Going to tweet excerpts from The Sultans by Noel Barber. An incredible book, every chapter is shocking. Makes me wish I'd read up on the court of the Ottoman Empire sooner.

The guardian of the harem was called the "Chief Black Eunuch." A powerful actor, he was nonetheless in the time of Suleiman a "man who had been castrated in Africa, sold as a slave for a few piastres." He was the harem's only connection with the rest of the world.

The harem was under complete control of the Sultan's mother, "for though a sultan could have a thousand concubines he could only have one mother." The first four of the harem to give birth to sons became sultanas, "after that the court abortionist was called in."

Suleiman the Magnificent fell in love and did the unthinkable. He committed to his Russian concubine Roxelana and swore off other women. This was the first marriage by a sultan in six centuries.

The "six centuries" part can't be correct, as the Empire wasn't that old. The old sultan who had to watch his wife be humiliated in captivity was Bayezid I, about 120 years earlier. Meant 6 generations maybe?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayezid_I#Bayezid_in_captivity

"The marriage of Roxelana was the first link in the chain of events that brought the downfall of the Ottoman Empire." She convinced Suleiman to murder his top advisor and his son. Assassinations were carried out by deaf mutes who had their tongues slit and ears punctured.

Mahomet II ascended to the throne and brought in his 19 brothers, telling them he meant them no harm, but it was time to be circumcised. Which they were, before being strangled.

Sultans were allowed to kill their brothers to "insure the peace of the world."

Potential sultans were imprisoned until ready to take power or killed, with only deaf mutes and concubines as company. As a result "each succeeding sultan seemed more mad, avaricious, debauched..than his predecessor." Some had to be dragged out of their prisons upon ascension.

Ibrahim had been locked in his cage since 2. He barricaded his door when they came for him. Later, upon a rumor one of them had been with another man, he drowned the 280 women of his harem. One escaped from her sack and made it to France.

Ok, by popular demand, here's the next page. The queen mother was stripped, dragged by her feet and killed, the sultana became a successful madam. She was killed when someone poisoned her by putting chopped hair and ground glass in her coffee.

The Janissaries went to kill Selim and his cousin (son of his possible lover). He fights them off long enough for the cousin, Mahmud, to escape, killing two deaf mutes. They chase Mahmud and get hot coals thrown at them by a strong female Georgian slave. Mahmud ends up sultan.

How technology and wealth shape history. In 1876, the Turks faced a rebellion in Bulgaria. They solved it the way they always did, through mass killing and rape. This time, a journalist was on the scene, and it therefore had geopolitical repercussions.

During the Armenian genocide, the American ambassador told the Turks of course they didn't mean for things to go so far. Enver Pasha said of course we did. Talaat asked if they could get the money on Armenian US life insurance policies. He was later killed by an Armenian.