Sabbataï Zevi appears purposely to have started on his Messianic journey to Constantinople exactly at the beginning of the mystic year 1666. He was accompanied by some of his followers, his secretary Samuel Primo being in his train. He had announced the day of his arrival at Constantinople, but circumstances proved false to him. The ship in which he sailed had to contend with bad weather, and the voyage was prolonged by weeks. Since the sea did not devour him, the Sabbatians composed marvelous stories describing how the storm and the waves had obeyed the Messiah. At some place on the coast of the Dardanelles the passengers of the weather-beaten vessel were obliged to land, and there Sabbataï was arrested by Turkish officers, sent to take him prisoner. The grand vizir, Ahmed Coprili, had heard of the excitement of the Jews in Smyrna, and desired to suppress it. The officers had strict orders to bring the pretended redeemer in fetters to the capital, and therefore hastened to meet the ship by which he came. According to orders, they put him in fetters, and brought him to a small town in the neighborhood of Constantinople, because the eve of the Sabbath was near. Informed by a messenger of his arrival at Cheknese Kutschuk, his followers hastened from the capital to see him, but found him in a pitiable plight and in chains. The money which they brought with them procured him some alleviation, and on the following Sunday (February, 1666), he was brought by sea to Constantinople--but in how different a manner to what he and his believers had anticipated! However, his coming caused excitement. At the landing-place there was such a crowd of Jews and Turks who desired to see the Messiah, that the police were obliged to superintend the disembarkation. An under-pasha commissioned to receive him welcomed the man-god with a vigorous box on the ear. Sabbataï Zevi is said, however, to have wisely turned the other cheek to the blow. Since he could not play the part of the triumphant, he at least wished to play that of the suffering Messiah with good grace. When brought before the deputy-vizir (Kaimakam), Mustapha Pasha, he did not stand the first test brilliantly. Asked what his intentions were, and why he had roused the Jews to such a pitch of excitement, Sabbataï is said to have answered that he was nothing more than a Jewish Chacham, come from Jerusalem to the capital to collect alms; he could not help it if the Jews testified so much devotion to him. Mustapha thereupon sent him to a prison in which insolvent Jewish debtors were confined.