Tarik Barleti (1470-1511), born Skender Barleti in Albania, was the Captain of the Janissary Corps during the rule of Sultan Bayezid II of the Ottoman Empire. Barleti was a supporter of the succession of Prince Selim and made a plot to eliminate the remnants of the Byzantine Empire by feigning allegiance with the Byzantine Templars to discover their base. However, he did not tell Prince Suleiman the Magnificent, who thought that he was really loyal to the Templars, and he was mistakenly assassinated.
Biography[]
Tarik Barleti was born a Christian Albanian, the second-oldest male in a family of four brothers and three sisters. But under the Ottoman devshirme system - where young boys were "volunteered" into the service of the Sultan - all these little details about his early life were quickly made irrelevant. Under devshirme, you were an Ottoman, first and last. As unfortunate as it sounds, the system worked out for a lot of young men at the time. Unlike slaves sold and traded elsewhere in the world, children raised in the devshirme system had a good chance of holding esteemed positions, such as becoming a Vizier or, in Tarik's case, a Janissary - one of the Ottoman Sultan's elite guards.
Tarik was therefore a loyal Ottoman and his hatred for the worldly Prince Ahmet was just as well known as his love and admiration for Prince Selim. This had the effect of swaying the loyalties of the entire Janissary corps into Selim's camp. So while the Janissaries remained technically loyal to their Sultan Bayezid II, they all harbored a secret desire to see Selim step in and take power. And because the Janissaries were a formidable political force in their own right, Tarik could say these things openly without fear of censure or recrimination. A bold man, to be sure.
In 1511 Tarik proved his loyalty by agreeing to remove the opponents to Selim's accession to power by infiltrating their organization. Meeting with Templar Order Grand Master Manuel Palaiologos, he agreed to sell him rifles in order to overthrow the government and restore the Byzantine Empire. Tarik gave the rifles to the camp in Cappadocia where the Templar Army was awaiting, and told them to meet him at Bursa, where he secretly arranged an ambush for the Templars. However, Prince Suleiman the Magnificent believed his false allegiance to be true, and fell for his own ally's ploy. He ordered Tarik to be killed for naked treason against his grandfather Bayezid II.
Death[]
Tarik dies
Tarik's encampment was infiltrated by Assassin Ezio Auditore da Firenze, sent by Prince Suleiman to kill him for naked treason to his grandfather. Ezio overheard Tarik say that the rifles would go to Palaiologos in Cappadocia where his army was stationed, and he would meet the Byzantines at Bursa. After hearing that, Ezio followed Barleti to a fight circle, where he was observing his Janissaries training.
Ezio entered the fighting circle and shot Barleti three times with his hidden gun. Barleti revealed to Ezio that he was preparing to ambush the Byzantine Templars where they felt safest, and he gave Ezio a map as proof. He told Ezio to destroy the Templars, and Tarik told Ezio to protect his homeland in God's name, to redeem the honor that they had lost in the fight.