Ibrahim Pasha, a Greek born to Greek…

Ibrahim Pasha, a Greek born to Greek Orthodox Christian parents, in Parga, Epirus, northern Greece, at that time part of the Republic of Venice, is the son of a sailor in Parga, and as a child, had been carried off by pirates and sold as a slave to the Manisa Palace in western Anatolia, where Ottoman crown princes (şehzade) were being educated.

He had been befriended there by crown prince Suleiman, who was of the same age.

Ibrahim had received his education at the Ottoman court and become a polyglot and polymath.

Upon Suleiman's accession to the Ottoman throne in 1520, Ibrahim had been awarded various posts, the first being the Falconer of the Sultan.

Ibrahim had proved his skills in numerous diplomatic encounters and military campaigns, and had been so rapidly promoted that at one point he had begged Suleiman not to promote him too rapidly for fear of arousing the jealousy and enmity of the other viziers, who expected some of those titles for themselves.

Suleiman, pleased with Ibrahim's display of modesty, purportedly swore that he would never be put to death during his reign.

After being appointed grand vizier, Ibrahim Pasha continues to receive other additional appointments and titles from the sultan (such as the title of Serasker), and his power in the Ottoman Empire has become almost as absolute as his master's.

Following the execution of his rival Hain Ahmed Pasha, the former governor of Egypt who had declared himself independent of the Ottoman Empir, Ibrahim Pasha travels south to Egypt in the following year and reforms the Egyptian provincial civil and military administration system.

He promulgates an edict, the Kanunname, outlining his system.