The first extant Ottoman examples of the gazavatnames, the historical works dedicated to narrating the heroic deeds of a sultan or a high ranking Ottoman official fighting against the Christians, date back to the fifteenth century and focus on the exploits of Sultan Murad II (r. 1421-1451). Assuming that these texts were composed in Murad’s time to provide factual information on his military campaigns, current scholarship has failed to read them critically in historical context. My paper not only shows that Sultan Murad’s gazavatnames were actually composed in his successor Mehmed II’s time but also argues that the image they construct for Murad should be analyzed in tandem with other contemporary representations of Murad, and most particularly, with those found in historical works composed to celebrate Mehmed’s deeds. While the gazavatnames portray Murad as a saintly figure, Mehmed’s panegyric histories suggest that he was a weak and cowardly person who wanted to escape from the battlefield. Through a close examination of these conflicting images of Murad, the paper hopes to delineate the broader political and ideological debates revolving around the issue of universal rule in the fifteenth century Ottoman Empire.