The Ottoman City and Its Parts: Urban Structure and Social Order

Subsidia Balcanica, Islamica et Turcica, 3

The Ottoman City and Its Parts Urban Structure and Social Order

Edited by IRENE A. BIERMAN RIFA' AT A. ABOU-EL-HA] DONALD PREZIOSI

iSTP1NBUL BiLGt UNIVERSITY LIBRARl

Aristide D. Caratzas, Publisher New Rochelle, New York

The Ottoman City and Its Parts: Urban Structure and Social Order

Copyright © 1991 by Aristide D. Caratzas, Publisher All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the permission in writing of the publisher. Aristide D. Caratzas, Publisher 30 Church Street, P.O. Box 210 New Rochelle, New York 10802 Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data Edited by Irene A. Bierman, Rifa'at A. Abou-EI-Haj, Donald Preziosi Includes bibliographical references and index 1. City planning-Turkey-History. 2. Cities and towns, Islamic-Turkey-History. 3. Architecture, Ottoman. I. Bierman, Irene A. II. Abou-El-Haj, Rifa'at A. Ill. Preziosi, Donald. NA9229.087 1991 307.76'09561-dc20 91-10731 CIP ISBN: 0-89241-473-1

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Contents

Part I: THE CITY AS A WHOLE Introduction: The Mechanisms of Urban Meaning 3

Donald Preziosi 1. Byzantine Constantinople & Ottoman Istanbul: Evolution in a Millennial Imperial Iconography 13

Speros Vryonis, Jr. 2. The Ottomanization of Crete

53

Irene A. Bierman 3. Power and Social Order: The Uses of the Kanun 77

Rifa' pi A. Abou-El-Haj PART II:' THE CITY AND ITS PARTS Introduction: Power. Structure, and Architectural Function

103

Donald Preziosi 4. Administrative Complexes. Palaces. and Citadels: Changes in the Loci of Medieval Muslim Rule 111 Jere L. Bacharach 5. Facades in Ottoman Cairo

129

Olka Bates 6. The Ottoman Sultan's Mosques: Icons of Imperial Legitimacy

Howard Crane Glossary Index

245

253

173

Contributors

Rifa'at Ali Abou-El-Haj

Ottoman historian and Professor of History, California State University, Long Beach

Jere L. Bacharadt

Professor ofIslamic History, University of Washington, Seattle

Ulkii Bates

Associate Professor of Art History, Hunter College of the City University of New York

Irene A. Bierman

Associate Professor of Islamic Art History, UCLA

Howard Crane

Islamic art historian and Professor of Art History, Ohio State University

Donald Preziosi

Professor of Art History, UCLA

Speros Vryonis, Jr.

Professor of Greek Civilization and Culture and Director of the Alexander S. Onassis Center for Hellenic Studies, New York University

Preface

"The presumption is that meaning in the urban environment is not completely contained in the structures themselves that comprise that environment, but is rather a complex function of interrelations among objects, users, and their historical circumstances."

These words have their origins in a position paper circulated in advance of a conference entitled Power and Structure in the Islamic Urban Arts, sponsored in May. 1984 by the Gustave E. von Grunebaum Center for Near Eastern Studies, the Art History area of the Department of Art, Design, & Art History, and the School of Architecture of the University of California, Los Angeles. During the days of that conference, a large group of art and architectural historians, historians, architects, city planners, and sociologists met to consider the many ways in which the urban environment was employed to signify and sustain specifically Islamic ideas and values of statecraft, political legitimacy, religious unity, and social and economic power. The participants were asked to address the question of how Islamic cities and their parts engendered and sustained such values, and how such values might be "legible' in Islamic architectural foundations and structures. The present volume is one product of that conference, and consists of essays commissioned subsequent to the conference on a more focussed theme of the historical relationships between political power and specifically Ottoman Islamic urban structure. Rather than publishing a traditional volume of conference proceedings, the editors projected a thematically unified volume made up of essays by several scholars whose research into the relationships between Ottoman political power and urban structure provides a multidisciplinary picture of the current state of our knowledge of the subject. The resultant collective venture is made up of six essays by historians and art and architectural historians of the Ottoman world which present overlapping insights into the social history of the Ottoman city and its parts. Many of the subjects taken up below in each study reappear in different ways in all six, and each essay further illuminates, and is in tum illuminated by, the others. Urban Structure and Social Order is divided into two parts: considerations of the Ottoman city as a whole [part One] and in its component parts [part Two].

viii Preface

Each part is preceded by an introductory section which identifies commonly addressed themes, and indicates the specific ways in which the conclusions and insights of each essay augment and resonate with those of the others. Many people helped to make this volume possible--some because they helped bring about the original conference which inspired the present study, and some because of their advice and counsel on the design and production of this book. The editors would like to thank Professor George Sabagh, Director of the von Grunebaum Center for Near Eastern Studies; Professor Nikkie Keddie of UCLA; and Dr. Heath Lowry, Director of the Institute for Turkish Studies, Washington, D.C., which awarded a publication subvention for the volume. In addition. special thanks go to Professor Speros Vryonis, jr., Director of the Alexander S. Onassis Center for Hellenic Studies, New York University, for his ongoing advice and encouragement; Mr. Jonathan Friedlander; Robert H. Gray, former dean of the UCLA College of Fine Arts; UCLA ViceChancellor Elwin Svenson; Susan Sims and Emiko Terasaki; and Ethel Sara Wolper for making the Glossary and Carel Bertram for making the Index. Special thanks must be given to Grace Wax. Caroline Kent. and Shannon W. Morris for typing this manuscript. We would also like to thank Professors Martin Krampen of the Hochschule der Bildende Kunste, Berlin, and Janet Abu-Lughod of the School of Social Research. whose theoretical and critical contributions to this work at its outset helped define the volume's thematic unities. The many contributors to the 1984 conference helped us in understanding the extraordinary diversity and complexity of urban design and history in the larger Islamic world. Finally. we wish to thank John Emerich of the Press for his ongoing encouragement and unfailingly good advice in bringing this project to completion. In all the transliterations, we tried to follow the system adopted by Islam Ansiklopedisi. The most notable exceptions were: For the Arabic ayn, we adopted the symbol' as in 'Ali; for hamzah, we adopted the symbol' as in Dar al-'Imarah. IRENE

A. BIERMAN

DEPARTMENT OF ART HISTORY, UCLA RIFA' AT A. ABou-Er.-HA] DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY, CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY AT LONG BEACH DONAlD PRFZIOSI DEPARTMENT OF ART HISTORY, UCLA

Part I

THE CITY AS A WHOLE

I have neither desires nor fears [Kublai Khan declared]. and my dreams are composed either by my mind or by chance. Cities also believe they are the work of the mind or of chance [Marco Polo replies]. but neither the one nor the other suffices to hold up their walls. You take delight not in a city's seven or seventy wonders, but in the answer it gives to a question of yours. Or the question it asks you, forcing you to answer. like Thebes through the mouth of the Sphinx. -Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities

Introduction

The Mechanisms ofUrban Meaning Donald Preziosi

If you were to visit the Athenian Akropolis to examine the great architectural remains of classical Greece, you would most likely come upon a curious anomaly in the symmetrical composition of the large gateway covering the western end of the Akropolis hill, a building known as the Propylaia. As you walk through the Propylaia, you may notice that the door and flanking windows of a room behind the left (north) portico do not align themselves with the intercolumnial spaces of that portico. This bizarre asymmetry is at odds not only with the doors of the central portion of the Propylaia leading onto the Akropolis platform, but in fact also with the alignments of all such architectural members in other classical colonnaded structures. The asymmetrical facade belongs to a chamber known in antiquity as the Pinakotheka, or picture-gallery, referred to by the ancient traveller Pausanias as housing pictures significant to Athenian history and mythology. Should you attempt to find a spot where the chamber's door and windows might appear in their canonically classical position (between the fronting columns), you will eventually find yourself at the center of the forecourt of the Uvshaped Propylaia, down on the zigzag ramp leading steeply up to the Propylaia platform. That spot is at the center of the ramp, and at the center of the forecourt. Directly ahead, to the east, you can look through the large central doorway of the Propylaia up onto the Akropolis platform. If you were standing at this point in the latter part of the 5th century B.C., you would see directly ahead of you through the main Propylaiaentrance the great chryselephantine statue of the Athena promakhos, the patron of the Athenian struggle against the Persians half a century earlier: the .head of this massive gold and ivory statue would dominate the view into the Akropolis. If you were to turn around, in the direction of the gaze of that statue, you would then see on the far western horizon the island of Salamis, the site of the Athenian naval victory against the Persian fleet.

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Donald Preziosi

This entire tableau orchestrated by the Propylaia and by the statue of Athena is nothing less than a theater of memory, or theatron: a place where the visible becomes legible. It is the obverse of the ancient Greek theater, for the spectator is at the center of the orchestra, not on one of the tiers of seats. The central point of this historical panorama transforms the spectator, the individual subject, into the very site for the production of meaning, where the individual gaze and perspective is the "measure" of things. By literally playing with the perceptual expectancies of the subject, it puts that subject into the only place where the architectural composition of the Propylaia as a whole would grammatically "read" within the canons of classicism; It should be recalled that the claim to exclusive or decisive success at Salamis was hotly disputed by Sparta, whose forces played a major role in the Persian defeat. For those with eyes to read it, the tableau mounted by Athens at the entrance to its most sacred religious sanctuary would have constituted a powerful and provocative political statement-a text made up of ideological imagery, composed by the Athenian state to legitimize and reinforce its claims to the leadership of all the Hellenes.! II

Cities and their parts work to engender, reflect, legitimize, and sustain the lived realities of social groups. They accomplish this by establishing certain distributions of individuals and objects; surfaces and boundaries; visibilities and occlusions, over space and time and in dynamically changing arrangements that sustain the relationships in which individuals and groups are caught up. While cities afford opportunities for action and interaction, they also constrain behavior through the fabrication of conventionally appropriate stages for interaction or separation. Urban structures acquire signification through active usage, and their meanings change according to position and perspective, intention and circumstance. Thus, the complex set of associations projected by a given city-say Istanbul-may be radically different to members of different classes or religious or ethnic communities, or to members of the same groups at different historical periods, or under changed political circumstances. The relationship of the individual historical subject to such urban realities is invariably highly complex. Individuals are more than passive "consumers" of urban imagery and structure: cities are not "read" as if they were texts or paintings. Rather, they are reckoned with in the dual sense of that phrase-simultaneously coped with and thought with. 2 At the same time that the individual subject must cope with a prefabricated urban fabric, he or she must think (with) it in order to fabricate a lived relationship to its affordances and constraints. To use a city means to actively understand its material, logi.cal, and semantic orders: to play its game according to conventionally established rules and protocols.

The Mechanisms

of Urban Meaning

5

A city's geometric and topologic economies operate as grids of certainties: networks of predictability and predication for the staging of behavioral routines, and episodic frameworks for inter-personal contact and avoidance. In this sense, an urban structure is a matrix of ideological instruments for creating and sustaining a story-shaped world. The sub-text of that story-shaped world is the fluctuating dynamic ofsocial power. A city is never neutral: the urban tabric is a device for tracking, measuring, controlling, and predicting behaviors over space and time. The realities it tabricates and maintains are invariably fictive-an ideologically-invested perspective on the proper social realities of individuals, groups, and classes. In this sense, there is no city which is not in some way a utopic fiction-or, more accurately, a matrix of varied and often conflicting fictions.s From such a perspective, ideology may be construed as a fixed set of positions or places for the social subject to inhabit, both physicallyand metaphorically. A given ideology establishes and maintains a particular form of subjectivity-a perspective from which given lived worlds cohere and appear ordered, legitimate, and natural.' Ideology and urban structure are not external to each other, as might be assumed were we to construe literally the assertion that what a city "represents' is power. Cities and their parts exemplify, embody, and express power relations, to be sure, but at the same time they enforce, perpetuate, and engender relations of power. At the same time that we inhabit a city, it inhabits us. As we come to understand more fully the nature of the "images of cities"5 that socialized individuals to form, it becomes more clearly apparent that one of the principal functions of cities is precisely to engender "images" of themselves, thereby providing the means whereby life-worlds and their imagery (which is to say their ideologies) can be reckoned with. In this regard, the history of building may be understood as the ongoing, dynamically changing, and frequently contradictory generation of ideological imagery.f III

The essays comprising this interdisciplinary volume are each concerned in varying ways with the means whereby particular historical cities within the Ottoman world established their own regimes of legibility-the ways in which cities made manifest the signs and emblems of power relations, and the ways in which they employed architectonic and other cues as to how they were to be "reckoned with" by their inhabitants. Each study, specially written for this volume, provides a slant or perspective on the problem of how Ottoman cities orchestrated meaning, deployed relations of power, and constructed and embodied particular ideologies. Each essay was written within a framework defined by these questions, and each of the historians, art historians, and architectural historians contributing to this joint project presents a perspective on the social history of the

6 Donald Preziosi Ottoman city-the multiple foci necessary for assembling a realistically complex picture of that history. Each of these perspectives overlaps with the others, illuminates them, and is in turn illuminated by them. It has been our joint understanding that any adequate understanding of social history is necessarily a collective endeavor that transcends the capacities arid programmmatic interests of individual disciplines or discourses. The following essays should be read in that spirit-as partial and in many cases deliberately overlapped perspectives on the issues at hand. The many subjects addressed below-histories of architectural formation, state patronage, and the histories of social, religious, political, and legal institutions-reappear in different ways in each study, and link together important facets of the relationship ofIslamic power and urban formation. Part One, devoted to the Ottoman city as a whole, includes essays by two historians and an art historian. Chapter 1, by Speros Vryonis, jr., considers the processes by which two imperial personages (Constantine and Mehmed) respectively gave form and substance to the imperial capitals of Constantinople and Istanbul. In Chapter 2, Irene Bierman examines the ways in which 17th-century Ottoman conquerors and settlers transformed a Venetian merchant city (Herakleion) into an Ottoman provincial capital, and signalled its newly Islamic status by the orchestration of architectural forms inherited from Venetian and native Greek foundations: the city became a small-scale reflection of the imperial capital ofIstanbul. Chapter 3, by Rifa'at A. Abou-El-Haj, focuses on the change in the social uses of Ottoman law (the kanun) in regulating life in Istanbul and elsewhere, and thereby illustrates the complex mechanisms by which Ottoman urban structures and foundations originated and were perpetuated. Vryonis considers the site of Byzantium/Constantinople/Istanbul as the medium-material of imperial iconography, and discusses the nature of the site itself, the almost daernonic personalities of Constantine and Mehmed, and the valorization of the site by the joining together of site and personality in the physical creation of a "super-city.' Constantine brought to Byzantium the Roman Empire, Christianity, and Greek culture; Mehmed brought to Constantinople Islam and the Sultanate (to be followed eventually by the Caliphate). According to Vryonis, the rise of the two successive imperial capitals entailed a 9-fold integration of the political powers amassed by Constantine and Mehmed These processes are described as irnperialization, sanctification, rnandarinization, literalization, militarization, demographization, thesaurization, monumentalization, and sacralization, or ceremonialization, Vryonis argues that both Constantine (in 330) and Mehmed (in 1453) used similar or equivalent means in constructing the foundations of their respective imperiurns, and that in a number of respects, both rulers had ambiguous attitudes toward the cultures they replaced-pagan Greek culture and Byzantine Christian culture, respectively. In both cases, a process of sanctification

The Mechanisms

of Urban Meaning

7

purged, eliminated, and transformed such elements in the new imperial iconography. Vryonis considers such processes as examples of a translatio imperii, and he details many of the ways this was accomplished by both Constantine and Mehmed. What is important here-in connection with the general subject of the volume-is the implication that the establishment of an imperial urban structure entailed in both historical instances a fundamental reorientation upon an existing or surviving material infrastructure-both the urban structure as a whole and the relative disposition and deployment of its various component parts. In other words, it may be said that each imperial founder created new conditions of legibility within the urban infrastructure. While the most obvious and familiar example of such translationes was the conversion of the great church of the Haghia Sophia into an Islamic mosque through palpable and significant architectonic renovations both internally and externally, the process may be seen in every facet of urban life, and on every scale. This is evident in a wide variety of "rewritings" of portions of the visual environment. A good example is the great porphyry column set up in the Forum of Constantine, crowned by a statue of the ruler in the attitude of Helios, holding a globus crucifix in one hand. Placed beneath the base of the column were various significant Christian relics, as well as the pagan Palladium brought from Rome. The entire structure represents an amalgam of pagan and Christian practices and formations, all of which were in effect transformed to constitute a sanctification of the new political order. The new imperial capital materialized on the Bosphorus as a microcosm of the Christian imperial macrocosm, transforming and subsuming the signs and relics of the old Greco-Roman order. What was accomplished on a colossal scale in the new Christian imperial capital reflected transformations taking place throughout the Greco-Roman world on a microcosmic scale during the previous two centuries. This may be seen in the ongoing transformations of Greek pagan temples and shrines into sites of Christian worship: a transformation involving, in many cases, the simple conversion of a pagan temple into a Christian church by the closing off of the old east entrance, the opening of an entrance at the western end, and the refitting of the interior with an altar on the east end, often accompanied by the erection of an apsidal wall behind the altar table. In a similar fashion, Christians in the West converted old urban basilical forms once used for commercial or civic offices into churches. In all cases, such translationes involved the transformation of older urban imagery into structures meant to be "read" in strikingly different ways: the significance and connotations of the urban infrastructure were changed, and in effect "rewritten.' Constantine and Mehmed were fascinated by aspects of the cultural traditions they replaced and transformed. Both rulers saw themselves as straddling two worlds, and both appear to have seen themselves as personalities large enough to subsume the legacies of the old and new orders. Vryonis's essay argues strongly that the imperial iconography established by

8

Donald Preziosi

each founder cannot be adequately understood without a consideration of the inseparability of urban form and the orders of urban life. The essay by Bierman (Chapter 2) extends some of Vryonis's major concerns into a provincial context: the world of Ottoman Crete. Conquered by the Ottomans in the 17th century, the island had for four centuries been occupied by the Venetians. Their capital of Candia (present-day Herakleion) was itself a miniature version of the Venetian imperial capital on the Adriatic in that it replicated several of its key architectural monuments in approximately the same relationships to each other. Thus Venetian Candia contained a Piazza San Marco, a Basilica San Marco, a Campanile, and a governor's palace corresponding to the position occupied by the Palazzo Ducale relative to its associated buildings in Venice. Moreover, just as the great civic and religious center of Venice fronted on a major thoroughfare (the Canal Grande), so did the equivalent complex in Candia open onto the major land gate of that city. Equivalent foundations were made in the second major Venetian Cretan city to the west, Rethymnon (Retimo). In Candia and Rethyrnnon, the Greek Orthodox structures permitted within the urban core were rendered invisible, marginalized behind the monumental Venetian urban core. The Ottoman conquest of the island resulted in an eradication of Latin Christian institutions and foundations and the deportation of the Venetian and Western populations back to Europe. Bierman details how the Ottoman conquerors remodeled all Venetian and many Greek structures in the city of Candia into institutions ofMuslim function. Archival and architectural evidence suggests that the transformation of the Venetian political and religious infrastructure involved materially minor, but symbolically major remodellings. Three items appear to have been sufficiently expressive of Islarnicization in the transformation of Latin Christian churches: the erection of an Ottoman-style minaret built over the foundations of an older Latin bell-tower; the installation of a chronogram plaque on the front facades of former churches; and the establishment of a graveyard with characteristic Ottoman tombstones adjacent to the new cami. Apart from the interior replacement of Christian furniture by minbars and qiblas, these three alterations to otherwise untransformed structures sufficiently signalled Islamic religious hegemony. Bierman observes an apparent anomaly in this transformational process in the siting of the Sultan's Mosque in Candia. In contrast to Imperial Istanbul, where the Great Church of Constantinople, the Haghia Sophia, was transformed into the Aya Sofia Cami (the great mosque of the conqueror Mehmed), in Candia the sultan's cami was sited on the ruins of a Franciscan monastery, near the eastern gate of the city: the old Basilica San Marco in the urban center was converted to the mosque of the Grand Vezir. Bierman's explanation of this anomaly gives us an insight into the process of Ottomanization itself: the new Sultan's mosque stood on one of the highest points within Candia, at a position where its distinctive Ottoman outlines

The Mechanisms of Urban Meaning

9

would have been visible for many miles both on land and at sea. This siting suggests that the conquerors may have been concerned with orchestrating the urban structure of Candia as a whole as a miniature echo of the great imperial capital on the Bosphoros, where imperial mosques standing on the major hills of the city were visible far out to sea to any approaching traveller. Candia thus would have been rendered legible as an Ottoman and Islamic city from far and wide. This external legibility was complemented by a system of internal legibility, with the foundation of numerous camis, tekkes, sebiihanes, mescids, and other characteristicallyOttoman Islamic institutions, often transforming (or standing in positions in the city overlying) prominent Venetian foundations. The 17thcentury Ottoman traveller Evliya Celebi observed that while the entire Muslim population of Khania (Haniye) and Rethymnon (Retmo) could be accommodated in three camis, twice that number were initially built in each city. Vryonis observed, in connection with the imperial foundation of Constantinople, that many civic and religious structures were built, far more than would have been immediately required by the small initial population of that city. Bierman argues that the deliberate creation of a distinctively Ottoman "skyline" in the provincial cities of Crete resonates with the iconographic programme evident in the imperial capital of Istanbul and in other great cities of the empire. Yet by the mid-17th century, patterns of patronage and institutional support within the empire had come to be different from those characteristic of earlier times. She suggests that despite the visual prominence given externally in the Cretan cities to the Sultan's camis, these foundations did not include complexes serving as major centers within the cities, nor did they in fact signal the exercise of extraordinary philanthropic generosity (as they would in the capital and elsewhere). Indeed, she observes that in some instances, the Sultan's camis had no congregation on Crete, and in one case (Sultan Ibrahim's Cami), it served as a gunpowder magazine. Such anomalies suggest that on 17th-century Crete the Sultan's cami was an "empty" sign representing sultanic power as such: actual political and .ecomonic power lay elsewhere, and was expressed in the strong patronage of the mosques of the Grand Vezir, the Pasa households, and the Valide Sultan, as well as in foundations endowed by the original conquerors and their progeny. Thus, while the connotative functions of Sultanic power were tenaciously maintained, their denotative functions had radically changed. The complex historical nature of these changes in power and patronage within the Ottoman Empire, legible in the architecture and urban structure of provincial Crete, are equally legible in Istanbul itself in connection with the social uses of the Ottoman law (kanun), as discussed in great detail by AbouEI-Haj (Chapter 3). His essay examines changes to, and augmentations of, the complex body of legal regulations during the period 1600-1800, and indicates the ways in which such changes reflect important shifts in social and econom-

10

Donald Preziosi

ic relations. Such changes are embodied in the provincial microcosm of patronage and institutional foundation and support on Crete, where, as Bierman has shown, the signs of Sultanic power become increasingly empty. By attending closely to the content and social functions of the kanun and what became an associated literature (such as the nasihatnameler), we may be able to understand the specific nature of the patronage of Ottoman institutions and foundations during the period 1600-1800. Abou-El-Haj's study indicates quite clearly that while the form of the kanun remains constant during this period, its social usages and practical referents shift, often very dramatically. What once were the instruments of domination (through surplus extraction), the kanun of the sixteenth century and the nasihatnameler (political polemics of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries), are refitted and entered into the discourse over modern constitution-making in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Thus the rights of the sipahis, once spelled out in some of the nasihatnameler, are used anachronistically to annotate and explicate the sixteenth century kanun. Such anomalies between formation and reference are themselves echoed in the findings of both Vryonis and Bierman in their research into the history of urban structure and its changing ideological connotations. All three essays in this section exemplify and reinforce this historical specificity. Taken together, the studies by Vryonis, Bierman, and Abou-EI-Haj offer complementary and partly-overlapping insights into Ottoman urban and social history, highlighting by turns the internal and external dimensions of that history. In so doing, they demonstrate the interdependence of architectural, urban, and social questions, not only in specifically Ottoman contexts, but more broadly. Not least of the implications to be drawn from this section is one which is strongly methodological: that the writing of social history in its fullest sense necessarily involves the integration of many different lines of research-from the history of art and architecture to the history of legal, political, and social institutions. An important corollary to this is that the writing of social history works against the grain of disciplinary specialization and fragmentation as a multidisciplinary and collective enterprise: a dialogue among histories and historians.

NOTES 1. A discussion of this example nuy be found in D. Preziosi, "Reckoning with the World: Figure, Text & Trace in the Built Environment," Americal'lJOflrl'lal ofSemiotics, vol. 4, nos. 1-2 (1986): 1-15, and in idem., (Between Power & Desire: The Margins of the City) in Glyph Textual Studies I: Demarcatil'lg the Disciplil'les (Philosophy, Literature, Art) (1986): 237-253. 2. The notion of "reckoning" with urban structure is developed in the essays cited in the previous note. The viewing position described above is what might be termed an al'lamorphic point, from which visual anomalies and ambiguities dissolve, and a

The Mechanisms of Urban Meaning

11

canonically proper tableau or perspective locks into place. Such phenomena are characteristic of many planned foundations in various cultures: as I. Bierman argues below in Chapter 2, Ottoman foundations on Crete present equivalent "canonical" tableaux of the whole city that are emblematic of Ottoman Islamic hegemony. The literature dealing with aspects of this phenomenon (often under the heading of genius loci) is quite large; a useful introduction may be found in C. Norberg-Schulz, Meaning in Western Architecture (New York: Praeger, 1975), esp. 427-434, with references. See also idem Genius Loci (New York: Rizzoli, 1980). 3. On the relationships between architecture and ideology, see M. Tafuri, Theories & History of Architecture, (New York: Harper & Row, 1976), esp, 61-73; idem., Architecture and Utopia (Cambridge MA: MIT Press, 1976), 150-169. On utopias vs. heterotopias, see M. Foucault, "Of Other Spaces," Diacritics vol. 16, No.1, Spring 1986, pp. 22-27. 4. On ideology as engendering "positions" for subjects to inhabit, see R. Coward & J. Ellis, Language & Materialism, Developments in Semiology & the Theory of the Subject, (London & Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979), esp. 71-82. Ideology, according to the authors, puts individuals at the imaginary center of a social structure, making the subject the place where ideological meanings are realized. Ideology achieves such closures by fixing the relationship by which the individual represents himself in his world of objects (p. 74). From such a perspective, all architectonic formations work to engender ideological imagery: for an example of the operations of such mechanisms, see n. 2 above, and Chapter 2 (Bierman) below. 5. The classic study of urban imagery is K. Lynch, The Image of the City (Cambridge MA: MIT Press, 1960). Lynch's research into the ways in which urban inhabitants develop "images" or cognitive maps of their environments has given rise to a very large body of research into the subject over the past quarter-century. A useful introduction to key issues is R. M. Downs & D. Stea, eds., Image & Environment: Cognitive Mapping & Spatial Behavior (Chicago: Aldine, 1973). See also, A. Renier, ed., Espace et representation (paris: Les Editions de la Villette, 1982), esp. 123-184, and M. Krampen, Meaning in the Urban Environment (London: Pion, 1979), esp. Part 2 (93-307), which recounts a series of empirical studies on what the author terms the "psychosemiology" of architecture. 6. This subject is taken up in various ways by a number of authors in the present volume; in Part One, particularly by Vryonis (Chapter I), who discusses the ways in which the imperial rulers of Constantinople-Istanbul employed the urban site itself to orchestrate ideological imagery, and by Bierman (Chapter 2), who shows how these imperial practices were reflected in a provincial comer of the Ottoman empire, the island of Crete. In Part Two, the detailed mechanisms of these practices are outlined by all three authors-in terms of the shifting loci of Muslim rule in administrative complexes (Bacharach); in the "Ottomanizing" facades of buildings in Cairo (Bates); and by Crane under the umbrella term of "icons of imperial legitimacy" in the mosques of the Ottoman Sultans in Istanbul and elsewhere.

1

Byzantine Constantinople & Ottoman Istanbul Evolution in a Millennial Imperial Iconography Speros Vryonis,Jr.

When the semi-legendary Byzas ostensibly founded the first Greek city on the Bosphorus, Byzantion (tradition dates it to 667 B.C.), he chose a site of unrivaled geographical excellence, situated as it was at the juncture of two land masses and two seas. But even after the rebuilding of the city along Roman lines by Septimius Severus in 196 A.D. it remained a small provincial emporium of no political importance. Yet its natural military security (surrounded on three sides by the sea), maritime advantages (sheltered deep harbor), continental hinterlands (the rich agricultural areas of Thrace and Bithnia), and proximity to the great sea routes and land highways linking Europe to Asia and the lands north of the Black Sea to the lands south of the Mediterranean, all rendered the small city of Byzantion potentially more blessed than the three Mediterranean super-cities of Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria. Later Byzantine and Ottoman writers praised the geographical, as indeed the climatic, virtues of the site as particularly suited to be the receptacle of imperium. This brings us to the first of the three components of this paper, the site itself, which is to the imperial iconography and style what the medium-material is to an architect, sculptor, or painter. The geographical site and its physical topography remained constant factors in the evolution of the Byzantine and Ottoman capitals to a degree that the land itself was historically and mystically transformed because it inherited first Athens, Rome, and Jerusalem, then Mecca, Damascus, and Baghdad. No other geographical site was so constituted as to be able to receive and to renew all these elements. It brings us to the English student of Asia Minor, Sir William Ramsay, and his preoccupation with the concept of the sanaus locus, the abiding sanctity of a given and well defined geographical site, the geographical spot which, once sacralized, retains "forever" its holy character. The second element is that of the daemonic personalities of the founding genii: in the first instance Constantine the Great, in the second Mehmed the Conqueror.' In both cases, the two imperial capitals emerged first as acts of conscious re-foundations (both urban and imperial), on a grandiose scale, by men of ruthless genius whose vision was ecumenical and focused on eternity. Constantine and Mehmed were absorbed into the rhythms of long-lived and

14 Speros Vryonis,Jr.

vital imperial traditions; their re-foundations constitute major historical reorientations with longevity and with imperial successors (Constantius II, Theodosius II,Justinian I, Bayazid II, Selim I, and Snleyman I) who extended and consummated the act of imperial creation in Constantinople-Istanbul. A cursory examination of the personalities and character of the first Christian emperor and the first Muslim sultan to rule on the Bosphorus is in order and of intrinsic interest. Because of the heroic stature of both men, and the absolutely fundamental nature of their roles in founding imperial cities and empires, within a century of their respective deaths they entered the golden realm of historical myth. Constantine became the ideal of Byzantine monarchs and was reckoned, along with his mother Helen, a saint in the Byzantine church. The figure of Mehmed was transmuted into the image of the just and pious sultan, revered by both his Greek and Turkish subjects for his justice and benevolence, and by Muslims as endowed with a peculiarly religious aura. Undoubtedly these transformed imperial and sultanic types played an important role in the imperial iconography of the city long after the death of their prototypes, but historical myth obscures their real role in the very act of creation of the imperial iconography of Constantinople-Istanbul. Constantine's principal biographer and contemporary, Eusebius of Caesarea, has written an unblushing encomium which is at the same time a frankly Christian apologia. As such the Vita Constantinii must be balanced by the hostile writings of Zosimus. In the case of Mehrned, we have contemporary accounts from Greeks (especially Critobulus, but also Ducas and Chalcocondyles), Ottomans (Tursun Bey), and Italians (particularly Angiollelo); once more the ruler is seen through more than one prism. Through the prismatic views of the disparate sources the student of these eras may see beyond the later "romantic" encrustations and glimpse into the historical personalities of both rulers and, having thus glimpsed at their personalities the student can better interpret their historical acts. The first characteristics shared by both men that emerge from an analysis of their historical acts are supreme political intelligence and military genius, an absolutely lethal combination. Coupled to these are inexhaustible energy (psychological and physical) and never-faltering determination. Before proceeding to any further delineation of their personality traits one should make an initial probe to ascertain their motive force. Later Greek and Ottoman authors certainly saw as a motive force religion and the hand of God, and it is true that in their lifetimes Constantine and Mehmed were intimately involved with religion at both intellectual and institutional levels. The truth of the matter, however, is to be found elsewhere. The pagan author Zosimus wrote of Constantine that he became arrogant, "when he had attained to the sole authority," and that further, he "gave himself up to the unrestrained exercise of his power." Finally, Zosimus accused Constantine of "aspiring to the sovereignty of the whole world"2 Among the world conquerors to which his Christian biogra-

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pher Eusebius compared him was Alexander the Great, saying of Constantine: That he conquered nearly the Whole World. But our emperor began his reign at the time of life at which the Macedonian died, yet doubled the length of his life, and trebled the length of his reign. And instructing his army in the mild and sober precepts of godliness, he carried his arms as far as the Britons, and the nations that dwell in the very bosom of the Western ocean. He subdued likewise all Scythia, though situated in the remotest North, and divided into numberless diverse and barbarous tribes. He then pushed his eonquests to the Blemmyans and Ethiopians, on the very confines of the South; nor did he think the acquisition of the Eastern nations unworthy his care. In short, diffusing the effulgence of his holy light to the ends of the whole world, even to the most distant Indians, the nations dwelling on the extreme circumference of the inhabited earth, he received the submission of all the rulers, governors, and satraps of barbarous nations, who cheerfully welcomed and saluted him, .sending embassies and presents, and setting the highest value on his acquaintance and friendship; insomuch that they honored him with pictures and statues in their respective countries, and Constantine alone of all emperors was acknowledged and celebrated by all.3

Critobulus, biographer and contemporary of Mehrned, on two occasions compares Mehmed with Alexander the Great. In the first he remarks that it would be unjust for the deeds of others, ...petty as they are in comparison with yours, [that they] should be better known and more famed before men because done by Greeks and in Greek history, while your accomplishments, vast as they are, and in no way inferior to those of Alexander the Macedonian, or of the generals and kings of his rank, should not be set forth in Greek to the Greeks, nor passed on to posterity for the undying praise and glory of your deeds.f

He continues: When he became heir to a great realm and master of many soldiers and enlisted men, and had under his power already the largest and best parts of both Asia and Europe, he did not believe that these were enough for him nor was he content with what he had: instead he immediately overran the whole world in his calculations and resolved to rule it in emulation of the Alexanders and Pompeys and Caesars and kings and generals of their sort. s

In one of the versions of the chronicle of George Sphrantzes there is specific reference to Mehmed's fascination with the cult of Alexander: He was not without wisdom. Having delved into the craft of astrology he loved to read constantly. He read the lives and accomplishments of Alexander the Macedonian, Octavius Caesar, Flavius Constantine the Great. Theodosius of Spain-emperor of Constantinople. And he sought and searched for devices so that he might surpass all of them and so that he might expand the boundaries of his kingdom to the limits. 6

Mehmed seems to have had ample opportunity to learn of the exploits of Alexander the Great, not only from the Greek and Italian familiars of his court," and from the Iskandername, a Turkish poem by Ahmedi which treated the Persian contents of the Alexander legendf but also from a fifteenth century manuscript of Arrian's Anabasis of Alexander in his own palace library.? Julian Raby has recently indicated that Mehmed frequently read of

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Alexander's exploits in Arrian and that the Saray manuscript of Arrian, which can be dated to the 1460's, is written by the same palace scribe who committed to writing Critobulus' history of'Mehmed.t? It is thus clear that the motive force giving direction to the political intelligence and military genius of Constantine and Mehmed was the desire to create, or perhaps to recreate an ecumenical empire. All of their historical acts are to be understood against the background of this consuming passion; the accomplishments of Alexander the Great served both as the model to be imitated and as the yard stick by which their respective accomplishments were to be measured. If the one version of the chronicle of Sphrantzes is to be believed, Mehmed not only had the model of Alexander in common with Constantine, he had also as an additional model the accomplishments of the founder of Constantinople, Constantine himself Given the unusual nature of the two men's preoccupations-the acquisition of massive, unlimited power-their additional personal traits fall into place. The two monarchs had considerable education for the practical men of state that they were, education that seemed to be ongoing throughout their lives, though interestingly, doubt has been expressed as to their complete mastery of literary Greek: the fame, as well as much about the history of their accomplishments, has been vouchsafed to posterity by Greek intellectuals writing in Greek. (As we saw above, Critobulus was quite articulate about the fact that Mehmed's historic deeds were so great that they deserved to be, and indeed needed to be, recorded in Greek to receive their proper due.) Both rulers, to continue with their personal traits, exhibited courage, an insatiable thirst for glory, vanity, conceit, magnificence, arrogance, suspicion, faithlessness, and jealousy. Though these were often interspersed with mercy, kindness, and self-control, one is left with a strong sense of an impersonal cruelty which arose from their unbending desire to acquire great power. Though Constantine was eulogized for his Christian virtues by Eusebius, and specifically for his paternal and uxorious excellence, he nevertheless did not hesitate to have his wife Fausta murdered in her bath, and to have his son Crispus and his young nephew Licinius executed, along with other friends.t! Yet, with the passage of his historical figure into the realm of historical legend, he achieved sainthood in the church. Mehmed, according to the well-informed Theodore Spandugino, was responsible for the deaths of 873,000 persons during his long reign. 12 If we are to believe the contemporary eyewitness accounts ofJacopo de Promontorio, who was among the advisors of the sultan in the court, and also the accounts of Gian-Maria Angiollelo, who served in the court as a gulam, Mehmed's cruelty attained colossal proportions and diabolical refinements. Diverse and horrible are the punishments, injustices, and cruelties of the Grand Turk. The most usual death he metes out to anyone he pleases, whether guilty of any crime or not, is to make the man he wishes to punish lie down on the ground, a sharp long pole is placed in the rectum; with a big mallet held in both hands the executioner

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strikes it with all his might, so that the pole, known as a palo, enters the human body and, according to its path, the unfortunate lingers on or dies at once. Then he raises the pole and plants it in the ground; thus the unfortunate is left "in extremis." He does not live long. Another horrible cruelty is inflicted on grave offenders: the victim stands erect with his hands tied. He causes a two-pronged fork equipped with barbed hooks and affixed to a wooden pole to be rammed into his neck from behind just below the chin in such a way that the windpipe is not touched and that the pole is at the victim's back. Usually, the prongs protrude by four or five hand's breadths near the ears. Then his hands are untied. Eager to save his life, the unfortunate raises himself with both hands to escape from the hooks. For a moment suspended at the highest point, he inevitably falls back. This continues and sometimes the unfortunate spends the whole day or even as much as two days in this torment. Then he dies a horrible death.... Many claim that the sultan has people buried alive or even devoured by elephants and other wild beasts. But Master Iacopo says he has never seen such acts of cruelty. The worst, however, is the following: for the special punishment of those whom he particularly hates, he keeps among his executioners three or four perfect beasts, whom he pays well and whom, when he wishes to avenge himself on someone, he causes to eat the person in question in his presence until he gives up the ghost. That is the most hideous death that has ever been mentioned... .In short, if ever a ruler has been feared and dreaded, ruthless and cruel, this one is a second Nero and far worse. 13

Thus these cosmic architects of world power are what Kantorowicz (in the case of Frederick II) and Babinger (in the case of Mehmed II) term the "daemonic personalities" that do not behave according to the established morality of a society. Quoting Goethe, Babinger remarks, "In reality...only the observer has a conscience; the man of action is always without one. "14 It may seem to some that a consideration of this aspect of the personalities of Constantine and Mehmed is at best tangential to our subject, but in fact it is not. The creation first of Constantinople and then of Istanbul 1,130 years later are cosmogonic in the sense that they are coterminous with the creation of two vast worlds, and a cosmogonic creation is a daemonic creation. The erection of two super-cities, for this is what Constantinople and Istanbul were for the better part of a millennium and a half, was the act of two world tyrants, who not only materially realized their colossal vanity in marble, cement, and bronze in the very act of foundation, but who also perpetuated their political genius in a most extraordinary fashion. Power of the type that Constantine had reunited in one hand and the massive power-empire that Mehmed had brought together in his own person had to be centered in a great city. That both rulers saw in their creation of their super-city a super-human act is profusely illustrated by the sources. According to the Cappodocian historian Philostorgius (368-430/40), Constantine attributed the very marking out of the city's location and of its boundaries to divine intervention: He [philostorgius] says that Constantine in the twenty-eighth year of his reign was tracing out the wall on foot having in hand his spear. It seemed to those who were following him that he was extending the size [of the city] more than was needed and so someone came up to him in order to ask him: "How far, Lord?" and he, answering

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explicitly said: "Until He who is in front of me halts," thus clearly indicating that some heavenly power was walking before him.l s

In the introduction to the vakif docwnent establishing the massive Fatih complex (mosque, medreses, turbes, etc. of Mehmed II), Mehmed speaks of the transition and transmutation of his energies "from lesser wars to the mightiest war,"16 referring in the former to his long wars of conquest and in the latter to the rebuilding of Constantinople-Istanbul. In other words, world conquest culminates in a supreme act: the building of the receptacle of world power, the super-city. Plutarch, in his life of Themistocles, relates the now famed conversation between the renowned Themistocles and the anonymous, insular boor from the tiny, insignificant isle ofSeriphos: The man from Seriphos told him [Themistocles] that he had glory not because of his own [ability] but because of the city [Athens]. "You speak the truth," said Themistocles, "but neither would I have become famous if I were from Seriphos, nor would you had you been an Athenian."17

The point of the anecdote is that fame and glory derive from individual brilliance within a powerful political tradition. In the case of Themistocles, his abilities fructified because they had the appropriate large-scale arena: the birth of the Athenian empire. I wish to state again, at this point, that obviously the activities of both rulers have to be interpreted against an even broader historical, political, and economic background. I choose to concentrate here only on the personality factor, it being understood that without these broader factors that resulted in the creation of the Byzantine and Ottoman Empires, we could not fully account for the foundations of Constantinople and Istanbul. With this observation we move to the third area of introductory analysis in this presentation. We saw that the geographical factor of the peninsula of Byzantion was a condition that existed long before the habitation achieved great political importance. The area was "valorized" when the second factor, the daemonic personality, joined an imperial tradition to that peninsula in a creative act of political enormity. It was not merely a matter of moving capitals from one spot to another: The Romans had had capitalsat Rome, Milan, and Nicomedia and the Ottomans had had capitals at Bursa and Edirne. In fact, the nature of that peninsula as we saw was unique, unlike the preceding Roman and Ottoman capitals. Once the two founders transferred imperium to it and consummated this by the physical creation ofthe super-city, the preexisting potential of this peninsula was brought into being: it was "valorized." Constantine brought to Constantinople the Roman Empire, Christianity, and Greek culture; Mehmed brought Islam, the sultanate, and eventually there followed the caliphate as well. We are speaking then of the momentous drama of translatio imperii, a drama in two acts. We return to the concept of William Ramsay and the sanctity of a given geographical site. We are in the presence of the consecration of the most sacred political soil in the history of the Near East and Europe in the period from 324 to 1821.

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The rise of the two successive cosmopoleis on the Bosphorus entailed basically a nine-fold integration of the great political power which Constantine and Mehmed had amassed: imperialization, sanctification, mandarinization, literalization, militarization, demographization, thesaurization, monumentalization, sacralization.is Imperialization called for the final localization of the head, heart, and sensory nerve system of empire; it therefore entailed the specific centralization of power about the person of the ruler within the super-city. As mentioned earlier, imperialization of Constantinople-Istanbul presupposed the translatio imperii into the sacred palace. An essential and complementary process was that of the city's sanctification. In a sense, God and saints became not only the defenders of the imperial capital (and so their houses were generously built and lavishly endowed), but they also became residents of the city themselves. Tombs of martyrs, saints, seyhs, and divinized rulers came to be the most cherished possessions of, and central points around which revolved the life of the inhabitants of cosmopolis. This too, involved a translatio, a translatio of religious relics which, as a result of the flow of the centuries, rendered Constantinople and Istanbul a vast religious reliquary. The increasing density of religious objects, churches, mosques, and tombs covered cosmopolis with a richly layered sanctification. Imperium always rests more firmly and assuredly when it resides next to sanctity, Inasmuch as the cosmopolis constitutes the head and heart of a vast imperial provincial body it must, in order to centralize its power, have the necessary nerve system to articulate its vast body and to force it to move in consonance with the desires of the head. This was achieved by the imperial city's mandarinization, that is, the creation of a huge bureaucracy with its intricate network of bureaus, clientele, and memory system (archives) that transmitted the accumulated desires (laws) of successive imperial generations to the far-flung limbs of the imperial body, assuring regularity to the entire political and social process of imperium. Mandarinization, as also sanctification, brought with it Iiteratization, as both processes functioned, and could function only, through the written word The canons of imperialization and of sanctification had to be reduced to uniformity once and for all, so that mandarinization would have a stable basis. As the rulers created educational systems, there ensued a further translatio to the cosmopolis of learned men, a translatio of the written materials in which the various wisdoms of the ages were accumulated. Thus, literatization created schools and libraries.The super-city was accordingly the centralized focus ofscience and knowledge, just as it was ofsanctity. The imperialization of the peninsula of the Bosphorus necessitated its militarization, for imperial capitals with strongly centralized imperium are very vulnerable to seizure both from within and without. This gave rise to a militarization that is to be seen in what one would call the Maginot line mentality. The city's choice as imperial center was in part dictated by the advantages of its geographical location. Surrounded on three sides by the sea,

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Constantine and Theodosius II placed massive walls along the land side, along with lesser maritime walls, so that it remained throughout most of its history an impregnable fortress. Thus walls and sea were intended to protect the imperial city from seizure from the outside. It is fascinating to see that one of Mehmed's first orders to the first governor of the city, after he had battered the walls with artillery and captured Constantinople, was to rebuild the walls. But imperium was of such a delicate and coveted nature that it had to be protected from seizure from within the city itself; therefore the palace (both Byzantine and Ottoman) was also protected by walls. In both the Byzantine and Ottoman instances the palace was protected by extensive military contingents lodged within the palace confines. The imperium localized within the sacred space of the city walls enjoyed, further, the protection of a massive provincial structure which extensive hostile forces would have to dominate before capturing the heart, mind, and nervous system of the center. It was in this respect that Ibn Khaldun formulated his famous theory that empires decline first at the peripheries, and only after all else has fallen away does the focal point of imperium fall captive to the new conquerors. Such was the fate of Byzantine Constantinople, and the fate of Ottoman Istanbul was largely, though not completely, parallel. A cosmopolis of this type must also be a megalopolis. The ancient Greek preference for urban life is commemorated, but not always correctly understood, in Aristotle's famous dictum: Man is a "politikon zoon," (man is an urban animal). In a humanistic fashion, Byzantine authors from Libanius to Theodore Metochites explain that man's virtues reach the greatest development and refinement in great cities, and that they decline in villages and small towns where there is not sufficient reward and fame. Both these literati lived in super-cities: Antioch and Constantinople.I? Thus a city in which the divine emperor himself resided could be properly "valorized" only if its demography reached heroic proportions by the standards of that day. The capital, in which the imperium resided, had to be a super-city. Thus both Constantine and Mehmed took great care to effect a translauo populi that sought to bring not only large numbers of inhabitants for the capital, but one which would also bring the nobility, artisans, merchants, men of letters, holy men, and various ethnic groups. The super-city was to be not only a megalopolis, but it was to have (in addition to the nobles) the inhabitants who would feed the capital with specialized skills: bureaucrats, literati, priests, rnullas, seyhs, dervises. It was thus to be a microcosm of the imperial macrocosm. The similarities of the Greek and Ottoman super-city in this respect are striking. Perhaps the most attractive aspect of the cosmopolis was its ethnic and linguistic variety, most colorfully illustrated in the verse of the twelfth-century Constantinopolitan poet, who boasts that he can greet people on the streets of Constantinople in seven languages (in addition to Greek) and proceeds to do so in "Scythian," "Persian," "Latin," "Alan," "Arabic," "Russian:' and

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"Hebrew. "20 The citizens were grouped in smaller neighborhoods, usually about churches/mosques, within thirteen to fourteen larger urban regions.s! Constantinople and Istanbul were for extensive periods between the fourth and eighteenth centuries the largest urban agglomerate in Europe and the Near East.22 The irnperialization of Constantinople-Istanbul brought with it a high degree of thesaurization, the accumulation and centralization of the empire's economic wealth. The evolution of both Byzantine and Ottoman empires entailed, at crucial stages, the transformation of the eastern world from polycentric to monocentric political life, that is, from a region in which political, economic, and cultural life were focused in three or four super-cities (Antioch, Alexandria, Rome, Constantinople--Damascus, Cairo, Baghdad, Istanbul) to a region in which these activities were increasingly centered in one super-city. Just as imperialization, sanctification, and mandarinization brought in their train various "translationes," so thesaurization brought a centralization or concentration of wealth to the Bosphorus, a "translatio abundantiae"--taxes from population, crafts, commerce, agriculture, animal husbandry, the Egyptian grain shipments, and international trade from the east, west, north, and south. The megalopolis lived and attained its grandeur from the toil of the provinces. Perhaps the best illustration of the parasitic character of the cosmopolis is to take two imperial religious foundations: that of the monastic complex of Christ Pantocrator, founded by the emperor John II Comnenus (1118-1143) and his wife Irene in Constantinople, and that of the vakif of the Fatih complex founded by Mehmed II in Istanbul. The first of these two foundations (it was of course Christian, but was later converted first into a medrese and then into a mosque [as Zeyrek Kilise Cami] in the reign of Mehmed II) included the monastic church of Christ Pantocrator, the church of Theotokos Eleousa, the chapel of the Archangel Michael, dwellings for 89 monks, a xenodocheion, a five-chambered hospital with 64 beds, a medical school, a leprosarium, etc. The hospital, which had 63 medical personnel and 103 administrative personnel, also contained an outpatient clinic for citizens who wished to be examined or treated for minor ailments. The typikon does not give a complete account of all expenses, but it does give enough to illustrate the vast economic wealth on which the foundation was based. The expenditures on the hospital personnel and patients were 2,375 hyperpers, 216 new hyperpers, 17,917 kilograms of bread, 39,392 kilograms of wheat, 5,554 liters of wine, 1,110 liters of olive oil, 96,216 kilograms of wood for fuel. More significant, however, in terms of the economically parasitic character of the super-city, is the sou~ce of the revenues. Of the approximately 117 properties either given to the Pantocrator, (or from which they derived revenue) the vast majority were in the provinces: 24 villages and 25 proasteia, 2 fortresses, 1 pronoia, 9 episkepseis, 4 xenodotheia or hans, 1 salt work, 2 baths, etc.2J The Ottoman example, the Patih complex of Mehmed II, is even more

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impressive. It included the following institutions with a total of 496 personnel: The great mosque (95), an imaret (soup kitchen, 35), a hospital (30), and medreses (168). The complex fed 1,117 individuals daily (including 160 guests and 794 medrese students, among others). Thus we are in the presence of a huge economic enterprise affecting large numbers of people. But 83% of the annual income (500,000 aktes, or 30,000 gold ducats in 1490) came from its 57 villages in the Balkan districts of Corlu, Tekirdag, and Kirklar IIi. The remaining revenues came from the taxes of 12 hammams in Istanbul.> A corollary of the axiom that the super-city lived parasitically off the provinces is that the process of thesaurization was reversed as the cosmopolis declined and lost its provinces, so that wealth began to flow out of the city. The translatio imperii to Constantinople and Istanbul was thus accompanied by the processes of sanctification, mandarinization, literatization, militarization, demographization, and thesaurization. Such an evolution needed concretization and spiritualization; it needed form and order, morphe and taxis. The first of these two was acquired through monumentalization; the second was acquired through sacralization. Imperium was monumentalized first in the creation of the palace, sanctification in the erection of churches, mosques, monasteries, tekkes and shrines. Mandarinization was concretized in the palace, as well as in senate houses and municipal administrative buildings, whereas literatization appeared in the schools, medreses, and in the structures built to house the literary treasures which either made their way to the capital, or were committed to writing there. Militarization is most spectacularly reflected in the city's land walls, but also in the palace walls of Topkapi. Demographization and thesaurization are materialized in the great Byzantine fora and the Ottoman bazaars, in the public loutra and hammams, and finally, in the great public boulevard of the Mese-Divan Yolu. The latter, which retained the same location for centuries, led imperial processions and ordinary citizens along the major churches, mosques, and market places of the city to the great land walls and thence to the European provinces. These then are the elements common to the imperial iconography of Byzantine Constantinople and Ottoman Istanbul. For both societies, the sacralization of the super-city--the process or taxis by which the monuments of this land were infused with their sacred power-was consecrated by time-honored ceremonial. In the tenth century the Byzantine emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus warned his son that the ceremony must be observed: To neglect this eeremony, and to sentence it as it were to death, is to be left with a view of the empire devoid of ornament and deprived of beauty. If the body of a man were not gracefully formed, and its members were casually arranged and inharmoniously disposed one would say that the result was chaos and disorder. The same is true of the institution of empire; if it be not guided and governed by order, it will in no way differ from vulgar deportment in a private person. 25

Ceremonialization constitutes the mystical litany accompanying all basic

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relations of man to God, of man to man, and of man to nature that transpired within the formal confines of the super-city. First was the very act of succession of emperors and sultans whether achieved peacefully or violently, This ceremonial of the practical acquisition of power was consummated by the wearing of the crown or the girding of the sword, appropriate acclamation by soldiers, blessing of religious men. Above all, it was effected by entry into the palace and by sitting on the throne itself From that moment onward the movements and utterances, indeed, the entire life of the ruler were regulated by ceremony that transformed him divinely in the eyes of every member of society. The taxis or ordo of both city and palace was structured in consonance with this, the first concern of the trans/alia imperii. The sanctifying function of the religious institution was equally entrapped with rigidly ordered ceremonial, ceremonial which brought sacralization to the life of every individual, not only at all major rites of passage from birth to death, but also on special and specific occasions in the religious calendar as well as in daily life. God was thus brought into the daily life and actions of individuals and so into the entirety of the citizens' life. Religious ceremonies and processions infused churches and mosques with a sacred character obvious in such a phenomenon as the right of asylum and in the practice of incubation. It was in these same structures that the succession of emperors and sultans was sanctified and religious relics and imperial corpses sacralized. The Christian liturgy, above all, was believed to bring the Godhead, in the form of the Holy Spirit, into the physical structure of the church, where it transformed the wine and bread in such a manner that it enabled the communicant to partake of the Godhead physically in an act of sacred cannibalism. Yet bureaucracy, literature, military life; economy, even the popular life of the people and their amusements were transformed by processions and exercises that had a very specific liturgical character and united them to the imperial palace and to God. Literary compositions were themselves the vehicle of this liturgization, as were often the painted images of the holy. The imperial processions had as an integral part the formal participation of bureaucrats, holy men, literati, guildsmen, and other representatives of the populace. Of particular importance were the games of the hippodrome (with their own ritual), viewed both by the imperial family and the citizens from the stands. In some ways parallel to the hippodromic activities of Byzantines were the participations of the people through their guilds in Istanbul's great imperial a/ays called to memorialize the circumcisions of the sultanic offspring or other events, and which passed through the Ok Maydan (the former Byzantine hippodrome). At a lower social level, there were the "expeditions" or outings to the public baths. Initiation to trade corporations, as indeed the rebellions of corporative and other bodies, all had their own ceremonial. Thus the form and order of the super-city's life were two inseparable parts of its imperial iconography without either of which the other would have no meaning or existence. The supreme character of this imperial city was reflect-

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ed both in the Greek and in the Ottoman epithets applied to it. The Greek authors most often refer to it as The Queen of Cities, The Ruling City, the Second Rome, the New Rome, The City Guarded by God, Eye and Heart of the World, or Fortune of the Christians; most conunonly, however, it was simply called The City.26 The Ottomans used two names derived from Greek usage, Kustantiniyya and Stambul. Occasionally the Ottomans called it New Rome, but they more often referred to it as Paytakht-i Saltanat, Dar al-Khalifa (capital city of the sultanate, Domain of the Caliph), Madinat al-Muwahhidin (City of the Believers in the Unity of God), lslambol (Full of Islam), AIMahrusa (The Well-Protected), or simply Sehir (The City),27 The foundation of Constantinople (limitatio, 324) and its consecration on 11 May 330, were so momentous that Constantine ordered the astrologer Valens to cast the horoscope of the city's fate, and thereafter set 11 May, as the date for the annual celebration of the city's birthday. Later tradition attributed much to Constantine that was actually affected by his successors; in effect, the period 326-565 represents the period of fundamental formation of the super-city. The fully evolved monumental aspect of the city reflects its imperialization, for (as Dagron has remarked) Constantinople had its institutions before its inhabitants, and its walls and palace before its houses. This is to say, it was conceived of as a plan, a scheme to be implemented Its buildings did not result from prior growth and accretion of population: It was a true foundation. 28 Constantine built the original kernel of what was to become, over the centuries, a vast palace complex covering over 100,000 square meters.s? In his reign it was a more modest, tripartite complex consisting of the famed Chalce (a high ceremonial entrance with various halls), the Scholae (a group of buildings in which were housed the imperial troops of the slholarii, landidati,· and excubitores), and the complex of the emperor's household, the palace of Daphne. Under Justinian I, Theopohilus, Basil I, and the tenth century emperors the palace was vastly expanded to accommodate increasingly all aspects of imperial court ritual and government. Justinian rebuilt the Chalce with eight arches and a central dome. The upper parts of the walls depicted the victorious wars of the emperor in mosaic, whereas the lower portions were ornamented in brilliant marbles. Above the great bronze gate of the Chalce (prior to Iconoclasm), was the mosaic image of Christ, later replaced by a painted image. janin has described the Chalce as a "veritable" museum. 30 It contained imperial statues, with appropriate verses composed for the occasion by the philosopher Secundus, as well as a statue Of Belisarius, the military architect of Justinian's glorious reconquista, In the dome were four sculpted Gorgons taken from the temple of Ephesian Artemis, and above them two bronze horses from the same city. Most striking in the monumentalization of imperial power were the Chrysotriclinos and the Magnaura sections of the great palace. The former, built and decorated in the reigns of Justin II (565-578) and Tiberius (578-

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582), was a large octagonal chamber with 16 windows that brought rays of light into the center of the room in a dazzling manner. The imperial throne was set in the apse of the chamber, the half dome of which was decorated with a mosaic representation of the enthroned Christ. The symbolism of throne, mosaics, and light combined the concepts of earthly and heavenly imperium, and when brought to life in the imperial ceremony performed in the Chrysotriclinos to the accompaniment of music from the golden organs and the mechanical tree with its singing metallic birds, the participants, both emperor and beholder, were transformed. The Magnaura-a magnificent hall intended primarily for the reception of foreign ambassadors by the emperor seated on the Throne of Solomon--has been described by the tenth century Latin ambassador, Liudprand ofCremona. Before the emperor's seat stood a tree, made of bronze gilded over, whose branches were filled with birds, also made of gilded bronze, which uttered different cries, each according to its varying species. The throne itself was so marvellously fashioned that at one moment it seemed a low structure, and at another it rose high into the air. It was of immense size and guarded by lions, made either of bronze or of wood covered over with gold, who beat the ground with their tails and gave a dreadful roar with open mouth and quivering tongue. Leaning upon the shoulders of two eunuchs I was brought into the emperor's presence. At my approach the lions began to roar and the birds to cry out, each according to its kind; but I was neither terrified nor surprised, for I had previously made enquiry about all these things from people who were well acquainted with them. So after I had three times made obeissance to the emperor with my face upon the ground, I lifted my head, and behold! the man who just before I had seen sitting on a moderately elevated seat had now changed his raiment and was sitting on the level of the ceiling. How it was done I could not imagine, unless perhaps he was lifted up by some such sort of device as we use for raising the timbers of a wine press. On that occasion he did not address me personally, since even if he had wished to do so the wide distance between us would have rendered conversation unseemly, but by intermediary of a secretary he enquired about Berengar's doings and asked after his health. I made a fitting reply and then, at a nod from the interpreter, left his presence and retired to my lodging.31

The palace in its fully developed form led out, through the Chalce, to the Augusteum, the Hagia Sophia, the Senaton, the Library, the Forum of Constantine, the Hippodrome, and the ports on the Sea of Marmara. It was, accordingly, centrally placed as regards the constitutive forms and ceremonies of the imperial city.32 Directly in front of the Chalce to the east was the square of the Augusteum, surrounded by porticoes on all four of its sides and graced by five heroic 'imperial statues atop columns: St. Helen, Constantine with his three sons and two nephews, Leo I Eudocia, and TheodosiusJustinian I. This latter is the most famous, best-described of the city's statues, and survived until the late fifteenth century when the Turks melted it down for the casting of cannons. Procopius gives us the earliest detailed description of this work: And on the summit of the column stands a gigantic bronze horse, facing toward the east, a very noteworthy sight. He seems about to advance, and to be splendidly press-

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ing forward. Indeed he holds his left fore foot in the air, as though it were about to take a forward step on the ground before him, while the other is pressed down upon the stone on which he stands, as if ready to take the next step; his hind feet he holds close together. so that they may be ready whenever he decides to move. Upon this horse is mounted a colossal bronze figure of the Emperor. And the figure is habited like Achilles, that is, the costume he wears is known by that name. He wears halfboots and his legs are not covered by greaves. Also he wears a breastplate in the heroic fashion, and a helmet covers his head and gives the impression that it moves up and down, and a dazzling light flashes forth from it. One might say, in poetic speech. that here is that star of Autumn. And he looks toward the rising sun, directing his course, I suppose. against the Persians. And in his left hand he holds a globe, by which the sculptor signifies that the whole earth and sea are subject to him, yet he has neither sword nor spear nor any other weapons,but a cross stands upon the globe which he carries. the emblem by which alone he has obtained both his Empire and his victory in war. And stretching forth his right hand toward the rising sun and spreading out his fingers, he commands the barbarians in that quarter to remain at home and to advance no further. 33

Immediately to the east of the Augusteum were the patriarchal residence and library, and the great church of the Hagia Sophia flanked by St. Irene to the east. To the south of the Augusteum was one of the two senate buildings, ornamented by statues including those of Zeus of Dodona, Artemis, and Aphrodite. and where the senators met to celebrate the New Year.34 To the north of the Augusteum and Milion was the Basilike which housed the famous statue of Tyche, various educational institutions (including the socalled University of Constantinople). and which was graced by various statues. Of central importance was the Bibliotheke or Library which. according to one source. when it was attacked by fire in 475 contained 120.000 manuscripts. Rebuilt by Justin II, by the eighth century (26) it was said to have housed 36,500 works when it was once more exposed to fire.35 In the immediate vicinity of the palace and the hippodrome were the famed baths of Zeuxippos which Constantine remodeled and then graced with a large number of statues that he had gathered from pagan sites in Asia Minor. Greece, and Italy. and which the sixth-century poet Christodorus has described 75.36 Both the public baths and the spectacular hippodrome were essential to the existence of the Constantinopolitans and figured greatly in their consecrated cycle of daily life. Here emperors, aristocracy, and the citizens of the cosmopolis gathered to witness and participate in games, spectacles and shows. Because the hippodrome was located between the palace and the great central boulevard (the Mese), the imperial retinue had direct access to the kathisma from the palace, whereas the citizens occupied the 30 to 40 rows which surrounded the hippodrome on its three sides. Constantine embellished this Severan construction by bringing here too large numbers of ancient statues. By the fifth century the spina contained an Egyptian obelisk. the serpentine bronze column from Delphi commemorating the Greek victory over the Persians at the battle of Platea, and other adornments. The colonnaded sphendone, or curve of the hippodrome, had among the more famous

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statues those of Castor and Pollux, Hercules, the Chalcydonian boar, Athena, Scylla and Charybdis, and the four bronze horses later taken to Venice and placed on the cathedral of St. Mark.J7 Just to the north of the Augusteum and west of the Hagia Sophia was the Milion, the point of departure of the Mese which led through the fora to the great land walls and finally to the European provinces.P The Milion was marked by the dome of a great triumphal arch resting on four lesser arches. Imperium was symbolized by the statuary groups of Helen and Constantine holding the cross atop the dome, and the statue of the Tyche of Constantinople. Below were statues of Sophia, wife ofJustin II, her daughter, her niece, and equestrian statues of Trajan and Theodosius 11.39 The great ceremonial boulevard then led to five splendid fora that opened up as the Mese progressed westward toward the land walls. The first was the forum of Constantine.w a circular colonnaded complex to the northwest of the hippodrome which was dominated by the porphyry column of the city's founder. The column was fifty meters in height and crowned with the statue of Constantine as Helios with a globus crucifix in the left hand and a lance or scepter in the right. According to a later source, there had been placed under the base of the column wood from the true cross, saints' relics, the basket which had been used in the miracle of the loaves, the crosses of the two robbers, the vase ofperfume, and the pagan Palladium brought from Rome. The column, the statue, and the sacred objects allegedly placed underneath constitute a sanctification of Constantine's imperium. The next market place, the massive Forum Tauri, was also dominated by a tall column atop of which was the statue of Theodosius I set there in 386; relief; on the sides of the column commemorate his victories over the barbarians. Among the numerous statues gracing this forum were the four Gorgons from the temple of Ephesian Artemis. There followed the Forum Amastrianum and then the Forum Bovis in the present day district of Aksaray. In the latter one saw again the statues of Constantine and Helen. The last great agora to the west was in the district of Xerolophos, the Forum of Arcadius (Avret Pazar), and it was dominated by a tall column carrying the statue of Arcadius. As with the other fora, this too was surrounded by colonnaded porticoes and was lavishly decorated with an assortment of statues. The Mese continued its course to the walls which it transected at the Golden Gate, the triumphal portal through which Emperors entered and exited from the city. The Mese and the fora served imperial ceremonies in which the imperium resident in the city was celebrated and in which emperor, officials,soldiers, guildsmen, and the populace all played their clearly defined roles. The shops of merchants and craftsmen were established along this road and about the fora, the guild of the perfumers being assigned to the area of the Chalce so that the aroma of their goods would be wafted upward to the quarters of the palace, and that of the tanners being banished, because of the offensive odium, to a district outside the city's walls. The role and history of the church of the Hagia Sophia in the city's imperi-

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al iconography are obviously of great importance. They were central to imperialization and sanctification, and so the palace, the patriarchal residence, the hippodrome, and the buildings were in immediate proximity to the church, and the central Constantinopolitan boulevard, the Mese, began nearby. It remains for us to say a word about a church that was second in importance only to Hagia Sophia, the church of the Holy Apostles. It would seem that the church was begun by Constantine, finished by his son Constantius II and completely rebuilt by Justinian I, the first consecration having been consummated in 356. The church came to serve as the semi-official mausoleum of emperors into the eleventh century and so was intimately associated with the imperial cult. Most revealing as to its role in sacralizing imperial authority is the account which Constantine's biographer, Eusebius, gives of its erection by Constantine: He also erected his own sepulchral monumentin this church. All these edifices the emperor consecrated with the desire of perpetuating the memory of the apostles of our Saviour. He had, however, another object in erecting this building: an object at first unknown. but which afterwards became evident to all. He had in fact made choice of this spot in the prospect of his own death, anticipating with extraordinary fervor of faith that his body would share their tide with the apostles "themselves, and that he should thus even after death become the subject. with them, of the devotions which should be performed to their honor in this place. He accordingly caused twelve coffins to be set up in this church. like sacred pillars in honor and memory of the apostolic number, in the center of which his own was placed, having six of theirs on either side of it. Thus, as I said, he had provided with ardent foresight an honorable resting place for his body after death, and, having long before secretly formed this resolution, he now consecrated this church to the apostles believing that this tribute to their memory would be of no small advantage to his own soul. Nor did God disappoint him of that which he so ardently expected and desired. For after he had completed the first services of the feast of Easter, and had passed this sacred day of our Lord in a manner which made it an occasion ofjoy and gladness to himself and to all; the God through whose aid he performed all these acts, and whose zealous servant he continued to be even to the end of life, was pleased at a happy time to translate him to a better life.41

Constantine had assumed the epithet isaposiolos (equal to the Apostles) and had associated himself with the cult of the Apostles as the thirteenth Apostle, and superior to them as is evidenced by his burial in the mausoleum-church. In 356 the relics of the Apostle Timothy were brought from Ephesus and deposited in the church of the Holy Apostles, and in 357 relics of the Apostles Luke and Andrew followed. Thus Constantine's power was sacralized by his association with the Apostles, and the sanctification of the city was intensified by the physical presence of three of the Apostles rhemselves.ss Such, in brief, is the monumentalized form of the imperial iconography of Byzantine Constantinople: Palace, churches, hippodrome, libraries and schools, fora and shops, walls, harbors, and water system. The ceremonial, to which allusion was briefly made, mystically transformed the structures and infused them with their meaning and role in the imperial iconography:

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Graeco-Roman imperium, Christian eschatology, and Greek paideia. The Ottoman conquest of the city on 29 May 1453 was a momentous historical act its conqueror perpetrated at the same time an act of destruction and an act of recreation. The three day sack of the city left it an uninhabited shambles in which was heard neither beast nor fowl, only the cries of the dying were audible. Those Constantinopolitans who survived the frightful slaughter, some 60,000, were taken outside the city to the tents of the Ottoman anny as slaves of the Ottoman soldiery.P Mehmed had allowed his troops a three-day period of intensive pillage (yagma) claiming for himself the walls and the buildings only. But in this respect he established his claims on the physical structure of Constantinople from the first moment that he entered the conquered and desolate city: Descending [Mehmed] to the Great Church and having dismounted from his horse he entered and was overcome by the sight [of the church of the Hagia Sophia]. Coming upon one of the Turks, who was smashing one of those marble slabs, he asked the Turk for what reason he was destroying the floor. The latter replied, "On behalf of the Faith [Islam]." He [the sultan] stretching out his arm struck the Turk with the sword saying this: "The treasure and enslavement suffice for you [plural]. The buildings of the city belong to me." The tyrant had repented over the agreement [to allow the soldiers to sack the city], witnessing [now] the treasures taken away and the mass enslavement. Having dragged the Turk by his legs, they threw him outside half dead. The sultan summoned one of their polluted priests and he, having been summoned, ascended the pulpit and called out their accursed prayer. And this son of lawlessness, the forerunner of Antichrist, having ascended the holy altar performed his prayer. 44

Clearly the sultan was willing to part with the treasures and inhabitants of the imperial city, and to allow them to be taken by his soldiers. The buildings and the walls, however, were his and he would not tolerate their alienation, or as in this case, their destruction. The first monument which Mehmed then claimed was the great church of Hagia Sophia, the pivotal center of imperial sanctification in Byzantine times. Shortly after dispatching the vandalizing Turkish soldier, he performed there his first official act in the city: the Muslim prayer. By that very act he Islamized the most famous church in Christendom, where countless Byzantine emperors had been consecrated and crowned, and made of it the central mosque of the City.45 Before departing for Edime, he ordered the military governor of the city to repair the great walls, to build a new citadel there (Yedi Kule), and to create for the sultan a palace north of the Forum Tauri (Eski Saray). Thus he planned immediately for the essential monumentalization of the new translatio imperii: Palace (residence of imperium), mosque of Aya Sofya (residence of sanctity), and the walls both delimiting and defending the imperium of Istanbul. On a return trip to Istanbul in the autumn of 1455, he found all three major works completed; by 1457 he had his officials draw up the document establishing the vakif(religious economic foundation) of Aya Sofya.46

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In 1459 Mehmed seems to have taken a crucial decision in the rebuilding of the imperial capital and at that time he revealed his plans: Command oj the Sultan to all able persons, to build splendid and costly buildings inside the City. Then he called together all the wealthy and most able persons into his presence, those who enjoyed great wealth and prosperity, and ordered them to build grand houses in the City, wherever each chose to build. He also commanded them to build baths and inns and marketplaces, and very many and very beautiful workshops, to erect places of worship, and to adorn and embellish the City with many other such buildings, sparing no expense, as each man had the means and the ability.f?

Having previously secured the walls, converted Aya Sofya into a (ami, built the citadel of Yedi Kule, and begun the bedestan in 1456, the sultan now ordered the powerful and the wealthy to undertake the building of the nahiyes (large urban units that were self-contained) in various parts of the city. His summons to the powerful and wealthy to take an active role in the building of the city recalls Constantine's summons of the Roman nobility to the newly founded Constantinople. The nahiye centered about a large mosque and a large market area and contained many smaller neighborhoods (mahalles) each usually centered about a smaller mosque. The sultan set the example for the high officials by undertaking to build both the mosque complex of FatihSultan Pazar and the new palace on the easternmost acropolis of the city: The Sultan himself selected the best site in the middle of the City, and commanded them to erect there a mosque which in height, beauty, and size should vie with the largest and finest of the temples already existing there. He bade them select and prepare materials for this, the very best marbles and other costly polished stones as well as an abundance of columns of suitable size and beauty plus iron, copper and lead in a large quantities, and every other needed material. He also gave orders for the erection of a palace on the point of old Byzantium which stretches out into the sea-a palace that should outshine all and be more marvelous than the preceding palaces in looks, size, cost, and gracefulness. Furthermore he ordered them to construct many very fine arsenals to shelter the ships and their furnishings, and to build very strong, large buildings for the storing of arms, cannon, and other such supplies. He also ordered many other similar things to be done to beautify the City and to be useful to the public as well as to be necessary and valuable in his wars and fighting. And in order that all this should be done speedily, he set over the work his most experienced and energetic commanders. Now it was his plan to make the City in every way the best supplied and strongest city, as it used to be long ago, in power and wealth, glory, learning, and trades, and in all the professions and all sorts of good things, as well as in public and private buildings and monuments. 48

The Fatih mosque complex, which was begun in 1463 and finished in 1471, contained a mosque, 16 medresses, a hospice, a han, a hospital, a children's school, a book store, and accommodations for the personnel of the medreses. We have already seen what were its incomes and expenses.s? Nearby, and providing revenues for the Fatih complex, were the Sultan Pazan, the Sarradjhane, and a bath. In this matter the whole of Istanbul, that is the part

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within the walls, was built up so that by the reign of Suleyman I it had 13 nahiyes and 219 mahalles. 50 Of these mahalles, 30% came into being during the reign of Mehmed II; 192 cami and mascid were also erected during his rule. 51 He also, significantly, removed the palace from the region north of the Forum Tauri to the Acropolis on the eastern tip of the peninsula, thus withdrawing the imperial residence from immediate contact with the city's daily life. The new imperial city was fundamentally monumentalized under Mehmed, but there were yet further extensions and developments, particularly- in the reigns of Bayezid II, Selim I, and Suleyrnan I. Very much as in the reigns of Constantine's successors, so in the sultanates of Mehmed's successors the city was further and greatly developed. Bayezid II, Selim I, and Suleyman I each built vast kiilliyat, or mosque complexes, with schools, libraries, hospitals, hospices, imarets, and tiirbes attached to the mosques so that they constituted important urban centers for the life of Ottoman Istanbul. Their endowments bestowed upon them rich incomes with which the kiilliyats were able not only to maintain their large administrative and service staffs, but also to provide education, medical care, charity, and other social services. 52 The spread of the sultanic foundations over the city, as the spread of the great Byzantine fora, indicated not only the city's expansion, but the complexes came to constitute a characteristic feature of the imperial iconography of Istanbul. It is of interest to note that each sultan was buried in the tiiroe within his own kiilliyat, whereas many of the Byzantine emperors were buried in one church, that of the Holy Apostles. But mosques and churches both frequently attended to the schools, hospitals, kitchens, hospices, and shops for the populace. At the Same time the palace built by Mehmed, which came to be known as Topkapi, and thebedestan were subsequently greatly expanded.53 The imperial iconography had elements of continuity as well as of change. The most pronounced change was in the location of the palace, henceforth much more secluded from the populace than it had been in early- and middle-Byzantine times when the Great Palace had been located next to the hippodrome, the public baths, Hagia Sophia, the public library, and the central boulevard with its groups of business establishments. 54 There was a slight displacement westward of the economic center, but otherwise there was a basic continuity in the monumental imperial iconography. The center of religious sanctity remained not only in the same geographical location, but in the very same building, Aya Sofya, which became the central mosque of both the city and the empire. The ceremonial boulevard, the Divan Yolu, was largely the Same as the Byzantine Mese, and the economic life centered about this boulevard and on the shores of the Golden Hom continued in the same sites with a similar rhythm. Regal sanctity remained rooted to a certain degree in the Same spot where Constantine and many of his successors had been buried: on the hill of the church of the Holy Apostles. It is surely significant that after Mehmed had given the church of the Holy Apostles to Gennadius as the new patriarchical residence that in 1461 Gennadius was forced to abandon it. In

32 Speros Vryonis, Jr. 1463 the dynastic church of the Holy Apostles was completely destroyed (no remains whatever have been found or identified) and replaced by the Fatih complex where the new conqueror and refounder of Constantinople-Istanbul was buried in his tarbe. Mehmed, and his successors too, by the same processes of imperialization, sanctification, mandarinization, literatization, militarization, dernographization, thesaurization, monurnentalization, and sacralization, had once more monwnentalized and sacralized imperium in the old familiar confines of the Golden Hom, the Bosphorus, the Marmara, and the land walls. Though Mehmed assured the continuity of imperial tradition in the peninsula of Byzantion, when we consider the matter historically rather than iconographically, it was a different historical tradition. How did Mehmed and his successors view the Byzantine tradition of imperiwn and what did he do with it? The fate of three Byzantine monuments will serve as a symptomatic guide to this area of research. He preserved and renewed (and left them in their original function) the great land walls much as they had been. He transformed Hagia Sophia from the imperial church to the imperial mosque. He destroyed the dynastic mausoleum of the Holy Apostles and replaced it with his own mosque-tomb. This question once more brings us to the complex and multi-faceted personalities of Constantine and Mehmed, both of whom sat astride two different and changing worlds. As rulers who appeared at turning points in the history of the Mediterranean world, both Constantine and Mehmed played crucial roles in dramatic changes. As primary actors in the drama of historical evolution they stood astride two different worlds: Constantine straddled the late ancient pagan and the early Christian worlds; Mehmed presided over the worlds of declining Byzantium and rising Islam, and so by their actions in creating the super-city they displayed certain attitudes toward the cultures of the outgoing or declining worlds. Dagron has pointed to the inherent contradiction in Constantine's official monuments. Atop the great arch of the Milion, Constantine erected a statuary group depicting himself, Helen, the cross, and the Tyche of the city.55 Atop the great porphyry colwnn in his own forum, Constantine was represented in a statue as Helios-Apollo, the sun god. 56 Yet he was buried in the sanctuary of the Holy Apostles, his casket placed in the midst of 12 apostolic cenotaphs. Perhaps the most striking of all these cultural contradictions is the fact that he built Christian churches and yet decorated his new city with the best of pagan sculpture to be found in the empire. Among the works of art i"n his own forum there were 12 sirens on top ofporphyry columns with wild animals, as well as a statue group in which Paris is presenting the apple to Aphrodite. Mention has already been made of the adornment of the hippodrome's sphendone with pagan statuary. But the most detailed evidence for Constantine's fascination with pagan sculpture is the sixth-century ecphrastic poem of Christodorus that describes many of the statues for the great baths of Zeuxippos. Though the statues perished in the

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great conflagration of 532 that consumed the magnificent baths, Christodorus has provided us with an eye-witness account (somewhat stylized) of these statues. He describes seventeen deities and mythological figures, 26 statues representing 24 personalities from the two Homeric poems, 14 poets and tragedians, seven scientists and philosophers, three historians (Thucydides, Herodotus, Xenophon), three orators, five statesmen, and one wrestler. It is interesting to note and to underline that the preponderance of the statues represents pagan Greek gods and heroes (46), 27 pagan authors, whereas there are only five statesmen. Obviously the world of official urban leisure was pagan and Greek, at least within the confines of the public baths.57 Statues remained, for centuries, an important part of the city's iconography,58 and especially the monumental columns on which the imperial statues were mounted. By the time that the tenth-century poet Constantine the Rhodian composed his ecphrasis on the church of the Holy Apostles and on the seven wonders of the city, many of the statues had disappeared, but others were still standing and these, along with the tall columns, remained noteworthy landmarks of the city.59 Though much of the statuary had been destroyed by previous fires (especially the statues of the Baths of Zeuxippos) there was still enough statuary in the fora and the hippodrome so that along with these great columns they gave a definite quality to the city's iconography. The destruction of perhaps the majority of the remaining statues by the Fourth Crusaders beginning in 1204 changed this aspect of the city drastically and forever. When the Latins came, the Byzantine imperial apparatus-rulers, bureaucrats, and clergy-abandoned the city. The Latins, short of money, took a large number of statues off to the foundries where they were melted down, allegedly, for coin. The moving description of this barbarous act is preserved in a text attributed to the historian Nicetas Choniates; it offers us a striking contrast in the views that the Crusaders and a learned Byzantine had of classical statuary. He mentions that they sought out some of the statues which had stoicheia inimical to them and destroyed them as well, but the majority seem to have been melted down for economic reasons.60 Having opened the tombs of the emperors, as many as were in the shrine which is built around the church of Christ's Apostles, they plundered all night and utterly, lawlessly stole whatever golden ornaments, or pearls, or clear and imperishable valuable stones still remained in them. And having found the corpse of the emperor Justinian unravaged by the centuries-long years, they marvelled at the sight, but they did not restrain themselves from the graveyards. Those of the western races spared neither the dead nor those yet living.... A little later they pulled down the icon screen of the Greatest Church being reckoned in many tens of thousands of minas of silver, and of the purest silver, thickly covered with gold. And since they lacked money (there is no satiety of wealth when the barbarian people are desirous) they looked covetously on the bronze statues and delivered them to the fire. 61

The author of this interesting text allows us to understand that up to its

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destruction the pagan statuary of the city was still considered to be an essential element in the city's iconography, culturally and aesthetically. 62 When the Byzantines retook the city in 1261, it would seem that little of the statuary remained. One statue which survived was the equestrian monument of Justinian in the Augusteum, one of the seven wonders of Constantinople. But by the first half of the fifteenth century the statues had largely vanished from the Constantinopolitan landscape and thus this aspect of the city's imperial iconography was altered. Although Nicetas Choniates (if he is the real author of the text on the destruction of the statues) felt no ambiguity as to this pagan element in the city's imperial iconography, in the tenth century Constantine the Rhodian had been torn between the wonder of the statues and the hatred which he felt for Graeco-Roman paganism.O Of interest in regard to the statues are the remarks of Manuel Chrysoloras in his letter written from Old Rome to the emperor John VIII Palaeologus in which he compares the marvels and wonders of the Old and New Romes. In this comparison Chrysoloras asserts that the New Rome was not inferior to the old as to the number and quality ofstatues: 64 That there .were also very many other such statues in the city is proven by their bases which are still visible and the epigrams [inscribed] on them. Of these many were [to be found] in other places. and very many [most] were in the hippodrome. I myself saw many others formerly which I know now to have been taken away.65

Though there were still some statues to be seen, his argument as to their formerly great number and presence is drawn from the numerous statue bases and inscriptions that were still to be seen around the city in his day. In fact most of the statues, he implies, have disappeared, and the process of their disappearance is still going on in his lifetime:66 "And I have heard that there are many other such [statues] which I myself have not seen, in hidden places. "67 Chrysoloras then proceeds to explain to the emperor why there are no longer many statues left in the city: The reason that it [Constantinople] did not have more of them [statues] was that that city came into being then when they were neglected here [Rome] also, because of religion [there being an] avoidance. I believe, of the similarity of statues and idols. How could they [in Constantinople] continue to create what had formerly been removed here [in Rome]? They discovered and created other things: panels {pi"akes}, icons, and paintings. that is. I say, of mosaics. which is a most brilliant and permanent art. 68

Thus the statues, because of their easy association with past idolatry, were not continued, but were replaced by paintings and mosaics. Chrysoloras is writing at a time then the statues had largely disappeared and Byzantines had become disaccustomed to the daily sight and presence of the splendors of the ancient art ofsculpture. When the Turks finally took the city, the most spectacular of the statues, the equestrian figure ofJustinian in the Augusteurn, was one of the few statues that had survived. The classical portion of the imperial iconography of Constantinople had largely disappeared. The Ottoman Turks, because of reli-

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gious proscriptions and unfamiliarity with classicalart had no interest in statuary in the new imperial iconography of Istanbul.s? The fate of Justinian's colossal equestrian statue, as indeed of the pillar on which it stood, nicely illustrates this. We are informed of the statue's short and final history in Ottoman hands by the sixteenth-century observer Pierre Gylles, one of the last individuals to see the famous statue before its destruction: The Palace is entirely in Ruines, yet I collect from the Pedestal of a Pillar of Justinian lately standing, but now removed by the Turks, which Procopius says was built by Justinian in the Augusteum, and Zonaras in the Court before the Church of Sophia, that the Augusteum stood where there is now a Fountain, at the West End of the Church of the Hagia Sophia ...On the Top ...was set a large Horse in Brass, facing the East, which indeed afforded a noble Prospect. He seemed to be in a marching Posture, and struggling for Speed. His near Foot before was curvated, as though he would paw the Ground: his off Foot was fixed to the Pedestal, and his hind Feet were so contracted, as though he was prepared to be gone. Upon the horse was placed the Statue of the Emperor. 'Twas made of Brass, large like a Colossus, dress'd in a warlike Habit like Achilles, with Sandals oil his Feet, and armed with a Coat of Mail, and a shining Helmet. He looked Eastward, and seemed to be marching against the Persians. In his left Hand he bore a Globe, devised to signify his universal Power over the whole World. On the Top of it was fixed a Cross, to which he attributed all his Successes in War, and his Accession to the Imperial Dignity. His right Hand was stretched to the East, and by pointing with his Fingers, he seemed to forbid the barbarous Nations to approach Nearer, but to stand off at their Peril. Tzetses, in his Various History, describes what kind of Helmet he had upon his Head. The Persians. says he, generally wore a Turbant upon the Head...They are, says he, of the same Shape with that, with whi~h the Statue of Justinian, erected upon a large Pillar, is crowned...Zonaras writes, that Justinian, in the seventeenth Year of his Reign, set up this Pillar, in the same Place, where formerly had stood another Pillar of Theodosius the Great, bearing his Statue in Silver, made at the Expense of his Son Arcadius, which weighed from seven Thousand four Hundred Pounds. When Justinian had demolished the Statue and the Pillar, he stripped it of a vast Quantity of Lead, of which he made Pipes for Aqueducts, which brought the Water into the City. This ill Treatment of Theodosius by Justinian, was revenged upon him by the Barbarians; for they used his Pillar in the same Manner, and stripped it of the Statue, the Horse, and the Brass wherewith it was covered, so that it was only a bare Column for some Years. About Thirty Years ago the whole Shaft was taken down to the Pedestal, and that, about a Year since, was demolished down to the Basis, from whence I observed a Spring to spout up with Pipes, into a large Cistern. At present there stands in the same Place a Water-house, and the Pipes are enlarged. I lately saw the Equestrian Statue of Justinian. erected upon the Pillar which stood here, and which had been preserved a long Time in the Imperial Precinct, carried into the melting Houses, where they cast their Ordnance. Among the Fragments were the Leg ofJustinian. which exceeded my Height, and his Nose. which was above nine Inches long. I dared not publickly measure the horse's Legs, as they lay upon the Ground, but privately measured one of the Hoofs, and found it to be nine Inches in Height.70

Though the original attitude of Constantine the Great and of his immediate successors had led to the massive adoption of a major pagan element in the Constantinopolitan imperial iconography, that is to say statuary, the internal

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development of Byzantine civilization led to its demise. As Manuel Chrysoloras had written, while resident in Rome, the Christians gradually abandoned the sculptor's craft because of religious prohibitions and when the Turks took the city what little of this impressive sculpture had survived soon disappeared In the realm of'Iiteratization, however, the course of development was radically different. Imperialization, sanctification, and bureaucratization had as their "literate" monuments schools and education, libraries and literature, and thus the craft of teaching and writing, unlike that of sculpture, was in constant and uninterrupted demand and was constantly renewed. There are gaps in the long history of schools and libraries in Constantinople, but it is fairly certain that there was never a complete break between Byzantine and ancient pagan schools-education. Religion did not question the basis of late ancient education, rather it accepted it. And inasmuch as the ancient Greek texts remained the basis of education the state, rulers, and very often the church concerned themselves with continuing a form of ancient education---schools, libraries and the reproduction of manuscripts. Constantine's son Constantius II, ordered the new edition of the ancient Greek texts in Constantinople: Plato, Aristotle, Demosthenes, Isocrates, Thucydides and the others, and he constructed an important library to house the texts of the ancient Greek authors. Julian passed a law increasing the technical and library staff to care for these texts. Theodosius II established a higher school in Constantinople, the socalled University of Constantinople, and by 475-6 we are informed that when fire broke out in the Chalkoprateia, the great imperial library included 120,000 manuscripts. Almost three centuries later we are told that it still counted 36,500 manuscripts, when it was again threatened by fire.71 Though the information on libraries and manuscripts remains scant for the immediately succeeding periods there is no doubt that in the later period and down to the Turkish conquest itself the state and the church continued to care for libraries, manuscripts, education and schools. The westerner Pero Tafur remarked that he saw a number of ancient authors in the library of the imperial palace when he visited Constantinople in 1437, whereas a chance remark of Constantine Lascaris (a young man at the time of the fall of Constantinople) reveals that he saw the entire work of the ancient historian Diodorus Siculus in the imperial palace.72 Thus the imperial iconography which eventually rejected pagan statuary from its organism, readily assimilated and further developed pagan literatization via schools, an educational system based on the ancient texts, and libraries. A study of the city'S Byzantine monasteries reveals that at least eleven possessed libraries in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, but inasmuch as the record is very incomplete, the number must have been considerably higher and among their manuscripts undoubtedly they possessed a significant number of pagan Greek works. 73 Many of the larger and more important churches and the patriarchate as well undoubtedly possessed libraries.Zt

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When Mehmed created an Ottoman Imperial iconography in his new capital, what was his attitude to the Greek-Christian literatization which he found before him? In the new Ottoman imperial iconography, as we saw, the geographic site remained the same. Primary sanctification was monumentalized in the same structure where it had resided under the Byzantine emperors, and on the other hand the first sultanic mausolewn in Ottoman Istanbul was on the site of the burial church of the Byzantine emperors. By and large bureaucratization and literatization followed the traditional Islamic patterns that the Ottomans had adopted earlier in their rise to empire. But the reign of Mehmed, as well as his personality, indicate that in the realms of bureaucratization and literatization the sultan led a double life. Though as a sultan he Islamized the overall bureaucratization and literatization of Istanbul's imperial iconography, personally he seems to have been interested and indeed fascinated by the Greek literary remains and traditions, and he was also aware of Byzantine bureaucrats. Indeed the system of slave officials and troops exposed him to Byzantine practices within the palace milieu. 75 What happened to the books and libraries of the Byzantines at the time of the conquest? The historian Ducas, whose detailed narrative is based on eyewitness accounts, describes a savage pillaging of the Byzantine capital which included a large scale looting of the libraries as well. Mter three days, after the capture [of Constantinople] he released the ships so that each could go off to its own provinces, bearing a load so as to sink. And what sort of load? Luxurious garments, silver, gold, copper, tin vessels, countless books, prisoners...All [the ships] were fully loaded and the tents of the anny were full of captives and of all types of goods enumerated above ...Having loaded the wagons with all the books, more than can be counted, they scattered them everywhere in the east and west. And so ten books were sold for one coin, i.e, Aristotelian, Platonic, theological and every type of book. Tearing loose the gold and silver from countless gospels which were covered with every type of ornamentation, some they sold and others they threw away. They consigned all icons to the flames and having roasted meat with the fire, they ate. 76

That the sack of the city destroyed much is confirmed by the Greek, Ottoman, and Western sources."? It is difficult to ascertain what did survive i.n the way of Greek manuscripts and for this there are two brief indications. In the sixteenth century, the patriarchal notary Thodore Zygomalas drew up a catalogue of the manuscripts in the patriarchal library at the Pammakaristos church. Only a fragment of this catalogue survives and lists 174 manuscripts.P it is not clear what the provenances and dates of these manuscripts were. Of more immediate interest is the collection of non-Islamic manuscripts which Mehmed II brought together in his own palace library, the contents of which were described as early as 1592 by Dominico ofJerusalem, a jew converted to Christianity who was the court physician of Murad Ill, Dominico speaks of some 120 volwnes, a figure more or less commensurate with the study of A. Deissmann in his detailed analysis, reconstruction, and catalogue ofMehmed's non-Muslim books. They consist of works in Greek, Latin, Armenian, Syraic,

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Slavic, Italian, Arabic (Christian), Hebrew, and Old French, but by far the largest single group consists of works in Greek. Deissrnann gave considerable attention to the question of what function these Greek works served in the palace milieu. According to him the collection of these works reflects the interests of a conqueror who saw himself as the ruler who effected a decisive turn in history, and who, standing between East and West in Istanbul, sought to unite the cultures of these two worlds in his person."? Mehmed, Deissmann continues, brought this library together in consultation with such scholarly advisors as George Amiroutzes whom Mehmed had brought into the court. Such individuals wrote works for Mehmed, but Mehmed undoubtedly acquired manuscripts during the course of his conquests too, whereas other works (Critobulus) were dedicated to him. Finally, Deissman asserts, the sultan himself must have commissioned a number of these works, especially during the period after the conquest of Constantinople. He argues, with some plausibility, that the lavishly illuminated Octateuch of the Saray must have come from the library of the Byzantine emperors.s? The Greek manuscripts of Mehmed's library reflect a rather wide interest: history (Alexander, war, technology), geography, mathematics, astronomy, philosophy, poetry, Old and New Testaments, the antiquities of Constantinople, and the history of the construction of Hagia Sophia. It includes some twenty-odd ancient Greek authors (Homer, Hesiod, Pin dar, Polybius, Arrian, Ptolemy, Aristotle, Plato, Euclid, Galen, Xenophon, appian, etc.), at least 12 Byzantine authors (Critobulus, Maximus Planudes, Psellus, John Cantacuzene, Leo Grammaticus, Zonaras, St. Basil, Proclus, Nicephorus Uranos, etc.). Most unexpectedly, it included the Arabic translation of George Gemisthus Pletho's Compendium Zoroastreorum et Platonicorum dogmatum, the third book of the De legibus with the hymns to the pagan gods, and the Chaldean Oracles. It would seem that the translation is based on that part of the manuscript that the patriarch Gennadius Scholarius had not burned, and so it would seem that he turned it over to the Sultan. The translation would indicate that Mehmed had some interest in the events surrounding the attempt of PIetho to revive the ancient system of pagan religion. Whereas the number of Greek manuscripts in Mehmed's library is not large, the number is nevertheless significant as is also the fact that the ancient authors include philosophers, historians, scientists, mathematicians, and poets. Deissmann explained their presence by seeing in the personality of Mehmed a historical figure who understood himself as the unifying force then of eastern and western cultures. More recently, Julian Raby, in a series of carefully researched and tightly argued papers, has further refined the problem and the possible interpretations of both the library and the personality of Mehmed. Raby has explained in further detail Mehmed's broad cultural personality, his exposure to westerners, and his reliance on Greek secretaries in the earlier years of his reign. He

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has concentrated his analysis on the paleography and codicology of some of these works, and he has shown that of some sixteen Greek manuscripts produced by the Greek scriptorium in his court in Constantinople between 1460-1480 there are two groups. The first was intended for his personal use, the second for the palace school in which the future administrators had to be taught Greek among other languages. Raby indicates the six works which he asserts to have been intended for Mehmed's use as the following: CritobulusHistoriae, Arrian-Anabasis, Homer-Diad, Testament of Solomon, Diegesis- Tenth century text on erection of Hagia Sophia, and the Greek translation of Buondelmonti (western travel accountj.s! As a result of his codicological analysis Raby came to the interesting conclusion that Critobulus' Historiae and Arrian's Anabasis (of Alexander the Great) were bound as companion volumes. Further, he connects Mehmed and the Homer manuscript to a section in Critobulus where Mehmed is said to have visited the site of Troy where he asked about the burial place of Achilles and Ajax, who, he said, had been fortunate to have had such a poet as Homer to sing their praise.82 Reference has already been made earlier in this paper to the fact that one of the historical standards by which Mehmed measured his conquests were the conquests of Alexander the Great, hence it is understandable that he would have had a copy of Arrian in his library and that it should be bound as a companion volume to Critobulus. The last two texts, the Diegesis of the construction of Hagia Sophia, and the travel account ofBuondelmonti, both of which give detailed accounts of Byzantine Constantinople, reflect his interest in the topography and history of the site which became the site of his own capital. Hagia Sophia figured so importantly in his world that there were Persian and Turkish translations made of the Diegesis in his own life time. 83 The remainder of the Greek manuscripts of his Greek scriptorium in the palace reflect the contents of a late Byzantine school curriculum and from this Raby argues that these works must have been utilized for the training of future administrators in a language which they did not know. 84 Thus we come back to the larger question of Mehmed's attitude to the literary culture and to the bureaucracy of Byzantine civilization. His attitude toward these was selective and restricted to his life in the palace. He collected a number of Greek manuscripts and of Greek literati. In the palace, this resulted in a certain intellectual and scriptorial activity in Greek during his life-time. Toward the end of his reign, these Greek secretaries disappear and are replaced by renegades from differing nations.8 5 The nature of this second group of manuscripts is emphasized by a manuscript that escaped the notice of both Deissrnann and Raby, but which was noted by the Turkish scholar Djaferoglu and commented on by A. Papazoglou, This is manuscript 4749 in the collection of Aya Sofya and entitled Lugat-ifarisi arabi ve rnmi ve sirbi, also Lugat-i elsine-i eme« It has been identified as having been in the library of Mehmed II and is a handbook for the learning of Arabic, Persian, Greek and Slavic. Consisting of 51 pages, it contains the exact same phrases in these four

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languages and must have been intended for the instruction of those inside the palace.86 After the death of Mehmed II, the afterlife of this Byzantine literatization weakened greatly. His son Bayezid II shared little of his father's interests in this domain. Symptomatic of this change is that the collection of Byzantine religious relics that Mehmed had not only collected, but which he also seemed to revere, was dispersedby Bayezid who used it in his diplomatic bargaining with the West.87 Thus we see in the case of both Constantine and Mehmed an example of cultural ambiguity in their attitudes toward the outgoing cultures. In the case of Constantine, it was pagan sculpture; in the case of Mehmed, it was a taste for pagan and Christian literature, bureaucrats, statuary, and religious relics. But in both cases, sanctification purged and eliminated these elements from the systematic imperial iconography. APPENDIX Translation from the section on the Destruction of the Statues by Nicetas Choniates And since the barbarians lacked money (there is no satiety of wealth when the barbarian people are desirous), they looked covetously on the bronze statues and delivered them to the flame. Accordingly, the heavy bronze statue of Hera in the agora was cut into staters and consigned to the foundry, and her head could barely be carted off to the great palace by four-yoked carts of oxen. And after, he, Paris, standing with Aphrodite and giving her the apple of strife, was removed from his base. The four-sided bronze device, which rises high into the air and competes as to height with the greatest of the columns, as many as are raised upright in many areas of the city, who when he sees this would not marvel at its variety? For every musical bird is engraved thereon singing the song; of spring. The labors of farmers and pipes and milk pails, the bleating of sheep and the boundaries of lands are depicted. There spreads out the open sea, and schools of fish are seen, some being caught, others overpowering the nets and easily returning to the deep. Erotes in groups of two and three oppose each other with flowers, naked of clothing, throwing and receiving apples, bubbling over in sweet laughter. This particular four-sided figure ends in a sharp form having the shape of a pyramid, and above it is the statue of a woman which is pushed about by the first movement of the wind. Hence it was named Anemodoulion. And even this most beautiful work they send to the foundries, just as also the equestrian figure standing on a trapezoidal base in the (forum) of the Taurus, heroic in shape and marvelous as to size. Some said that this man is Jesus ofNaue, and they interpret his hand outstretched toward the sun, which

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is advancing on its westward journey, as though ordering the halt at Gabaon. To the majority, however, it (represents) Bellerophontes, born and raised in the isle of Pelops, who is seated on Pegasus. The horse is without bridle. Pegasus is thus presented striking with ease his hooves on the plains and disdaining all, and he bears the rider as both a bird and pedestrian. But there is an old tale that has come down to us, and it lies in the mouths of all, that in the left front hoof of this horse there is a statue of a man; according to some he is of the race of the Venetikoi, to others he is from another of the epizephyrian nations that are not subservient to the Romans, of some one of the Bulgarians. Often the hoof was made secure so that what was known to be hidden therein should in every way remain undetected The horse having been chopped to pieces, along with the rider, and having been consigned to the fire, the bronze statue that was entombed in the hoof of the animal was found and it was covered with a garment which they weave from the wool of sheep. Having inquired a little as to the things said about it, the Latins threw this into the fire. Nor did these barbarians, who have no love for the beautiful, spare the statues standing in the hippodrome or other types of wondrous works from destruction. These too they minted into coins, trading the great for the small and exchanging great things that were most greatly created for insignificant, small change. And there was Hercules Trihesperus, magnificently set with his basket, and spread over his head was the lion's pelt looking out fiercely, even though in bronze, almost roaring, and scattering the reckless mass gathered about. Him also they tore down. He was seated, angry, having neither quiver nor bow in his two hands, nor putting forward his club, but stretching out the base, just as his own hand, as far as possible. He is bending his left knee and he sets the elbow of the left arm on it. He stretches out the rest of the hand, leaning his head downward into the palm, despondently and calmly. He was weeping at his own fate and unable to endure all the struggles Eurysthenes had set for him not out of necessity, but out of envy, being puffed up by his good fortune. He (Hercules' statue) was broad of chest, wide of back, with thick hair and full buttock, strong arms, and achieves such a size, I think, one would imagine Lysimachus to ha~e made the original Hercules, he who had created first and last with his own hands this most excellent art. And he was thus the greatest, as the cord going about his thumb (i.e., of Hercules) would stretch out like a man's belt. They who divorce bravery from its accompanying virtues, and having appropriated it (bravery) and boasted about it, and holding it in high esteem, they did not pass by such a Hercules without pulling him down. And they pulled down with it (the statue of Hercules) the saddled, braying donkey, and the ass driver following him, which the Caesar Augustus had set up in Actium (which is Nicopolis in Greece), and who, when at night went out to reconnoiter the army of Anthony, came upon a man driving a donkey.

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And when he asked who he is and whither he is going, heard: "I am called Nikon and my donkey Nikandros, and I am going to the anny of Caesar." Nor did they restrain their hands from the hyena and she-wolf who gave milk to Remus and Romulus. They exchanged these ancient objects of reverence for insignificant coins and these bronze, and placed them (statues) in the foundry. In addition, the (statue of the) man wrestling the lion, and also the Nilotic horse, whose hindermost parts of the body end in a tail studded with scales, and the elephant shaking his trunk; and in addition to these, the sphinxes, which in the foreparts are like shapely women, and which in their hindparts are horrible like beasts, which are also very strange as they walk on land, and by lightness of wing they go about and compete with the greatwinged birds; and the unbridled horse raising its ear, snorting and prancing haughtily and obediently; and that ancient evil, the Scylla, appearing like a woman as far down as the waist (and this part projecting forward because of its huge breasts) and full of savagery, and thereafter cleft into beasts of prey that leap upon the ship of Odysseus and devour many of his companions. There is in the hippodrome a bronze eagle, the novel creation of Appollonius of Tyana and a magnificent device of his magic. Once when he came among the inhabitants of Byzantion, he was asked to do away with snake bites from which they suffered greatly. Doubtlessly utilizing magic with his associates, of which the teachers are the daemons, and all those who proclaim their orgies, he raised up on a column an eagle, a sight 'dripping' pleasure on the souls and persuading those enjoying the subject to spend time there, just like those listening to the songs of the Sirens, which are so difficult to pass by. He held out his wings, as though in flight, and the serpent was lying at his feet leaning backward and coiled, he hindered him from flying off as with the extreme end of the body he was dashing against the wings in order to bite him. But the venomous animal failed. Having been pierced by the barbs of the eagle's talons, his vigor faded, and he seemed rather to become fatigued, or rather thus struggling with the bird he became attached to his wings. And as the serpent breathed his last, the venom perished with him. The eagle, gazing proudly and not hooting aloud the victory, set off to lift with him the serpent. Once taking him up into the air to testify to this (the victory), he announced it by the joy of the look and the death of the serpent. This (sight), should it be seen, the contortions of the snake and the bite of death would be forgotten, and all the snakes ofByzantion would be frightened by this example, and it would persuade them to scatter and to enter their holes. The statue of the eagle is marvelous, not only because of all that we have recited, but also because of the lines engraved on its wings, which are twelve. It clearly shows the hours of the day to those who casually look at it, if, of course, the rays of the sun are not darkened by the clouds. And what of white-armed Helen with the beautiful ankles and slender neck, who, having assembled all of the Hellenes in Troy and having ravaged it, and landing at the Nile, and thus retracing her steps again after a long time,

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returned to the land of the Laconians? Did she soften the cruel ones? Did she soften those of an iron will? To the contrary, not at all was she able to do such a thing, she who had embraced every beholder by her beauty, although she was garbed pretentiously, appeared dewey, even though in bronze, moist, saturated with love in the chiton, veil, crown, and braided hair. This braid is finer than the spider's web, and the work is imposing. The crown bound the forehead with gold and precious stones imitating light, and the braid, reaching down as far as the legs, clasped together with a fetter in the back the hair, which was confused and blown about by a wind. And her lips were a little open like a flower bud so as to seem to be speaking. Immediately encountering the charming smile, which fills the beholder with joy, and the flashing glance, and the arch of the eye brows, and the other beauty of the body, no one, no matter who, can describe it by word so as to pass it on to later generations. o Helen, daughter of Tyndaris, fair beauty, offshoot of the Muses, concern of Aphrodite, very best gift of nature, prize of Trojans and Greeks, where is your pain-banishing medicine that causes forgetful-ness of all evils, and.which the spouse of Thonos granted you? Where are your invincible love potions? Why did you not make use of these now as you did in the past? I think that it was decreed by the Fates that you should fall under the rush of the flame, though you still had not stopped consuming your beholder with love. These descendants of Aeneus would say that they condemned you to the flame as a revenge for Troy, which because of your cruel love was charred by the lighted flame. The greed of these men, however, does not allow me to be mindful of and to speak of such a thing by which the rarest and most beautiful works of art anywhere were consigned to complete destruction; and to say that they frequently gave and sent to their wives moderate amounts of cash; and to record whether they devoted themselves to their (gaming) tables and draughts all day long, or whether they were inspired to rash and mad attacks (rather than to prudent bravery) against each other thus putting on the armor of Ares they gave preference to the prize of victory over all their possessions; over their wedded wives, from whom fathers hear who are their children, and even over the greatest matter of the soul, concerning which men exercize all care. And as for the reading and knowledge of those words that rhapsodes composed about you? "It is no cause for anger that Trojans and well-greaved Achaeans should suffer grief for a long time over such a woman. For she is greatly like the immortal goddesses as to her face."

Let that too be recorded in the discourse. There was set up on a stele a small woman, young in face and at her most charming age, with her hair braided and drawn back over both sides of the brow. She was not raised up high but could be touched by those stretching out their hands. The right hand of this statue, without any support below it, held up in the palm, by the

44 Speros Vryonis, Jr. foot of a horse, a man on horseback as another man would hold up a cup of drink (?). The rider, armed with coat of mail, and his legs girt about by greaves, was in the full vigor of body and simply exhaled bellicosity. The horse had raised up its ear to the trumpet blast, with neck high, its eyes piercingly keen, and its breathing as a result of its running was already evident in its eyes. Its feet were raised up in the air in a display of the reeling of battle. Next after this statue there were set up, very near the eastern turning point of the tetraoton, which is called the turning point of the Reds, statues of charioteers. They are examples of the charioteering art. But they do not command the charioteers with open display of the hands, as it is the case when those approaching the victory post should not let go of the reins. They must wheel in the horses by drawing away and must apply the spur continuously and more violently, so that shutting in the victory post from those coming behind, they allow the rival charioteer to drive on around the course and to come in last, even though he might be driving a faster horse, and though he might be well trained in the racing skill. The discourse shall add something else to that which has already been recounted, though it was not proposed that everything should be committed to writing. This is something charming in appearance and a little more wonderous than everything. This work is on a stone base and it depicts a bronze beast, more likely a Brachycercon than an ox, for it has not a deep throat such as the Egyptian oxen have, nor is it equipped with hooves. This beast was holding with its jaws and was choking another animal, which was armed over its entire body with scales that were so jagged that even in bronze form they inflicted pain on him who touched them. It was thought that the former was a basilisk and that the latter, which was being seized by its mouth, was an asp. Not a few conjectured that the one was a Nilotic ox and the other a crocodile. I am not interested in this difference of opinions, but will speak rather about the novel struggle which was carried out on both sides whereby they mutually inflicted and suffered, killed and were killed, seized and were seized, and whereby both won and were defeated by one another. The former, said to be a basilisk was all of him swollen from head to foot. His whole body had sunk down and it had turned green like a frog, for the poison had gone through the entire structure of the beast and infected it with death. It had sunk down on its knees, and the life-giving force which had faded was erased from its expression. Rather, the sight would have led the beholder to think that formerly it might be revived from the dead, had not the bases of the feet supported it and held it upright. And the other beast, which was held fast by its jaws and was struggling with its tail, was in a similar state as it was gasping from being strangled by the grip of the teeth. It seemed to be straining to leap and to try to jump out of the enclosure of the teeth and to fall out of the "chasm." But it was unable to do so because the parts right after the shoulders and the front legs, and all the parts of the body joined to the tail were held in the mouth (of the basilisk) and were pierced by its jaws.

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And thus were they being killed by one another. The conflict was common to both as was the self-defense. They were both victorious, and yet death was mutually concurrent. It occurs to me to say that to be destroyed by one another, and to be led off on the road to death by one another, these affairs, which are deadly bearers of evils and destructive for man, are portrayed not only in statues and do not occur alone among the stronger beasts. They also occur frequently, however, among the foreign nations, which have attacked us Romans, killing and being killed by one another. They are destroyed by the power of Christ who does not rejoice in blood but who disperses the bellicose foreign nations, and who displays justice against the attacking basilisk, the trampling lion, and the dragon.

NOTES 1. I do not intend to go into the social background which lay behind the rise and formation of the two men. For the historical circumstances of their rise and rule see: A. H. M. Jones, Constantine the Great and the Conversion ofE"rope (London, 1948); F. Babinger, Mehmed the Conq"eror and his Times, trans. R. Manheim, ed. Hickman (princeton, 1978). 2. In E. C. Richardson, "The Life of Constantine by Eusebius," in A Select Library ofNicene and Post-mane Fathers ofthe Christian Ch"rr.h (Grand Rapids, 1971) I: 420435. 3. Richardson, 483. 4. Critobulus, History of Mehmed the Conq"eror by Ksitovoelos, trans. C. T. Riggs (princeton, 1970), 3. Critobul din Imbros, Din domnia I"i Mahomed al II -lea anni 1451-1467, ed. V. Grecu (Bucharest, 1963),25-27. 5. Critobulus, 14; Critobulus, 4, 279. 6. George Sphrantzes, Phrantzes, C0'P"s Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae (hereafter Bonn), ed. B. G. Niebuhr, vol. 36: 93. 7. Babinger, "Mehmed II, der Eroberor, und Italien," Byzantion XXI (1961): 127130. 8. Babinger, Mehmed the Conqueror, 500. Ahmedi, lskendemame, IncelemeTipkibasim, ed, I. Onver (Ankara, 1983). 9. A. Deissmann, Forshungen "nd FIlnde im Serai mit eniem Yerzeir.hnis der nir.htislamis. chen Handschriften in Topkap" Serai zu Istanblll, (Berlin-Leipzig, 1933), 60. A. Pertusi, "Le epistole storiche di Lauro Quirini sulla caduta di Constantinopoli e la potenza dei Turchi," Lauro Quirini umanista. St"di e testi, a t1'ra di K. Kra"tter et al., ed. V. Branca, Civilta Veneziana, Saggi, XXIII, (Florence, 1977): 229, quoted by J. Raby, "Mehmed the Conqueror's Greek Scriptorium," DIlmbarton Dales Papers XXXVII (1983): 19: "Quam ob rem sese princiem orbis terrarum gentiumque omnium, idest alterum Alexandrum, et esse et dici vult. Unde et Arianum, qui res gestas Alexandri diligentissime scripsit, quotidie ferme legere consuevit." 10. Raby, "Greek Scriptorium," 18. 11. Philostorgius, ed. J. Bidez, Philostorgios Kirchengeschichte, in Die griechisr.hen r.hristlichen Sr.hriftsteller der ersten dreiJahreh"nderte (Leipzig, 1913),21: 14 17. 12. Spandugino, De la origine deli imperatori ottomani, ed. C. Sathas, Mnemeia

46

Speros Vryonis, Jr.

EllenikesIstorias IX (1890): 170. 13. Quoted by Babinger, Mehmed the Conqueror, 429-31, who also evaluates the source's reliability. 14. Ibid., 432. 15. Philostorgius (Bidez) 20-21 (II,9). 16. O.L. Barkan, "The Problem of the Construction and Settlement of Istanbul after the Conquest," (manuscript of a paper given at the Princeton Conference on the Economic History of the Middle East, 1975), 1-2. 17. Plutarch, Themistocles XVIII, 3. 18. For a broad historical survey see, R. Meyer, Byzantion, Konstantinupolis, Istanbul. enie genetische Stadtgeographie. Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien. Philosophisch-historische Klasse. Denkschriften. 71. Band, e. Abhandlung, (Vienna, 1943). 19. S. Vryonis, "Cultural Conformity in Byzantine Society, Ninth to Twelfth Century," in S. Vryonis and A. Banani, Proceedings of the Fifth Giorgio Levi della Vida Biennial Conference, entitled Individualism and Conformity in Islam (Wiesbaden, 1977), 128. 20. S. Vryonis, "Byzantine Demokratia and the Guilds in the Eleventh Century," Dumbarton Oaks Papers XVII (1963): 291-292. 21. A. M. Schneider, "Strassen und Quartiere Konstantinopels," Mitteilungen des deutsche« archaologischen Instituts Istanbul III (Berlin, 1950), 76-78. H. Inalcik, "Istanbul," Encyclopedia of Islam, 2nd ed., 229-230. 22. The estimates for the population of Byzantine Constantinople have varied greatly inasmuch as satisfactory, official figures are lacking. See G. Dagron, Naissance d'une capitale. Constantinople et ses institutions de 330 Ii 451 (paris, 1974), 518-541, for a survey of the literature, sources, and figures: a. Under Constantine I the city covered 700 hectares and may have had a population of 100,000 to 150,000. b. Under Theodosius II the area within the new walls was 1,400 hectares and could hold 400,000-500,000. By 430 its population had surpassed that of Rome and so it must have, as of 430, been between 200,000 and 300,000. For an earlier discussion on the population in the period of the Comnenoi see, D. Jacoby, "La population de Constantinople a I'epoque byzantine. Une probleme de demographie urbaine," Byzantion XXXI (1961): 81-109, who allows that the Constantinopolitan population may have reached 400,000 at the period of maximum growth. See also Schneider, "Strasse und Quartiere Konstantinopels," passim, for the problem of the figures in the Notitia Urbis Constantinopolitanae, and consult Dagron, op. dt., 525-530, for their most recent evaluation. For Ottoman Istanbul much more in the way of statistics and physical monuments remains so that we are on somewhat sounder ground. That Byzantine Constantinople had drastically declined in the Palaeologan period there can be no doubt. The city had lost its supporting provinces in much of the Balkans and Asia Minor. On the basis of rough estimates to be found in travellers accounts the population has been placed at 40,000 to 50,000. A. M. Schneider, "Die Bevolkerung Konstantinopels im XV Jahrhundert," Nachrichten der Akademie Der Wissenschajien in GOttingen. PhilosophischHistorische Klasse,Jahrgang 1949, #9,231-237. But it is much more likely that it was close to 70,000, because during the conquest of the city in 1453 the prisoners taken were reckoned at 60,000 and the number slain at 4,000. From a survey made in 1477 by the Cadi Muhieddin (Topkapi Saray A~ivi, D 9524) we see the following number

Byzantine Constantinople and Ottoman Istanbul

47

of households recorded for the taxes (though we cannot tell whether the survey is comprehensive):

Muslims Greek Orthodox Jews Kaffans Annenians of Istanbul Annenians & Greeks from Karaman Gypsies

Households 8,951 3,151 1,647 267

% 60 21.5 11 2 2.6

372

384 31 14,803

2.7 .2 households

These figures have been emended by Inalcik in his article "Istanbul," EI2, 243, to read: Muslims Christians Jews

9,517 5,162 1.647 16,326

households

46,635 25,295 8.070 80,000

hearths or households

In the registers of 1535 there are: Muslim hearths Christian hearth Jewish hearths

Ibid., 243. In 1550 a western observer estimated the number of households so that the population may have been around 500,000 (about 4 to the household). It is interesting that the notitia documentation attests 322 neighborhoods for early fifth century Constantinople (Schneider, "Strassen und Quartiere Konstantinopels," 77), whereas the number of neighborhoods (mahalles) in Ottoman Istanbul was: 182 under Mehmed II, 219 in 1540, and 292 plus 12 cemaats in 1634 (Inalcik, op. cit., 234). A late tradition gives a romanticized version of a part of Constantine's plans to colonize his new foundation: Desiring to populate his city and desiring above all to bring the Romans to Byzantion, Constantin!' the Great took from them secretly their rings. . . and sent them against the king of the Persians who was called Sarbaros, They were: Four magistroi-Addas, Protasius, Scopebros, Philoxenus; Eight patricioi-Domninus, Probus, Dareius, Maurus, Rodanus, Sallustius the eparch, Modestus, Eubolus. And as has been .said he sent them to Persia where they remained 16 months. Constantine the Great having sent to Rome took their wives, children and families. He also appointed building engineers so that they might survey their houses and how the lands of each lay. And as they observed their houses, some on the shore of the sea and others on the hinterland, and [as they observed] their shapes... and having taken the families of these senatorials, they came to Byzantion and they constructed their houses in the same pattern. They [the magistroi and patricioi] having returned from Persia with vic-

48

Speros Vryonis Jr. J

tory and having sent tribute of 365 centenaria, they were received by the emperor who feasted them and addressed them making trial of them: "Do you wish to depart for Rome?" They replied that they did not wish to depart for two months. The emperor replied: "I wish to give you your houses this evening." Having ordered his parakoimomenos Euphratou (who had converted him to Christianity) the latter gave each one of them his house. And they having seen their doorways and the courtyards . . . that they were like the ones in Rome as to size, shape, and height, and also the view from the doorways, they imagined that they were in Rome. But finding their families [there] as well they were amazed. Then did they believe that it was not a dream but a desire of the emperor, "that settled us here against our will. . . .. The regions [of the city] took their appellations from their names. Philoxenus built the cistern called Philoxenus. Probus erected the church of Prodromus. . . the so-called Probou. Domninus built a house in the region of Maurianou which Agrikolaus had. Dareius built the house of Icanatissa, of Sclerus. Maurus built the house which Belonas had.. Rodanus built a house which is called the [mansion] of Euouranes... Sallustius built a house which is called that of Kontomytes. Modestus built a house, that of Lampros, in the area of the Holy Apostles. The text is edited in T. Preger, Saiptores originum constantinopolitanarum (Leipzig, 1901) I: 146-148. The anecdote is of interest inasmuch as, whatever its factual veracity, it depicts a type of colonization involving the grandees of the state, much as in the case of Mehmed's colonization of Istanbul. Earlier sources emphasize Constantine's policy of resettling citizens from other parts of the empire in Constantinople. Indeed, the extension of the walls first by Constantine and then by Theodosius II indicates that they planned to create a great city with a large population. He [Constantine] having been persuaded by the words of God, expanded greatly the city formerly called Byzantion, and encompassed it with very great walls. Since he reckoned the indigenous citizens to be insufficient in regard to the greatness of the city he built great mansions here and there along the boulevards. He settled in them illustrious men with their households, having summoned them from Rome the Elder and from other nations, and made them owners [of these mansions]. The text is in Sozomenus, II, 3, iii-iv, ed. J. Bidez and G. C. Hansen, Sozomenus Kirchengeschite, (Berlin, 1960). Sozomenos, II, 35, speaks of the immense growth of the city's population. 23. P. Gautier, "Le Typicon du Christ Saveur Pantocrator," ReV14e des Etudes Byzantines XXXII (1974): 21 and passim. It is of interest to note that when, in the reign of Mehmed II, it was transformed into the Zeyrek complex (mosque and medreses) the structures, in their rededicated form, received a substantial vakif from the sultan that provided for extensive expenses, personnel, and services. The document provides details on the daily expenditures for a wide variety of personnel attached to the foundation: See E. H. Ayverdi, Osmanll mi'marisinde Fatih devri 855-886 (14511481) III (Istanbul 1973): 537. 24. O. 1. Barkan and E. H. Ayverdi, Istanbul vakiflan tahrir defteri 953 (1546) tarihli (Istanbul, 1970): x-xi, The Aya Sofya complex on the other hand had 250,000 ak;es, or 15,000 gold ducats, and this income came largely from sources within the city itself: revenues of 2,360 shops, 1,300 houses, 2 caravansarays, 30 beghanes, 23 boza hanes, 12 hammams, in Istanbul, Uskudar, and Galata.

Byzantine Constantinople and Ottoman Istanbul

49

25. E. Barker, Social and Political Thought in Byzantium .fromJustinian I to the last Palaeologus (Oxford, 1957): 103. 26. E. Fenster, Laudes Constantinopolitanae (Munich, 1968). passim. 27. Inalcik, "Istanbul," EI2, 224. Byzantine Constantinople had early acquired a special character in the lore of the Muslim world prior to the appearance of the Turks in Iran. See A. Miquel, "La geographie hurnaine du monde musulmanjusqu'au milieu du 11e siecle." Geographie arabe et representation du monde: la terre et l'etranger (paris-The Hague. 1975) II: 411-444. 28. Dagron, op. cit., 8-9. 29. In addition to R. Janin, Constantinople byzantine. Developpement urbain et repertoire topographique, 2nd ed. (Paris), 106-120, for the great palace, see C. Mango, The Brazen House. A study of the Vestibule of the Imperial Palace of Constantinople (Copenhagen, 1959); R. Guilland, "Le Palais de la Magnaure," Epetens Etaireias Vyzantinon Spou do« XXVII (1957): 63-74; J. Labarte, Le palais imperial de Constantinople et ses abords, Sainte Sophia, Ieforum Augusteon et l'hippodrome tels qu'ils existaient au di"ieme siecle (paris, 1861); E. Mamboury and Th. Wiegand, Kaiserpalilsle von Konstantinopel (Berlin-Leipzig, 1934). 30. Janin, Constantinople byzantine, III. 31. The Works ofLiudprand ofCremona, tr. F. A. Wright (London. 1930),208. 32. Janin, op. at., 59-62, 73-76. 33. Procopius, On the Buildings, tr. H. B. Dewing with collaboration of G. Downey, The Loeb Classical Library (Oxford, 1940). VII, 33. 35, 37. See the reproduction of the fourteenth-century drawing in Beilage 2 of J. Kollwitz, Ostromische Plastik der Theodosiasiseher Zeit (Berlin, 1941). 34. Janin, op. cit., 155-156. 35. Janin, op. cit., 161-162. The first conflagration consumed also the statues of the Sarnian Hera, the Lindian Athena, the Cnidian Aphrodite. which was in the Lausus. Cedrenus (Bonn), I: 616;Zonares, XIV, 2. For the second fire see, Manasses, VV. 4257-4324; Glycas (Bonn). 231. 36. Janin, op. cit., 111-14. "Christodorou Ecphrasis," in Anthologie Crecq"e, ed. and trans. P. Waltz (Paris, 1928) I: 51-90. 37. Janin, op. cit., 183-194. 38. Janin, op. cit.• 36-37. 39. Janin, op. cit., 103-104. 40. Janin, op. cit., 59-72. 41. Eusebius (Richardson). I, 555. 42. Janin, La geographie ecclesiastiqve de l'empire byzantin. Premiere partie. Le siege de Constantinople et le patriarcat oecvmeniq"e. Tome III. Les eglises et les monasteres, 2nd ed, (paris, 1969).41-50. Dagron, op.dt., 401-409. For the church of the Holy Apostles see further, A. Heisenberg, Crabeskirch "nd Apostelkirch. Zwei Basiliken Konstantins. Untersuchungen zur Kunst und Literatur des ausgehenden Altertums. Zweites Teil. Die Apostelkirche in Konstantinopel (Leipzig, 1968). Ch. Angelides, "E perigraphe ton Ayion Apostolon apo ton Constantino Rodio. Architektonike kai syrnvolismos," Symmeikta V (1983): 49-92. 43. S. Shaw in his History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern r"rkey (Cambridge, 1976) 1: 57. has attempted to present the conquest and occupation of the city in 1453 as a peaceful. orderly event. But he has chosen to ignore all the contemporary Turkish, Arabic. Greek, Italian. and Slavic sources, which are unanimous as to the destructive character of the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople. See Vryonis,

50 Speros Vryonis Jr. I

"Stanford J. Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modem Turkey. Volume 1. Empire of the Gazis: The Rise and Decline of the Ottoman Empire 1280-1808, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, London, New York, Melbourne, 1976) A Critical Analysis," Balkan Stvdies XXIV, 1 (1983),55-78. 44. Ducas, Istoria Turco-Bizantina (1341-1462), ed. V. Grecu (Bucharest, 1958),375. 45. Inalcik, "Istanbul," E12, 224-225. 46. Ibid. 47. Critobulus (Riggs), 140. 48. Critobulus (Riggs), 140-141. 49. Inalcik, "Istanbul," E12, 229. Ayverdi, op. dt., 356-406. 50. Inalcik, op. cit. A. S. OIgen, Constantinople during the Era of Mohammed the Conqueror 1453-1481 (Ankara, 1939). Ayverdi, Fatih devri sonlan"da Istanbul mahalleleri, ~ihri" iskani lie "afilsil (Ankara, 1958). 51. Ayverdi, OMFD, 538-541. 52. For Bayezid II, see G. Goodwin, A History of Ottoman Architecture (London, 1971), 168-174; Islam Ansiklopedisi, the s.v, "Bayezid II". For Selim I, see Goodwin, op. cit., 184 ff; for Stlleyrnan I, see the two massive volumes of 6. L. Barkan, Saleyman Cami lie imareti insaatl (1550-1557) (Ankara, 1972, 1979), where Barkan has assembled the extremely rich and detailed data on the building, builders, and daily expenses for the erection of the killliyat ofSilleyman from 2,973 folia of archival documents. Goodwin, op. dt., 215-239. 53. Goodwin, op. cit., 132-137. F. Davis, The Palace of Topkapr in Istanbul (New York, 1970). B. Miller, Beyond the Sublime Porte (New Haven, 1931). On the bedestan, Inalcik, op. cit., passim. W. MOller-Wiener, Bildlexiko« zur Topographie lstanbuls (Tubingen, 1977),345-349. Ayverdi, OMFD, 557-571. 54. Wiegand, "Der Hippodrom von konstantinopel zur Zeit Suleimans des Grosses," Jahrbuch des kaiserlich Deutschen Archaologischen Instituts XXIII (1908), 1-11. 55. Preger, Saiptores orig. constant., 38, 166. 56. Janin, Constantinople byzantine, 78-79. Zonaras. XIII, 3, 24-27, gives interesting details. 57. Christodoros, Eephrasis, ed. and tr. P. Waltz, I: 51-90. 58. They were obviously understood differently according to social affiliations, religiosity and education of the contemporary observer. C. Mango, "Antique Statuary and the Byzantine Beholder," Dumbarlon Oaks Papers XVII (1963): 5>.76, stresses the superstitious perception of the statues. Nicetas Choniates (if he is the author of that treatise on the destruction of the statues) sees them as a classicizing author would see them, with great appreciation for their artistic quality and literary connotations. This variety in the perception of the statuary was not unique to medieval Byzantium. The ancient Greeks themselves seem to have varied as to their perception of the statues as well. 59. E. Legrand, "Description des oeuvres d'art et de l'eglise des Saints ApBtres de Constantinople. Poerne en vers iambiques par Constantin Ie Rhodien," RellUe des Etvdes Crecques IX (1896): 36-44, on the Seven Wonders of Constantinople and on the columns and statues. He listed: 1.The Equestrian statue ofJustinian in the Augusteum. 2.The porphyry column of Constantine in the forum of Constantine. 3.The Senaton, near the forum of Constantine, with its columns and the bronze gate taken from the temple of Ephesian Artemis which depicted the Gigantomachy with Zeus and his thunderbolts, Poseidon with his trident, Apollo

Byzantine Constantinople and Ottoman Istanbul

51

armed with bow, and Hercules. There was also the bronze statue of Athena of Lindos on a column. 4.The column with a cross in the Philadelphion. 5.The bronze Anemodoulion, a pyramid-like structure, decorated with bronze reliefs of animals, fruits, naked erotes in the vines, winds, and on top a statue that changed position in obedience to the prevailing wind. 6.The elevated column erected by Theodosius I in the Forum Tauri depicting his victory over the Goths. The equestrian statue ofTheodosius atop another column. 7.The column ofArcardius in the Xerolophos. For a discussion and identification of these statues, see T. Reinach, "Commentaire archeologique sur le poerne de Constantin le Rhodien," Revue des Etudes Crecques IX (1896): 66-103. 60. A. Cutler, "The De Signis of Nicetas Choniates. A Reappraisal," American Journal of Archaeology LXXII (1968): 113-210. R. M. Dawkins, "Ancient Statues in Constantinople," Folklore XXXV (1924): 209-248. E. Mathiopolu- Tornaitou, "Klassisisches und klassistisches im Statuenfragment von Niketas Choniates," Byzantinische Zeitschrift 73 (1980),25-40. 61. Mala Choniatae Historia, ed, I. A. van Dieten (Berlin, 1975) I: 647-48. On stoicheia, 643. For the translation of the text, see the appendix at the end of this study. The relevant section on the statues has also been edited in D. Morisani, F. Gagliuolo, A. de Franciscis, De signis constantinopolitanis (Florence, n.d.), 62. The four bronze horses placed atop St. Mark in Venice are said to have been taken from the hippodrome at this time. 63. Legrand, op. dt., 40, lines 147-149. 64. Manuelis Chrysolorae epistula adJoannem Imperatotem, Patrologia Craeca, CLVI, 2354. 65. Manuelis Chrysolorae epistula, 45. 66. Ibid. He argues, again on archaeological grounds, that the two great columns of the Forum Tauri and of the Xerolophos must have been great because of the size, brilliance, and luxury of the foundations. 67. Ibid., p. 48, possibly a reference to areas abandoned and overgrown by trees and vegetation. 68. Ibid. 69. The case of the sixteenth century Ibrahim Pasa, a devsirme who collected statuary, is clearly an exception. 70. P. Gilles, The Antiquities of Constantinople, with a Description of its Situation, the Conveniences of its Port, its Jlubliek Buildings, the Statuary, Sculpture, Architedure, and other Curiosities ofthat City, tr.J. Ball (London, 1729), 127-130. 71. P. Lemerle, Le premier humanisme byzantin. Notes et remarques sur enseignement et culture aByzance des origines au Xe siecle (paris, 1971),43-73. 72. C. Manaphes, Ai en Konstantinoupolei vivliothekai autokratorikai kai patriarchikai kai peri ton en autais cheirographon mechri tes aloseos (1453). Melete philologike (Athens, 1972),56-60. 73. O. Volk, "Die byzantinischen Klosterbibliotheken von Konstantinopel, Thessalonike und Kleinasien," Ph. D. Dissertation (Munich, 1954), passim. 74. Janin, Constantinople Byzantine, 161-163. 75. Mehmed seems to have had a fascination for ancient statuary, western religious painting, and a reverence for the Byzantine religious relics. See Raby, "Greek Scriptorium," 22. Above all, the study and documents in Babinger, Reliquienhacher am

52

Speros Vryonis, Jr.

Osmanenhof im XV jahrhundert. Zugleich ein Beitrag Zur Geschichte des osmanlschen Goldpragung unter Mehmed II im Eroborer (Munich, 1956), Bay. Akad. der Wissenschaften. Philos.-Hist. Klass, Siztungsberichte, 1956, Helt 2. 76. Ducas (Grecu), 391-393. The Italian Lauro Quirini, who met up with eye witnesses of the sack of the city during his sojourn on the isle of Crete in July 1453, reports that over 120,000 manuscripts were destroyed during the pillaging of the Byzantine capital. For this and other references to the destruction of Greek manuscripts during the capture of the City, see Raby, op. dt., 16. 77. Vryonis, op. cit., 55-78. 78. Manaphes, op. cit., 148 for reference to the edition of the text. 79. Deissmann, op. dt., 24-25. 80. Deissmann, 35-36. 81. Raby, op.tit., passim. 82. Raby, op. dt., 21, for the texts. 83. F. Tauer, "Notice sur les versions persanes de la legende de I'editication d'Aya Sofya," Fuad Kopralu Arm~gani (Istanbul, 1953), 487-494; "Les versions persanes de la Iegende de la construction d'Aya Sofya," Byzantinoslavica XV (1954): 1-20. See also Raby, op. dt., 19 and note 29 for further bibliography. 84. Raby, op. dt., 27-28. 85. Raby, op. cit., Passim. 86. Papazoglou, "Ena cheirographo ellenotourkiko tes vivliothekes tes Ayias Sophias," Nea Estia XIII (1939): 389-391. 87. Babinger, Reliquienschacher, passim.

su;

2

The Ottomanization of Crete Irene A. Bierman

This study reports on one aspect of the Ottornanization of Crete: the imposition of architectonic signs of Ottoman Muslim Power upon the existing Venetian Christian built environment following the conquest of Crete in the mid-seventeenth century.' If the major cities of mid-seventeenth century Crete-Hanya, Retme, and Qandiye-are viewed through the metaphor of a public stage, then what occurred in these cities was the transformation of those stages to provide a setting in which the creation of a specifically mid-seventeenth century Ottoman Muslim hegemony could be dramatized. In short, the Ottoman building program reinforced the political and religious values of the Ottoman Muslim hierarchy and the political conditions at the capital and throughout the empire. The new buildings that signalled this Ottomanization were mesdds, tekkes, kiUuphanes, and, in special focus here, the cami institutional complex with its minaret, chronograrn plaque, and, cemetery. These Ottoman Muslim structures were, in effect, laid over the Venetian Latin-Christian built environment. (Venetian Crete had been itself constructed for similar imperial purposes.) Crete is of particular interest among the Ottoman provinces because two different sign patterns were used to proclaim Ottoman power. One was external, as it faced the approaches to the cities (mainly from the sea, but also from the land); the other was internal in that it reorganized urban spaces to support Ottoman Muslim activities. Both sign patterns reinforced and supported the will of the Ottoman hierarchy to enforce and strengthen its rule over the Venetian, Orthodox Greek, and jewish populations of Crete. Unless a conquered city is razed and rebuilt, the surviving signs, when considered diachronically, are viewed against the abiding shadows of other signs from other times and other powers. Therefore, it is in the initial moment of shift in dominant ideologies on Crete from Venetian LatinChristian to Ottoman Muslim that the specificities of the processes of change in urban space can be partially distinguished and analyzed. This study, in attempting to .suggest the context of this shift in power on Crete will begin with a brief historical note that concentrates on the period immediately prior to the conquest. Then it will describe the urban infrastructure of the island as

S4 Irene A. Bierman

it had been under Venetian control when the Ottomans conquered; finally the paper will explore the key elements of the process of Ottornanization, especially the establishment of camis, as they relate to the external and internal systems ofsigns ofOttoman power. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND The history of Crete, the fourth largest of the Mediterranean islands, spans 8000 years. During much of that time, Crete's geographic location made it an important link in the economic and political structures of neighboring powers. The current capital, now called Heraklion, was founded in 82iA.D., when the Arabs erected a defensive ditch around their new port settlement, naming it khandaq (ditch). No above ground archaeological remains of this period have been found to date. The Byzantines reconquered the island in 961 and maintained the capital city, although its name was Hellenized to Khandax or Khandakos. Little remains in the urban areas from this period, although traces are found in the countryside. The Franks, who had conquered Constantinople and thus inherited Crete from the Byzantines, sold Crete to the Venetians in 1204. They too maintained the capital city, although the name, reflecting the new language of rule, became Candia. The Ottomans, in turn, retained the capital city, naming it Qandiye. The names of the two other major cities on the island, Khania and Rethyrnnon, likewise were Ottomanized to Hanya and Retrne. For the Venetians, Crete was a key bastion in the Eastern Mediterranean. It was an important source of tax income as it exported substantial quantities of oil, wine, grain, and timber to Europe. The port city of Candia became an important intermediate point for Eastern Mediterranean goods arriving in Venetian trading convoys. To protect this valuable outpost, the Venetians fortified the cities of Candia, Khania, and Rethymnon-one of the largest Venetian fortresses-and created other fortifications at Seteia, in addition to a network of smaller installations. These fortified cities and coastal castles ringed the island with an effective and impressive armor for several hundred years. A traveler approaching Crete in the early seventeenth century would have easily recognized these distinctive fortifications as Venetian. Certainly these fortifications proclaimed Venetian imperial power by their size and quality of design. The orchestration of the quantities of material and workers necessary to construct such fortifications represented substantial political authority. But in the eyes of Evliya Celebi, the seventeenth-century representative of the then dominant Ottoman ideology, these very fortifications represented Ottoman, rather than Venetian power. As the following quotation from his Seyahatname suggests, Evilya Celebi wished his readers to see these fortifications as representing Venetian fear: And when in the year [929/1522] Sultan Slileyman ... may mercy and forgiveness be upon him conquered Rhodes [from the Knights] of Malta, fear struck the hearts of the

The Ottomanization

of Crete

55

Frankish Infidels. (The power of the Turk Siileyrnan is revealed. No doubt Suleyrnan or a Mehmed Khan certainly will come to this island of Crete as welll) And so thinking, they [the Venetians] fell to dread and terror and made these castles of Hanya, Retme and Qandiye like the wall of Alexander. 2

Evliya Celebi continues to comment that after Sultan Selim II conquered the island of Cyprus from Venice, the Cretan Venetian Christians added bastions to the castle of Hanya in order to fortify it further.t The Venetian sources confirm the structural fortification of the cities and the island in response to these same events. In the end, these fortifications could not withstand the Ottoman attacks. Although the Venetian population was somewhat disaffected with Venetian home rule-heavy taxes, harsh punishments, the denuding of forests-they fought hard against the Ottomans. Khania and Retimo fell in 1645, but Candia was able to resist the siege for almost twenty-five years until 1669. One result of this siege pattern was that the conquest created differing conditions in Candia than those in Khania and Rethymnon. If we maintain the metaphor of these cities as stages, then the effects of the historical circumstances produced different actors and audiences for each stage. In both Khania and Rethimo the Greek Orthodox and the Venetian Latin rite populations remained. In Candia, however, the conquest-surrender documents provided for the safe return to the homeland of those Venetians who remained when the Ottomans took over. Thus, when the Ottomans entered Candia in 1669, the capital city was virtually empty of actors and audiences, except for some few Greek Orthodox Christians and Jews. The situation thus echoed that of the successful siege of Constantinople some two hundred years earlier where a virtually empty urban space was counteracted by a policy of repopulation.t On Crete, and especially in Qandiye, the Ottomans resettled mainly Muslims from their Albanian, Egyptian, and Anatolian provinces. Even some Christians (mainly Armenians) were settled on Crete. VENETIAN CRETE It is evident on architectonic and archival grounds that the Venetians had sought to make each of the two major cities Retimo and Candia (especially the capital Candia) into miniature replicas of Venice, complete with the primary distinctive features (such as presence of particular forms and stylistic inflections) of their great capital on the Adriatic.! This task involved the construction of buildings serving as concrete analogues for the Basilica San Marco, the Palazzo Ducale, the Loggia, the Campanile, and the Piazza San Marco. The corresponding structures and spaces on Crete were small-scale provincial versions of their Adriatic model; what is of special interest here, is the apparent fact that the elements of the public urban core in Retimo and

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The Ottomanization of Crete

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Candia were composed together according to spatial relationships that in the main replicated the prototypes in Venice. Despite the constraints of a different topography on the mountainous island of Crete. the central monumental core of these Cretan cities was developed to replicate that of Venice itself, thereby reinforcing and perpetuating Venetian political and religious values and attitudes by their presence and their spatial relationships. The Venetians enforced a policy of segregating the Venetians and Latin clergy from the Greek population who lived predominantly in the interior of the island. The Venetian urban structures and the institutions they housed helped both to assure the political allegiance of the Venetians living abroad. and to maintain their Latin faith.6 These essential architectonic elements and their spatial relationships are indicated on the sketch plan based on the seventeenth-century Venetian plan of Candia (pre-Ottoman conquest) made by WurtmUller (fig. 1). The Candian San Marco and its campanile stand on the east flank of the piazza (the Candian Piazza della Biade) to the south of the loggia. The plan indicates the positions of the Palazzi of the Governor and the Admiral to the west of the public square; a major fountain built by Morosini near the center; the Fondaco and the old city gate to the south. It should be noted in making the comparison with the Venetian (Adriatic) center that the original Can dian central area was near the original main Venetian city gate in Candia, thereby replicating the position of the Palazzo Ducale, San Marco basilica, and Piazetta in Venice with respect to its major urban threshold on the Venetian Canal Grande. The pre-conquest plan as shown incorporates the subsequent growth of Candia to the south and the new city walls enclosing new outlying suburbs. Thus. the monumental central core originally on the city threshold which had in part signaled the relationship of the state to the sources of economic power. was relegated. by the time of the Ottoman conquest, to the geographical center of the enlarged urban area. The plan of Retimo reveals a modified interpretation of these essential elements. apparently in response to the topography and senlement patterns. Here the San Marco Basilica was located away from the main piazza. The existence of a substantial inner citadel, the Portezza,? which was the original settlement site. altered the ideal urban topography such that the San Marco basilica was constructed where the original settlement sprang up. on the Portezza, The piazza was-located in the lower city of Retimo on the flat land to the south. which came to constitute the major residential and commercial area. Here the piazza is a miniature L-shaped version of the great Piazza-piazetta system in Venice: in both cases, the piazetta section opens out onto the water (to the east). Nearby. at the northeast side of the Retimo piazetta stood a tall clock tower that is no longer extant; it recalls, if not in exact location. at least the relative size and prominence of the Venetian carnpanile.s

S8 Irene A. Bierman

These central urban cores, which focused activity within a space defined by certain types of structures, both presented and perpetuated Venetian power. One element of that power, namely Latin rite, or Roman Catholic Christianity and its adherents, was reinforced by the presence of a considerable number of Cistercian and Mendicant monastery foundations, in addition to the parochial churches supported by the Venetian lords. In all three cities Franciscan monastery foundations dominated both in number (two in Candia and Khania and three in Retirno)? and in position within each city. The churches of these monasteries were usually the largest churches in each city and located on major land and sea thresholds. Besides the Franciscans, the Augustinians, Dominicans, Servitius, Crucifixius, and Benedictines had their own churches in these cities. These were all funded by donations of local land holdings and support from Rome. Consequently, the Venetians closely watched these monk-clergy whose first loyalty was to Rome, rather than Venice.t? Venetian Roman Catholic Christianity, however, is not only legible in the presence of the central core replicating the Adriatic capital and in the presence of other Latin rite churches and monasteries, it is perpetuated also in the way in which the arrangement of the central core obscured vision and accessibility to the Greek Orthodox structures that were permitted within the urban area. The structures and institutions of Greek Orthodoxy were in general marginalized to the interior of the island, but in Candia, the capital, the Greek Orthodox metropolitan cathedral of St. Titos, was located just off the main piazza. Nevertheless, for the pedestrian in the street (the actors on the stage) the buildings of the Venetian central core obscured direct vision of St. Titos, and the Venetian street alignment obscured direct access to this structure. Additionally, Venetian regulations concerning the public use of writing augmented and reinforced this marginalization. These regulations called for the effacement of the inscriptions in Greek on the exterior of St. Titos, and their replacement with writing in Latin.U Thus, although the denotative message of the words remained the same, the range of connotations associated with a specific alphabet, Greek script, were replaced by those of Latin. OTTOMANIZATION Ottomanization, the next layer in the archaeology of the Cretan urban areas, did not eradicate buildings. It did, however, dissolve the prominence and centering function of the Venetian public monumental core. Some of the structures forming the core continued to function in similar fashion: the governor's palace in Qandiye became the saray of the vezir; the loggia became the office of the defterdar (fig. 2a, 2b).t 2 But in the Ottoman system these structures lacked the formal qualities and the power persona of the office holder or resident to give them the place they had in the Venetian system.

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Thus, although the structures remained, and their functions were often similar, their imponance in the Ottoman system did not replicate that in the Venetian. Ottomanization, a palimpsest upon the Venetian urban fabric, aimed to legitimize the ruling elite. Within Ottoman rule, by the mid-seventeenth century the Sultan's power was being confined, while that of the vezir and Pll5a households increased. Patronage, which had been dominated by imperial generosity, was, by the mid-seventeenth century, balanced by the dispensatory abilities of the vezir and pasa households.P Of course, the effects of these power shifts were felt throughout the Ottoman empire, but these changes are highlighted in Crete because Ottornanization was taking place at that moment. The nature of mid-seventeenth century Ottoman hegemony was made clear on Crete through two different systems of legibility, which obliterated the central format indicative of Venetian hegemony. The external system that conveyed Ottoman domination was embodied in the siting of the Sultan's cami with its minaret. This represents a continuity of practice, despite major shifts in the power structure in the capital and in the provinces. The internal system was primarily embodied in the presence of many cami complexes throughout the city that served as centers within the urban fabric for the acculturation of Ottomans. The patronage of these institutions was indicative of the shifts in power in the empire; their number (in excess of what was initially required by the Muslim population) was indicative of their function of generating Ottoman ideology. The External System The external system which made clear that Crete was joined to the Ottoman empire was effected by the siting of the Sultan's cami. His cami was located in the most prominent topographic site, and thus with its minaret was the most visible structure to land and sea approaches to the island's cities. To all who approached, the Sultan's cami marked these cities as Muslim and signaled a ruling system in which hegemony rested with the Sultan and his entourage. That the choice for the siting of the Sultan's cami had to do with its external visibility to sea and land routes and not considerations of visibility or function within the cities is highlighted by comparing the circumstances of Qandiye and Retme. In both cities, the Sultan's cami is on the highest point, rendering it readily visible to the sea and land approaches. Yet, from the point of view of an actor-pedestrian in these two stages, only in Retme can the Sultan's cami be seen from almost all points within the city. The topographical differences between these two cities is what makes the Sultan's cami visible in Retrne and not in Qandiye. The hilly configuration of Qandiye renders the Sultan's cami visible only when the pedestrian directly approaches the area of the cami itself. In contrast, in Retme, the Sultan's cami is on the Fortezza,

Fig.2a Contemporary view of Sultan's cami in Retme taken from the city.

separate from the city and raised above it (figs. 2a, 2b) Thus, the inhabitants of the city, located in the commercial flat plain below the Fortezza, can readily see the cami. Yet, this topographical configuration that enables the population to see the cami, simultaneously makes it non-functional to the city's population by removing it from the central urban area. Moreover, the government practice of barracking the army in the Fortezza completely seals access to the cami. Such circumstances suggest how important maintaining the location of this tami was in creating the external image of Ottoman power. The siting of the Sultan's cami on Crete functioned as an icon of the earlier tradition: it represented to external view the place and function of the Sultan within the urban culture as it had been denoted in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. And yet, while this external position was retained on Crete, it denoted a different meaning in the mid-seventeenth century. A brief comparison with earlier Ottoman practices distinguishes the functional difference of the Ottoman Cretan practice. The prominent siting of the Sultan's cami that created an identifiable skyline was a practice of long standing with the Ottoman Sultans. It began in Bursa, the earliest Ottoman capital, where the Sultans' camis were situated so that they were prominently visible. It is exemplified most obviously in the final Ottoman capital, Istanbul. There, in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the major hills were chosen by successive Sultans as locales for the patronage of communal structures. This siting denoted structures that functioned as a major center of Ottoman culture within the city. In Bursa, and especially in fifteenth and sixteenth-century Istanbul, these endowments of the Sultan generally supported larger structures with more associated functions than any

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single other structure in the City.14 While the central formal element of these structures was a cami with its flanking minarets, the cami proper was only part of an elaborate complex called kalliye. In these complexes the traditional cami functions-e-congregational prayer, Friday sermon, Muslim education, as well as a locus of support for Muslim socio-cultural activities-were expanded and elaborated. These efforts made functions more diverse. New structures were needed then and additional personnel to staff them. This siting practice also connoted a whole range of ideological relationships in which the Sultan, as a major center of patronage that dispensed power, exercised extraordinary philanthropic generosity funded by a conquest economy. Certainly others within the ruling group (for example, the Timurtas family in Bursa),15 also supported foundations within the urban area. In fact, although the number of endowments within the city supported by members of the ruling group other than the Sultan was always greater than those supported by the Sultan himself, in the fifteenth and sixteenth century the Sultan's complex, situated so prominently, was arguably more costly and elaborate than any single other endowment. Thus maintaining the prominent siting of the Sultan's cami on Crete linked the external presentation of Ottoman power there with earlier architectural traditions that embodied primary functions and ideological realities specific to the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Yet, by the mid-seventeenth century, while the external sign was maintained, it no longer either denoted or connoted the earlier functions and relationships.

Fig.2b Contemporary view of Sultan's cami; original minaret is missing.

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In the mid-seventeenth century on Crete the prominently sited Sultans' camis did not denote complexes that served as the major centers within the cities, nor did they denote the exercise of extraordinary philanthropic generosity. In fact, as we shall see below, they did not always even denote the maintenance of a Muslim congregation. Instead, even though the sign of the Sultan's power was maintained, the largest congregations and the largest endowments were supported by the members of the vezir and p asa households. As if to emphasize this point, the size of the congregation supponed by the valif is a significant theme in Evliya Celebi's account of the Ottomanization of the Cretan cities. He notes, for instance, that Gazi Yusuf pasa the conqueror of the City,16 supponed the largest congregation in Hanya (the first city conquered by the Ottoman forces). In Retrne the largest congregations were supponed by the qapundan-! derya (Admiral of the Fleet) Deli Huseyin p~a, the Valide Sultan (Sultan Mother) Kosern Mahpeyker, and 'Ankebut Ahmed pasa, who later became the governor of the liva of Amasya.i? In Qandiye, the principal congregations were those of the Grand Vezir Kopruluzade Fazil Ahmed p~a (fig. 1) and the defterdar (chief finance officer) Ahmed pasa. The role of the Grand Vezir Kopruluzade Fazil Ahmed pasa as the major patron of the capital city, Qandiye, is indicative of his dominant power position in Istanbul in the second half of the seventeenth century. It was he who led the campaign that led to the capture of Qandiye and the capitulation of the island to the Ottomans. The change in the denotative function of the Sultan's cami is further emphasized by Evliya Celebi's detailed description of the Sultan's cami in 'Inadiye, a city built by the Ottomans for the siege of Candia.18 There the structure called "Sultan Ibrahim's cami" was the only cami within the city without a congregation. In fact, it did not function as a.cami, but rather as a storage depot for black powder.t? While this is not the only incident of the Ottoman's storing powder in mosques (e.g., the Panhenon Mosque, Athens and the Sukur Bey Mosque, Nigde), the point here is that the external sign of the Sultan's former power was tenaciously maintained, even while the denotative function had so radically altered. We could express this relationship another way by saying that the ideal or fictive relationships were maintained to external view, while the actual relationships were masked to that view. The connotative functions of the Sultan's cami likewise changed. The ideological relationships naturalized by the Sultan's camis on Crete were ones in which the position of the Sultan as head of state was maintained, but in which his power was shared by a ruling elite composed of the vezir and p~a households.s? The Sultan's former ability to dispense extraordinary philanthropies had been curtailed in the seventeenth century by a changed composition and configuration of the ruling elite. By the mid-seventeenth century most of the Sultans (Murad IV was an exception) were vinually puppets of the ruling elite who had a significant share of the wealth of the empire. In the mid-seventeenth century the major construction of the cami

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was sponsored by the vezirs and their associates not only on Crete, but throughout the Ottoman empire.s! Thus, by the mid-seventeenth century a redistribution of the resources of the empire had taken place and although others shared substantively in the wealth, the Sultan nonetheless endured and was not impoverished by these changes. Although the Sultan's camis on Crete conformed to the siting traditions established within the empire, they were not marked by the presence of multiple minarets that had indexed imperial patronage in some cities. 22 Rather, they uniformly had one minaret. This lack did not render their external legibility ambiguous. No Sultan's cami in the Ottoman provinces that today make up Yugoslavia, Rumania, Greece, and the Balkans was constructed with multiple minarets or received additional ones. 23 The relevant populations of the mid-seventeenth century would have readily understood the priorities of these visual signs. Those who were part of the Ottoman empire (Muslims, Christians, or Jews), as well as travelers from outside the system, could not have escaped the signs of Ottoman presence that dominated so much of the Mediterranean. Thus what becomes clear in analyzing the practice with regard to the Sultan's cami on Crete is that maintaining its prominent presence was the primary external indicator in visually linking this newly acquired territory to the rest of the Ottoman ernpire.P We could question why it was so important to hold so tenaciously to this external image when the internal relationships had so changed, but that is an inquiry for another study. Nonetheless, the fact that the siting was maintained also had an effect on the inherited city fabric, In terms of the urban fabric on Crete, the siting of the Sultan's cami helped to obliterate the function of the Venetian central core. It affected this shift by not consistently privileging the site of the San Marco Basilica with its Piazza. In the capital city, Qandiye, the most prominent topographical spot was not that occupied by the Venetian San Marco church, but rather the one occupied by the Franciscan monastery church, St. Francis. The Franciscan church thus became the Sultan's cami (figs. 1 and 3). In Retrne, however, it was the San Marco Basilica that became the Sultan's cami, because the San Marco was in the prominent place in the original settlement of the elevated Fortezza (fig. 2b). Thus, the requirements of the Ottoman system of external signs, at variance with the inherited Venetian system, effectively changed the relationships between areas within the city, and reinforced new, seventeenthcentury Ottoman ones. The Internal System The internal system of legibility that proclaimed Ottoman Muslim hegemony to the urban populations was a palimpsest on the entire Venetian urban fabric, In some instances Ottoman construction even augmented the area covered by the Venetians. Ottornanization replaced the centralized

Fig. J View of the Sultan's cam; in Qandiye, taken e. 1900. Gerola.

Venetian core with a series of neighborhood centers at the heart of which was a cami complex. These were not the only structures and institutions that Ottomanized the urban setting. Evliya Celebi's account of the conquest records the Ottomanization process of the island in the mescids, hadith colleges, tekkes, sebils, cemeteries, and fountains that he specifically enumerates as transforming the cities from "infidel" to Ottoman. Yet while he counts all of these other structures/institutions, he records specific details only about the cami. In his account it is the cami, as well as its patron, location, and size of its congregation, that affects most significantly the dynamic process of Ottomanization. That Evliya Celebi stresses the role of the cami institution in the internal transformation of the city (as does this study) underscores the centrality of this institution in providing the conduit for acculturation into the Ottoman world. And, for the focus of this study, it was the institutional complex that, by the mid-seventeenth century, displayed the most formally developed visual indices. Thus it was this institutional complex, of all of those within the Ottoman system, that had the most potential for palpably changing the stage set of the Cretan cities. The institution of the cami (in contrast to that of the meSlid) is important because of the way it supports and sustains Muslim life and Ottoman culture--as a locus for Muslims to fulfill the requirement for communal prayer, as the initial institution for childhood instruction (supporting teachers specifically for this purpose), and as the place of the

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Friday sermon, an on-going guide to Muslim living for adults.25 It is through this institution that Muslims who came to Crete with the Ottoman forces, those who were soon to be resettled there, and converts from the local populations were acculturated into the Ottoman Muslim system. Immediately upon the Ottoman conquest, camis were established in each of the cities. In all three cities, but especially in Retme and Qandiye, which were the more important Ottoman cities, the system of distribution of camis was similar in terms of relative siting of the camis, visual elements of the structures, congregations, and patronage. In most instances in each of the cities Latin-Christian churches (both monastery churches and parochial churches) were converted into cami complexes. It was expedient to do so: these structures were numerous, and, being the structures of the previously dominant ruling group, the Ottoman's wanted to supplant them. In many cases the Roman Catholics who used these structures had left the cities. In Qandiye, in contrast to Retme and Hanya, almost all of the Venetian LatinChristian population had left the city with the Ottoman conquest. The Latin churches there provided empty stage sets for the Ottoman actors. Such a practice of appropriation, of course, echoes the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople, and beyond that, the conquest practices of many groups throughout history.26 The patterning of the initial new cami construction in each city was limited

Fig. 4 Contemporary view of cami ofKil~iik Hasan

p~a.

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Irene A. Bierman

to two caregories.s? the replacement of a structure on a desired site that had been damaged by siege, such as the San Marco Basilica on the Fortezza in Retrne, which became the Sultan's 'ami; or the establishment of a 'ami on a city threshold site not privileged by the Venetians, such as that of Kncuk Hasan pasa 'ami on the waterfront in Khania (fig. 4),28 or the Valide Sultan's 'ami by the Tekke Qapusi in Retme. This study has so far discovered only one instance where a Greek Orthodox cathedral was converted into a 'ami. 29 However, when the grand Vezir Kopruluzade Fazil Ahmed p~a converted the basilica of St. Titus, the patron saint of the island, into his 'ami, he effectively removed all visual traces of Greek Orthodoxy from the urban areas.3D And, when this cathedral was converted into a 'ami, the street patteming of the Venetian piazza system was altered to allow pedestrians direct access and vision to this 'ami of the Grand Vezir. The population center of the capital city was thus dominated by the grand Vezir's 'ami along with that of the deJterdar Ahmed p~a whose cami was the converted San Marco Basilica (figs. 1 and 5). The architectonic evidence of the pattern of placement of the new constructions as well as the transformed structures suggests a strategic orchestration so that these structures would communicate Ottoman Muslim power and presence to citizens coming into and out of the cities as well as those who moved through them. That these structures were initially (immediately post conquest) more important sociologically and ideologically than for their primary functions is indicated by the number of 'amis which far exceeded the initial needs of the Muslims. Evliya Celebi's record alluded to their connotative function when he remarked that in Haniye and Retrne almost the entire Muslim population was served by three ,amis, and yet at least double that number were initially established in each city.31 These extra ,amis, especially in the empty city of Qandiye, presumably were established for generated congregations: those moved to the island by the Ottoman policy of resettlement (mainly Egyptians, Anatolian Turks, and Albanians) and conversions from the local populations.x Ottoman patronage on Crete was present in the structures and institutions sponsored by the members of the socio-political groups that were specific to the mid-seventeenth century. Thus the Ottoman presence on Crete was different from, for example, that of the Ottoman area now called Yugoslavia, which was conquered substantially earlier. Initial building and the support of institutions on Crete (,amis as well as all other Ottomanizing structures) were sponsored by the Sultan, the Valide Sultan,33 and the conqueror of each city whose position varied, although the Grand Vezir Kopraluzade Fazil Ahmed Pasa undertook the successful siege of Candia.>' In addition, the a1a of the yeniferis and the commander of the segban corps of the yeniteris invariably sponsored 'amis. Others also sponsored structures, although their rank was more variable. Only a few of these patrons had been members of the devsirme. Most of them rose in rank in the government by alternate means. 35

Fig. 5 Cami of defterdar Ahmad Pasa, taken c. 1900. Gerola.

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Irene A. Bierman

The defterdar Ahmed pasa, for example, whose cami was the converted San Marco Basilica in Qandiye, started his career in the circle of Civizade Mehmed Efendi. 36 Deli Huseyin pasa, the conqueror of Retme, was from Yenisehir in Anatolia.P According to Evliya Celebi, those patrons financed their structures and institutions by vakfs based largely on local land holdings. This method of financing was the norm within the empire. Usually money was sent for endowments only to Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem. In assessing the Ottomanization process on Crete, it must be remembered that the long conquest process seriously depleted both Ottoman and Cretan finances as well as manpower. Looking back to that moment, Crete stands as the major last Ottoman conquest. And, although that would not have been clear to them then, the devastation of the long conquest was a financial and manpower reality that must be reckoned with in the transformation of the Cretan cities. The Ottoman practice of transformation on Crete offers us a special opportunity to isolate the significative architectural units which unambiguously communicated Ottomanization to the urban inhabitants. Given that the majority of camis were transformed churches, Ottomanization had to involve the pursuance of a policy aimed at creating a semiotic visual environment of Ottoman hegemony that repeated in condensed form selective expressive features from an already established system. That little alteration was necessary to make Latin-Christian churches appropriate for Muslim use suggests how clearly these significative units distinguished Ottoman from "infidel," to use Evliya Celebi's word The qibla on Crete is southeast and Latin-Christian churches are oriented east-west, thus only slight interior changes were necessary for Muslim use. More relevant to our purposes here, the facade of the structure as built could thus remain the facade of the Ottoman cami. How then was Ottomanization communicated to the urban populations? Archival and architectural evidence suggests that three main additions to the exterior of the cami were sufficient expressive elements to convey the transformation from Christian function to Muslim function: the addition of an Ottoman shaped minaret; a chronogram plaque and a graveyard associated with the cami. The most highly visible significative unit was the minaret, which on Crete, as usual in Ottoman construction, was placed to the right of the facade of the cami/church. This placement was also the usual location of the bell tower associated with most of the Latin churches. In all of the instances that this study can now reconstruct, the square bell tower was torn down and replaced with a round tower with a conical top, even though the Latin bell towers could have served the same purpose as the minaret (fig. 3). How essential this total replacement of the form of the tower was for an unambiguous recognition of the tower as a minaret, and thus as an index of a cami, and not as a bell tower and thus as an index of a church, is underscored by what had

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been Ottoman practice in newly conquered Muslim areas. In the eastern Mediterranean where some minarets from previous Muslim rule had been square, the Ottomans merely capped the square towers with the conical tops that communicated Ottoman Islarn. 38 But on Crete, a mere capping of an existing square bell tower did not create sufficient context for the real utility of the tower to be communicated. The power of this significative unit is seen from the actions of the deOttomanizing process that came with Cretan Independence in 1898. Bells were not added to the top of the round Ottoman minarets, rather the whole round tower was torn down, and a square bell tower was constructed, The second significative unit-the chronogram plaque-not only marked each cami, but at the same time linked it to all other Ottoman foundations throughout the city. Each cami (transformed church or newly built) displayed a foundation chronogram in a location on the structure conspicuous to the urban pedestrian. These plaques presented lines of Ottoman poetry contained in separate frames. The poetry indicated the name of the patron, his/her rank, and in a chronogramatic last line, offered the date of the endowment. If these foundation chronograms on camis were the only ones displayed within the urban area their function as indices of Ottomanization would have been circumscribed But such chronograrns marked Ottoman foundations (sebiIs, or fountains, medreses, tekkes, kiUiiphanes) throughout the cities, indexing in their presence and their content, significant shifts in the urban order that were intrinsic to the new rule.39 It cannot be suggested that everyone passing these plaques understood from the chronograrn content the nuances of Ottoman society (although that undoubtedly happened to some in time who became part of the Ottoman state), but that the distinctive form of the inscription denoted the institutionalization of the personified and personalized Ottoman hegemony. Those who used the cami institution (or the others within the city) knew through whom the benefits had come. And often patrons sponsored several institutions. In Hanya, for example, immediately after the conquest of the city, Mahmud Ala, the segban bQ5i, sponsored not only a cami on the harbor shore, but also the largest fountain in the city with the chronogram: Blessings of God, the segban bqi, the praised ata, o(ata_i Mahmutl) may the all-loving God make his end praised (mahmutl) 'Ali composed this beautiful chronogram for the completion of the fountain: "0 All-Wealthy God" is added up with two missing year 1073~4o

These chronograrn plaques served to connote that old structures were serving new institutional functions that fostered Ottoman Islamic hegemony, for example camis, tekkes, and mescids that were converted structures, It linked them with newly built Ottoman consttuctions. On another level, however, these plaques served as symbols of significant shifts in the urban organization that were intrinsic to the new order. Such is the case with the fountains and sebilhanes, for with Ottomanization the delivery of water to the urban areas

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was supported by vakfs donated by prominent members of the state. In the Venetian period these water sources were maintained by the central government. And, finally, the last significative unit that indicated a 'ami institution, and thus in part, an Ottoman city, was the cemetery. Continuing traditional Ottoman practice, the 'ami complex contained a cemetery for the Muslim notables, usually located outside, alongside of the 'ami structure. Tombstone styles were typically Ottoman, that is, the head gear indicating the rank of the deceased person was carved onto the top of the tombstone (fig. 6).41 All those Muslims and non-Muslims who passed by the 'ami structures would be reminded of the specific official stratification of Ottoman society by the distinguishing head gear on the tombstones. The presence of these graveyards must have been initially very startling to the inhabitants of the cities, not only because of the difference in the tombstone practices, but because the siting of the cemeteries was in contrast to the Venetian Latin-Christian and Greek Orthodox practice. Before the Ottoman conquest the graveyards in the cities had been located just inside the land walls, but separated from the population center. 42 Venetian Lords of significant status were buried under the floor of the San Marco Basilica in Qandiye. Since the 'ami structures were strategically dispersed throughout each city, the contiguous graveyards were ubiquitous indicators of continuing Ottoman presence and the changes brought about by the new power.O The effectiveness of these cemeteries as indexes of Muslim presence can be assessed by the actions of the Cretans in gaining their Independence when they removed all of the tombstones from their locations throughout the city. In this short study I have concentrated on a number of distinctive and expressive features of Ottoman hegemony on Crete. My focus has been on those elements that were externally visible to those who approached the cities by land and sea routes and those elements that were internally visible to the pedestrian-actor who walked the Cretan cities. The time frame for analysis has been set at the immediate post-conquest period, a synchronic slice that enables concrete examples of the practices of the military, social, and political power of the Ottoman Empire to be isolated, thus showing the similarities to and distinctions from Ottoman practices in other provinces and at other times. Such a focus necessarily passes over many other kinds of expressive features that are part of the whole visual system, for example the interiors of buildings. It also minimalizes the rich complexity of the visual panorama of signs that were part of the Ottornanization process, such as the way distinctive Venetian material was reused in Ottoman buildings. Although the larger study of which this essay is a part is in its initial stages, enough has emerged to date to indicate that a more thorough knowledge of the Ottoman practice during the seventeenth century must be tied to an increased understanding of the architectonic and semiotic facets of power.

Fig. 6 Ottoman tombstones in the Historical museum. Heraklion.

NOTES 1. This paper is based on preliminary data from a larger on-going project on the Ottomanization of Crete that I co-direct with Donald Preziosi. We are grateful to the Academie Senate, UCLA, the UCLA Art Council, and to the Research Foundation of SUNY-Binghamton for important initial funding. Edward Mitchell, my research assistant for this project, is responsible for the Ottoman translations used in this paper, as well as other significant research help. Donald Preziosi is responsible for all translations from Greek. We have gratefully received advice and help from a number of people: Rifa'at Abou-El-Haj, Oktay Aslanapa, Nurhan Atasoy, Jere Bacharach, Judah Bierman, Howard Crane, Pierre MacKay, Theo MacKay, Baha Talman, and Speros Vryonis. Preliminary findings from this study concerning the above-ground archaeology have been published: Irene A. Bierman and Donald Preziosi, "Re-reading an Urban Text: The Ottornanization of Cretan Cities," in Semiotics 1983, eds. John Deely and Margot Lenhardt (New York: Plenum, 1985) and Donald Preziosi, "The Ottomanization of Cretan Cities," in Historual Archaeology. ed. Charles Redman (New York: SUNY Press, 1986). 2. Evliya A few years later the governor Abu Musa al-Ash'ari rebuilt the mosque and dar al"imara with sun-dried bricks, a more substantial material. The exact location of the administrative center in relation to the mosque is unknown. The story of the mosque-administrative complex at Kufa is of greater

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interest for this study. In 630, the governor Sad ibn al-Waqqas built a mosque, and on the qibla side erected a dar al-"imara, which included the treasury (bayt aI-mal). The two locales were separated by a narrow street. According to the Arab sources, thieves broke into the treasury and the Caliph Umar (634-644) ordered that the daral-'imara be built adjacent to the mosque so that there would always be people around to safeguard the treasury. A Persian, Ruzbih ibn Buzurgmihr ibn Sasan, is credited with rebuilding the mosque and dar al-. 'imara with more substantial materials.t For this study the critical development in Kufa was the placement of the dar al-'imara on the qibla, creating an organic linkage between the two. Muslims were defining a spatial relationship between two key buildings whose architectural elements were not related. Moreover, the linking of these two types of building was to spread to places thousands of miles distant, for another two centuries. These new rulers, overwhelmingly Muslim Arab, represented a small portion of the population in these urban centers, not simply because they were a ruling elite but because the majority of the residents was initially not Muslim and, often, not Arab. There were obvious needs for a mosque as well as some sort of administrative center within the urban environment. Placing the two buildings within close proximity to one another made sense, since both served the needs of the new elite, their military, and the small but growing number of Muslim converts in the amsar. These religious and political needs did not in themselves dictate a physical or organic relationship between the two principal edifices. The dar al-'imara could have been on anyone of three sides of the mosque and it would have been possible for members of the congregation to be close to the treasury and hear thieves as related in the preceding story, if they were at the qibla end of the mosque. Rulers could enter near or at the qibla side of the mosque from three sidesand still be separated by a barrier from the rest of the congregation if such a form of protection was deemed necessary. We will never know why the dar al-'imara was set on the qibla side of the mosque, but the explanation is certainly more complex than the commonly accepted reasons-that is, the need to protect a possible treasury in the dar, or the ruler's need to slip easily into the front of a prayer area from the dar. When a Believer prayed toward Mecca, the prayer was directed at God but with the close proximity of the dar al-'imara on the qibla side, did the prayer also "travel" through the official residence of the Muslim ruler? Did the physical connection or close proximity of the place of "secular" rule and the house of prayer along the most important wall symbolize the dual responsibilities of these early Muslim rulers? Something was deemed important about this relationship, because it would appear again and again. In chronological terms the next major development took place in Damascus during the governorship of Mu'awiya, in the reign of the Caliph Uthman (644-656). According to the Muslim texts, Mu'awiya used the eastern half of the main cathedral, the ancient Roman temple or temenos, as a

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mosque, while the Christians retained the other half. The governor built a residence, a dar al-'imara, of burnt bricks on the south side of the mosque and connected with it, allowing him to enter through a door into a protective chamber or maqsura. The residence or administrative building had a dome which was known as the Green Dome (al-qubbat al-khadra). A contemporary Greek visitor who, upon seeing Mu'awiya's dar al-'imara, is said to have remarked, (The upper part will do for birds and the lower for rats.)5 Even allowing for the biases of the source who would have known many impressive Byzantine churches, this description does not leave the reader with the sense that the Umayyad dar was an impressive building. The memory of that residence and its so-called Green Dome was still alive in the fourteenth century when the great Muslim traveler Ibn Battuta visited Damascus. He noted that on the south side of the Umayyad mosque there once had stood the residence of Mu'awiya along with those of his principal supporters, and it was called al-khadra or "The Green". According to Ibn Battuta, the 'Abbasids after 750 destroyed it, and in his day the area was used as a market.s Under the Umayyad Caliph al-Walid (705-715), the Muslims took over the whole temenos area and constructed a major mosque. But, there is no evidence that the dar al-'imara was radically changed The physical connection between the primary center of religious activity and that of a building associated with administrative activities continued, but this spatial relationship did not have any axial or mathematical quality based on geometric ratios. In the Mediterranean Islamic orbit a physical tie was retained between the two locales but without any elaboration into more complex patterns. After Mu'awiya became Caliph (661-680) he appointed Ziyad ibn Abihi to a number of governorships. The building projects of Ziyad, as noted by Michael Morony, mark a turning point in the introduction of the architectural forms of authoritarian rule among Muslims in Iraq a tum toward Sassanian precedents." Ziyad's first major governorship was under the Caliph 'Ali (656-661), in Istakhr (659-662), where he developed a reputation for the severe imposition of law and order. He also reorganized the social system of the city, implemented agricultural improvements, and built a mosque.s We can identify one other critical development using the drawings of Donald Whitcomb. 9 The mosque was not built in the old Sassanian center but in a new area. The primary purpose appears to have been to separate the new ruling elite of Arab Muslims from the bulk of the population, who were neither Arab nor Muslim. This is consistent with Muslim policy in many other urban areas. In Whitcomb's drawings there is the outline of a building attached to the qibla side of Ziyad's mosque, which could have been the dar al-'imara. At some unknown date this building on the qibla side was rebuilt with a new orientation for the qibla direction. Although Whitcomb does not give dimensions for the original buildings, using a simple scale the following ratios can be established The width of the dar is twice that of the mosque while the

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depth of both is the same. There is also an axial arrangement such that if a line were drawn perpendicular to the qibla wall, it would bisect both the mosque and dar. Unlike the developments in Damascus and Kufa mentioned above, there are clear physical and geometric relations between the two key buildings of this early Islamic center. The dar al-'imara and the mosque are connected and not separated by a street. Therefore the qibla wall is part of the dar al-'imara and the prayers of the believer come into contact with the (secular) building. By creating an administrative unit twice the size of the house of worship and along an axial line so that the dar would always extend beyond the mosque along the qibla wall, the governing authority was making a visual statement about the relative importance of the two buildings and, perhaps, the interdependency of their functions. These geometric relationships may have drawn on Sassanian models or ideals, but what is more important is that they were carried by Ziyad to Iraq, where he served as governor. From there the model went to Wasit, probably Marv, and eventually Baghdad Therefore the layout developed in Istakhr represents a significant variation to the physical arrangement that had emerged earlier in Iraq and Syria. In 665 Ziyad ibn Abihi became governor of Basra, and a number of changes in the architecture of the existing buildings were undertaken, which had a profound impact on the architectural and artistic history of the mosque. These changes included copying the use of a maqsura from Mu'awiya's mosque in Damascus, moving the minbar to the south side of the center axis or future mihrab, and cutting a door from the maqsura to the governor's palace (dar al-'imara) , which was built along the qibla wall. The mosque and dar were rebuilt of more substantial material, and finally the whole area was enclosed by a formidable barrier with an impressive gate. Although excavations have not brought to light specific data, I would suggest that the axial plan found in Istakhr may have been repeated in Basra since Ziyad served as governor in both places. The evidence for developments in Kufa is slightly more extensive. In 670 Ziyad rebuilt the Friday mosque and the governor's administrative center, which was attached to the qibla side of the mosque, The axial plan was retained and, although I have not been able to find statistical data, I anticipate finding a simple ratio between the dimensions of the two buildings consistent with the work he ordered elsewhere, and which would be found in later administrative centers in Iraq. The culmination of the Istakhr pattern in Umayyad Iraq was the building, circa 702, by the governor al-Hajjaj of a mosque-dar al-'imara complex in Wasit, his new administrative center. Not only was the axial pattern retained for the connected mosque and administrative center, but the sides of the two buildings were two hundred and four hundred cubits respectively, the same 2 to 1 ratio found forty years earlier.i? The dar al-'imara built by al-Hajjaj was known as the Green Dome or al-qubbat al-khadra. The tie to Mu'awiya's

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administrative center is immediately obvious and, although there is scholarly debate about both the color and the meaning of this dome and its successors, there is little doubt that it was a sign of imperial rule even if its specific symbolism is unclear.t! The new combination of mosque-palace-green dome was used in other cities culminating in the greatest imperial center of them all, Madinat alSalam, the City of Peace or the 'Abbasid Caliph al-Mansur's Round City built in 766. The architectural complex did not suddenly appear in Baghdad after a hiatus of over sixty years, a period following the construction of such a model in Wasit. It was used in at least two locations before the founding of this new 'Abbasid city. The Umayyad Caliph Hisham (724-743) made Rusafa in Syria his administrative capital, and built a palace known as al-qubbat alkhadra. 12 In Marv sometime in the early 750s the leader of the 'Abbasid Revolution, Abu Muslim, built a domed chamber which was attached to the mosque.P This dome could have evoked for its viewers the possible themes of celestial associations and the identification with power in general, if not Sassanian power in particular.i! It is also important to remember that domes aid in the visibility of an edifice. Even when walls exist, a dome rising above them can be an external locator or sign indicating where the principal mosque and governmental center are located. The most famous "green" dome (in fact, a mosque-dar al-'imara complex) was built by the 'Abbasid Caliph ai-Mansur in his "City of Peace," Baghdad.i! There is a direct link between the elements that went into this imperial center and the Umayyad centers. First, the arrangement of a circular wall was new, although the concept of this type of fortification was not. Second, the central plaza was dominated by a large complex known as the Gold Palace (al-qasr al-dhahab) or the Green Dome (al-qubbah al-khadra) , because of the dome that capped the palace. Third, the palace and the mosque were arranged so that the administrative center was on the qibla side of the religious building although there was room to create any type of physical arrangement desired. Moreover, in light of the fortified quality of the walls of the Round City, security for the Caliph could not have been of primary concern for this organic tie between the mosque and the palace (or dar). Fourth, the two units were arranged along a central axis. Finally, the complex repeated the ratios for the two buildings found in Wasit, demonstrating further that there was a direct link between the complexes. The 'Abbasid Caliph al-Mansur built a number of other buildings outside the Round City. On the east side of the Tigris a new imperial complex was built in al-Rusafa. It was completed in 776 and was used by the Caliph alMahdi (775-785). The area enclosed by protective walls and a moat included as its primary buildings a palace-mosque combination, which followed an axial plan. The palace on the qibla side of the mosque was even larger than the buildings in the Round City, and appears to be based on a 2 to 1 ratio of the widths and central axis. It probably had a large dome over the palace.ls There

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was no other major mosque in this area when the palace complex was built. Thus all the elements ofan almost century-old tradition were retained. AI-Rusafa was not the first site AI-Mansur chose on which to build a new mosque-palace combination after completing the Round City. He intended to build for his son, the future al-Mahdi, a palace-mosque combination in the area of al-Kharkh; but, because of the large Muslim population in al-Kharkh, he set the royal residence elsewhere. Only a mosque, which was called alSharqiyah, was built in al-Kharkh.t? In about 796, Harun aI-Rashid (786-809) chose Raqqa as his chief residence, where he was planning to create a whole series of buildings. It is reported that this 'Abbasid caliph built a palace in Raqqa with a green dome, but no trace beyond the literary memory remains.ts With the move of the 'Abbasids to Sarnarra in 836, no new governmental complexes were built which retained the pattern of mosque with palace on the qibla side, with or without a green dome. In summary, my argument has been that a concept of a physical relationship between an administrative center and the primary place of prayer for the urban elite was created in Umayyad Iraq. Under the impact of Ziyad the plan of this complex became more sophisticated and an axial relationship as well as a geometric one was established between the two units. Walls were added to separate the elite using this area from the mass of the populace. With al-Hajjai who "revived" or "created" a so-called Green Dome, the populace beyond the walls had a visual sign of the locale of power even if they could not "read" its full symbolism or see the actual structure. The 'Abbasid monuments were part of this tradition, and were not a radically new development. The post-Harun al-Rashid world rejected these spatial arrangements for their centers of government. The green dome, the axial arrangement of mosque and palace, the geometric ratios, the placing of the palace against the qibla wall, were design features with no subsequent history. Having carried the story to mid-ninth century Iraq, it is necessary to return to the early eighth century and DaITL1Scus in order to trace the type of urban and architectural developments that took place in the Mediterranean basin. The earlier argument was that Mu'awiya had established a pattern by connecting the dar al-'imara with the principal masjid on the qibla side. When al-Walid (705-715) undertook his building program in Damascus this concept of a physical tie between the two buildings with the administrative center placed on the qibla side of the mosque was retained. Excavations in Jerusalem in the late 19605 along the southern wall of the Haram aI-Sharif uncovered another example of the mosque-palace pattern. When modern administrative buildings were demolished, and a few feet of surface dirt removed, the outlines of a whole series of buildings associated with the Umayyad era emerged. The most important of them, the dar al-'imara, was just to the south of alAqsa mosque, that is, on the qibla side of it, and separated from the Herodian

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wall by a narrow street.t? The Umayyad Caliph al-Walid had work done on al-Aqsa mosque and the building complexes, particularly the dar al-'imara, which was connected by a bridge to al-Aqsa on the Hararn al-Sharif The archaeological work confirmed data in the Aphrodito papyri from Egypt, which refer to craftsmen going from Egypt to work on the mosque and palace.20 In 747 Jerusalem suffered terrible damage from an earthquake, and this event can serve as the terminal date for the use of the administrative structures. There is no evidence of an axial relationship between the two buildings nor an obvious ratio in their respective sizes. However, the critical element for this study is that the dar al-'imara and mosque were connected, and that the former was on the qibla side, indicating the continuation of a physical relationship between the two. Clearly, the relationship between these two important buildings in early Islamic centers can be traced back in Greater Syria to the actions ofMu'awiya even before he became Caliph. Another example from the reign of al-Walid can be found in the small town of 'Anjar, originally 'Ain al-jarr, which is located in the Biqa Valley. Inscriptions and the Aphrodito papyri permit a dating of the site to 714 or 715. 21 While excavation data has not permitted the identification of the specific function of the buildings other than the mosque, it is generally held that the building on the qibla side of the mosque was the dar aI-'imara. 22 It is even tempting to see the same pattern of administrative center-mosque in the outline ofKhirbat al-Mafjar, near Jericho. As Muslims established their rule in North Africa beginning in Egypt, the architectural combination of the dar al-'imara connected to the main mosque was repeated, for example, in the history of administrative centers in the area of modern Cairo up to the Patirnid conquest in 969. Unfortunately, the textual sources do not make clear where the first administrative center was after Amr ibn al-'As conquered the area in 641 and established the first mosque. In 686 the governor 'Abd al-'Aziz built a large building west of the mosque of Amr, known as the Gilded House or dar al-Mudhahhaba, but nothing else is known. Furthermore, 'Abd al-'Aziz is said to have set up a new capital in Helwan for which there is no other inforrnation.st The 'Abbasid conquest of Egypt in 751 was followed by the construction of a new administrative site, north of al-Fustat, called al-'Askar (The Cantonment). To quote Janet Abu-Lughod,"A prototype ofa princely town, al-'Ashr was planned as a permanent settlement whose core was the official residence, the dar al-'imam, together with the central mosque around which the markets were concentrared.P' The fifteenth-century historian al-Maqrizi makes it clear that the dar aI-'imara was attached to the mosque on the qibla side.2 5 'Abbasid administrators built palaces elsewhere and it is very possible that the real center of government moved from the dar al-"imara, but the idea that there was to be a building called a dar al-'imara connected to the primary mosque on its qibla side was retained from earlier periods. Although Ahmad ibn Tulun (868-884), founder of the Tulunid dynasty in

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868, came from Samarra in Iraq, he adopted local customs when it came to constructing his most important buildings. His new governmental site, called al-Qata'i (the Wards), was north of AI-'Askar. Ibn Tulun built a mosque, and on its qibla side, a dar al-'imara. 26 In addition Ibn Tulun, as so many of his predecessors, built other palaces, parade grounds, parks, and so on. The mosque-palace combination was also carried westward and could be found in Qairawan, Tunisia, and Cordova, Spain-with the significant variation that in the latter case the administrative center was not on the qibla side of the mosque but to the west, across a narrow street.27 The river was on the qibla side, which might explain the unusual siting of the dar al-'imara; in theory, though, the mosque could have been set farther back, permitting room for a dar. Another possible explanation is that the memory of the original model or its symbolism had become so weak that only the connection between the mosque and dar was retained, rather than any specific pattern for that connection. These early mosques were hypostyle in form, and the dar al-'imara had a central courtyard-features common to virtually every major Muslim building in the Mediterranean basin during the first three centuries of Islam. Fortified walls around the complex, elegant or elaborate gates, impressive or colored domes-none of these were present in the preceding examples, and thus they were not required as parts of the architectural vocabulary when new centers of Muslim political power were being created However, we must remember that none of these urban settings were centers of imperial rule, but only provincial administrative capitals. The architectural vocabulary that was appropriate for Damascus and Baghdad may not have been felt necessary or appropriate in the more Western lands. Moreover, with the exception of Damascus, all the examples of a mosque-dar al-'imara combination with set ratios, axial plans and even green domes, were located in lands that had been part of the Sassanian empire and its architectural legacy; the Mediterranean basin sites, however, were in the late Roman world, primarily in its Byzantine form. With minor exceptions, none of the building complexes discussed above were in cities that had pre-Islamic citadels. For only relatively brief periods 'were these fortified locales used as the site for the new Muslim centers of power. 28 The overwhelming pattern of this first period is that the government centers were located on the same geographic plane as the rest of the city. The mosque-palace tie grew out of geopolitical necessity: the first Muslims ruled these lands as a small minority dependent on their troops against a rural and urban population that was almost overwhelmingly non-Muslim. The mosque and dar al- "imara had to be near one another to meet local administrative needs, increase the sense of security and solidarity for the ruler and his fellow Muslims, and establish a palpable sign of Muslim presence. The only architectural combination of units which developed in these Western lands was the placing of the administrative center on the qibla side of the mosque. What did not emerge was a set of complex architectural

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relations-axial plans, set ratios between units, green domes-as they had in the more Eastern lands. The second period is associated with the growth of an urban Muslim population whose religious, educational, and social needs were being met by the main urban mosques. There was also the creation of a clearer sense of an Islamic way of life, which was guided by the ulama and not the political leadership. Thus the necessity that had held the earliest Muslim rulers to the center of the urban areas was no longer salient. The new pattern was one of administrative centers, or rather, palace complexes that included mosques and administrative buildings, away from the existing population. As in the first period, these Muslim rulers did not use the older citadels (where they existed), nor did they construct new ones. The earliest example for the new loci of political power comes from 'Abbasid Iraq in the ninth century, but it did not set a general pattern. Developments in North Africa in the tenth century may have been more important as a model. Sarnarra, built by the 'Abbasid caliphs, is the best ninth- century example of the new type of Muslim building activities on a grand scale. The mosques and palaces were larger and more elaborate than earlier edifices in the 'Abbasid capital of Baghdad. For most scholars Sarnarra is associated with the 'Abbasid caliphs' goal to protect themselves and their new Mamluk troops from the civilian population of Baghdad. The architectural elements in Sarnarra do not retain the spatial relations characteristic of earlier governmental centers. The older signs of sovereignty are absent. The scale of the building activities reflect power and wealth, if not conspicuous consumption, but there is no organic relationship between them. Unlike other scholars, I attribute the break between Samarra and earlier building activities to the loss of the previous architectural vocabulary oflinking the two key buildings. The earlier sign system has disappeared; consequently, the symbolic value of these structures must have changed.s? Although Sarnarra constituted a break from the earlier pattern of the mosque-dar aI-'imara pattern, it was not immediately copied. Ahmad ibn Tulun, whose building activities in Egypt were mentioned above, had grown up in Samarra, but when ruling in al-Fustat he followed the local tradition and linked his new mosque and dar. The Fatimid city of al-Qahira, built after jawhar conquered Egypt in 969, was located north of Ibn Tulun's al-Qata'i; it included two large palaces and a mosque (al-Azhar) to serve the court and their supporters, and many smaller buildings and an outer wall. The spectacular walls that eventually surrounded al-Qahira date to more than a century later. Although al-Qahira was an imperial center, the architectural values of the tenth century were not the same as those of eighth-century Baghdad. This new capital did not have its palace on the qibla side of al-Azhar, there were not geometrical or axial relations between the two principal buildings, and no green dome. The whole complex of buildings was elegant in its own right, but it was separated from the bulk of the urban population and thus unseen by them. Even the

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original walls would not been seen by the majority of the urban dwellers of the older Muslim settlements, because they lived a significant distance to the south. Paula Sanders has suggested that the (spiritual topography) of the Fatimid caliph as imam found its way into the actual topography of the administrative centers-palace complexes built by the Shi'ite rulers.w The complexes planned at al-Mahdiyya, al-Mansuriyya, and eventually at al-Qahira, reflect the religious and cosmic values of the Fatimids-inc1uding a different role for the palaces and the associated mosque.t! Without accepting the politicoreligious value system associated with Fatimid claims to the imamate, rulers from Spain to Afghanistan adopted a similar model for the locale of their political rule. In Spain, in 945, the Umayyad ruler Abd al-Rahman III moved his residential and administrative center from Cordova to Medina al-Zahra, where it remained until 981.32 There were numerous buildings. the largest and best preserved of which is called Salon Rico. The mosque, a very modest building, is to the south of Salon Rico. Medina al-Zahra had a defensive wall. This complex can be considered as standing on the same plane as Cordova. but was so physically separate from it that only those serving the court from among the urban population would have any sense of its location, let alone its architectural features. Further to the east, Aleppo is a very interesting case, because it has one of the oldest and most impressive citadels of any Middle-Eastern city. However, the citadel was rarely used as a governmental center by Muslims before the eleventh century. In 715, when the Umayyads built their central mosque, it was not in the citadel. There is no evidence that the Umayyads or 'Abbasids placed their governors in buildings in the citadel: more likely they were in a dar al-'imara in the city. But Aleppo also offers another example of the pattern wherein the rulers separated their new government complex from their subjects by locating it outside the urban center, thereby relying on horizontal distance rather than vertical distance (as in a citadel). The famous Hamdanid ruler, Sayf al-Dawlah (945-967) built an extensive residential palace complex outside the existing city and away from the Muslim urban masses, which was totally destroyed in 962 when the Byzantine emperor Nicephorus Phocus sacked Aleppo. However, the citadel, which was in poor condition, housed a force of Dailamite troops: they held out against the invading Byzantine army until the Christian emperor and his troops left after a week of looting and pillaging.33 Sayf al-Dawlah had fled before the invading Christian army and had not used the citadel as a place of refuge nor as his seat of government. His building activities reflect a pattern found in many other Muslim lands in the tenth and eleventh centuries.>' For the scholar seeking data on where Muslim rulers placed their government in urban centers, the history of Antioch on the eve of the Crusader capture in 1097-1098 offers interesting evidence.f The Turkish

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ruler Yaghi-Siyan lived in a palace within the former Byzantine city, and when Antioch was about to fall to the Latins on June 3, 1098, he fled His son, Shams al-Dawlah, gathered his own followers and retreated to the citadel where they held out until June 28. When the relieving force of Muslims had been beaten, Shams al-Dawlah surrendered the citadel to the Crusaders. The Crusader leader Bohemond promptly established himself in the citadel. Shams al-Dawlah's last act, using the citadel as a governmental center, was not characteristic of Muslim rulers up to this point. Another example of this type of administrative center will illustrate the geographic breadth of the development of separated palace complexes. Mahrnud, the Ghaznavid ruler (999-1030), established himself in the eastern Islamic territories. While there is no clear record of his building activities in Ghazna, nor where his governmental residence was located, the data for the area of Bost is clearer. Bost included an impressive citadel, but Mahmud established for himself an elaborate, extensive palace complex along the banks of the Helmend River. The complex is almost four miles long and includes large units which archaeologists such as Daniel Schlumberger, have labeled as palaces. Beyond the South (or Great) Palace, a mosque was located 36 Mas'ud III (1099-1115), Mahrnud's great grandson, was the builder of an impressive palace complex outside Ghazna. In this case the mosque was part of the overall complex rather than a separate unit. 3? Here again, the local rulers have separated themselves from the older Muslim urban centers. The actions of the leaders during the Crusaders' taking of Jerusalem will serve here as a final demonstration of the point at hand. During final attack on Jerusalem, July 14, 1098, the Patimid governor and military leader, Iftikhar al-Dawlah, retreated to the citadel-the tower of David-from which he negotiated with the Crusaders. He turned the citadel over to Raymond in return for safe passage for himself and his garrison, while the Crusaders massacred Muslims and Jews in the city. By August, Godfrey, the first Crusader ruler ofJerusalem, had control of the citadel and had probably made it his administrative and military headquarters.ss It is not clear where Muslim administrators had been located in the period from the 'Abbasid conquest of Jerusalem to the Crusader conquest, but the old dar al-'imara was not used; probably neither was the citadel. Many Muslim cities had citadels. Yet during what I have labeled here the second period, somewhat more than two centuries, citadels were not the locale of administrative rule. Individual governors and minor dynasties may have lived in them. Most of the successful dynasts, however, sought to build for themselves and their entourage elaborate complexes outside the existing urban centers. These new complexes reflected their wealth and power. In addition, the locale of these complexes served to distance them from the city's inhabitants. This population was primarily Muslim, and it had its own buildings, such as mosques, to meet its own needs. Yet this distancing may have helped foster the ruling group's sense of power, solidarity, and

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superiority. The walls around these new complexes, some of which were fortified, only strengthened this situation. However, although these walls were on the same general plane as the existing urban center, they would not have been seen by many and the structures they enclosed would have been known to even fewer. Ties between the Muslim rulers and their urban Muslim population were made palpable through various ceremonial practices, some of which were based on Muslim religious traditions, as well as others which drew on older indigenous practices. Unlike the first period, no clear, systematic architectural expression of the relationship between the ruling elite and the rest of Muslim population existed during the second period. However, the visual relationship between ruler and ruled, master and subject, was to change from the late eleventh-twelfth century on. The focal point for Islamic governments was to become the citadel. The citadel was not an Islamic invention; in fact, it is considered one of the earliest signs of man's conquest over his environment and other men.t? In the Middle East, occupied citadels date back to prehistoric times and can be found in virtually every area. Until the late eleventh century, with minor exceptions, even those Islamic cities that had pre-Islamic citadels did not use them. The citadel was a place for storing military hardware, a potential lookout tower, a base for supplementary troops and a locale for possible refuge when the city proper was attacked. Neither Caliphs and their governors, nor sultans, and their local representatives usually lived in these citadels. Nonetheless, no matter how old or new the citadels were, they took on new prominence beginning in the twelfth century. They became the focal point ofMuslim administration. With this development, we are in what I call the third period of Islamic administrative architectural history. In some cities before the twelfth century, palaces were built on promontories or geological formations which then became the bases for citadels. This was true in Tulunid Egypt as well as Nasrid Granada and Malaga. Citadels as such were constructed by Muslims, like those built in North Africa by various Berber dynasties. It is unlikely, however, that the Almohads and Almoravids originated the model copied by other Muslim rulers living in more Eastern lands. It is possible that the critical turning point in establishing the use of the citadel as the primary Muslim administrative center came with the Zangid dynasty, whose initial base was in Mosul. 'Imad al-Din Zangi (1127-1144), the atabeg of Mosul, set the pattern when he reconstructed the citadel and the fortifications of Mosul, It is not absolutely clear that he moved all the governmental administrative activities into the citadel or that he built a new palace which adjoined the citadel and was separate from the rest of the city.40 'Imad al-Din's son, Nur al-Din Zangi (1146-1174) continued the original policy in Syria by transferring the locus of government to the citadels. During his reign Nur al-Din undertook numerous building activities, but the most important ones for the theme of this study were those he ordered done on

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the citadels in Harna, Hirns, Aleppo, and Damascus.n Nur al-Din's work of creating the citadel as the center of governmental power, as the apex of political control, was to be continued by Salah al-Din (1169-1193) and the Ayyubid dynasty (1169-1250). For example, Salah alDin began work on the citadel in Cairo while his brother al-'Adil (12001218) is credited with undertaking (or completing) work on the citadels in Cairo, Basra, Damascus, and Aleppo, among others. 42 There are a nwnber of common themes to all of these edifices, despite the unique quality of each. Numerous buildings were constructed within the walls of the citadel, to meet the needs of the governing elite and their military entourage. Although complete descriptions for most of these citadels is lacking, they all had at least a mosque, a palace, barracks, and a bath; in other words, they were an independent city within a larger urban unit and it was possible for an individual to be born and to die within the confines of the citadel's walls and still have spent an active and productive life. The fifteenth-century author Khalil al-Zahiri wrote of the Cairo citadel: The royal residence, where the throne of the empire is located, is known today as the Castle of the Mountain. This palace has no equal in area, splendor, magnificence, and height. Around it are walls, moats, towers, and a number of iron gates which make it impregnable. It would take a long time to give a detailed description of the palaces, rooms, halls, belvederes, galleries, courts, squares, stables, mosques, schools, markets. and baths that are found in the palace; so we will limit ourselves to describing the most remarkable things and those which can best exemplify the greatness of the Empire. 43

He then describes the palace and the Great Mosque, which, he is told, can hold five thousand worshipers. The first and most important factor is that the citadel represents a concentration of governmental power, which has a very cleat spatial relation to the rest of the city. Citadels existed on a different plane from the rest of the city. Not only could the ruler look over his subjects but they, in turn, knew where he was. While a citadel cannot be seen from every part of a city, it can be seen from most. In the first period, with the model of the dar at- 'imara-mosque combination, and the second, in which the palace complexes were separate from the original Muslim political centers. most people would never have seen the walls that surrounded the residence, let alone the royal residence itself. This was not the case with the citadel. It was organically tied to the rest of the built environment, usually by walls; at the same time, though, it was above the urban area. Both Muslim and Christian travelers remarked on the formidable character of these citadels. The work of S.D. Goitein, based on medieval Jewish Geniza material, reenforces this interpretation of the changed relationship between the populace and the ruler, symbolized by the building of a citadel. Apropos of the second period Goitein wrote, "The civil population of Fustat had nothing to do there (i.e., al-Qahira)." He was describing the lack of contact between the commercial center of greater al-Fustat and the Fatimids' royal residence, al-Qahira. But with the building of the citadel on the Muqattam mountain,

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contact was established with the population and "summons and visits to the qaI'a now make their appearance in the Geniza, sometimes with unpleasant consequences for the persons concerned. "44 The emerging preeminence of the citadel as the center of political and military power within the Muslim urban setting was also repeated in other parts of the Islamic world; the citadel became the dominant location of Muslim administrative centers from Spain to India. Art historians have debated the meanings of the various units within the Alhambra, but first and foremost this fourteenth-century creation in Nasrid Granada is a citadel in that a range of buildings, functionally similar to those in Cairo's citadel, were situated Similarly, Herat, Ghazna, Samarqand, to name only a few cities east of the Arab world, have citadels that became the center of political power with a full range of activities and structures. Many of these cities had preIslamic citadels, but their role as Muslim governmental centers dates, in most cases, from the thirteenth century if not later. This architectural concept-s-whereby the ruler and his court were to be placed within a citadel-was carried also to the Indian subcontinent and was exemplified by many of the cities under Muslim control. What is most difficult to explain is why this shift from the use of palaces, often separated from the bulk of the urban population but on the same plane, to citadels within the urban setting but physically above the rest of the population, took place. Extensive studies of the eleventh and twelfth centuries are still needed before a clearer picture emerges, but we can speculate why the Eastern Arab world was the site for this development. The causes might have included changes in the organization of Muslim armies, new expectations in terms of royal patronage, and the experience of Crusader practices. In many cases, the users of these citadels were ethnically alien with respect to the urban dwellers. The eleventh and twelfth centuries mark the triumphs of a whole series of nomadic armies, the most famous of which were those of the Selcuks. Many of these rulers would have felt threatened by or vulnerable to attacks by urban mobs or semiorganized city groups. The citadel offered them obvious protection. Nevertheless, rulers such as those who were alien or felt isolated from the population, often sought to span the gap between themselves and the populace by sponsoring foundations that serviced the population. This is the moment when Sufi orders became a significant part of the social fabric, and some of these military leaders patronized Sufi buildings-and in doing so, often endowed and allocated space for their own retirement. This activity highlights an interesting psychological relationship between the two types of building activities associated with these new rulers. They constructed citadels for themselves, whereas they sponsored mosques, schools, and Sufi hospices, which would permanently remind the populace of the presence of their patron. A second factor, whose relationship to the use of citadels is unclear, is the change in character and organization of the Islamic armies. Previously they

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had been composed of salaried cavalry and infantry of slave origin, whereas in the new Muslim armies, the men were still of slave origin, but, the infantry component disappeared. Thus, armies of the Selcuks, Zangids, Ayyubids, and other dynasties were composed of cavalry, both Mamluk and free, the latter most often of nomadic origin. Along with the citadels, this new generation of rulers established parade grounds which were used for training their cavalry. Infantry would serve in sieges (and in the palace as guards) but were not a central military force.45 How did Muslims "read" their cities in the centuries before the age of Ottoman hegemony? The obvious types ofsources that we could look to for an answer-references in chronicles, comments by travelers, texts by architects-are all silent on this issue. In many areas not even the buildings remain, and only faint memories of them exist in written texts. The absence of this data should not lead us to the conclusion that there was no significance to the architectural layout of the urban environment. This study has argued that one element of it, the locus of political power, was not the result of a series of arbitrary whims. It was a distinct pattern of organization, even if its meanings may not always be clear or explicit in the historical record. With the success of the conquests of the Fertile Crescent and Egypt, Muslims found themselves a new political elite, a new military power, and, in most lands, a minority. All of these factors influenced the earliest building activities in this first era. Places of prayer and administrative centers were needed. However, what eventually emerged in lands from North Africa to Iran was a pattern whereby the most important administrative center, at least initially, was placed on the qibla side of the mosque. Clearly, the two roles of the governing power were tied together, and by placing the dar closer to Mecca, the interrelated importance of the roles of governor and religious leader were indicated. Within the world of the former Sassanian empire, the architectural relationship was even more formalized. The potential administrative center was always physically connected to the qibla wall, twice as wide as the mosque, usually crowned by a green dome, and both buildings were arranged in a symmetrical plan around the same axial line. The second era coincides with the transformation of urban centers into Muslim cities, that is, places where the overwhelming majority of the population is Muslim. This population had certain needs which have a palpable architectural character, such as the requirement for a large mosque or a number of mosques which served as the gathering place for the Friday noon prayer. The rulers, for reasons of security or preference, no longer felt a need to be located within the older urban environment or above it. The building of Samarra in the ninth century by the 'Abbasids may be the earliest extant example of rulers building separate cities, but the Fatimid program in the following century probably had a more lasting impact. The Fatimids, who were Shi'ites, separated themselves from the populace, which was overwhelmingly Sunni. Each group, then, was served by separate edifices.

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The citadel, whose use can be traced to ancient Near Eastern civilizations, did not become a major locus of Muslim rule until the late eleventh and twelfth centuries. The alien origins of many of the military leaders and changes in military technique were two factors that led to the emergence of this particular architectural form as the center of military and political power. The citadel overlooked the city; the cavalry dominated the infantry; the rulers were above their subjects; they were all part of the same program, which found expression in the relationship between parts of the urban setting. The Ottomans would use these citadels when they conquered many of the lands of the Eastern Mediterranean, but they would also develop other ways of expressing their political, military, and religious role in society. NOTES I wish to thank my colleagues Caroline Bynum and Peter Sugar as well as the members of the University of Washington's History Research Group for all their valuable comments and criticisms 1. G. Deverdun, "Kasaba," Encyclopaedia oj Islam, 2d ed. IV.684-86 (hereafter referred to as EI). 2. K.A.C. Creswell, Early Muslim Architecture, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1959), 1.22 (hereafter referred to as EMA). Michael Morony, Iraq aJter the Muslim Conquest (princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), p. 75. 3. Creswell, EMA, 1.22. 4. Ibid., 1.26. Morony, Iraq, p. 75. John D. Hoag. Islamic Architecture. (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1975), p. 14. 5. Creswell, EMA, 1.41. 6. Ibn Battuta, The Travels oj Ibn BatMa, AD 1325-1354, trans. H.A.R. Gibb (Cambridge: Hakyuyt Society Works, 1954),1.130. 7. Morony, Iraq, p. 75. 8. Donald Whitcomb,"The City of Istakhr and the Marvdasht Plain," Akten des VII. Internationalen Kongresses jar Iranische Kunst und Archaologie (Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 1979), p. 364. 9. Ibid. 10. Creswell, EMA, 1.138. Morony, Iraq, p. 79. 11. Charles Wendell, "Baghdad: Imago Mundi, and Other Foundation-Lore," Internationaljournal oJMiddleEast Studies, Vol. II (1971), p. 119-20. 12. Hoag, Islamic, p. 28. 13. Creswell, EMA, 11.3. 14. Wendell, "Baghdad," p. 119. 15. Much fuller discussions of the symbolism of this city can be found in the works of Wendell, Oleg Grabar, The Formation oj Islamic Art (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973), and Jacob Lassner, The Topography oj Baghdad in the Early Middle Ages (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1970). 16. Jacob Lassner, The Shaping oj 'Abbasid Rule (princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980), p. 205. 17. Lassner, Topography, p. 181. 18. Grabar, Formation, p. 69.

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19. Benjamin Mazar, The Mountain ofthe Lord (Garden City: Doubleday, 1975), p. 269. 20. Ibid. 21. J. Soudel-Thomine,"Ayn al-Djarr," EI, 2d ed, 1.787. 22. Hoag, Islamic, p. 28. 23. Wladyslaw Kubiak, al-Fustat: Its Foundation and Early Urban Development (Warsov: Wydawnietwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 1982), p. 205, 207, 214, AlMaqrizi, al-Khitat (Beirut: Dar al-Sadr, n.d.), 1.209. 24. Janet L. Abu-Lughod, Cairo: 1001 Years of the City Victorious (princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971), p. 14. 25. al-Maqrizi, al-Khitat, 1.304. 26. tsu., 1.313. K.A.C. Creswell, A Short Account of Early Muslim Architecture (London: Penguin Books, 1958), p.304. 27. Creswell, EMA, 1.61, 140. 28. Amman under the Umayyads is one exception. 29. Michael Rogers, The Spread of Islam (Oxford: E1sevier-Phaidon, 1976), pp. 127, 132-33, 138, 143. 30. Paula Sanders, "The Court Ceremonial of the Fatirnid Caliphate in Egypt," unpublished Ph.D. dissertation (Princeton University), 1984, p. 61. 31. nu., p. 65. 32. Construction began in 936: Hoag, Islamic, p. 81. 33. Ramzi Jibran Bihazi, "The Hamdanid Dynasty of Mesopotamia and North Syria," unpublished Ph.D. dissertation (University of Michigan) , 1981, p. 864. 34. A minor nomadic dynasty, the Mirdasids (1023-1079), used the citadel as their residence and governmental center. 35. Steven Runciman, A History ofthe Crusades, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1951), 1.317-24. 36. Hoag, Islamic, p. 188. 37. Clifford E. Bosworth, The LAter Ghaznavids (New York: Columbia University Press, 1975), p. 88. 38. iu«, pp. 337-41. 39. Lewis Mumford, The City in History (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1961), p. 28. 40. Ibn Battuta, Travels, II.348. 41. Nikita ElisseeffNur al-Din, (Damas: Institut Francais de Damas, 1967), pp. 71215. 42. K.A.C. Creswell, "Fortifications in Islam before A.D. 1250," Proceedings ofthe British Academy, Vol. XXXVIII (1962), p. 125. Neil MacKenzie at the University of Michigan and Paul Cheveddan at UCLA have produced dissertations on issues related to this topic. 43. Susan Jane Staffa, Conquest and Fusion: The Social Evolution ofCairo A.D. 6421850 (Leiden: E.]. Brill, 1977), p. 107. 44. S.D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983),IV.34. 45. The Mongol conquerors of China followed a similar policy when they ruled from Peking.

5

Facades in Ottoman Cairo* Olka Bates

INTRODUCTION The architecture of Ottoman Cairo is of particular interest to art historians for several reasons. In 1517, after approximately 550 years as the capital of various groups, from the Fatimids to the Mamluks, Cairo was conquered by the Ottomans and reduced to the status of a provincial city. The consequences of such a change for the architecture of any city would be of considerable interest, but Cairo is of particular importance because at the beginning of the sixteenth century it boasted many more monumental Islamic structures than did Istanbul. This established architectural tradition affected the general development of styles in Cairo up to the end of the Ottoman rule, in 1789. The dominating stylistic trends in Ottoman Cairo remained peculiarly Cairene, that is, they seemingly did not reflect the influences of its rulers.! The Ottomans did not alter the architectural scene in Cairo as they had in other provinces that they annexed to the empire, as for example, in the Balkans. This reluctance on the part of the Ottomans to impose their building traditions on Egypt can be interpreted as more than their awe at the buildings in Cairo. Cairo, an Islamic city, was not just conquered by a Muslim force, but by a Sunni one. The Ottoman sultan, Selim I, had to secure a fetva or decree from the Seyhulislam in order to attack the Sunni Mamluks.s Still, there were, however, at times overt but often subtle signs and symbols used in buildings founded by the Ottomans in Cairo that indicate their supremacy and power in Egypt. This paper is an attempt to isolate and interpret some of these undisguised but subtle forms and elements that Ottomans employed in their architecture in order to signify their position as rulers of Egypt. The analysis of signs and symbols of power) will be limited to the facades of a number of selected buildings. The facades are the public sides of structures which are to be encountered by all passers-by, and thus, any message they may bear must be readily intelligible. I presume that the Ottoman patrons did use such signs, although these signs might have been short-lived, inconsistent, or at times unclear. Nevertheless, an inhabitant of Ottoman Cairo must have

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comprehended any message that might have been encoded in the stone of the building by its patron. A (decoding) of such messages is possible for the contemporary scholar when the building being analyzed is studied in its cultural, historical, and social context.> Although a building may have more than one facade, depending on its configuration and spatial relationship to its surroundings, I shall concentrate here on that side of the building containing the main entrance. Particular shapes and forms that are used to decorate portals may have distinctive characteristics. The iconography of portals, when decoded, can be interpreted in the political and social context of their period. The movement in space and time as the approach and entry to the building take place, the path configuration and access, as well as sequence of spaces, are to be considered together with the shape of the portal in order to estimate the impact of the main entrance on the public.! The buildings selected for study here are those whose patrons were Ottomans from Istanbul. The most obvious candidate as a patron in this sense was the governor of Egypt.t The tenure of an Ottoman governor in a province was one year, which was often renewed in the sixteenth century, less so in the early seventeenth. After about 1600, governors were moved around quite frequently,s Correspondingly, only a small number of structures in Cairo can be securely credited to the patronage of Ottoman governors." Egypt, one of the most prized provinces of the Ottoman empire, has relatively few buildings founded by Ottomans.s As a result, only six structures : sponsored by governors shall be considered here. To compensate for the small number of buildings, I have also included for consideration three structures founded in Cairo by Ottoman sultans and a queen mother through their agents. Another high ranking Ottoman official, the ala of the harem or dar assadet agasl (also called Kizlar alasl), was among those who often frequently left their architectural imprint in Cairo. The alas often were appointed as supervisors of the Ottoman vaqf in Egypt after their retirement from the court.? Several of these men, as they completed their tour of service in Cairo, as a means to commemorate themselves, commissioned the erection of structures many of which were of the sebilkattab type.l 0 These I shall not include in this study. PATRONS, BUILDERS, AND BUILDING MATERIALS Another area of inquiry before the (message) of the facades can be decoded concerns the personnel and material that were involved in the construction of these buildings. The questions that come to mind concern the recruitment of master builders and craftsmen, their training and organization. In addition, the final composition of a facade was affected by such factors as the ready availability of building materials or the difficulty of transporting them from afar? Of still greater significance is the question of the nature of designs, drawings, and written or verbal instruction to workers constructing the

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buildings. What is at issue here is whether such drawings, and instructions were conveyed from the office of the imperial architects in Istanbul or were locally prepared, and how these plans were executed in the course of a construction. These facts, unfortunately, are difficult to determine precisely. Our knowledge in the area of actual building activities is quite limited and does not enable us to refer to specific cases of buildings; but, we do know that the organization of architect-builders in Ottoman Cairo paralleled that of the principal one located in Istanbul, which was attached to the imperial court.l! In Egypt, it seems, architect-builders were recruited from the yeniferi and locally created military units. Their appointments and promotions ultimately were decided at the imperial office of the royal architects, on the recommendation of the provincial office.12 The training of master builders, however, seems to have been carried out locally.P According to one document in the Prime Minister's Archives in Istanbul, builders in Cairo, not attached to the provincial office of architects, were hired by Muslim citizens but of unspecified groups or classes.>' Master craftsmen trained in specific techniques or in certain materials were in demand; on the request of the imperial office of royal architects in Istanbul, they traveled to important construction sites. 1S Unfortunately, we do not know whether architects, builders, or workers were ever recruited from outside of Egypt to work on the specific buildings under consideration here. When the need arose, materials were sent from one area of the empire to another, at least for imperial undertakings and important structures, such as the Masjid-i Haram in Mecca, and for the constructions ordered by influential governors.t- Sinan Pasa, the governor of Egypt (1567-1568,1571-1573), and whose mosque is one of the structures considered in this paper, had lead sent from Istanbul to Cairo.t? This is the only case yet known to me. In a centralized political system such as the Ottoman administration, which included the imperial and provincial offices of architect-builders, it is tempting to assume that designs and drawings for major buildings in the provinces were prepared at the imperial office and dispatched to the provinces to be locally executed. Although we do know the existence of some such drawings, there is unfortunately no record that any type of drawings or even a set of instructions were sent to Cairo.P' On the other hand, large-scale building activities or those sponsored by high-ranking Ottoman officials in the provinces were known at the imperial court. There are documents in the Prime Minister's Archives regarding the mosques of Mahmud and Mesih Pasas, both considered in this paper.t? The analysis of plans of building; founded by Ottoman officials in Cairo has led me to assume that at least several of these were prepared in Istanbul. Some were carried out by builders familiar with Ottoman architecture of the capital, but most buildings were executed by local masters who worked according to instructions. In the latter cases, discord between the ground plan and elevations occur. For example, while the plan of the mosque of Malike Safiye

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is clearly based on types that existed in Istanbul, its elevation curiously departs from the prototypes in Istanbul. It seems likely that local masters worked quite independently of the instructions from Istanbul (which may not even have existed for relatively minor constructional details) in the areas of decoration, fenestration, and secondary structural elements. In these areas the local masters followed the traditions best known to them, that is, those characteristic of the architecture of Cairo. We shall return to this point when we consider the facades closely. To summarize at this point, the governors appointed to Egypt seem to have been prepared to undertake construction of buildings in Cairo whenever their tenure there and circumstances allowed them. Due to the greater likelihood of reappointment, the sixteenth-century governors had more of an advantage than their seventeenth-century successors. The royal family of the Ottomans, who had land holdings at their disposal in Egypt, had structures bearing their names built in Cairo (but more often in Mecca and Medinaj.s? The organization of master builders and craftsmen was rigidly organized, along the lines of the imperial system in Istanbul, and the whole system was centralized, to the extent that promotions originated at the top. At times people and materials moved from one province to another, although at present we lack specific information about how this relates to buildings in Cairo. Such major transportation of personnel and materials was decided on at the imperial center and decisions were implemented by provincial courts.

orr OMAN MOSQUE FA Finally, the imperial vakfs facilitated the development and populating with

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Turkish immigrants from Anatolia of new quarrers in the Ottoman capitals by providing some of the social, economic and cultural infrastructure required to attract and sustain such settlement. Their expenditures stimulated the district's economy, their staffs of functionaries and complements of students caused a growth in the local population, and the presence of an institutionalized setting for worship and learning secured the neighborhood for the immigrant Turkish-Islamic culture, all of which factors can be seen to have been at work in the growth of the rhaniye , Hudavendigar, Yildmm, Yesil, and Muradiye quarters in Bursa, and in that of the Fatih district in Istanbul.us

o

Thus, the iconography of the imperial mosques was in pan manifested in the functions, some explicitly acknowledged, others implicitly present, sustained by the system of imperial vakJs set up to provide for the needs of the imperial mosque complexes. These functions, education, charity, and worship, and ideological, social, and political control, settlement, and economic development, all served metaphorically to suggest the power, piety, and hence the legitimacy of the Ottoman sultan. Yet such institutionalized activities hardly exhausted the range of functions centered in and around the imperial mosques, functions that served to proclaim publicly this idealized image of the Ottoman ruler and dynasty. On the operative level, expression was given to these notions perhaps most dramatically through the use of the imperial mosques as settings, or, better, as theatrical backdrops for much of the ritual and ceremonial associated with the great public religious, state, and dynastic celebrations which occupied the Ottoman ruler through the cycles of succession and military success of any particular reign. Evliya Celebi alludes to this use of the imperial mosques when he mentions Sultan Muhammed IV's girding in 1648 of the sword of Osman at Eyup in the ceremony known as the taklid-i sey[, the formal act of investiture of the Ottoman sultans (figure 17).115 Elsewhere, he describes his participation as a Kuran reciter in the ceremonial observance of Kadir Gecesi (the Night of Power, or twenty-seventh of Ramazan when the Kur'an is believed to have been revealed) in the mosque of Haghia Sophia, with Sultan Murad IV and several thousand members of the imperial court present in the year 1735. 116 In the same year, he recounts the events surrounding Murad's return to Istanbul from his victorious campaign against the Safavids in Azerbaijan. It was celebrated in the capital with the illumination of the imperial mosques and seven days and nights of festivities and rejoicing, culminating in the sultan's participation in Friday prayers at EyUp, and followed by prayers of thanksgiving at the Fatih mosque and visits to the tomb of Fatih, the Sehzade mosque, and the mosques and tombs of Sultan Bayezid and Murad's father, Sultan Ahrned.u? In each of these instances, the imperial mosques were used as settings for important ceremonial events in which the sultan was called upon to participate, events associated with succession to the throne, with the

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Fig. 17

Ktll~ alaYI of Sultan Mahmud II, early 19th century (after Allom, Constantinople, [London, 1838])

celebration of one of the great Muslim religious festivals, and with the giving of thanks for military successes in the field. Evliya's somewhat casual references to these observances hardly exhausts the list of occasions on which the imperial mosques were used for such purposes by the Ottoman sultans. In addition to temporal occasions as, for instance, the investiture of a new sultan, military victories and the birth of male heirs to the imperial house, the sultans' mosques were used as settings for religious observances including the Night of Power, the birth of the Prophet Muhammad (marked by the annual Mevlid service, figure 18), the first day of Ramazan and of Kurban Bayrarm, and most importantly, the weekly performance of the Friday Prayer, the cuma namaZl, known as the selamlik (figures 19, 20). The celebration of these events was marked, as is hinted at by Evliya in his description of Murad's visit to Eyup and various other imperial mosques, by the alay, a formal procession by the sultan accompanied by members of ruling and learned institutions and by elements of the army, from the palace, through the streets of the capital, to one of the imperial mosques, followed by a religious observance, and a return to the palace. With the exception of the girding at EyUp, there was no fixed rule as to which of the imperial mosques was to be used for such celebrations. Nonetheless, it became customary in certain periods for one mosque or another to function in a particular capacity.

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Thus, in the eighteenth century, the annual Mevlid service tended to be celebrated in the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, while prayers at the beginning of the two bayrams were said either in Sultan Ahmed or the Haghia Sophia. Selim III frequently performed the cuma selamllgt in the Selimye in Uskudar, while Abdulharnid II rarely ventured beyond the Hamidiye Mosque just outside the grounds of Yildiz Palace in B~iktas.1I8 Concerning the actual character and specfic events surrounding these formal visits to the imperial mosques, a large nwnber of more or less detailed accounts are to be found in both Ottoman and Western sources, particularly for the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.U? Such descriptions make it clear that while details of the alar in particular changed over time, in their fundamentals these observances remained remarkably conservative. Of them all, it was the cuma alayi, culminating in the selamllk at one of the imperial mosques that was the oldest and most frequently performed of these public ceremonies, being enacted weekly at the time of the Friday noon prayer and dating back, apparently, to the earliest years of the dynasry.P? Although it was simplified in the second half of the seventeenth century by Muhammed IV, and of necessity further changed after the destruction of the Yeniceri corps in 1826, its broad outlines remained unaltered. Traditionally, after selection of the imperial mosque at which prayers were to be performed, detailed arrangements were made, both in the palace and at the mosque itself by the silahdar aga. On the day of the selamhk the btl$ cavU$ ala, richly robed in ceremonial dress, journeyed to the mosque a half hour in advance of the sultan, accompanied by forty has odali and fifteen miilazim mounted on richly caparisoned horses. Two of the midazim, identifiable by the aigrette feathers fixed in their headgear, were charged with carrying the two imperial turbans tdestar-i humarun), which were respectfully saluted by onlookers along the route. On arrival at the mosque, this advance party prepared the hunkar mahfili and then, arranging themselves in ranks, formally saluted the sultan on his arrival in a ceremony known as the sank alaYl' The actual selamhk alayi, the formal progress of the sultan accompanied by the sadrazam and other high state officials, began at the palace, made its way to the mosque, and after prayer retired again to. the palace. Security on the route along which the alay passed was given over to the Yeniceri corps. Participation in the alar was fixed by palace regulations, which strictly mandated the position of each member in the procession as well as the special ceremonial robes and headgear that each participant was to wear. Thus, the b~ iukadar walked at the sultan's right and a second fukadar marched on his left, carrying the sultan's slippers in a red, satin pouch. A third fukadar, known as the cizmeti (boot maker), followed with a spare set of slippers in a similar pouch and was in turn followed by a fourth iukadar and various agas. The sultan rode to the selamlik on horseback, he and his entire party being screened and protected on all sides by ranks of solaks (guards for imperial processions), and was only preceded by the haseki agas who went on foot.

Fig. 18 Mevlid service in the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, late 18th century (after D'Ohsson, Tableau, [paris, 1788-1824])

Taking up the rear of the sultan's immediate entourage were the darussaade agasl, silahdar aga, rikabdar aga, sir katlbl, bii$ kapia, zUliiflu baltaa kethudast and other high court officials,all of whom rode on horseback. Along the route through which the alay passed the sultan was acclaimed by the onlooking populace proclaiming "Long live my padisah and his state" and "Let not my padisan be proud.. Greater than thee is God!" On his arrival at the mosque he was again acclaimed by the party of waiting officials and populace and was formally greeted by the miitevelli of the mosque and aga of the Yeniceri, who removed the sultan's shoes and replaced them with slippers. The sultan then retired to his loggia for prayer and listened to the hutbe. At the selamlik the Yeniferi aga were empowered to submit matters to the sultan for decision and, in addition, when the sultan emerged from the mosque he would receive petitions from his subjects and dispense redress of grievances.

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Finally, he departed the mosque, again with great ceremony, and returned to the palace with the selamlik alay«. The symbolic significance attached to the selamhk by the Ottomans and their subjects is vividly suggested by the fact that it survived until the very final moment of the dynasty's history. Indeed, the last selamlIk was carried out by the caliph Abdulmecid II on February 29, 1924, just four days before the abolition of the caliphate by the republican Turkish government and Abdulrnecid's preemptory exile to Europe. l21 The selamlik, creating again a visible link between the palace and the mosque, between the state and religion, proclaimed publically the sultan's central role in each of these two foundations of the Ottoman social order. At the same time, the glittering public display of the alay served to show the sultan, his court, and army in all their majesty, a testament to the power and grandeur of the Ottoman ruler. And finally, the selamhk, providing as it did a setting for public redress of grievances, was a reminder that it was the sultan, God's Viceroy in the world, who was the ultimate source of justice in the Ottoman state. Thus, it was in substantial part the activities that took place within the precincts of the sultans' mosque complexes that conferred meaning on this architecture. The message that it sought to convey was the legitimacy of the Ottoman sultans and of their house. It was a message given definition by a series of specific acts and events: piety and zeal were demonstrated through support for and participation in the ritual of the orthodox faith; charity through the provision of food and shelter to the needy; learning in the Islamic sciences through the foundation and staffing of medreses; and power and justice through the events surrounding the ceremony of the selamllk. For, ultimately, it was by means of the concrete and public display of the virtues of the ideal Islamic prince in settings such as the imperial mosque complex that the Ottoman sultan was able to sustain his claim to possession of the attributes and qualities of rightful sovereignty. In seeking for the mechanisms by which meaning is imparted to architecture, Western art historians have generally searched for concrete systems of formal symbols: the cruciform plan defines the Christian church; the shikara of the Hindu temple represents the cosmic mountain in which the god resides; the height and light of Gothic architecture are symbols of the divine. Given this tendency, it would be satisfying to see clear symbolic meaning in the specific forms of the Ottoman imperial mosques. One might wish, for example, to see the dome as a cosmic symbol, as an image of the universality and omnipotence of God, or as a testament to the cosmic pretensions of the sultans. The minaret could be understood as an image of his power, a symbolic appropriation of the land, witness to the sovereignty of Islam and of the Ottoman padisah. And the unity of interior space in the imperial mosques could be taken as emblematic of the unity of the Muslim community. The problem with such interpretations is that they fail to find confirmation

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as receptacles of world power, 18; as centers of science and knowledge, 19; Imperial capitals as a, 20 Symmetry/ Asymmetry (architectural ) 1,181; Ottoman vs. Mamluk, 151, 153, 159, 166, Tax-farming: 80-81 Thesaurization (centralizing economic wealth) 21 Tombs, Imperial Ottoman: placement and characteristics of, 207-10, 239 n.84 Translatio Imperii: (transfonning of elements of older culture) 7; in Constantinople/Istanbul, 18-19,23, 29fT. See also Renovation Urbanization as natural or enforced resettlement: 20, 62, 72 n.4, 74, n32, 89 Vakf as support for major monuments, 21-22, 68, 130, as support of personnel and services, 218-19 Walls, city: Byzantine and Ottoman as militarization, 19,20,22; in Venetian Candia 54; as linking city with citadel, 124. See also Citadels Walls, Mosque enclosure: Ottoman, 32, 134,142, 143,145,175,185-6; Mamluk,134