Mehmed II, the Ottoman sultan who captured Constantinople in 1453 and ended the Byzantine Empire, died on May 3, 1481, while leading an army eastward, possibly poisoned by rivals fearful of his next target. His death triggered a succession crisis between his sons Bayezid and Cem that would shape Ottoman politics for years. He left behind an empire vastly expanded and a capital transformed from a shrinking Byzantine relic into a thriving imperial city.
Mehmed II had spent nearly three decades making enemies of everyone from the Pope to the Venetian dorepublic to rival Muslim states, and by 1481 rumors swirled that his final campaign, mysteriously undisclosed in its target, was aimed at Egypt, Rhodes, or even Italy. He never reached wherever he was going. Encamped near Gebze on the Asian shore opposite Constantinople, the sultan collapsed and died, most likely from gout complicated by poison, though Ottoman court intrigue makes certainty impossible.
His physician, a Jewish doctor named Yakup Pasha, faced accusations of murder and was later killed by an enraged crowd, an indication of how badly Mehmed's soldiers wanted someone to blame. The sultan's death set off a frantic race between his two sons. Bayezid, based closer to the capital, secured the throne with the support of the elite Janissary corps before his brother Cem could mobilize, and Cem spent the rest of his life as an exile and pawn of European courts.
Mehmed's legacy was staggering regardless of how he died. He had turned Constantinople, conquered as a half-ruined city of 50,000, into an imperial capital of hundreds of thousands, rebuilding its markets, mosques, and defenses. Historians still call him 'Fatih'—the Conqueror—for good reason.
Key people: Mehmed II, Bayezid II, Cem Sultan