Selim

Selim is a Turkish given name meaning Peace. Selim is also the name of a district in Turkey's Kars Province.

Selim is similar to the boy's name, Salem, which is of Hebrew origin, and also means "peace." It is related to Shalom and Solomon. In the U.S. there is Salem, Massachusetts and Salem, Oregon.

Other boy names that sound similar are Salim and Saleem.

Rulers named Selim of the Ottoman Empire

Three sultans of the Ottoman Empire were called Selim:

• Selim I the Grim Yavuz (1465 - September 22, 1520)
• Selim II Mest (May 28, 1524 - December 12, 1574)
• Selim III (December 24, 1761 - July 28/29, 1808)

Other rulers:

• Pasha Selim - Regional Governor of the Ottoman Empire, including Macedonia and Albania, from 1846 - 1849. Turkish Commander in the Crimean War.
• Selim Hamid Khan IV (1908 - 1999) Deposed crown prince; the youngest son of Sultan Abdulhamid the Second. The young Prince Selim IV moved to Alexandria, under the protection of Egypt's royal family. He studied in Egypt and England, and eventually settled in France, where he died.

Mozart's opera: The Abduction from the Seraglio and the role of Selim Pasha

The opera was first produced at the command of the Austrian emperor Joseph II on July 16, 1782 at the Burgtheater in Vienna. It played off a contemporary enthusiasm for the "exotic" culture of the Ottoman Empire, a nation which had only recently ceased to be a military threat to Austria. The Pasha is named Selim, and the climax of the plot depends on a rather selfless act on the part of the Pasha. Some have suggested that the Pasha is portrayed and positively valorised for acting like a Christian (this argument is made in Matthew Head - Orientalism, Masquerade and Mozart's Turkish Music, and possibly implied by Mary Hunter who says that he is 'represented as European by his act of mercy' (in 'The Alla Turca Style' in Jonathan Bellman (ed) - The Exotic in Western Music)).

Selims in North America and Northern Europe in the 1800s

The effect of this opera is found in the number of European and North American children named Selim in the following decades:

• Selim Franklin (1814-1883) born in U.K., pioneer of San Francisco in 1849, and legislator in Victoria, BC. His brother Lumley Franklin was the 2nd mayor of Victoria, BC.

• Selim M. Franklin (October 19, 1859 - November 22, 1927) - Attorney and legislator in Arizona and regarded as the father of the University of Arizona in 1885.

• Selim Newton (1799 - Jan 25, 1871) - pioneer settler of Fond du Lac County in Wisconsin, and original owner of the Galloway House.

• Selim Palmgren (1878–1951) - Finnish composer, pianist, conductor. He taught composition at the Eastman School of Music.

• Selim H. Peabody, LL.D. (1829-1903) - President of the University of Illinois from 1880 to 1891.

• Comdr. Selim E. Woodworth (November 27, 1815 – January 29, 1871) and the USS Woodworth (DD-460)

Selim, the Champion Sire of 1814

In 1802 a thoroughbred in England was named Selim, bred by General Sparrow and sold to the Prince of Wales as a three-year old. Selim was the offspring of Buzzard and Alexander Mare. Selim won six races, including the Craven Stakes and the Newmarket Oatlands Stakes. Buzzard was the winner of the Oaks Stakes. (Photo of Selim the 1802 thoroughbred)

Selim was a Champion Sire in 1814. He sired six Classics winners: Azor (ch c 1814) who won the Derby, Medora (ch f 1811) who won the Oaks, Nicolo (ch c 1820) who won the Two Thousand Guineas, Selim Mare (br f 1812) who won the One Thousand Guineas, Turcoman (br c 1824) who won the Two Thousand Guineas, and Turquoise (br f 1825) who won the Oaks Stakes. Probably his most influential offspring was Sultan (b c 1816) a Derby second and Champion Sire. Selim was humanely destroyed in 1825 at the age of twenty-three.