Tulipomania - Mike Dash [118]
Chapter 15. At the Court of the Tulip King
Many of the books that were consulted for chapter 3 were also useful here, particularly those of Mansel and Miller. Surprisingly, there seems to be no good biography of Ahmed III, but accounts of his tulip fêtes appear in numerous secondary sources, many of which have been drawn on; the most original and useful were Arthur Baker, “The Cult of the Tulip in Turkey,” Journal of the Royal Horticultural Society (September 1931), and Michiel Roding and Hans Theunissen, eds., The Tulip: A Symbol of Two Nations (Utrecht and Istanbul: Turco-Dutch Friendship Association, 1993). The historical background has been taken both from general histories such as Alan Palmer, The Decline and Fall of the Ottoman Empire (London: John Murray, 1992), and more specialist studies, including Lavender Cassels, The Struggle for the Ottoman Empire, 1717–1740 (London: John Murray, 1966).
Mehmed IV and the tulip Palmer, Decline and Fall, pp. 10, 14–15, 37; Bay-top, “Tulip in Istanbul,” pp. 50–56; Miller, Beyond the Sublime Porte, p. 124.
Ibrahim the Mad During his eight-year reign, he was also noted for deflowering a virgin every Friday. See Palmer, Decline and Fall, p. 19; Penzer, Harem, pp. 188–91.
Execution might, after all, still be their lot When court officials entered the cage to call Süleyman II (1687–91) to the throne in succession to Mehmed IV, the new sultan is said to have cried out in terrified exasperation: “If my death has been commanded, say so. Since my childhood, I have suffered forty years of imprisonment. It is better to die at once than to die a little every day. What terror we endure for a single breath.” See Inalcik, Ottoman Empire, p. 60.
The time of tulips Göçek, East Encounters West, p. 10.
Nedim the poet Palmer, Decline and Fall, p. 36; Wheatcroft, Ottomans, pp. 77, 79; Mansel, Constantinople, p. 181.
Sultan Ahmed’s flower festivals Barber, Lords of the Golden Horn, pp. 109–10; Mansel, Constantinople, pp. 76–78, 180–81; Palmer, Decline and Fall, pp. 37–38; Miller, Beyond the Sublime Porte, pp. 124–26; Penzer, Harem, pp. 258–60.
General passion for tulips in Ahmed’s reign Demiriz, “Tulips in Ottoman,” pp. 57–58; Baytop, “Tulip in Istanbul,” p. 55; Baker, “Cult of the Tulip in Turkey,” p. 235.
Eighteenth-century criteria for ideal tulips Baytop, “Tulip in Istanbul,” p. 53; Demiriz, “Tulips in Ottoman,” pp. 57–58; Murray, “Introduction of the Tulip,” p. 20.
Ottoman officials’ flowers and bribes of tulips Mansel, Constantinople, p. 182; Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire, p. 234.
Fazil Pasha Mansel, Constantinople, p. 147.
Damat Ibrahim Palmer, Decline and Fall, pp. 33–35, 38.
The Sa’adabad Ibid., p. 34; Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire, p. 234; Mansel, Constantinople, pp. 180–81; Göçek, East Encounters West, pp. 51, 79; Pallis, Days of the Janissaries, p. 199.
The fall of Damat Ibrahim and Ahmed III Palmer, Decline and Fall, pp. 38–39.
Mahmud I and the decline of the tulip in Turkey Barber, Lords of the Golden Horn, p. 110; Wheatcroft, Ottomans, pp. 80–81.
Chapter 16. Late Flowering
The later history of the bulb trade is reliably covered in modern histories. The hyacinth trade is described in detail by E. H. Krelage in Bloemenspeculatie in Nederland: De Tulpomanie van 1636–37 en de Hyacintenhandel 1720–36 (Amsterdam, 1942), and the later history of the tulip by both Krelage, in Drie Eeuwen Bloembollenexport (The Hague: Rijksuitgeverijj, 1946), and Daniel Hall, in The Book of the Tulip (London: Martin Hopkinson, 1929).
Continuing trade in tulips Krelage, Bloemenspeculatie in Nederland, pp. 97–110; Krelage, Drie Eeuwen Bloembollenexport, pp. 15–18; Segal, Tulips Portrayed, p. 17; Mundy, Travels of Peter Mundy, vol. 4, p. 75; Garber, “Tulipmania,” pp. 550–53.
Aert Huybertsz. Posthumus, “Die Speculatie in Tulpen” (1927), pp. 82–83.
Haarlem as the center of the later bulb trade Krelage, Bloemenspeculatie in Nederland, pp. 102–04;