Book

Report on Ottoman Cartography

HISTORY of CARTOGRAPHY vol 2.1: Cartography in the Traditional Islamic and South Asian Societies
Pre-modern Ottoman Geographical Mapping (Under Islamic Cartography)

10. Ahmet Karamustafa – Introduction to Ottoman Cartography

Background of the cartographers:
Ch. 11: Maps by architects, engineers, and soldiers, and geographers
Ch. 12: Maps by historians (of military exploits)

11. Ahmet Karamustafa – Military, Administrative, and Scholarly Maps and Plans
Two lines of mapmaking: state sponsored and private enterprise

Administrative maps mostly from 16th century onwards
Mehmed II: Italian peninsula, Adriatic; Ptolemy’s geography examined but minimal patronage of
Ottoman mapmaking tradition
Military maps: Cartographic literacy; siege plans, town sketches -> practical cartography ->adaptation to
European cartography came in late 17th, and 17th centuries -> Ottoman and European traditions existing
side by side until the 17th century
Siege plan of Belgrade (1521) – primarily military but also has artistic content
Siege plan of Malta (1565) – produced in the field
Szigetvar (1566) – also possibly produced in the field
- And many more examples from the 17th and 18th centuries, suggesting that practical cartography
was not unknown in the higher levels of the Ottoman military establishment even before they
adopted the European practices. However, there was no institutionalized office for drafting
these plans and diagrams
Architectural plans and waterways: Suyolu nazırı (inspector of waterways) drafted topographical
diagrams in his reports, no trace of scientific proportion or perspective drawing, high use of pictorial
representation.

Cartography as a private enterprise
Maps produced for private use were limited to academic works, a few non-textual free standing maps,
or drawings of Kaba, or wall paintings being exceptions. Two periods:

1. Islamic-Ottoman = Lokman
2. European (mid-17th century) = KÇ (Atlas Minor), Ebu Bekir Dimaşki (Blaeu’s Atlas Maior),
Müteferrika

Two categories:
1. World Maps: Geographical texts retain the Islamic tradition, while maps popularly get borrowed
from Europe starting in the second half of the 16th century. Texts start changing after mid-17th
century.
2. Regional maps: Lacking overall, but two examples: mid-17th century Tigris and Euphrates; EvÇ’s
map of the Nile (somehow said to be datable to shortly after 1685!). Then regional maps start to
appear with the replacement of traditional cartography by European theory and practice. In the
18th century.

Town views and itineraries are presented in the following chapter by Rogers:
12. J. M. Rogers – Itineraries and Town Views in Ottoman Histories

The illustrated histories from 16th century (looks at 21 MSs, most of them single copy), produced for the
Ottoman court. As these histories come to contain increasingly (?) realistic itinerary maps, town plans
and bird’s-eye view illustrations, they constitute geographical/topographical sources.

Main periods identified in the development of these illustrations: Concern with historical accuracy;
European sources and stylistic influence

1. Pre-16th century Islamic tradition = urban topography almost totally ignored (except two
depictions of Baghdad) (1/21)
2. First instances of urban topography in the 16th century Ottoman MSs starting with Piri Reis,
flourishing with the experimental style of Matrakçı Nasuh (5 MSs mentioned) (11/21)
3. Mature and formalized Ottoman style after 1568, reaching their apogee during the reigns of
Murad III and Mehmed III, Seyyid Lokman (5 MSs mentioned) being the court historian (9/21)
4. Declining imperial power => declining illustrated histories especially after the 2nd half of the 17th
century

No extant sketches or drafts for these illustrations, but according to Rogers these have clearly (sic)
existed, and were probably kept in the Grand Vizier’s office – especially material related to military
campaigns such as siege plans, elevations of fortresses, and other topographical documentation.
Mecmuʿā-i Menāzil of Matrakçı Nasuh to be considered in this military context – innovation of sketching
in the field probably started with him, although it was almost standard in Europe around this time, and
such realistic portrayal of geography in their histories attracted the Ottoman interest.

Influences fro East and West in the 15th century, but these do not fully explain the Ottoman interest in
detailed representations of cities:

1st appearance of such illustrations in Kitab-ı Bahriye: part autobiography, part intended for practical use
by sailors; schematic architecture, some personal experience (corsair’s point of view) included in the
representations, while Süleyman’s struggle for supremacy in the Mediterranean finds consideration in a
spy-work emphasis on fortifications and arsenal of Venice. Mostly in the “portolan style” in its town
views (with the notable exception of Alanya), Kitab-ı Bahriye causes the term to be applied –albeit as
something of a misnomer– for later town illustrations.

2nd phase in topographical illustration in Beyan-ı Menāzil-i Sefer-i Irakeyn by Matrkçı Nasuh: His writng
and sketching on the spot generated the remarkable accuracy of the illustrations. His sources were
probably not of European origin (given the fact that no printed illustrations of Anatolian towns -except
Istanbul- was accessible before 1572), instead Iranain, Syrian and Egyptian influences could be found.
Three illustrations of importance: Sultaniye (most technically refined composition, other town views
related to each other–probably works by local artists from Tabriz or Baghdad), Shrine of Husayn at
Kerbela, and of Ali at Najaf (belong to a different genre of hajj scrolls).

3rd phase - later Ottoman histories of a period mostly occupied with campaigns in Europe, therefore
much more open to European source material, stylization becomes popular in Ottoman painting after
1540 –not sure where it comes from. The best example is Szigetvar illustrations, getting more and more
stylized but originating from an eye-witness draft. The sketches by European draftsmen were certainly
accessible to Ottoman painters in the second half of the 16th century, but all European influence came
from mostly Venetian printed sources.

4th phase is notable for an interest in the architecture of individual buildings, appearing more frequently
after 1580, and replacing the fashion for bird’s-eye view and topographical elements.


Pınar Emiralioğlu - Geographical Knowledge and Imperial Culture in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire

Focuses on the 16th century cartographic production and its relationship with the Ottoman
imperial agenda. Three sections treating the city of Constantinople; the Mediterranean Sea;
and “frontiers” such as the Indian Ocean, India, and the New World, as their spatial emphases.
Emphasizes the idea of universal sovereignty - imperial expansion paralleled in the 16th century
with a boom in cartographic production. but could the cartographic works influence state
policy? – Emiralioğlu says yes wrt Constantinople and the Mediterranean, but agrees with
Casale’s “age of exploration” argument only to a limited extent.

4 question of the book:
What were the circumstances that triggered Ott. claims to universal sovereignty?
– Rapid territorial expansion in the 16th century
Production and distribution of geographical works (in view of these circumstances)
– Istanbul being presented as the center of a new world empire
How is the relation between Ottoman geography and politics reflected?
– Struggle for supremacy in the Mediterranean
What does this relationship mean in the context of the early modern world?
– No systematized and institutional presence in the Indian Ocean, but late
appreciation of the importance of geographical knowledge

Primary Sources: Geographers and cartographers
Uses both geographical texts and cartographical sources:
- Piri Reis
- Ali Macar Reis
- Hacı Ahmed
- Selman Reis
- Atlas-ı Hümāyūn
- Tarih-i Hind-i Garbi
- Cihannüma (KÇ)

Secondary Sources:
Engages the discussions on
- connections between cartographic/geographical production and state ideology (harvey, ebel,
karamustafa, kivelson (working on Russia), pinto (who will be at the CMES for a workshop on
March 3-5 and present on KMMS –kitab el-masalik ve’l-memalik ca. mid 10th century), gruzinski):
“geographical works as tools for central powers to project their world perspectives”
- north-south frontier (hess, greene)
- age of exploration (özbaran/orhonlu, casale, soucek, brummett, hagen)
 o account of presences and absences
o exceptionalism (Emiralioğlu does not openly argue against this –which according to me
is a weakness in her presentation of her position, but I will come back to that later)

Ch. 1: Negotiating space and imperial ideology in the sixteenth-century Ottoman Empire
Territorial expansion – imperial power manifested and reproduced in the form of geographical
works of the Hapsburg and Ottoman Empires were in dialogue. The geographical consciousness
influenced by the rivalry between the OE and the Habsburg and Safavid Empires.
Selim I: Mediterranean and the Red Sea, new arsenal, Barbarossa entering state service (1519),
however, Indian Ocean faction project was peripheral, but early 16th century was the Ottoman
renaissance in the geographical knowledge of the Mediterranean (Piri Reis being the main
character in this part of her argument, also mentions Seydi Ali Reis)
Süleyman I: Rightful universal ruler, successor of Alexander the Great => grand imperial vision:
Hungary, Barbarossa officially appointed (1534), Baghdad campaign, canal projects => canonical
geography: al-Muvakit (1525), Piri Reis (1521), Matrakçı Nasuh (1537) => universal empire and
Constantinople as the center (Sinan’s skyline). Hacı Ahmed map (not original), Seydi Ali Reis
(marginalizing the Indian Ocean), world maps (Ali Macar Reis, Walter’s World Atlas –emphasis
on Mediterranean)
Murad III: THG & Rulers of India and China again marginalizing the New World and India and
China, observatory – geographical consciousness attesting to awareness of the expanding world
and shifting networks, but their claims to universal rulership remained (although shifted the
central theme from the Roman to a Sunni Muslim empire).
End of 16th century: No more claims to universal rule (in 1590s?) Ottomans as pious Sunni
Muslims with Central Asian origins.

Ch. 2: Mapping and describing Ottoman Constantinople
Territorialization of imperial claims
- placement of Istanbul as the center of the “old world” starting with Mehmed II
(contrary to the trend of downplaying the city in previous (?) geographical and
cartographical texts)
e.g.
1. evsaf-ı İstanbul (Latifi)
2. 1525 work of Mustafa b. Ali al-Muvakkit: Iʿlāmu’l-ʿIbād fī Aʿlāmi’l-Bilād (Public
Instructions for the Distances of Countries OR A Public Announcement of the Milestones
of Countries) [CASALE: part of the exploration and discovery literature – SOUCEK: these
are not genuine, no maps, no innovative content (puts Seyfi Çelebi, Muvakkit,
Sipahizade Mehmed in the same category), EVLIYA: was very precise in determining the
kıbla/time? such that other muvakkıtin and even those of Frengistan would go to his
muvakkitahne (in Bayezid II complex?) to calibrate their tools]
Philip II’s geographic projects -//- not matched by Ottoman surveys whose content was not
organized or standardized
3. Matrakçı Nasuh – imperial vision
4. Aşık Mehmed – re-placing Ka’ba in the center after the Takiyüddin observatory
destroyed


Ch. 3: Charting the Mediterranean: The Ottoman grand strategy
Portolan atlases drawing a growing interest at the court
• Piri Reis coming closer to being an official cartographer (p. 95) for the Ottoman Empire
[exact opposite of Soucek’s argument] – information about the Atlantic and the Indian
ocean in the introduction, but then the whole book is devoted to the Mediterranean
(empirical knowledge being the source of detail and accuracy)
• Three atlases (Ali Macar Reis, Walter’s, Atlas-ı Hümayun) consolidating the
Mediterranean as the core area for the Ottoman imperial agenda. WSA produced in
Italy – list of maps in WSA p. 103, AMR being a sea captain, Imperial Atlas extended with
a world map.

Ch. 4: Projecting the frontiers of the known world
Indian ocean (Seydi Ali Reis f. 1554-57 –patron: Rüstem Paşa), and the New world (THG c,
1580s) –peripheral, but growing interest among Ottoman intellectuals – but the policy makers
remained uninterested in expanding beyond the core areas –evidenced by the number of
copies p.124 “That only ..” is a bit problematic perhaps since -for instance- Rogers’ illustrated
MSs have only one copy each.

Emiralioğlu argues that there was an absence of an official institution for geography and
cartography, but production continued through the search by scholars for patrons among court
elites, often promoting a particular political agenda, but not to the extent that a core-periphery
relation (in the Wallerstein-ian sense) with the frontier zones could be realized.

Epilogue: links to 17th and 18th centuries – as the Ottoman state changed (failure of the imperial
enterprise: military conflicts, financial problems, rebellions, factionalism in the bureaucracy –
not necessarily to be called decline), political and intellectual culture was transformed, and
their use of geography also changed throughout the long-18th century.
Geographical production increased: Campaign on Crete could be one of the main reasons of
this change. Hagen also mentions the changing background of the geographers –in addition to
changing patronage
Accompanied with increased use of European sources in the 17th century:
• Anonymous portolan
• Levamiü’n-nūr (Flashes Illuminating the Darkness of Atlas Minor)
• Cihannüma (1657) – geography now presented as a separate discipline from history
• Ebu Bekir Dimeşki (Marsigli)

Printed books in the 18th century
then in 1802 with the publication of Cedid Atlas Tercümesi (translation of Faden’s General
Atlas) “scientific model of collecting, measuring, and presenting geographic information” (p.
155) did not come as late as 19th century
Printing press made the difference in the European case – the circulation of the Ottoman
geographies remained rather limited – the argument around comparing quantities.

• Does Emiralioğlu engage in the discussions of exceptionalism (of Piri Reis, for instance)?
o Emiralioğlu does, but only marginally. It is of course not a very strong argument to
suggest that Piri Reis was representative of a larger world of Ottoman cartographic
production comparable to the Habsburg case, especially given the tardiness of the use
of printing press in Ottoman book production. However, Emiralioğlu could have gone
deeper into the circulation in the Ottoman Empire of books, atlases, and maps
produced in Europe, and made a case for the existence of a maritime culture which
incorporated a lively geographical/cartographic interaction, which could perhaps be
observed –for instance Piri Reis’ or other upper-middle rank naval officers’– not-so-
exceptional access to maps of Columbus, KÇ’s access to volumes of Mercator’s atlas,
not to mention the portolan charts and isolarii (exactly those of which many
Ottomanized versions were produced –as Karamustafa mentioned) – instead
Emiralioğlu seems to think of the Ottoman world to be too isolated, making the
contacts with European cartographers a very rare event. (p. 106-109)

• Separation or conversation between the European and Ottoman cartographies?
o That being said, I think a larger problem is Emiralioğlu’s preoccupation with whether
Ottoman territorial expansion with an imperial (even imperialist) agenda was realized
or not. This preoccupation directly comes from the comparison between the east and
west, or the European and the Ottoman, or innovation vs. tradition. This is perhaps the
very consequence of the unproductive question -still prevailing in the field- of whether
to take Ottoman mapping as a counterpart to early modern European mapping rather
than dealing with it as an inherently separate, ‘Islamic’ phenomenon, and Emiralioğlu
says it should be taken as a counterpart of the European mapping. This however,
comes at the expense of undermining a more practical understanding of Ottoman
perception of space (emerging in the 16th century) directed to perhaps more
domestically-oriented projects, like waterways, battle plans, town views, river maps
(considered as regional maps) –which, we can call internal incorporation in the
Wallerstein-ian terminology.

• How does Emiralioğlu use Evliya Çelebi as a source?
o Emiralioğlu mentions Evliya only once in reference to Evliya’s description of the
mapmakers’ guild (15 cartographers in 8 shops). However, Evliya also mentions a very
very interesting story about Bayezid II and Columbus (and actually he gives the story
twice!), making him quite a good source for understanding different “Ottoman mental
attitudes” towards geography in the epilogue.
o Palmira Brummett in her “Mapping the Ottomans” uses Evliya Çelebi extensively – this
is a book on the 17th century cartographic practices in the Ottoman Empire and Europe,
and specifically focuses on how the Ottoman lands are depicted. Emiralioğlu takes
Evliya Çelebi to compare to European travel accounts (though Emiralioğlu uses only the
available translations of Seyahatname and not its entirety).