beys and the nomadic Arabs of Kilis and Azaz.

Ali Janbulad practically proclaimed his sovereignty by having the Friday prayers read in his name, and likely minting coins as well.

Ali Janbulad had maintained friendly ties with certain Celali rebel leaders, including Cemsid Bey of Tarsus, who had taken control of Adana and its vicinity, and Tavil Bey of Bozok, who was a recipient of Ali Janbulad's financial aid.

Ali Janbulad saw in Baghdad a potential refuge where he could regroup.

Ali Janbulad communicated with the major Anatolian Celali leaders Kalenderoglu Mehmed and Kara Said.

Ali Janbulad was required by the treaty to assist a European conquest of Jerusalem and recognize the city's Christian denominational redirection to Roman Catholicism from the Eastern churches.

Ali Janbulad boasted to the Duke's representatives that he was poised to become an independent sultan of Syria.

Non-Ottoman and non-Safavid diplomats maintained that Ali Janbulad sent the shah gifts to elicit Safavid sympathy.

Ali Janbulad temporarily neutralized the strongest Celali chief of Anatolia, Kalenderoglu Mehmed, by appointing him sanjak-bey of Ankara.

Ali Janbulad likely realized upon hearing of Cemsid's defeat his weakened position against the grand vizier.

Ali Janbulad publicly proclaimed in Aleppo that he served only Sultan Ahmed and threatened the grand vizier "would taste the strength of his army" should he proceed toward his domains.

Ali Janbulad determined the most favorable place to assault the grand vizier was the mountain pass of Bakras, where he dispatched his sekban to fortify themselves.

Ali Janbulad was taken by surprise upon Murad Pasha's arrival in the plains north of Kilis and compelled him to revise his strategy away from the familiar hilly terrain of Bakras where his sekbans were most accustomed to fighting to the plains of Kirikan or east banks of the Afrin River where the grand vizier's field artillery was most effective.

Ali Janbulad encamped with about 25,000 of his sekbans and other cavalries in the wide Amik Valley near Lake Amik.

Many other leading figures in Ali Janbulad's army were taken captive in the battle and revealed to Murad Pasha, Ali Janbulad's explicit intentions to establish a sovereign state of his own based in Aleppo.

The day ended without a decisive victory for either side, though Ali Janbulad's men had gained an advantage and demonstrated their strength.

Ali Janbulad had the imperial infantry and cavalry feign a slow retreat, thereby encouraging Ali's sekbans to pursue them on the field and expose them to the fire of the hidden artillery.

Ali Janbulad lost significant numbers of soldiers in the artillery barrage, while Murad Pasha's Rumeli cavalry and reserve troops launched a counterattack with musket and cannon against Ali Janbulad's remaining forces who could not see their commanders to due to the smoke of the artillery.

Ali Janbulad fled eastward and Murad Pasha ordered mass executions of captive troops, few of whom were pardoned, and then ordered a pyramid of 20,000 skulls erected in front of his camp next to 700 captured rebel banners, including Ali Janbulad's white standard.

Ali Janbulad gathered his kinsmen in Kilis before proceeding to Aleppo and positioned hundreds of loyal soldiers with his kinsmen in the inner Citadel of Aleppo with two years-worth of food and supplies.

Ali Janbulad fled toward al-Bira with 2,000 men, hoping to link with the sons of Tavilahmedoglu Mehmed.