Jervantes was captured on 5 October 1578 by Ottoman Empire.The Turkish researcher Rasih Nuri İleri (1920-2014) claimed to have found the name of Cervantes among the slaves that worked in the construction of the mosque from 1578 to 1580, under the orders of Mimar Sinan, the great architect of the period. This theory, never supported by any academic publication, was later spread by several Turkish media sources.