The yeni valide mosque complex at eminönü

Muqarnas

Volumn 15, Issue , 1998, Pages

  Thys Şenocak, Lucienne ^a  

^a KOÇ UNIVERSITY   (Turkey)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 24844456655     PISSN: 07322992     EISSN: 09210326     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/1523277     Document Type: Article

References (49)

1. Robert Mantran, "Foreign Merchants and Minorities in Istanbul during the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries," Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire, ed. Benjamin Braude and Bernard Lewis, 2 vols. (New York, 1982), 1:127-37
2. Fmdikh Mehmed Aḡa, Silahdar Tārihi, 2 vols. (Istanbul, 1928), 1:218-19
3. See Leslie Peirce, "Shifting Boundaries: Images of Ottoman Royal Women in the 16th and 17th Centuries," Critical Matrix 4: (Fall-Winter, 1988): 61, n. 39. Sūlcyman's mother Hafsa Sultan, for example, built the Sultaniye in Manisa where she had her court with her son Sūleyman before he became sultan and moved to Istanbul
4. See M. Çaǧatay Uluçay, Manisa'daki Saray-i Amire ve Şehzadeler Tūrbesi (Istanbul, 1941), p. 9
5. and "Kanuni Sultan Sūleyman ve ailesi ile ilgili bazi notlar ve Vesikalar," Kanuni armaḡam, (Ankara, 1970), pp. 230-31
6. For records of the foundation inscriptions of imperial women who built in the capital before Hatice Turhan, see my The Yeni Valide Mosque Complex in Eminōnū, Istanbul (1597-1665)" Ph.D. diss., University of Pennsylvania, 1994, pp. 56-62. In the main portal inscription of the Yeni Valide mosque, the valide sultan takes full credit for founding the mosque. The line in the lowest panel of the inscription to the immediate right of the central portal inscription proclaims that she ordered the mosque to be built (emru sultanina ataleleha). The third line of the inscription again refers to the valide's role as the patroness of the mosque (Ammarahu Rabbuhā lemā tehvi vecezāhā bi-kūlli mekremetin a'limū's-strru ve a'limū'n-necvā. hasenun kale fihi tārihā; note the feminine endings of rabbuhā and vecezāhā, which openly acknowledge that the patron was a woman)
7. Ūlkū Bates, "Women as Patrons of Architecture in Turkey," Women in the Muslim World, ed. Lois Beck and Nikki Keddie (Cambridge, Mass., 1978), pp. 243-60
8. For the problem of who in the Ottoman hierarchy had the authority to select or allocate a building site, see my "Yeni Valide Mosque Complex," p. 25, n. 51, and Irvin Schick's review article, "Gynaeceum and Power: The 'Sultanate of Women' Reconsidered," New Perspectives on Turkey, Spring 1995, p. 12. Summarizing Ayvansarayi's Hadikat-ūl Cevāmi, Ūlkū Bates reports that 7 percent of the mosques in Istanbul, or 63 out of 953, were built "by or for" women ("Women as Patrons," p. 246). I suggest that mosques built for women and mosques built by them should not be lumped together in the same group merely because women were somehow involved in the project. Analysis of the language of the foundation inscriptions, contemporary chroniclers' reports, and the foundation charters can be very helpful in determining the chain of authority in architectural projects, but this research must be done on a case-by-case basis. For example, it is evident from the foundation inscription of Hatice Turban's mosque and Silahdar's account of the project that she was recognized as the legitimate patroness of this pious work. Further, in the valide's official foundation charter, her political authority in the empire is confirmed by her title, sāhibel-ūl devlet ("the [female] owner of the Ottoman state"). There is clear evidence in the second phase of the Yeni Valide project that ultimately it was the valide who was exercising legitimate and official authority, hence there is no doubt that the Eminōnū project was built by her and not for her
9. ("The Yeni Valide Mosque Complex," p. 226; Istanbul, Sūleymaniye Library no. 150, fol. 9b)
10. Letters between the grand vizier and Hatice Turhan further attest to the valide's interest in and concern with commercial matters. In a letter written to the grand vizier about the loss of revenue from Egypt, the valide inquires of the vizier, "What is the reason why the [annual] revenue from Egypt has fallen to 800 purses when it used to be 1200 purses?... During the reign of my lord Sultan Ibrahim, may God have mercy on him, and during the reign of Sultan Murad, how many times, year after year, did we see the Egyptian revenues arrive? What can they be thinking of that they send such a shortfall?"; as quoted and translated by Leslie Peirce in The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignly in the Ottoman Empire (New York, 1993), p. 236; from the Topkapi Palace Museum Archives (TSMA) 7001/32. The income that Hatice Turhan had endowed for the Yeni Cami complex was, according to the waqfiyya (Suleymaniye Library no. 150, fol. 24b-29a), derived from real estate and rental properties in Istanbul and in several villages in Rumelia. For a comprehensive list of all properties and expenses mentioned in the waqfiyya, see my "Yeni Valide Mosque Complex," pp. 228-30, Appendix 1.4
11. Raymond Janin, Constantinople byzanline: développement urbain el répertoire topographique (Paris, 1950), pp. 237-42
12. Ali Ūlgen, Fatih devrinde Istanbul (Ankara, 1939), p. 12. The origins and ideology of the Karaite sect of Judaism are controversial and beyond the scope of this article. For additional information, see William Brenner, "Karaites of Christiandom-Karaites of Islam," The Islamic World from Classical to Modern Times (Princeton, 1989), pp. 55-74
13. For information regarding the Karaite sect in Byzantine history, see Zvi Ankori, Karaites in Byzantium: The Formative Years, 970-1100 (New York, 1959)
14. Halil Inalcik, "Jews in the Ottoman Economy and Finances, 1450-1500," The Islamic World from Classical to Modern Times: Essays in Honor of Bernard Lewis, ed. C. E. Bosworth et al. (Princeton, 1988), p. 527, n. 1, 2
15. Tahsin OZmacr;z, "Zwei Stiftungsurkunden des Sultans Mehmed II Fatih," Istanbuler Mitteilungen, 4 (1953): 25-28
16. Uriel Heyd, "The Jewish Communities of Istanbul," Oriens, 6, 2 (1953): 304
17. S. Yerasimos, "La Communauté juive d'Istanbul à la fin du XVIe siècle," Turcica 27 (1995): 101-30
18. Uriel Heyd, "The Jewish Communities of Istanbul in the Seventeenth Century," Oriens 6 (1953): 300-3, for information on related archival documents: Bajbakanhk Arşivleri (BA) (Prime Ministry Archives of Istanbul) Tapu ve Tahrir Defterleri (Cadastral Survey Records) nos. 210, 240; Maliyeden Mūdevver Defterleri (MM) (transferred from the Finance Ministry) 90, fol. 105b; MM 14393, MM 2060, MM 20198, MM 286
19. For summary information about MM 14393, see the recent article by Yerasimos, "La Communauté juive d'Istanbul," pp. 107-8 and nn. 21-25
20. Inalcik, "Jews in the Ottoman Economy and Finances," pp. 513-50
21. Benjamin Arbel, Trading Nations: Jews and Venetians in the Early Modern Eastern Mediterranean (Leiden, 1995) pp. 18-19
22. Haim Gerber, "Jewish Tax Farmers in the Ottoman Empire in the 16th and 17th Centuries," Journal of Turkish Studies 10 (1986): 146, 152
23. From the reports of Venetian officials residing in Constantinople at this time we know that the Venetians found Safiye Sultan to be a particularly useful link to her son, Sultan Mehmed III. See Eugenio Alberi, ed. Relazioni degli ambasciatori veneti al senato, ser. 3, 3 vols. (Florence, 1840-55); 3:439-40, as cited by Peirce, Imperial Harem p. 223, for reports by Venetian officials concerning Safiye Sultan. While recent research has established that neither Safiye Sultan nor Nurbanu, her predecessor, was of Venetian origin, (see B. Arbel, "Nur Banu (c. 1530-83): A Venetian Sultana," Turcica 24 [1992]: 241-59), it is clear that she was often involved in trade negotiations with the Venetian merchants of Constantinople
24. Mustafa Selaniki, Tārih-i Selāniki, 2 vols., ed. Mehmed Ipşirli (Istanbul, 1989), Mehmed Raşid, Tārih, 5 vols. (Istanbul, 1282), vol. 1; Silahdar Findikh; Mehmed Aǧa, Silahdar Tarihi, 2 vols. (Istanbul, 1928), vol. 1; Evliya Celebi; Seyâhatnāme, 5 vols. ed. C. Mumin (Istanbul, 1314/1896-97). To date there are few construction records from the Yeni Valide project. The brick orders for the second phase of building (MM. 5777) do exist; they show payments for bricks ordered for the mosque, shops, coffee rooms, and other structures of the complex from 6 August 1661 to 27 March 1664. For a translation of these orders, see my "Yeni Valide Mosque Complex," pp. 237-41. Unfortunately, the Mūhimme registers (book of records of the Imperial Assembly of the State) 74, 75, 76 and 92, 95 which correspond to the first and second building phases respectively of the Yeni Valide project do not contain court orders or contemporary documentation related to the building of the complex
25. Expropriation was not a simple process even for royalty. According to Josef Schacht, expropriation for the public good was possible "only within very narrow limits. The theory of Islamic law has thus developed only a few rudiments of a special law of real estate; conditions of land tenure in practice were often different from theory, varying according to place and time, and hence the institution of vakf has become of great importance" (An Introduction to Islamic Law [Oxford, 1964], p. 142, from Schacht's chapter on property, pp. 134-43
26. See also H. Gerber's important study of Ottoman law in a comparative perspective, State, Society, and Law in Islam: Ottoman Law in Comparative Perspective [Albany, N.Y., 1994])
27. Selaniki, Tārih-i Selāniki, pp. 723, 849-50
28. A. Ūlgen, "Yenicami" Vakiflar Dergisi 2 (1942): 388
29. H. Peynircioǧlu, 1. Aksoy, and K. Ōzūdogru, Eminōnū Sūleymaniye-Unkapani bōlgesinin geoteknik elūdū. ve Yeni Cami temellerinin incelenmesi, Istanbul Teknik, Ins, aat Fakūltesi, No. 31 (May 1978): 9-10
30. Peirce, Imperial Harem, p. 242, n. 48
31. John Sanderson, Travels of John Sanderson in the Levant 1584-1602, ed. Sir W. Foster, Hakluyt Society, 2nd series, vol. 67 (London, 1931), p. 204
32. Evliya Çelebi, Seyāhatnāme, 1: 302; see n. 48
33. Cornell Fleischer, Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: The Historian Mustafa Ali 1541-1600 (Princeton, 1986), pp. 101-6
34. Cited by Gūlru Necipoglu, "The Sūleymaniye Complex in Istanbul: An Interpretation," Muqamas 3 (1985): 113 and n. 100
35. Richard Parker, Robin Sabin, Caroline Williams, Islamic Monuments in Cairo: A Practical Guide (Cairo 1985), p. 162. The Cairo foundation and other pious works outside Istanbul that were sponsored and supported by Safiye Sultan will be the subject of a forthcoming article
36. Crane, Risale, p. 66; fol. 52a
37. For information about the Sultan Ahmed complex, see Zeynep Nayir, Osmanh mimarliǧinda Sultan Ahmet kūlliyesi ve sonrasi (1609-1690): TSMA D. 212, Islimlak ve maheme masraflan defteri; Necipoglu, "Suleymaniye Complex in Istanbul," p. 113; Godfrey Goodwin, A History of Ottoman Architecture (Baltimore, 1971), p. 343
38. Bates, "Women as Patrons of Architecture in Turkey," pp. 243-60
39. Silahdar, 1:218-19
40. Suleymaniye Library 150, fols. 17b-18b
41. The waqfiyya says that the Jews claimed there was a single black spot in the area (siyāh pākize), possibly a reference to the burned foundations remaining from Safiye Sultan's project (Sūleymaniye Library 150, fols. 17b-18b)
42. References to the Qur'an are quoted from The Koran, trans. N.J. Dawood (London, 1993)
43. Qur'an 59:2
44. Qur'an 59:3
45. Qur'an 59:15
46. Madeline Zilfi, "The Kadizadelis: Discordant Revivalism in Seventeenth-Century Istanbul," Journal of Near Eastern Studies 45, no. 4. (1986): 251-69
47. Paul Rycaut, The History of the Turkish Empire from the Year 1623 to the Year 1692 (London, 1680), pp. 104-5
48. see also M. Zilfi, Politics of Piety: The Ottoman Ulema in the Post-Classical Age (1600-1800) (Minneapolis, 1988), pp. 149-54
49. Bu cāmi' ewelce Fātih'in vālidesi tarafindan on Misir hazīnesi sarf olunarak tāklarina kadar yapilmis iken, bānlyesi merhumenin̄ vukū'i vefatina mebnl o zamāndan beru harab ve nā-tammām kalub zulmiye ismiyle Şōhret bulmuşdu."... "Harlk-i meshūreden sonra Mehmed-i rābi'in vālidesi sultān Istānbul'u gezerken bu cāmi in esāsini keşf ederek helāl mahndan 5.000 kīse ifrāz ile bināsina şūrū' ederek adini "'adliyye" koydu" (Seyāhatnāme 1:302)