Lagâri Hasan Çelebi

Lagâri Hasan Çelebi was an Ottoman aviator who, according to a sole account written by the traveller Evliya Çelebi, made a successful manned rocket flight in 1633. Evliya reports that he launched in a seven-winged rocket using 50 okka, about 140 pounds, of gunpowder from Sarayburnu, the point below Topkapı Palace in Istanbul, at the time of the birth of a daughter of Sultan Murad IV. The account says that before launch he declared that he was going to talk to Jesus, that after ascending he landed in the sea and swam ashore, and that the Sultan rewarded him with silver and the rank of sipahi in the Ottoman army. Because the flight rests on a single narrative source, it is recorded here as a traditional account rather than as independently confirmed history.