According to custom, at five years of age he was given the governorship of the city, with a number of carefully chosen councillors, for his first taste of authority. In 1439, he was brought back to Erdine for his circumcision ceremonies whereupon he was given a different governorship.
Mehmed had not been his father's favorite son. The impetuous and headstrong prince had been difficult to control and to educate. Yet when his brother was strangled one night in bed, the 11-year-old Mehmed became the heir to his father's throne and was summoned to Erdine to learn of the workings of government.
Although Murad had made numerous military excursions himself, he hoped generally to secure peace to the east and to the west of the Empire. Yet in 1444, Christian forces advanced into Ottoman territory on the second crusade in two years. Leaving his son in charge at court, Murad prepared to meet this threat to his state. That summer, while his father was away, Mehmed briefly enjoyed the authority of the sultanate for the first time.
On November 10, in a major battle at Varna on the Black Sea, the Turkish army defeated the Crusaders, and the Christian prospect of pushing Islam off the European continent no longer seemed likely.
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