76 Seiten, kart.,
A-4 Heft, 2021
Leseprobe
The books and maps that were printed in his workshop during Müteferrika’s lifetime are actually considered to be known and already adequately researched. However, as part of the preparations for the exhibition “Travelling Tales: Thousand and One Nights between the Orient and Europe” (2019), when short descriptions of the many objects to be exhibited had to be compiled for the visitors, an astonishing number of questions remained unanswered regarding a hand-colored map. Upon close examination, it turned out that all previous information on the map was contradictory or even wrong, as Müteferrika’s participation in the map became more and more likely:
In a cartouche on the maps there is an inscription in Ottoman Turkish which can be read as following: “Engraving from Mığırdic from Galata”. However, a certain Mığırdic Galatavi is also known as one of the engravers from Müteferrika. Another text on the map mentions the year 1151 and Istanbul, and at that time only Müteferrika had a license to print in Ottoman Turkish there. Can this map therefore be assigned to the so-called Turkish incunabula? So far nobody seems to have noticed a relationship, but some arguments appear to prove the connection.
The Author:
Thoralf Hanstein was born in Sondershausen in 1970. He studied Arabic studies, religious studies and business administration at the University of Leipzig and received his doctorate in 2001 on Islamic marriage and family law in Indonesia. Since 2011, he has been the subject specialist for Arabic and Islamic Studies at the Berlin State Library. His research interests include the manuscript studies of the Islamicate World and aspects of Islam in Indonesia.
