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A Note on the Location of the Royal Ottoman Painting Ateliers

Author(s): Alan W. Fisher and Carol Garrett FisherSource: Muqarnas, Vol. 3 (1985), pp. 118-120Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1523087 .

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ALAN W. FISHER AND CAROL GARRETT FISHER

A NOTE ON THE LOCATION OF THEROYAL OTTOMAN PAINTING ATELIERSWhere was the royal Ottoman atelier? Ever since RifkiMelul Meric's publication of the sixteenth-century Ot-toman pay records listing court artists and theirsalaries,' scholars have assumed that, because artistsappear on the court lists, they must have workedtogether in a common atelier or ateliers in or near thepalace. The question then asked was where this atelierwas located, and that question remained unanswered.But it now seems possible that the question posed wasthe wrong one. For if the question is instead askedwhether a royal Ottoman atelier ever existed inside ornear the Topkapi, at least a tentative answer can thenbe produced.Several pieces of evidence suggest that the palace,and more specifically the palace library, may haveserved as a gathering and collating place for sections ofmanuscripts that were either written or decorated atvarious locations, both in Istanbul and elsewhere in theOttoman empire. If so, this would broaden the implica-tions of Marianna Shreve Simpson's recently publishedsuggestion that pieces of the sixteenth-century SafavidHaft Aurang were produced at various places in theSafavid state and then brought together at the kitdb-khdna of its patron, Sultan Ibrahim Mirza.2 Ourhypothesis would extend this production practice to thesixteenth- and seventeenth-century Ottoman empire.The first piece of evidence is really the absence ofevidence in an unpublished 1686 translation of adescription of the Topkapi Sarayi found in the papers ofGirardin, the envoy of Louis XIV to Istanbul. It is aFrench translation of Serai enderun sic, cio, penetratedell'seriio detto nuovodei G. sri e re ottomani written byBobovi in 1657.3 Bobovi was a slave and music instruc-tor in the palace until he was ousted for drunkenness.His description of the Topkapi Sarayi circulatedthroughout the European community in Istanbul.Bobovi's description of the palace, aside from theharem, is detailed. It describes virtually all the rooms inthe first three courtyards, including the laundry, baths,

dormitories, kitchens, schoolrooms, and the treasuHe tells us about the training of the palace futionaries, includes lists of textbooks, and notes thsome of the palace pages were taught variocalligraphic styles and could study famous examplescalligraphyin the palace. But Bobovi does not sayactlywhere the now famousOttoman manuscriptswproduced,or whetherany of these pageswere trainedillumination, painting, or any other aspect of the arthe book. Because of the detail in which he describthe palace and the education and functions of thoseside it, the question ariseswhether the books were pduced in the royal palace at all.Bobovi paints a differentpictureof the city of Istabul. He refers to tutors, deaf-mutes, and mercha"from the bazaars" who come and go from the citythe palace. He says that some of the best craftsmwork near the bazaar. It is clear from this descriptthat by the mid-seventeenthcentury the palacewas ctainly not completely removed from Istanbul, as itsaid to have been in the early sixteenth century.Another source makes it clear that Istanbul was fof craftsmen and artists. Evliya Qelebi, the mseventeenth-centuryOttoman gentleman and travelsays that Istanbul had more than 1,100 sub-gui(esnaf)organized into 57 large guild groups. The groof artists was headed by the ser nakkas,whose heaquarters, Evliya says, were in a "manufactor(kdrhane).Its members included the gold-beaters(zerbyan),gilders(miizehhebkesan),bookbinders(miicellidbooksellers (sahhafan), stationers (kagitcian) wspecialized in Persian and Venetian paper, inkstaand portfoliomakers, clerks, inkmakers,papercutteartificial-palm-treemakers, wax-birdmakers, printecalicoprinters, embroiderers,and embroiderersof hadkerchiefs.4In this group were three sections of painters. Tfirst, the nakkasan,is said to have had one hundrshops, including one in the upper story of the Li

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A NOTE ON THE LOCATION OF THE ROYAL OTTOMAN ATELIERS

House (Arslan-Han), and to number over a thousandmen. Evliya says these painters "arrange bows, chairs,and so forth on litters, upon which they place works ofthe most famous painters, such as Shah Quli, Veli Jan,Aga Riza, Murdar Ilik, Bizad, Mani, Frenk Sinor, andJan Shah."5 The second group are the portrait painters(nakkasan-i musaviran), who number forty men in fourshops. Evliya says that while the Prophet Muhammadgave no one permission to paint any image other thanthe lion on his battle standard, the Greek painters "toexalt the glory of Islam" paint the battles of Hamza andthe heroes of Islam, and that they "paint them like theancient heroes, of whom mention is made in theShahname." He lists the most famous Turkish portraitpainters as Miskali Solakzade, Teriaki Osman (elebi,and Tas Baz Pehlivan Ali.6

Finally, the third group of painters comprises thepainter fortune-tellers (falciyan-i miisaviran). Their chiefis Hoca Mehmed Qelebi whose shop was in the districtof Mahmud Pasha and who had once had the honor ofspeaking with Sultan Siileyman I. His shop, reportsEvliya, is filled with "pictures and figures of all theaforesaid heroes and knights drawn with the pen oncoarse paper to be used as soothsaying devices." Thoseportrayed include Yusuf and Ziileyka, Majnun andLeila, Farhad and ?irin, Warka and Gulsah. Evliyaasserts that Hoca Mehmed Qelebi "carried them to theSultan, and at the public procession passed as chief ofthese painter soothsayers exhibiting his pictures." Inshort, according to Evliya there were literally hundredsof painters in Istanbul in the mid-seventeenth century,and some of them had dealings with the royal palace.7Other texts add support to our hypothesis and extendit back into the sixteenth century. If one examines cer-tain manuscripts from the reign of Murad III in the latesixteenth century, it is possible to find a stylistic likenessbetween manuscript illustrations assigned to the"palace ateliers" such as some in the Siyar-iNabi, a cy-cle of eight hundred miniatures produced in 1594-95 forMurad III, and the "tekke style" identified by Atasoyand Qagman in a group of manuscripts whose col-ophons indicate they were made in Mevlevi dervishconvents in Baghdad or Konya. Because of their iden-tification with Sufi convents, scholars have been slow toconnect these manuscripts with the orthodox palacemilieu, but there is evidence that there were connec-tions. In 1590, for example, Murad III broughtMahmud Dede, a Mevlevi from Konya, to the TopkapiSarayi to have him make a translation of the Manaqib-ithavaqib.He is said to have returned to Konya to carry

out this task.8 Further, the Meric pay records notepiecemeal payment of 300 akces per miniature for tSiyar-i Nabi miniatures.9 It therefore seems reasonabto suggest that miniature painters and cagraphers-including some working in the tekstyle-may have been supplying these miniatures frovarious sources, either by moving artists between tekor other ateliers and the palace or by sending job lotsa central gathering place.A still earlier piece of evidence can be considered.a document recording palace expenses for the peri1552-55, the expenses for the production of the Sehnai hassa of Kanuni Siileyman are recorded.10 The tocomes to 21,056 akces. Among the items listed are 1akces for "the cost of carpenters for construction of patitions in the room of the kdtibs of the sehname in thouse of Fethullah Qelebi, the ?ehnameci." It seempossible in this instance to postulate a separate atelfor this master in the sixteenth century. As in the latdescriptions of Evliya Qelebi, it seems possible, tothat this atelier was situated in the city of Istanbul, boutside the palace.l

Although far from providing a definitive answerthe question, the evidence does warrant considering tpossibility that in the sixteenth and seventeenth cetury, the Ottoman empire handled the manufacture its memorable manuscripts much as the Safavids diThe palace served as a gathering point for the artisgenius of the various workshops of the empire and wmuch more closely connected with the art of the cand of the tekke than has heretofore been perceived.Michigan State UniversityEast Lansing, Michigan

NOTES1. R. M. Meric,TurkNakisSanatiTarihiArastirmalari:I. Vesi(Ankara,1953).2. M. S. Simpson,"The ProductionandPatronageof the HAurangby Jami in the FreerGalleryof Art,"ArsOrienta

(1982):93-104.3. Paris,BibliothequeNationale,ms. N.A.F. 4997.Ourtrantionand annotationof thismanuscriptwillappearinArchOttomanicum(in press).4. Evliya Qelebi, Seyahatname,10 vols. (Istanbul,1896-191:607-12.SusanSkilliter,Lifein Istanbul,1588:ScenesfroTraveller'sPictureBook(Oxford:BodleianLibrary,1977),andprivateconversationinJune 1981,statesthat in thesixteecenturytherewas a schoolof paintersin Istanbulwho wprobably European-comparableto the well-documeChina-tradepainterswho were both Chinese and Eu

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CAROL GARRETT FISHER AND ALAN W. FISHER

pean-who produced genre scenes of the city and countrysidefor Europeans. It is important to keep in mind that such officialtitles as sernakkas, nakkasbasi, ista, and kethiida found in worksabout Ottoman painters were titles commonly used for officialsthroughout the Ottoman guild system; they had no specialsignificance for artists (i.e., they were not equivalent to"master," "chief painter," and so forth). See Robert Man-tran, Istanbul dans la secondemoitie du XVIe siecle (Paris, 1962),pp. 367-89, for an analysis of guild organization. The payrecords in Meric, show that the guild titles, sernakkas, iista, andkethiida, were used in the palace pay registers as well.5. Evliya Celebi, Seyahatname, 1:607.6. Ibid., pp. 610-11.7. Ibid., p. 611.8. F. Qagman, "XVI. Yuzyil Sonlarinda Mevlevi DergahlarindaGelisen Bir Minyatiir Okulu," I. Milletler Arasi TiirkolojiKongresi (Istanbul 15-20, X, 1970) (Istanbul, 1979), pp. 651-79;N. Atasoy and F. (agman, Turkish Miniature Painting (Istanbul,1974), pp. 58-63; C. Fisher, "The Pictorial Cycle of the Siyer-iNebi: A Late-Sixteenth-Century Manuscript of the Life ofMuhammad," Ph. D. diss., Michigan State University, 1981,pp. 90-99.

9. Meric, Turk Nakis Sanati Tarihi, p. 76.10. Omer Lutfi Barkan, Istanbul Saraylarina ait Muhasebe Defterleri,(Tirk Tarih Kurumu Belgeler, vol. 9/13) (Ankara, 1979), pp.69-70. The expenses (all in akces) included:

gold leaf (178 packets), 2,805ink, 209

paper (devlet-abade, which was the much valued yellowisglazed paper): 356 pieces, 3,392 akcesSamarkand paper, 192 pieces, 800

gold leaf and lapis lazuli for the chief grater, 200lapis lazuli, indigo blue, asi (?), vermillion, white leared lead, yellow, green, camel (l1k), smoke (dide) f

illustrating the Sehname-iHassa, 185salary for Mustafa, chief katib of the sehname, 4,620subsistence for the katibs of the sehname (30 persons1726 akcessubsistance for the painters (15 persons), 558cost for katibs for writing the sehname of 45,000 beytsa. 15,000 beyts 600 akcesb. 30,000 beyts 3600 akceskatib-graters foreman (siibasi), 200bookbinder, for cardboard and chemicals, 20scribes for "white writing" (beyaz-i sehname), 1,880Which Shahnama is involved is unclear. (agman and Atasoy ltwo that could conceivably be candidates: Topkapi Sarayi

1549, 43 miniatures, c. 1540, and Topkapi Sarayi H. 1522,miniatures, c. 1560-65; but it could, of course, be an entireunknown one.

11. Fethullah Arif Qelebi was the sehnamecifor much of the reignSultan Sileyman I. Atasoy and Qagman, Turkish MiniatuPainting, p. 28, state that "this position only became officiduring the reign of Suleyman the Magnificent. Its macharacteristics were based on the works of Arifi. ... Arifi wrohis seyname of the Ottoman dynasty in five volumes, of whicthe Siileymannamais the fifth and last.

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