Istanbul_ The Collected Traveler_ An Inspired Companion Guide - Barrie Kerper [29]
The decorative styles initiated in the nakkaşhane had a profound impact on the production of the other imperial societies of the Ehl-i Hiref, as well as on that of the artisan guilds. These styles constituted the artistic vocabulary of the age and were universally applied to both imperial and nonimperial arts throughout the Empire.
In addition to illuminating manuscripts and tuğras, the nakkaşhane artists illustrated scores of literary and historical works for the imperial libraries. These manuscripts were exclusively produced for the sultan’s personal enjoyment. It was only when the imperial Ottoman collections became national museums, after the establishment of the Republic of Turkey in 1923, that these volumes were made public.
The nakkaşhane artists illustrated the texts of past authors as well as those dating from Süleyman’s reign. But their greatest contribution was the representation of contemporary events and the creation of the most outstanding genre of court painting, that of illustrated histories. This genre, which depicted the most important events of a sultan’s reign, was fully established in the 1550s.
The two significant ingredients of illustrated histories—the documentation of the settings and the portrayal of the personages—owed much to the efforts of two men who were not members of the nakkaşhane but belonged to the administration. The most prolific among them was Nasuh (died about 1564), a court official who accompanied the sultan on several campaigns and recorded these events. Nasuh was a true Renaissance man: he was a historian, calligrapher, painter, mathematician, swordsman, and inventor of athletic games. He not only wrote about Süleyman’s campaigns but also transcribed and illustrated his own texts, carefully documenting the cities and ports conquered by the Ottomans. One of his texts, entitled Beyan-i Menazil-i Sefer-i Irakeyn, is devoted to the campaign to Iran and Iraq which took place between 1534 and 1536. The first painting in this work depicts Istanbul and represents in detail all the monuments of the capital. Nasuh’s topographic renditions are invaluable sources for the re-creation of the city in the 1530s.
One of his colleagues was Haydar Reis (1492?-1572), a naval captain who practiced the art of painting. He made portraits of the sultan, his son Selim II, and other court officials, using the pseudonym Nigari. His portrayal of Süleyman as an aging ruler accompanied by two officials was made toward the end of the sultan’s life and realistically depicts the physical condition of his subject. Nigari’s paintings, executed from life, helped to promote the development of portraiture in the court.
Ottoman sultans were acutely conscious of their role in history and established the post of şahnameci, the official court biographer. During Süleyman’s reign this post was held by Arifi, who was commissioned to write a five-volume history of the Ottoman dynasty. The fifth and last volume in the series is the Süleymanname, devoted to Süleyman’s reign and completed in 1558.
Arifi chose the artists who illustrated this volume with great care. Most of the paintings were assigned to an anonymous master who devised the compositions for accession ceremonies, receptions of foreign dignitaries, sieges of fortresses, and battles in the field. He conjoined the topographic style seen in the works of Nasuh with Nigari’s interest in portraiture, and depicted the events, the settings, and the participants with documentary realism. His paintings are exquisite works of art, as well as historical documents that re-create the age—whether they show the Battle of Mohács, Hungary’s decisive defeat in 1526, a ceremonial event in the Throne Room during the 1539 circumcision festival of two princes, or an intimate meeting between the sultan and Barbaros Hayreddin Pasha, the grand admiral, in 1533.
The Süleymanname