page_title: Abaza Hasan Pasha
section_title: Assassination
hierarchical_section_title: Abaza Hasan Pasha / Biography / Assassination
caption_attribution_description: English: Frontal view on the Citadel of Aleppo Deutsch: Die Zitadelle von Aleppo, frontale Sicht
context_page_description: Abaza Hasan Pasha, also called Kara Hasan Pasha or Celali Hasan Pasha, was an Ottoman provincial governor and celali rebel of the mid-seventeenth century. He launched two rebellions against the Ottoman government, the second and largest of which ended with his assassination in Aleppo on 16 February 1659 following a failed attempt to force the deposition of the Grand Vizier Köprülü Mehmed Pasha.
  Abaza Hasan first gained prominence in 1648 by defeating the Anatolian rebel Kara Haydaroğlu, for which he was rewarded with the rank of voyvoda of the Yeni Il Türkmen. After this office was taken from him through palace intrigue, he launched his first revolt, occupying territory in northwestern Anatolia. During this time he rallied to his side other military men with grievances against the government as well as thousands of the sekban and sarıca characteristic of the Celali Rebellions. He eventually achieved his goals, recovering his office and reconciling his relationship with the central government. In the following years he was promoted to the rank of pasha and received the governorship of various provinces in the east.
context_section_description: By early 1659, Abaza Hasan's army was suffering greatly from lack of supplies in the unusually harsh winter. In response to the increasingly vocal complaints coming from his troops, including the open defection of several thousand of them to the loyalist side, he accepted the impossibility of his victory and opened negotiations with Murtaza Pasha, using the Mufti of Ayntab as an intermediary. In exchange for vows of safety and pardon, he and his top commanders agreed to surrender and enter the city of Aleppo, while their army remained encamped outside. The rebels were then lodged in the mansions of the loyalist pashas, with Abaza Hasan residing with Murtaza. The two sides conversed cordially over the course of several days, and drafted letters to be sent to the capital, asking for pardon for the rebels. Despite this, at the time of the night prayer on 16 February 1659, the loyalists carried out a plot to murder their unsuspecting guests. While Abaza Hasan was preparing for prayer by performing ablutions, assassins approached and cut his throat from behind. A cannon was then fired from the Aleppo Citadel, indicating to the other pashas that it was time to massacre the remaining rebel leaders.
  Historians disagree on the motive for this sudden betrayal. Some attest that Murtaza ordered the massacre out of distrust, while others are of the opinion that Abaza Hasan was himself actively preparing to seize Aleppo from within, and Murtaza took action to preempt this.
  Abaza Hasan's head was severed and stuffed with straw to be put on display in Istanbul, and his body was hung outside of one of Aleppo's city gates, serving as a public demonstration that the revolt had been crushed.
caption: A cannon was fired from the Aleppo Citadel (pictured in 2010) to signal that Abaza Hasan had been killed.
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