Queen Elizabeth I to Sultan Murad III - Imperial Imagery

att. George Gower, Queen Elizabeth I, 1588
(National Portrait Gallery, London) 

This portrait of Queen Elizabeth I painted in honor of the biggest victory of her reign over the Spanish Armada of 1588 brings back a distant memory of standing in the middle of the National Portrait Gallery, listening to my niece relaying the story of having to count the pearls on the queen's dress for a school assignment. While we stood before the life-size portrait of 'Bess', admiring the elaborate treatment of the surfaces and observing her intrinsic features, I realized we did not have any equivalent to this, from our own history except for the one portrait, The Sultan Mehmed II, by Gentile Bellini.  In an earlier post, I had discussed the mobility of artists, influences and ideas as well as works of art in the fifteenth-century in regards to Mehmed II.  However, after Mehmed's death, commissions for portraiture in the Italian Quattrocento tradition seems to completely disappear from the Ottoman court.  The common belief that this was due to the religious inclinations of Bayezid II seems to be unanimous.  As a consequence of this, instead of portrait galleries full of life-size, oil on canvas likenesses of the Ottoman Sultans, Topkapi Palace museum contains folios full of manuscript illuminations with depictions in the Ottoman tradition.  What I want to discuss here is where the images for the Sultan portraits in these manuscripts came from if no known likenesses existed?

Siblizade Ahmed, Mehmed II Smelling a Rose, 1480
(Topkapi Palace Museum)

The first series of Sultan portraits was part of an illuminated history of the Ottoman empire that  was commissioned by Murad III (r.1574-1595) in 1578.  Sema'ilname, written in Ottoman Turkish by Seyyid Lokman was to be illustrated by Nakkas (illuminator) Osman and contain detailed biographic information about each of the twelve sultans including their victories, conquests as well as patronage. 1   The portrait of Mehmed II by Siblizade Ahmed, where the artist combined the Timurid miniature tradition with the slight modeling and light and shadow effects of the Italian masters, was already in the Topkapi Palace collection at this time.  Capturing the images of the other sultans must have proved to be challenging since the Grand Vizier, Sokollu Mehmed Pasa requested the aid of the Venetian bailo, Niccolo Barbarigo in locating the collection of Sultan portraits they had heard existed in Venice.

Haydar Reis (Nigari), Sultan Selim II, 1561-62
(Topkapi Palace Museum)

Haydar Reis (Nigari), Admiral of the Fleet Hizir Hayrettin Pasa (Barbarossa) 
(Topkapi Palace Museum) 

The Sultan portraits series in the Venetian collection is thought to derive from a set produced by Haydar Reis, otherwise known as Nakkas Nigari.  There is a hypothesis that Paulo Giovio, Italian biographer, historian who collected portraits of the rulers and notables of his generation had acquired a set of  Sultan portraits made by Nigari in the middle of sixteenth-century and these had been used to make the engravings for Giovio's book on the lives of famous men, which were also the models for a variety of artists including followers of Veronese who wanted to produce portraits of the Ottoman Sultans.  These were the oil on canvas paintings that Grand Vizier Sokollu Mehmed Pasa was requesting from Venice. 

Ottoman Sultan Selim I, 1578
(Vitae Illustrium Virorum) 

Ottoman Sultan Suleiman I (The Magnificent), 1578
(Vitae Illustrium Virorum)

School of Veronese, Sultan Murad III, 16th c.
(Alte Pinakothek, Munich)

School of Veronese, Sultan Selim II, 16th c.

In The Sultan's Portrait:  Picturing the House of Osman, a very comprehensive and magnificent book/exhibition catalog for an exhibit that took place in 2000 at the Topkapi Palace, the different types of conveyed images and their sources of inspiration are discussed in great length.  For the most part, these images are not considered to be true likenesses of the Sultans but European skewed interpretations instead.   Nevertheless, they must have provided a model for Nakkas Osman to create his pioneering work that was to be a formula to be used for many centuries to come.

Nakkas Osman, Semailname- Orhan Gazi

Nakkas Osman, Semailname- Osman Gazi

Nakkas Osman,Semailname, Sultan Mehmed I

Nakkas Osman, Semailname,
Sultan Mehmed II

As can be observed quite clearly, Nakkas Osman's portraits recall Siblizade Ahmed's portrait of Mehmed II where the Sultan is depicted sitting three quarter view smelling a rose in one hand and holding a handkerchief in the other. Osman also had a precedent in the uniquely naturalistic depictions of Nakkas Nigari from the middle of the sixteenth century - upon closer inspection the features of Selim II (see below) by Osman are very similar to Nigari's depiction of Selim shown holding a bow and an attendant  with an arrow(see above).  It is known that the deceased Sultan's kaftans, turbans and other accessories were taken out of storage and used to create a more realistic image.

Nakkas Osman,
Semailname, Sultan Selim I

Nakkas Osman, Semailname,
Suleiman I (the Magnificent)

Nakkas Osman, Semailname
Sultan Selim II

Nakkas Osman, Semailname,
Sultan Murad III

Even though Sema'ilname may have been commissioned simply to display dynastic imagery similar to its European counterparts, with its many sources of inspiration and attribution, it can also be regarded as a vital link in connecting not only the Eastern and the Western traditions but also the past and the future as well.  Sultan Murad III's reign coincided with Queen Elizabeth I's and there were an exchange of letters and gifts between the two courts; the unexpected route of imperial imagery in the Ottoman court, I think begs the question of what they would have thought of each other had they actually exchanged portraits as was the custom between other European dynasties...

References:

1 Selmin Kangal and Priscilla Mary Isin, The Sultan's Portrait:  Picturing the House of Osman, Istanbul, Isbank, 2000

2 www.turkishculture.org -Images