Click here to buy tickets for this exhibition, or telephone +44 (0)870 8488484.
Click here to buy the Turks catalogue from the Royal Academy’s main website.
Robert Irwin on the splendours of the sultan’s court
‘Stubborn in his purpose, and bold in everything, he aspires to no less fame than that of Alexander the Great. He has read to him by two Italians in his service the histories of Rome and other nations. He speaks Turkish, Greek and Slavonic. Eager for information about the Western world, he possesses a map showing the realms and provinces of Europe… he declares that there must be but one empire in the world, one faith, one monarchy – and that to realise this unity there is no place more worthy than Constantinople.’
That was how Languschi, an Italian contemporary, described Mehmed II (reigned 1451–80) as he was soon after his accession to the Ottoman Sultanate at the age of nineteen in 1451. In 1453 Mehmed commanded the Turkish armies in the conquest of Constantinople. There had been twelve previous attempts by Muslim armies to capture that city and in the course of the centuries a considerable body of prophetic literature had developed which promised that the Byzantine capital would fall to Islam before the End of the World. Often these prophecies linked the fall of Constantinople to the fall
of Rome.
Mehmed’s capture of Constantinople established his reputation as a warrior in the service of Jihad – the ‘holy struggle’ to spread the faith among hostile unbelievers – the traditional role of the Ottoman sultans.
The origins of the Ottomans are obscure, but they first appear in history in Bursa, western Anatolia, at the beginning of the fourteenth century. They commanded tribesmen who attacked Greeks and other Christians for the promise of booty or, failing that, martyrdom in the service of Jihad. By the mid-fifteenth century the Ottoman Empire included most of Anatolia and a large area of the Balkans. But as long as Constantinople remained in Christian hands, that empire was vulnerable, with Venetian and Genoese fleets having the power to cut Turkey in Europe off from Turkey in Asia. Though the Byzantine fortifications of Constantinople had proved a formidable obstacle, the place that Mehmed and his troops entered in 1453 was a ghost city. Large areas within the walls had become a wilderness. The Sultan set about repopulating and Islamising the city. Citizens were conscripted from more heavily populated parts of the empire. An enormous mosque complex known as the Fatih (Conqueror) was constructed. Mehmed shunned the ruined palaces of his predecessors, which he believed to be haunted by djinns (spirits which assumed human and animal forms) and started the complex of buildings that was known as the Yeni Saray (New Palace) and later, in the nineteenth century, as Topkapi Saray (Gun Gate Palace). He also had a vast and characteristically Islamic bedesten (covered market) constructed. Mosques and religious teaching colleges sprang up throughout the city.
As Languschi’s report suggests, Mehmed was steeped in classical culture. His spectacular conquest encouraged him to think of himself as a new Alexander and as heir to the Caesars. As a Homer enthusiast, Mehmed also claimed that the Turks (Turci) were the descendants of the Trojans (Teucri) and that the capture of Constantinople was belated revenge for the sack of Troy. He employed Greek and Italian advisers. He asked the Venetians to send him a painter. They sent him Gentile Bellini, who produced portraits of Mehmed and other Turks, and painted erotic frescoes in one or two pavilions of the new palace. Mehmed commissioned portrait medals from a number of Italian artists, of whom the most distinguished was Constanzo da Ferrara. He corresponded with Ferrante of Naples, Sigismondo Malatesta of Rimini and other Italian princes.
Mehmed’s interest in classical culture and in contemporary western art had no precedent among his ancestors and no legacy among them either, until the nineteenth century at least. But his importance as a cultural mediator between East and West was limited. Much of the interest that Mehmed took in things Italian seems suspiciously utilitarian and even predatory. He was very interested in the geography of Italy, most probably because he was planning to invade it and sack Rome in fulfilment of the ancient prophecies. After Mehmed’s death, his son and successor, Bayezid II (reigned 1481–1512) sold off the Italian paintings and probably destroyed the erotic frescoes.
The great innovations in Ottoman arts and crafts owed nothing to the example of Renaissance models. Rather it was the building of the Yeni Saray and the Fatih mosque, as well as numerous smaller mosques, religious teaching colleges and palaces that provided a massive stimulus to Islamic crafts. Iznik tiles, which must be counted among the finest examples of Islamic ceramics, were produced in vast quantities and to an unprecedented high standard to cover the walls of the new buildings. Similarly it seems probable that the large and expensive medallion Ushak carpets were first produced in Mehmed’s reign. Almost certainly made to order from the court, their layout was perhaps modelled on bookbindings from the imperial library. Mehmed and his courtiers, theologians, designers and craftsmen looked to the East and to Persian culture of the Timurid territories for their cultural models. The visual culture of the Ottomans in the late-fifteenth century was a branch of the ‘International Timurid style’ with its decorative stylised foliage, lobed leaves and cloud bands. Samarqand, Bukhara, Herat and Tabriz – not Florence or Venice – were the real sources of inspiration for Ottoman art in the late fifteenth century. As for Italy, though Mehmed sent an invasion force to southern Italy in 1480, he died the following year with his dream of conquering Rome unrealised.
His puritanical successor, Bayezid II, favoured the austere and Quran-related art of calligraphy. He regarded Shaykh Hamdullah, the man who had taught him calligraphy, with such reverence that he would stand and hold the inkstand while his teacher worked. Bayezid’s grandson, Süleyman the Magnificent (reigned 1520–66) was also an esteemed calligrapher, following the Ottoman tradition of princes mastering an art or practical skill such as calligraphy, woodwork or gardening. But Süleyman’s artistic patronage extended much further than calligraphy.
The vastly increased resources of the Ottoman Empire in the sixteenth century, as well as the skill of Süleyman’s chief architect Sinan, meant that the great mosque complex of the Süleymaniye in Istanbul outstripped Mehmed’s Fatih mosque in size and in boldness of design. Though Sinan worked within a tradition of architecture that was distinctively Ottoman, other artists and craftsmen continued to look back on the culture of fifteenth-century Central Asia under the Timurids for their inspiration. Albums of Persian miniatures rather than European canvases furnished Ottoman painters with their chief models. Eastern foliage and a Persian form of Chinoiserie continued to provide much of the decorative repertoire of Ottoman textiles and ceramics.
Most of the European art that Süleyman acquired came to him not through individual commissions, but rather as loot from campaigning in the Balkans. The sack of the Hungarian capital of Buda in 1526, in particular, brought vast quantities of manuscripts, statues, jewels and other precious objects to Istanbul. Süleyman’s reign was simultaneously the military and cultural zenith of the Ottoman Empire.
• This feature first appeared in RA Magazine as ‘Dynastic Visions’. For more Turks features visit www.ramagazine.org.uk
• Click here to buy tickets for this exhibition, or telephone +44 (0)870 8488484.
• Click here to buy the Turks catalogue from the Royal Academy’s main website.
