Lady Mihrimar Shahnaz Avery (May 31, 1530 - December 12, 1610).
Only daughter of Sultan Suleiman I (the Magnificent) and wife, Alexsandra Lisowska (Khourrem), Mihrimar is regarded as a favourite daughter of Suleiman and was brought up in the Harem with her brothers, Mehmed (died young), Selim, Bayezid, and Cihangir (born physically disabled).
Mihrimar traveled throughout the Ottoman Empire with her father, surveying the lands and conquering new ones. It is written in Persian literature that she traveled into battle with her father on an Arabian stallion called Batal at the Battle of Gizabar in northern Egypt outside Alexandria, Egypt.
At the age of seventeen, she was married off to the Grand Vizier under Suleiman, Ibrahim Pasha's son, Abdieso Khan. Though unhappy, Mihrimar flourished in the arts and continued her travels with her father's court until her husband's death in 1550 in the city of Byzantine near Istanbul, where the court settled as it's capital.
There, she met Sir William Buchanaan Avery , renowned explorer under Queen Elizabeth I of England . The two supposedly had a love affair being Suleiman's favorite daughter, was able to marry him. Yet Mihrimar did not know that he would whisk her away to Egypt and later the Philippines, at which point they came to Panama, where they settled in the English colony of Britaine , at the port city of El Basque Blanca .
Mihrimar had three children, two sons: James and William, as well as a daughter: Dirran. She died on December 12, 1610 in seclusion at the family's plantation of Nur Mahalan Jihan.
