The world through the eyes of Pîrî Reis and Kâtip Çelebi

A collection of Ottoman-era maps from the great Ottoman Turkish cartographers of the 16th and 17th centuries -- Admiral Pîrî Reis and scholar Kâtip Çelebi -- is currently on display at İstanbul's Dolmabahçe Palace Art Gallery.

The show is a tribute to Kâtip Çelebi, the well-known 17th century historian, geographer and bibliographer, on the 400th anniversary of his birth, which is being marked across Turkey throughout the year as part of the 2009 Year of Kâtip Çelebi announced by the Turkish commission of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

“The Ottomans' Worldview: from Pîrî Reis to Kâtip Çelebi” includes detailed maps from the two prominent men who made some of the most important contributions to Ottoman geography and cartography together with works from other geographers from the same era.

The exhibition, organized by the İstanbul-based Bahçeşehir University Civilization Studies Center (MEDAM), aims to show the perspective of the Ottoman Empire from 1650 to 1660, MEDAM President Bekir Karlıağa explained in a recent interview with Today's Zaman. “Maps reveal the knowledge and technology of the period, and we thought showcasing them rather than adding our own interpretations or comments would be better,” he said, adding that this way the exhibit's viewers can come to their own conclusions.

The world maps of Pîrî Reis and his book “Kitab-ı Bahriye,” which he presented to Suleiman the Magnificent in 1526, are the most important 16th century Ottoman naval and cartographic works, Professor Karlıağa explained. “Even though they are prepared in a traditional style, the works of Pîrî Reis are portolan charts based on his personal experiences, observations and earlier maps from the East and West. Although they lack longitude and latitude lines, they are as precise as scientific maps for practical naval purposes since they have a projection center and are adjusted for variation,” Karlıağa said.

Kâtip Çelebi's work marked the beginning of the transition from traditional geographical methods to a more scientific study, Karlıağa said. Kâtip Çelebi's best known work is the “Kashf al-zunu-n ‘an asa-mi- al-kutub wa-al-funu-n” (The Removal of Doubt from the Names of Books and the Sciences), a bibliographic encyclopedia written in Arabic, listing around 14,500 books in alphabetical order. This work served as a basis for the "Bibliothèque Orientale" by Barthélemy d'Herbelot de Molainville.

Karlıağa added that it is fitting that 2009 has been declared the year of Kâtip Çelebi. “He was one of the most important Turkish-Muslim scholars of the 17th century, and this was because he was a multi-talented man. He studied many different branches of thought, including history, geography, music, arts, philosophy, law, mysticism and Islamic theology,” he noted.

The show also features maps from other geographers of the 16th and 17th centuries as well as maps of Ottoman territories from various European geographers of the time.

The show's İstanbul run at the Dolmabahçe Palace Art Gallery wraps up tomorrow, but it is slated to travel other locations in Turkey and abroad, including Ankara, İzmir, Bursa, Antalya, Adana, and Kayseri as well as California, New York, Paris, Aix en-Provence, Tashkent and Damascus this year. Conferences on the work of Kâtip Çelebi will be held to accompany the show.

The exhibition is part of MEDAM's series of cultural events to mark the year of Kâtip Çelebi. The cartographer's complete works will be translated into modern Turkish, and his famous world atlas, “Cihannüma,” will be translated into English. An international conference on Kâtip Çelebi, with 30 scholars from around the world expected to participate, is scheduled for June 19-20 at the Ankara State Painting and Sculpture Museum.

16 June 2009, Tuesday
RUMEYSA KIGER İSTANBUL