Suleiman (Civ4)/Civilopedia

Suleiman I, known as "The Magnificent," "The Legislator" and "The Grand Turk," was the caliph of Islam and the sultan of the Ottoman Empire, taking the reigns of the Turkish kingdom in 1520 and ruling until his death in 1566.
The only heir still breathing when his father Selim I passed on, Suleiman continued his father's tradition of expansion throughout the Middle East, creating a new level of prosperity within the empire. Suleiman's conquests reached from Baghdad to Egypt, making the Ottoman Empire the main channel through which the riches of the east could reach Europe. Ottoman naval supremacy in the Mediterranean further aided Suleiman's economic empire, the corsair Barbarossa sending innumerable European ships to the sea floor.
It was this penchant for expansionism that struck fear into the heart of Europe. The Sultan's push northward took him as far as Hungary, where he found his progress stalled by the Hapsburg ruler Archduke Ferdinand I.
While his territorial accomplishments were impressive, the Sultan did not ignore the culture of his homeland, Suleiman himself a skilled poet and fervent Muslim. Towards the end of his reign, Suleiman commissioned numerous new mosques of a previously unseen grandeur, designed by master architect, Sinan.
Suleiman became well known in both the Christian west and the Muslim east, but for strikingly different reasons. Most Europeans envied the Sultan for the sheer opulence in which he lived. Celebrations of a previously unheard of grandeur were held at the Hippodrome in Istanbul. Rooms covered in gold, gems and the finest tapestries could be seen throughout the Sultan's palace at Topkapi.
Muslims, on the other hand, respected the Sultan for his belief in the rule of law. The Sultan adopted Islamic sacred law to compliment the traditional law already in place from his predecessors. Both Christian and Muslim recognized the renewed strength and sense of honor that Suleiman brought to the Ottoman Empire, deeming him worthy of the title "The Magnificent."