Giritli Sırrı Pasha

He was born in 1844 in Kandiye, Crete, Ottoman Empire as the son of Helvacızade Salih Tosun Efendi.

He started out as a clerk in the local Ottoman bureaucracy in Crete and later came to Istanbul, pursuing an education with a particular religious emphasis.

Climbing through the hierarchy, he served as governor of Trabzon, Kastamonu, Ankara, Sivas and Baghdad, and was noted as a successful administrator.

The last one in particular, on the theme of the stories of Joseph and Jacob, remains a work of reference in Turkish literature.

Sırrı Pasha married the poet and composer Leyla Saz, and was the father of Vedat Tek, a groundbreaking figure of Turkish architecture.