contemporains, accomplirent une véritable revolution dans la politique de l’Europe.”[141] For four centuries France remained the most weighty foreign influence at the Porte. A fuller significance lay in what Lord Stratford de Redcliffe called the “extra‐koranic” character of the concessions made in this reign, the introduction of extra‐koranic legislation in both foreign and internal affairs, by the side of the maxims and rules of the Sheri or Holy Law. Turkey began to discover the inadequacy of Koran legislation for a modern state.[142] How much did Ibrahim Pasha influence Suleiman in this policy? He undoubtedly had the details in his own hands, but did he inspire the plan? Probably not. Suleiman knew pretty clearly what he wanted, and he pursued the same policy with the same success after the death of Ibrahim. His contemporaries ascribed to Ibrahim the brain and the force of Turkish diplomacy, and later historians have given to him the exclusive credit of this political evolution. But Zeller’s view[143] that too much importance may be given to the rôle of Ibrahim Pasha seems better substantiated. Zeller, nevertheless, in his introduction to _La Diplomatie Française_, accords to Ibrahim just that credit that peculiarly belongs to him, if we have rightly understood the work of the grand vizir, when he says: “Suleiman was not less enlightened than Francis; he had, as well as the latter, the knowledge of his own interests, and like him he was partially enfranchised from the prejudices of his nation.... At the same time we cannot doubt but that the grand vizir, whose ability and enlightenment are attested by all the ambassadors, contributed to open the mind of his master to the ideas outside his realm, to initiate him into a European Policy, to make him see the menace of the increasing power of Charles V, and the interest which he had to support France”. In the unusual liberality of thought and freedom from prejudice that Suleiman showed in his relation to Europe, we may see the influence of his intelligent favorite. Thus the two together, Suleiman and Ibrahim, or Ibrahim and Suleiman, as Ferdinand often spoke of them, started the Ottoman Empire from the lonely path of independence and semibarbarism to the labyrinthine and noisy streets of European politics. CHAPTER IV IBRAHIM THE GENERAL Suleiman’s reign was one of continuous war, and for the most part, conquest. His two most redoubtable enemies were the infidel Hungarians and the heretic Persians. His first great campaign was directed against Belgrad, which important city he took in 1521. This conquest he followed quickly by the victorious siege of Rhodes in 1522. In these two campaigns, Ibrahim seems to have taken no part, although he accompanied Suleiman to Rhodes in his capacity of favorite.[144] But in the first Hungarian campaign the grand vizir Ibrahim was placed second in command, the sultan himself leading the expedition.