Twenty members of the House of Osman lie buried within the mausoleum. Two were adults, both sultans; one of them died a natural death and one was executed. The other eighteen were infants or children, all of whom died of disease, mostly smallpox. In the garden outside the mausoleum, seven concubines lie at rest, each an Imperial Consort.

Before we consider them, let us examine the Ottoman dynasty's system of concubinage, through which all the royal personages in the mausoleum came into the world.

Concubines and the House of Osman

Islam allows a man a maximum of four wives at any given time, if certain conditions are met. Accordingly, when he acceded to the throne each sultan appointed a maximum of four ladies of his choice as his consorts (kadın, ‘lady’). As we shall see, in almost all cases they never became his legally married wives.

Drawn usually from the serving women in his household as prince, like all female staff of the Imperial Harem the kadıns were slaves, having been sold to the palace or presented as a gift, usually when young, and then trained in the métier they were to carry out within the harem.

The four consorts were ranked by hierarchy: Senior Consort (Başkadın), Second, Third, and Fourth. Below them ranked the other concubines who had been selected to share the sultan's bed and might bear his children. These ladies held the middle rank of concubines, ikbal (Arabic for ‘good fortune’), or the lowest rank, gözde (from the Persian guzīda, ‘chosen; select’). While unlimited in number theoretically, in fact practical considerations restricted their numbers, not least the necessity to provide each concubine with her own apartment and suite of servants. As a result, ikbals numbered no more than four (also ranked as Senior, Second, Third, and Fourth), while few sultans appointed any gözdes at all.

When a consort died or was divorced, the consort(s) below her in rank moved up one notch, and the sultan appointed another concubine to the post of Fourth Consort. In theory he could choose whomever he wished, but almost always he selected the Senior İkbal.