Publication Date
Maybe the seventeenth century
Publication Place
Maybe Istanbul -
Austrian National Library (ANL)
Subject
Ink, opaque watercolor and gold on paper, layout in engraving script, 21 lines per page.
Type
Other
Language
Undetermined
Digital
Yes
Manuscript
Yes
Physical Dimensions
316 × 220 مم (250 × 155 مم ) ، 172 صفحة
Library
Museum With No Frontiers
Library Asset ID
H.O. 192
Record ID
object;EPM;at;Mus24;13;ar
Library Location
Austrian National Library (ANL)
Date
Maybe the seventeenth century
Notes
The important guide on sailing and sea travel called Bahriyya was compiled by Piri Reis bin Haji Muhammad (died 962 AH/1554-55 AD), an Ottoman sailor and cartographer. This copy, which dates back to the seventeenth century, was written in large calligraphy, perhaps in Ottoman Istanbul. Piri Reis, an Ottoman captain and later admiral of the Ottoman fleet, was entrusted with the formation of two famous maps of the world and also this navigation guide for the entire Mediterranean region. While the latter can be attributed to the Italian Catalan, Protolan and Isolari (nautical atlases or nautical guides and island guides respectively), Piri Reis's work is considered quite original as it contains detailed descriptions of the coasts and islands of the Mediterranean starting from the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles. It is surprising that this manuscript is a late copy of its first publication in the year 1521, while the second separate edition, which includes a more detailed and longer text, was probably made five years later and gifted to Suleiman the Magnificent. The previous text consisted of 132 chapters with descriptive texts for the historical, geographical and maritime contents. This copy also contains 133 half-page to full-page map drawings that accompany the text, most of which show an image of a black compass rose in the middle. Like the other 20 surviving copies, it is likely that it was used mainly for practical purposes. In contrast, the second edition of the text is the surviving version of about ten copies that give a high quality of both its layout and rich images. This means that these manuals were intended to be educational for the nobility and it is assumed that the Fina version with its diagrams and not the drawings contain inaccuracies and suggest that sometimes even extending to the blocks of text that were produced by sailors or members of the Ottoman navy in the arsenal or in the planning workshops. The map drawings show cities with ports and forts, identified with place names and other representative details in bright colors. This representation seems to follow a fixed formation relationship with images of areas drawn at a high level. Some coastal islands or reefs (reefs), for example, are shown in red. Judging from the drawings, this evidence is similar in form to the copy kept in the University of Bologna Library (MS 3613, dating from 977 AH / 1569 AD), and it has been suggested that the Vienna Codex could be a copy of the Bologna Codex from the second half of the seventeenth century. The owner's notes and seals on page 1a show that the evidence was part of the collections of a person named Zainal Abidin Awlizadeh and also Joseph von Hammer Burgstahl.
Sample Text
Theresa Zischkin "Reis of the Sea (Piri Reis) Bin Haji Muhammad (Bahria) (Guide to Sailing and Sea Travel)" in Explore Islamic Art Collections. Museum Without Borders, 2026. https://islamicart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;EPM;at;Mus24;13;ar
Cilt
The light brown half-leather binding features the title as well as additional ornaments in gold print on the spine. It consists of European marbled paper over boards, which suggest that it was likely made in 19th-century Vienna.
Bu sayfanın künyesi
Prepared by:Theresa ZISCHKIN
Seçili bibliyografya
Duda, Dorothea,Islamische Handschriften II/2. Persische Handschriften, Die illuminierten Handschriften und Inkunabeln der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek, vol. 5/2, Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2008: 232-242.
