In an accident of history, Niccolò Machiavelli, who admired and feared the Ottoman Empire, completed his famous treatise of political philosophy, The Prince, the same year—1513—in which Selim defeated his half-brothers to secure the sultanate that he had gained in 1512. Selim was the archetypal Machiavellian politician, and, indeed, Machiavelli esteemed Selim over the two other Ottoman sultans he witnessed, Mehmet and Bayezit.
