Iznik pottery

The change was almost certainly a result of active intervention and patronage by the recently established Ottoman court in Istanbul who greatly valued Chinese blue-and-white porcelain.

From the middle of the century the potters in Iznik produced large quantities of underglazed tiles to decorate the imperial buildings designed by the architect Mimar Sinan.

European collectors also purchased a number of pieces decorated in blue, turquoise, sage green and pale purple which were believed to originate from the town of Damascus in Syria and became known as 'Damascus' ware.

Blue and white fritware pottery became known as 'Abraham of Kutahia ware' as the decoration was similar to that on a small ewer that once formed part of the collection of Frederick Du Cane Godman and is now in the British Museum.

[5] The ewer has an inscription in Armenian script under the glaze on its base stating that the vessel was "in commemoration of Abraham, servant of God, of K'ot'ay [Kütahya].

[6][7] In 1905–1907, during the construction of a new post office in the Sirkeci district of Istanbul near the shore of the Golden Horn, pottery fragments were unearthed that were decorated with spiral designs on a white background.

[8] In 1957 Arthur Lane, keeper of ceramics at the Victoria and Albert Museum, published an influential article in which he reviewed the history of pottery production in the region and proposed a series of dates.

[12] However, subsequent archaeological excavations in Kütahya have unearthed fragments of pots in the blue and white Iznik style that had been damaged during manufacture ('wasters') providing evidence that fritware pottery was produced in the town.

The art historian Julian Raby has written: "For the moment we have no choice but to call all Ottoman glazed pottery of the 16th and 17th centuries by the generic label 'Iznik', and to hope that in time we can learn to recognise the diagnostic features of contemporary 'Kütahya ware'.

A surviving account book for 1526 that records wages paid to craftsmen employed by the Ottoman court, lists a tilemaker from Tabriz with ten assistants.

[16] These underglaze tiles were used on the revetments of the facade of the Holy Mantle Pavilion (Privy Chamber) in the grounds of the Topkapı Palace and within the mausoleum of Çoban Mustafa Pasha (d. 1529) in Gebze.

[17][18] The most striking examples are five extremely large rectangular tiles, 1.25 m (4.1 ft) in length, that form part of the façade of the Circumcision Room (Sünnet Odası) of the Topkapı Palace.

[19][20][21] Although there are no surviving records detailing the output of the imperial workshops, it is likely that the potters manufacturing the blue-and-white underglaze painted tiles also made other items for the court.

[24] Archaeological excavations in İznik conducted by Oktay Aslanapa in the early 1960s revealed that the town had been an important centre for the production of simple earthenware pottery well before the introduction of the blue-and-white fritware.

The name originated from the discovery of sherds during excavations by the German archaeologist Friedrich Sarre at Miletus on the western coast of Anatolia in the early 1930s.

[26] Miletus ware used a red clay body covered with a white slip which was painted with simple designs under a transparent alkaline lead glaze.

[27][28] From the late 15th century, potters in Iznik began producing wares that were decorated in cobalt blue on a white fritware body under a clear glaze.

This had a similar composition to the fritware paste used for the body, but the components were more finely ground and more carefully selected to avoid iron impurities that would discolour the white surface.

[34] Although in his treatise Abū'l-Qāsim recommended that fritware vessels were allowed to dry in the sun before being decorated, it is probable that Iznik ceramics was given a biscuit firing.

[41] In the final decades of the 15th century, potters in Iznik began producing blue-and-white fritware ceramics with designs that were clearly influenced by the Ottoman court in Istanbul.

[42] The earliest datable objects are blue-and-white border tiles that decorate the mausoleum (türbe) in Bursa of Şehzade Mahmud, one of the sons of Bayezid II, who died in 1506–1507.

In some pieces, such as the front of a large charger with a foliate rim in the Çinili Koşk Museum in Istanbul, the decoration used only Ottoman Rumi designs.

Vessels were decorated for the first time with sage green and pale purple, in addition to cobalt blue and turquoise, and form a transition towards full-fledged polychrome ceramics.

The lamp was discovered on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem in the middle of the 19th century and is believed to have been associated with the refurbishment of the Dome of the Rock initiated by Suleiman the Magnificent.

[68][69] Around the base of the lamp are a series of inscribed cartouches giving the name of the decorator (Musli), a dedication to the İznik Sufi saint Eşrefzâde Rumi, and the date of AH 956 in the month of Jumada'l-Ula (AD 1549).

The design includes pale blue cloud-banks, small-scale arabesques on a green ground and a row of tulip buds in dark-blue cartouches.

The tiles were originally installed in a different building but were transferred to the Yeni Kaplıca bathhouse when it was restored by the grand vizier Rüstem Pasha in 1552–1553.

[72][64][73] Beginning in the middle of the 16th century, the potters in Iznik began producing coloured fritware tiles to decorate the imperial buildings designed by the head architect Mimar Sinan.

Purple is used with red in the tiled panel depicting flowering prunus under the portico to the left of the entrance of Rüstem Pasha Mosque in Istanbul.

[88] The bright emerald green was introduced for the first time on the portico panels of Süleyman's mausoleum in the funerary garden of the Süleymaniye complex,[91] which was completed in 1567.