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A late Ottoman intellectual on the Chora monastery: Mehmed Ziya's book on the ‘Kaʻriye Cami-i Şerifi’ in context

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2025

Artemis Papatheodorou Open the ORCID record for Artemis Papatheodorou [Opens in a new window]
Artemis Papatheodorou*
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Abstract

Mehmed Ziya, an Ottoman Muslim educator and intellectual, published an art historical treatise on the Chora Monastery/Kariye Mosque in Istanbul in 1910. This was largely a translation of three articles by the French Byzantinist Charles Diehl previously published in Études byzantines and in Le Journal des savants. Through his book, Mehmed Ziya attempted to acquaint the Ottoman Turks with this Byzantine monument, especially its rich decorations. Two letters appended in the book reveal his efforts to raise awareness among the youth in this respect, and to mobilize the Ottoman authorities regarding the protection and promotion of the Chora monastery more particularly.

Keywords

ByzantiumOttoman EmpireheritageChoraKariyeMehmed ZiyaHalil Bey
Type
Article
Information
Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies , Volume 49 , Issue 1 , April 2025 , pp. 68 - 77
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies, University of Birmingham

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References

1 Eyice, S., ‘İhtifalci Mehmed Zîyâ’, İslam Ansiklopedisi xxi, 559-560Google Scholar. For Mehmed Ziya's work on commemorations, see Keskin, N. Koç, ‘Bir yeniden canlandırma “Sadabad Günü İhtifali” Millî Folklor 17:133 (2022) 79-91Google Scholar.

2 Ousterhout, R., ‘The rediscovery of Constantinople and the beginnings of Byzantine archaeology: a historiographic survey’, in Bahrani, Z. et al. (eds.), Scramble for the Past: a story of archaeology in the Ottoman Empire (1753-1914) (Istanbul 2011) 181-95Google Scholar. For a focus on France, see Spieser, J-M., ‘Considering Byzantium: from seventeenth-century scholars to twentieth-century academics’, in Pitarakis, B. (ed.), From Istanbul to Byzantium: paths to rediscovery (1800-1955) (Istanbul 2021) 461-71Google Scholar. On the Fossati brothers, see B. Daskas, ‘Aya Sofia Kibir Giamy Scheriffy: the Fossati brothers, the Ottoman capital and the “Superb Imperial Mosque of Hagia Sophia”’, in Pitarakis, From Istanbul to Byzantium 20-39.

3 R. Ousterhout, ‘The rediscovery of Constantinople’, 197-8; Gerd, L., ‘The Russian Archaeological Institute in Constantinople and the politics of research’, in Delouis, O. and Pitarakis, B. (eds.), Discovering Byzantium in Istanbul: scholars, institutions, and challenges, 1800-1955 (Istanbul 2022) 163-84Google Scholar; Üre, P., ‘Russian archaeologists in Istanbul and international scholarly collaboration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries’, in Delouis, O. and Pitarakis, B. (eds.), Discovering Byzantium in Istanbul: scholars, institutions, and challenges, 1800-1955 (Istanbul 2022) 147-61Google Scholar. E.N. Boeck, ‘Mosaics and Mavericks: Nikodimov Kondakov's pioneering studies of the Chora (1880-6), in Pitarakis, From Istanbul to Byzantium, 475-85.

4 R. Ousterhout, ‘The rediscovery of Constantinople’, 195-6.

5 F.M. Sümertaş, ‘Fellow-citizens around a shared heritage: tradition, erudition, and cultural interchange in late Ottoman Istanbul’, in Pitarakis (ed.), From Istanbul to Byzantium, 145-7.

6 D. Stamatopoulos, ‘“Constantinople is the tower of Babel”: escaping from time to space in historical representations of nineteenth-century Istanbul’, in Delouis and Pitarakis, Discovering Byzantium in Istanbul, 129-36.

7 Stamatopoulos, ‘”Constantinople is the tower of Babel”, 136-9; Sümertaş, ‘Fellow-citizens around a shared heritage’, 149.

8 A. Papatheodorou, ‘Ottoman policy-making in an age of reforms: unearthing Ottoman archaeology in the 19th and early 20th centuries’, diss. DPhil Oxford 2017, 300-31.

9 G. Vassiadis, ‘Monuments, manuscripts, and memories: the Greek Philological Syllogos of Constantinople and the emergence of Byzantine studies in Istanbul’, in Delouis and Pitarakis, Discovering Byzantium in Istanbul, 104-6, 121.

10 Mishkova, D., Rival Byzantiums: empire and identity in Southeastern Europe (Cambridge 2022) 170-1CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 E. Eldem, ‘The Ottoman (Re)discovery of Byzantium’, in Delouis and Pitarakis, Discovering Byzantium in Istanbul, 18-31.

12 Mishkova, Rival Byzantiums , 171-6; Ş. Kılıç Yıldız, ‘Ottoman Scholars and the Byzantine architectural legacy of Istanbul’, in Delouis and Pitarakis, Discovering Byzantium in Istanbul, 39-43.

13 Dumont, A., ‘Le Musée Sainte-Irène à Constantinople. Antiquités Grecques, Gréco-Romaines et Byzantines,’ in Revue Archéologique 18 (1868) 255-261Google Scholar. E. Eldem, ‘Byzantium in Istanbul: the Byzantine collections of the Istanbul Archaeological Museums’, in Pitarakis, From Istanbul to Byzantium, 259-73.

14 Mishkova, Rival Byzantiums 176-81. Also Ş. Kılıç Yıldız, ‘Ottoman scholars and the Byzantine architectural legacy of Istanbul’ 43-56. E. Akyürek, ‘The study of Byzantine art history in Turkey up to 1955’, in Delouis and Pitarakis (eds.), Discovering Byzantium in Istanbul (85-6).

15 Mehmed Ziya, Kaʻriye Cami-i Şerifi [Kariye Mosque], transcribed by Ö. Zülfe (Istanbul 2012).

16 Mehmed Ziya, Kaʻriye Cami-i Şerifi, 70.

17 Ş. Kılıç Yıldız, ‘Ottoman scholars’, 56-9.

18 Ş. Kılıç Yıldız, ‘Ottoman scholars’, 55. My research has shown that the first article constitutes pp. 19 (last paragraph) to 46 (first paragraph) of Mehmed Ziya's book while the second article follows immediately where the first one ends and goes until p. 61 (second paragraph). The references to the pages are to the transliteration and not the original text in Ottoman Turkish.

19 C. Diehl, ‘Les origines asiatiques de l’ art byzantin’, Le Journal des Savants (1904) 239-51. In Mehmed Ziya's book, it covers pp. 61 (from new section) to 70 (up to new section). The references to the pages are to the transliteration and not the original text in Ottoman Turkish.

20 Mehmed Ziya, Kaʻriye Cami-i Şerifi, 65.

21 Mehmed Ziya, Kaʻriye Cami-i Şerifi, 11-12. For Hadîkatü’l-Cevami, in particular, see Hadîkatü’l-Cevami, in Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı İslâm Ansiklopedisi, https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/hadikatul-cevami (accessed 25.12.2023).

22 Mehmed Ziya, Kaʻriye Cami-i Şerifi, 14-16.

23 Mehmed Ziya, Kaʻriye Cami-i Şerifi, 79-80.

24 The Kariye mosque had been restored in 1875-1876 and again in 1898 following the earthquake of 1894 and ahead of a visit by Kaiser Wilhelm II: Ş. Kılıç Yıldız, ‘Ottoman Scholars and the Byzantine architectural legacy of Istanbul’, 60.

25 Mehmed Ziya, Kaʻriye Cami-i Şerifi, 76-78.