Mukbile Sultan

Mukbile Sultan was born on 19 September 1911 in the Dolmabahçe Palace. Her father was Şehzade Ömer Hilmi, and her mother was Gülnev Hanım. She was first child and only daughter of her parents. She had a brother, Şehzade Mahmud Namık, two years younger than her. She was the granddaughter of Sultan Mehmed V and Mihrengiz Kadın.[1]

On 29 October 1923, Turkey was officially declared as a republic, and in 1924, the imperial family was exiled,[2] after which her family settled firstly in Beirut, Lebanon, and then in Nice, France.[3]

Mukbile was engaged to her second cousin Şehzade Ali Vâsib, the son of Şehzade Ahmed Nihad, and grandson of Şehzade Mehmed Selaheddin in 1928. The two married on 30 November 1931, in Ruhl Hotel in Nice, France.[1][4][5] The couple moved to Alexandria, Egypt in 1935.[6] On 7 July 1940, she gave birth to the couple's only son, Şehzade Osman Selaheddin in Alexandria.[1]

Mukbile and her husband had to make do with an unassuming apartment on Mosseri Avenue, right next to Maadi's Synagogue. In fact, their landlord was the house principal benefactor Meyr Biton, a close attendant to Haim Nahum Efendi, the Turkish-born Grand Rabbi of Egypt. Mükbile and Vâsib later moved to Alexandria where their only son went to school.[7]

After revocation of the law in 1952, the princesses were allowed to return to Turkey. However, Mukbile chose to stay in Alexandria. She returned to Istanbul with her husband,[8] and son in 1974,[9] where they settled in Beşiktaş.[1] The same year she visited Dolmabahçe Palace with her son.[9] In 1977, Ali Vâsib became the Head of House of Osman after the death of Mehmed Abdulaziz,[10] and died in 1983.[1]

Mukbile Sultan died on 21 May 1995 in Beşiktaş, Istanbul at the age of eighty-three, and was buried in the mausoleum of her grandfather in Eyüp, Istanbul.[1]

Mukbile and Ali Vâsib had one son:

• Osman Selaheddin Osmanoğlu (Alexandria, Egypt, 7 July 1940), married with issue;

• Brookes, Douglas Scott (2010). The Concubine, the Princess, and the Teacher: Voices from the Ottoman Harem. University of Texas Press. ISBN 978-0-292-78335-5.
• Osmanoğlu, Osman Selaheddin (2004). Bir Şehzadenin Hâtırâtı. Yapı Kredi Yayınları.