The Rise and Sudden Fall of the Köprülü Dynasty

For two decades, the Köprülü family had served as the architects of Ottoman revival, steering the empire through military reforms and territorial consolidation. When Grand Vizier Köprülü Ahmed Pasha died in 1676, leaving only an infant son, the natural successor was his capable younger brother, Mustafa Zade. The empire expected—and needed—another Köprülü to continue their stabilizing rule.

Yet fate intervened. Sultan Mehmed IV, long a passive figurehead, abruptly asserted his authority. Ignoring tradition, he appointed Kara Mustafa Pasha—Ahmed’s brother-in-law and the sultan’s own son-in-law—as Grand Vizier. This decision shattered the Köprülü dynasty’s continuity, plunging the empire into a 13-year leadership vacuum with catastrophic consequences.

Kara Mustafa: The Ambitious Vizier Who Overreached

Nicknamed “Black Mustafa” for his dark complexion, Kara Mustafa was a man of towering vanity and unchecked ambition. His court was a spectacle of excess: 1,500 concubines, 700 black eunuchs, and stables overflowing with prized horses and hunting falcons—all designed to flatter the sultan. As Grand Vizier, he institutionalized corruption, selling government positions and extorting bribes from foreign diplomats.

But his greatest flaw was his delusion of military grandeur. Obsessed with surpassing Suleiman the Magnificent, he dreamed of turning Rome’s St. Peter’s Basilica into a stable and conquering Vienna before marching to the Rhine to challenge Louis XIV. In reality, he was a disastrous strategist. Within five years, he squandered Ottoman gains in Ukraine, losing critical territory to Russia in humiliating defeats. The 1681 Treaty of Radzin forced the Ottomans to abandon Ukraine, ceding a strategic foothold to their emerging northern rival.

The Road to Vienna: A Gamble for Glory

Undeterred, Kara Mustafa turned his gaze westward. When Protestant Hungarians, led by Count Imre Thököly, rebelled against Habsburg oppression, he saw an opportunity. Thököly’s plea for Ottoman suzerainty—and covert French encouragement—convinced Kara Mustafa to gamble everything on a campaign against Vienna.

In 1683, the largest Ottoman army in a century marched toward Austria. Flanked by Crimean Tatars and Thököly’s rebels, Kara Mustafa ignored seasoned advisors urging caution. At a critical war council, Ibrahim Pasha of Buda warned against rushing toward Vienna, likening the campaign to unrolling a carpet to claim gold at its center. Kara Mustafa scoffed: “You are an old man whose mind has dulled.” His hubris would prove fatal.

The Siege That Shook Europe

By July 1683, 150,000 Ottomans encircled Vienna. Yet Kara Mustafa’s tactical blunders multiplied. He delayed assaults, hoping the city would surrender intact—and preserve its riches for himself. His artillery, inadequate for breaching Vienna’s walls, forced reliance on tunneling. Meanwhile, a relief force gathered: Polish King Jan Sobieski, Bavarians, Saxons, and the Habsburgs’ Duke Charles of Lorraine.

On September 12, Sobieski’s winged hussars charged from the Kahlenberg heights. Ottoman forces, unprepared and leaderless, collapsed. Kara Mustafa fled, abandoning his jeweled tent (later sent to Sobieski’s queen as a trophy) and 10,000 dead. The rout marked more than a military defeat—it shattered the myth of Ottoman invincibility.

Collapse and Consequences

The aftermath was catastrophic. Kara Mustafa executed Ibrahim Pasha as a scapegoat before Sultan Mehmed IV ordered his own strangulation. The Habsburgs reclaimed Hungary, capturing Buda in 1686. Venice seized the Peloponnese, while Poland and Russia chipped away at Ottoman frontiers.

A brief resurgence came under Köprülü Mustafa Zade, who recaptured Belgrade in 1690. But at the 1691 Battle of Slankamen, his death in a reckless charge doomed Ottoman hopes. By 1699’s Treaty of Karlowitz, the empire surrendered Hungary, Transylvania, and the Peloponnese—its first major territorial retreat in Europe.

The Ottoman Empire’s New Reality

The 17th century closed with an irreversible shift. No longer the terror of Christendom, the Ottomans became the “Sick Man of Europe,” vulnerable to rising powers like Russia. The Köprülü era’s collapse exposed systemic rot: corrupt leadership, military stagnation, and an inability to adapt to Europe’s evolving warfare.

As historian Lord Kinross later observed, “Vienna was the high-water mark of Ottoman expansion.” The tide had turned—not just on battlefields, but in the corridors of global power. The age of Ottoman conquest was over; the age of decline had begun.