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Lot Essay
This Qur’an is one of the finest late Ottoman manuscripts to come to the market. It was copied by the celebrated calligrapher Yahya Hilmi who was born in the Süleymaniye district of Istanbul in AH 1249/1833 AD. His master, Mehmet Hashim Efendi (d. AH 1261/1845 AD), was a student of the famous scribe Mustafa Raqim. On his master’s death, Yahya studied with Halil Zühdi Efendi, receiving his ijaza in AH 1263/1847 AD. He then worked in the Memorandum Department of the Ministry of War for some sixty years, many of those as the department’s director. On his death in Shawwal AH 1325/November 1907 AD he was buried in the cemetery of the Süleymaniye Mosque (M. Ugur Derman, Letters in Gold. Ottoman Calligraphy from the Sakpi Sabanci Collection, Istanbul, exhibition catalogue, New York, 1998, pp.138-139).
His granddaughter, the painter Güzin Duran (1898-1981) and her husband the painter Feyhaman Duran (1886-1970), donated Yahya Hilmi’s red-ochre painted wooden house to the University of Istanbul. The house remains today as it was in Yahya’s time, with all its historical artefacts, levhas and paintings intact (Derman, 1998, pp.138-139).
Yahya Hilmi is best known as an indisputable master of the naskh script. He is known to have perfected the script and to have completed twenty-five Qur’ans in it, the last of which was only completed up to the twenty-first juz’. One of these twenty-five Qur’ans is a large-scale example in the Türk ve Islam Müzesi in Istanbul. Another, very similar to ours, is in the Harvard Art Museum, dated 1886-87 (inv.1984.451; published in Traces of the Calligrapher: Islamic Calligraphy in Practice, c.1600-1900, exhibition catalogue, Houston, 2007, fig.14, pp.8 and 24 and, with more images on https://www.harvardartmuseums.org/collections/object/213111). Such was the high regard in which Yahya was held that it is said that he was honoured with the task of completing an unfinished Qur’an by the master Shaykh Hamdullah (Nabil F. Safwat, Understanding Calligraphy. The Ottoman Contribution. From the Collection of Cengiz Çetindoğan, Part Two, London, 2014, p.458).
The Harvard Qur’an mentioned above relates to ours not only in the exquisite precision and elegance of Yahya’s hand, but also in the style and quality of the illumination which is certainly one of the most visually striking features here. Every verse roundel is executed in a different way, the artist playing with different floral and geometric motifs. The marginal medallions are similar. Each is different, and each deserves to be looked at under magnification. Like our Qur’an, the Harvard example shares the same features. Similarly executed illumination is also found on a hilyeh by Yahya Hilmi now in the collection of Cengiz Çetindoğan (Safwat, 2014, no.113, pp.458-459). In his discussion on the hilyeh, Safwat writes that his impression is that Hilmi always ensured that he had the best illuminators of his time working on decorating the manuscripts that he copied. It may even be that he worked with the illuminator and exercised some influence over certain elements of the illumination used. Although in different colours, our Qur’an, the Harvard Qur’an and the Çetindoğan hilyeh all use small prunus blossoms that almost form a continuous lattice in their decoration – as seen on ours surrounding the colophon. They also all use two colours of gold and a light stippling in some areas of the gold, giving a textured effect that glitters when you move the manuscript. The verse roundels and marginal medallions are also closely comparable.
The Harvard Qur’an, Çetindoğan hilyeh and our Qur’an are all have particular illuminators associated with them. The Harvard Qur’an is signed Nur al-Din; the illumination on the Çetindoğan hilyeh is attributed to Bahaddin Tokatlioğlu. Ours is signed by a certain Osman Yümni Effendi, who signs giving also the name of his master, Husni. Osman Yümni Efendi was born in Trabzon and died in Istanbul in AH 1337/1919 AD. He is known to have illuminated one other Qur’an, written by Hassan Tahsin in Istanbul in 1894, but illuminated later, in 1904 (noted in Manijeh Bayani, Anna Contadini and Tim Stanley, The Decorated Word, Qur'ans of the 17th-19th Centuries, The Nasser D. Khalili of Islamic Art, Part 1, London, 1999, p.168 and Derman, 1998, pp.140-141).
The condition of our Qur’an is near perfect – the original binding and fly-leaf are beautifully painted and preserved and the illumination as bright and fresh as if it were made yesterday. Previously sold by Bearnes, Hampton and Littlewoods in Exeter, it was said to be consigned there by a member of the household of a descendant of a Turkish Ambassador who was posted to the UK in the early 20th century. It bears all the hallmarks of having been a treasured possession, well looked after for many generations.
His granddaughter, the painter Güzin Duran (1898-1981) and her husband the painter Feyhaman Duran (1886-1970), donated Yahya Hilmi’s red-ochre painted wooden house to the University of Istanbul. The house remains today as it was in Yahya’s time, with all its historical artefacts, levhas and paintings intact (Derman, 1998, pp.138-139).
Yahya Hilmi is best known as an indisputable master of the naskh script. He is known to have perfected the script and to have completed twenty-five Qur’ans in it, the last of which was only completed up to the twenty-first juz’. One of these twenty-five Qur’ans is a large-scale example in the Türk ve Islam Müzesi in Istanbul. Another, very similar to ours, is in the Harvard Art Museum, dated 1886-87 (inv.1984.451; published in Traces of the Calligrapher: Islamic Calligraphy in Practice, c.1600-1900, exhibition catalogue, Houston, 2007, fig.14, pp.8 and 24 and, with more images on https://www.harvardartmuseums.org/collections/object/213111). Such was the high regard in which Yahya was held that it is said that he was honoured with the task of completing an unfinished Qur’an by the master Shaykh Hamdullah (Nabil F. Safwat, Understanding Calligraphy. The Ottoman Contribution. From the Collection of Cengiz Çetindoğan, Part Two, London, 2014, p.458).
The Harvard Qur’an mentioned above relates to ours not only in the exquisite precision and elegance of Yahya’s hand, but also in the style and quality of the illumination which is certainly one of the most visually striking features here. Every verse roundel is executed in a different way, the artist playing with different floral and geometric motifs. The marginal medallions are similar. Each is different, and each deserves to be looked at under magnification. Like our Qur’an, the Harvard example shares the same features. Similarly executed illumination is also found on a hilyeh by Yahya Hilmi now in the collection of Cengiz Çetindoğan (Safwat, 2014, no.113, pp.458-459). In his discussion on the hilyeh, Safwat writes that his impression is that Hilmi always ensured that he had the best illuminators of his time working on decorating the manuscripts that he copied. It may even be that he worked with the illuminator and exercised some influence over certain elements of the illumination used. Although in different colours, our Qur’an, the Harvard Qur’an and the Çetindoğan hilyeh all use small prunus blossoms that almost form a continuous lattice in their decoration – as seen on ours surrounding the colophon. They also all use two colours of gold and a light stippling in some areas of the gold, giving a textured effect that glitters when you move the manuscript. The verse roundels and marginal medallions are also closely comparable.
The Harvard Qur’an, Çetindoğan hilyeh and our Qur’an are all have particular illuminators associated with them. The Harvard Qur’an is signed Nur al-Din; the illumination on the Çetindoğan hilyeh is attributed to Bahaddin Tokatlioğlu. Ours is signed by a certain Osman Yümni Effendi, who signs giving also the name of his master, Husni. Osman Yümni Efendi was born in Trabzon and died in Istanbul in AH 1337/1919 AD. He is known to have illuminated one other Qur’an, written by Hassan Tahsin in Istanbul in 1894, but illuminated later, in 1904 (noted in Manijeh Bayani, Anna Contadini and Tim Stanley, The Decorated Word, Qur'ans of the 17th-19th Centuries, The Nasser D. Khalili of Islamic Art, Part 1, London, 1999, p.168 and Derman, 1998, pp.140-141).
The condition of our Qur’an is near perfect – the original binding and fly-leaf are beautifully painted and preserved and the illumination as bright and fresh as if it were made yesterday. Previously sold by Bearnes, Hampton and Littlewoods in Exeter, it was said to be consigned there by a member of the household of a descendant of a Turkish Ambassador who was posted to the UK in the early 20th century. It bears all the hallmarks of having been a treasured possession, well looked after for many generations.