Page 71 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

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under the Safavid Shah lsma il, who seized the mosque of Ayasofya. On his death in 1474, the not on the basis of their origins but by their
throne in 1501, but by Bayazid's death in 1512 bequest of his large library, which included styles and the materials in which they worked.
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most of eastern Anatolia was definitively under works from the observatory at Samarkand, Menavino, who himself had been a slave of
Ottoman control. completely transformed Ottoman astronomy. Bayazid n, states that they numbered seventy.
In conquering these new and largely tribal The earlier works of the great Herati poet, In their virtuoso work the fashions of Herat
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provinces the Ottomans invoked the traditions c Alishir Neva !, who singlehandedly trans- and Tabriz were brilliantly adapted to
of the great Turkish conqueror and destroyer, formed the local Turkish dialects of Central Asia Ottoman taste.
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Tamerlane, whose legendary exploits had into classical Chaghatay, were in Mehmed n's Recruitment of foreign craftsmen by con-
inspired the Aqqoyunlu no less than his numer- own library. And on his arrival in Istanbul in scription presupposed a careful check of their
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ous descendants, both in war and, paradoxically 1474-1475 the jurist Ali b. Yusuf Fenarizade, qualifications, but since an important function
perhaps, in learning and the arts. Tamerlane had who had studied at Samarkand, Bukhara, and of the Ottoman palace workshops was to
outdone his predecessors in despoiling the lands Herat and who was to reach high office under furnish gifts for the sultan on the great feasts
he conquered of artists, craftsmen, and scholars Bayazid n, brought with him a copy of the of the Muslim year, inferior work would not
to adorn his capital, Samarkand, though, as with famous early Turkish work of counsel for kings, go undetected. In any case, the benefits of con-
the workers of enameled glass he deported from the Kutadgu Bilik, executed in Uyghur script at scription far outweighed the disadvantages.
Aleppo and Damascus, sometimes without any Herat in 1439-1440. Conscription on a massive scale was the means
practical result. His successors followed his These scholars were welcomed, and the works used to provide the skilled labor for Bayazid's
example, and the booty of the later fifteenth- they brought with them to Istanbul made a fun- occasional building works such as his great
century Turkish states from victorious cam- damental contribution to Ottoman learning and foundations at Edirne (inaugurated 1487-1488)
paigns was henceforth not merely of luxuries, literature. But Mehmed n and his successors and in Istanbul (inaugurated 1505).
heirlooms, and cash but also of craftsmen and actively acquired artists and their works from
scholars. the East as well as from Europe. In 1472
Not all the Eastern scholars who reached Mehmed captured the Aqqoyunlu prince Yusuf- The Mamluks and the India trade
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Istanbul had been conscripted. Some were cha Mirza and demanded as part of his ransom Trade with India placed the Mamluks in a
attracted by the growing reputation of the Otto- albums of prized drawings, paintings, and callig- pivotal position in the Mediterranean world in
man sultans as patrons of learning. After Ulugh raphy from the Aqqoyunlu collections in the the waning years of the fifteenth century. From
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Beg's death in 1449, Ali Qushji, the head of his Royal libraries of Tabriz, Shiraz, and Herat. the India trade the Mamluks acquired luxuries
observatory in Samarkand where a new, radi- These are still for the most part in the libraries primarily for their own consumption —Chinese
cally revised set of star tables had been com- of Istanbul. More of this material came to Istan- porcelains, Indian cottons, ivory and ambergris,
piled, found his way to Istanbul after some bul after Mehmed's victory at Ba§kent in 1473 gemstones and pearls. Far more important eco-
years at the court of Uzun Hasan at Tabriz. On and after Selim i's sack of the Hasht Bihisht nomically, however, was the export trade for the
his arrival there in 1471 he was appointed, at palace at Tabriz in 1514. Although some of the northern Mediterranean in spices, drugs such
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the colossal stipend of 200 akge (rather more albums were already bound, they were as Indian opium, preservatives, incense from
than 4 ducats) per diem, to the staff of the reviewed in Istanbul and Ottoman heirlooms Somalia and Oman, and Indian dyestuffs, par-
were added, including a portrait of Mehmed ticularly lac, which gave the finest crimson for
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after Costanzo da Ferrara and a miscellaneous the velvets of northern Italy. Sultan Barsbay
collection of Florentine engravings dating from (d. 1432) had transformed the export trade into
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the 14605 and 147OS. Among these was a a state monopoly, and although the Italian docu-
hand-colored male portrait in profile wearing a ments inveigh against its extortions the monop-
tournament helmet, now attributed to the oly also protected European merchants from
Master of the Vienna Passion after Antonio piratical exactions and corsairs in the Red Sea
Pollaiuolo and in later states entitled, pic- and off Alexandria. 20
turesquely but groundlessly, II Gran Turco Immensely profitable as the monopoly was
(actually "The Sultan"). to the Mamluks, they were, like all middlemen,
Palace registers state that many of the highly vulnerable, requiring enormous amounts
Muslim painters working for Siileyman the of silver for the settlement of accounts in India
Magnificent in the 1520$ were conscripted from and a large and efficient seagoing fleet. Egypt,
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Tabriz by Bayazid n, while the Tabrizi painters however, depended abjectly upon imports of
sent to Istanbul after Selim i's victory at £al- both raw metals, including copper and brass,
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diran in 1514 included a certain Shahquli (d. c. and of timber, down to the minutest details of
1556), who was to become the head of Siiley- naval equipment, though contraband largely
man the Magnificent's studio. Bayazid n, who, frustrated the periodic papal embargoes on
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according to the historian Spandugino, inau- timber exports to Egypt from the northern
gurated pomp at the Ottoman court, conscripted Mediterranean. In the later fifteenth century
other craftsmen, prisoners of war, and slaves for the supply of silver, which came in payment by
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his palace workshops, including embroiderers European merchants for spices, was threatened
in gold thread, swordsmiths, boot-makers, by growing demand in the sea trade with India
tailors, and furriers, but above all jewelers and and by a growing shortage of silver resulting

fig. 2. Master of the Vienna Passion. Il Gran Turco. goldsmiths. These were divided into two from Ottoman control of the Bosnian silver-
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engraving. Topkapi Sarayi Miizesi, Istanbul groups, Rumi (Anatolian) and Acemi (Persian), mines in the hinterland of Dubrovnik. Critical
70 CIRCA 1492