Osman I

Osman Gazi was the son of Ertuğrul Gazi of the Kayı tribe of the Oghuz. His principality lay around Söğüt on the Byzantine frontier, and the founding of the Ottoman state is traditionally dated to 1299.

Taking Byzantine fortresses one by one, he extended his lands to the outskirts of Bursa and Nicaea. Legend tells of a dream he had in the house of his father-in-law Sheikh Edebali — a tree growing from his chest and shading the world — read as a promise of a great state.

Osman died in 1324; after his son Orhan took Bursa, his remains were moved there. The Ottoman dynasty ruled for more than six centuries, until 1922.