He was born in a village near Edirne, which helped accuse him of being of Bulgarian descent.

He spoke Greek, Turkish, Bulgarian, Russian and French.

His reign was associated with certain actions that lowered his prestige and caused heated reactions.

The first was his involvement in the Greek War of Independence in 1827 when some of the chieftains of Central Greece asked for his intercession with Sultan Mahmud II so that they would be amnestied.

He was also involved in the election of the Patriarch of Jerusalem, which was attributed to bribery, economical and administrative instabilities, leading to his deposition on 5 July 1830.