The iconicityof Islamic calligraphy inTurkey

IRVINCEMIL SCHICK

Islamic calligraphy isdeeply polysemic. At the most

basic level, of course, itembodies written text, and as
such expresses symbolically the meaning?whether
that
literalor metaphorical, denoted or connoted?of
text. But that is not all. As a highly visual art, Islamic
as a
calligraphy sometimes means iconically; and
at
in
the
Turkish
that
least
context, intensely
is,
practice
imbricated with politics, italso means indexically.

This article attempts to chart the movement of Islamic

calligraphy among these three types of signs1 before,
during, and afterTurkey's passage from empire to
republic, with special emphasis on its iconicity.
It isoften said that calligraphy is the most
Islamic of all Islamic arts, and this not
quintessential^
because of some supposed Islamic iconophobia, but

of the intimate relationship between

iconic
faith and thewritten text.2
While
is
contrasted
with
representation
usually
writing, and the
two are thought to be direct opposites, written text can
sometimes have an iconic?that
is,pictorial?quality,
and this isespecially true of some Islamic calligraphy
(fig. 1).3A practice widespread among Sufis and Shi'ites,
though by no means limited to them, is to shape
calligraphy into figurative images ranging frommosques
rather because

theMuslim

An earlier version of this paper was read at the "Deus (e)X Historia"
Iam very grateful to
held at MIT on April 26-28, 2007.
the convenors, Arindam Dutta, Mark Jarzombek, Caroline
Jones, Erika
Naginski, and Nasser Rabbat, for their kind invitation. Iwould also
conference

like to acknowledge
the other conference participants, as well as the
for the lively discussion
that followed?and
audience,
particularly
Daniel Bertrand Monk, for his perceptive observation
that the changing
inTurkey have endowed
fortunes of Islamic calligraphy
itwith an
indexical quality.
1. As will no doubt be clear

to the "second

(Cambridge, Mass.:
I should
247-249.

an accommodation
of sorts to the so-called "Islamic
of
images." But form often deliberately adds
prohibition
a new layerof meaning to the calligraphy, and this is
indeed the principal focus of this article.
Valerie Gonzalez
has distinguished between works
of pictorial calligraphy inwhich the image dominates
the text,which she calls the "figural or representational
regime," and those inwhich the text dominates the
image, which she calls the "scriptural regime." She
also distinguishes between those works of pictorial
calligraphy inwhich the text and image share a single

referent,and those inwhich their referents are distinct.5

The examples Idiscuss here are drawn from each of
these categories and will demonstrate, I hope, the
specific "value-added"
iconicity in Islamic calligraphy.
Writing

to many

Peirce, ed. Charles Hartshorne and Paul Weiss

Harvard University Press, 1931-1958),
vol. 2, ??
note that Iam not being doctrinaire
in using this

terminology, though Ido find itconvenient.

2. Iexplore this point in some detail in "Text," in
Keywords for
the Study of Islam, ed. Jamal J. Elias (Oxford: Oneworld
Publications,

forthcoming).
3. On the calligrapher Mustafa Rakim Efendi (1758-1826),
see
M. Ugur Derman,
Letters inGold: Ottoman Calligraphy
from the Sakip
Sabanci Collection,
(New York: The
Istanbul, trans. Mohamed
Zakariya
of Art, 1998), p. 98. For a superb example of his
Metropolitan Museum
work, see the back cover of the present issue.

as icon

Let me begin with a brief discussion of a work that

would at firstsight appear to be plain text, and yet is
perceived and treated as an image. Figure 2 is a textual
representation of the so-called "Seal of Prophethood," a
mark between the shoulders of the Prophet Muhammad
that is taken as proof of his divine mission.6 What
is

4. Such calligraphic
Turklerde Dint Resimler:
Several

readers, Iam referring here

of
signs" proposed by Charles Sanders
trichotomy
symbol, index, and icon. See The Collected
Papers

Peirce?namely
of Charles Sanders

and everyday objects like ewers and oil lamps, to

animals like lions, camels, and birds, and even human
beings.4 Received opinion holds that these images
are mere substitutes for "real" pictures?surrogates
inwhich writing provides the artistswith an alibi,

pictures have been studied by Malik Aksel,

Yazi-Resim
(Istanbul: ElifYaymlari, 1967).

inDavid R. Godine,
Islamic Calligraphics
appear
examples
Bisvesvar Nath,
(London: The Merrion Press, 1976) and Chaubey
"Calligraphy," The Journal of Indian Art and Industry 16, no. 124

(1913):31; most books on Islamic calligraphy also contain some. I

have analyzed
representations of the human body from
calligraphic
a Barthesian
in "Writing the
viewpoint
Body in Islam," Connect 3
(2001):44-54.
5. Valerie Gonzalez,
"The Double Ontology
of Islamic
on a Folio from the Museum
of Raqqada
Calligraphy: A Word-Image
65th Birthday Festschrift, ed. IrvinC.
(Tunisia)," inM. Ugur Derman
Schick (Istanbul: Sabanci University, 2000), pp. 313-340.
6. On the calligrapher Elhac
Fehmi Efendi
[al-hajj] Mehmed
see M. Ugur Derman,
The Art of Calligraphy
in the
(1860-1915),
trans. Mohamed
Islamic Heritage,
Asfour
Zakariya and Mohamed
(Istanbul:
Hattatlar

IRCICA, 1998), p. 241; ibniilemin Mahmud

(Istanbul: Maarif Vekaleti,
1955), pp. 92-93.

Kemal

inal, Son

212

RES 53/54 SPRING/AUTUMN 2008

and often ending

(startingwith Allah and Muhammad,
with the Seven Sleepers and their dog) would be placed
within largemedallions, one name per medallion per
page.7 The fact that these medallions are literally hors
texte already endows them with a certain pictorial
quality, but there ismore to itthan that. Inmany cases,
the medallions appear below (or are sandwiched
between) a caption that does nothing but state the

For example, ifthe name "Muhammad"

appears in the central medallion, then the accompanying
caption might say something like: "This is the name of
His Excellency Muhammad, may prayers to God and
is
peace be upon Him." Ifthe name in the medallion
name
is
the
"Abu Bakr," then the caption might say: "This
obvious.

Figure 1.Mustafa Rakim Efendi,calligraphic picture of a stork,

1223 a.h. (1808 ce). The text reads: "In the name of God,
most

gracious,

incomplete,

most

merciful,

but usually

goes

and
on

in him.

. . ." The

to say "is succor/'

sentence

is

Reproduced

fromMalik Aksel, TurklerdeDint Resimler: Yazi-Resim

(Istanbul: ElifYayinlari, 1967), p. 77.

significant about the panel is the lower inscription, in

Turkish, which says, interalia:
The benefitof this holy seal to thosewho visit itwill be
as follows:To thosewho look at it in themorning, having
performed their ritualablutions, itwill lastuntil the evening.
And to thosewho look at itat the beginning of themonth,
until the end of themonth. And to thosewho look at itat
the beginning of the year, until the end of the year.And for
thosewho look at itwhile on a journey,may their journey
be blessed. And thosewho die in the year duringwhich they
have looked at itshall die with faith.
At the end of the text, after the signature, are the
customary prayers, including asking forGod's forgiveness
for the calligrapher, for his parents, and "for all those
who look at it." It is significant that the verb "to read"
does not occur once, anywhere on the panel. Instead,
theword nazar (to look) recurs time and again. This
was
emphasis on looking strongly suggests that the panel
not only regarded as written text, as well as a devotional
object, but also as an image. After all, one reads text, but
one looks at an image.
Indeed, this hypothesis would seem to be borne out
the
occasional practice of supplementing calligraphy
by
with captions. Beginning in the eighteenth century, it
became common inOttoman devotional manuscripts
to include a section inwhich a series of holy names

of His Excellency Abu Bakr, may God be pleased with

him." This is a common pattern and begs the question
of why the captions were added in the firstplace. After
all, ifone can read the caption, then surely one can also

read the central medallion.

The answer to the puzzle is that the caption refers
in fact to two distinct objects. When
itsays: "This," it is
referring to the medallion below it;and when itsays "is
it is referring to the proper
the name of Muhammad,"
name of the Prophet. Inother words, the medallion
is
not identical to the name, it is an image of the name. It
is, in fact, an icon. Indeed, inmany such books, virtually
identical captions accompany pictures in the ordinary
sense of theword?for
example, images of holy relics
such as the mantle of the Prophet or his footprint.As the

for "picture," resm, isvery similar to theword for

"name," ism, the captions both look and sound almost
exactly alike.
indevotional books are
The captioned medallions
as
to
related
the genre known
hilye-i ?er?fe or hilye-i

word

invented by theOttoman calligrapher Hafiz

in the late seventeenth century.8 These are word
portraits of the Prophet Muhammad,
describing, within
an eminently recognizable composition, his physical and

saadet,
Osman

see Edwin Binney 3rd, Turkish Treasures

7. For nice examples,
of Edwin Binney 3rd (Portland, Ore.: Portland Art
from the Collection
is now at the Sackler
(thismanuscript
1979), pp. 139-140
Museum,
Harvard University); Nabil F. Safwat, Golden Pages: Qur'ans
Museum,
I. Shaker
and Other Manuscripts
from the Collection
of Ghassan
268-275.
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), pp. 226-230,
Letters inGold
8. On the hi lye, see Derman,
(note 3), pp. 34-37;
M. Ugur Derman,
Turk Hat Sanatmm }aheserleri
([Ankara]: Kultur
1982), plates 18, 19, 42, 47, and 49; FarukTaskale
Bakanhgi Yaymlan,

and Huseyin Gunduz, Hilye-i ?er?fe in Calligraphic Art: Characteristics

of the Prophet Muhammed
(Istanbul: Antik A. ?. Kultur Yaymlan, 2006).
see Derman,
On the calligrapher Hafiz Osman
Efendi (1642-1698),
Letters inGold

6), p. 221.

(ibid), pp. 72-74;

Derman,

The Art of Calligraphy

(note

Schick: The iconicityof Islamic calligraphy inTurkey 213

Figure 2. Elhac Mehmed Fehmi Efendi,calligraphic panel titled "Form

of the Seal of Prophethood ofMuhammad theChosen One," 1309 a.h.
(1891-1892 ce). Author's collection.

moral attributes (fig. 3). With slight variations, the central

medallion contains the following text:
[It is related] from 'Ali (mayGod be pleased with him) that
when he described the attributesof the Prophet (mayprayers
toGod and peace be upon him), he said: He was not too
tall, norwas he too short,he was of medium height amongst
the nation. His hairwas not shortand curly,norwas it
lank, itwould hang down inwaves. His facewas not overly
plump, norwas itfleshy,yet itwas somewhat circular. His
complexion was rosywhite. His eyes were largeand black,
and his eyelashes were long.He was large-boned and
broad-shouldered. His torsowas hairless except fora thin
line that stretcheddown his chest to his belly. His hands
and feetwere rather large.
When he walked, he would
lean forwardas ifgoing down a slope.When he looked
at someone, hewould turnhis entire body towards him.
Between his two shoulderswas the Seal of Prophethood,
and he was the lastof the prophets.
That these panels were intended as portraits is clear not
only from the descriptive text above, but also from the

fact that the components

of the panel were

named

(from

top tobottom):ba?makam (head station),

gobek (belly),

kusak (belt), and etek (skirt).

Now, the Arabic word hilyah refers to the features or
appearance of a person, and theOttoman compounds
hilye-i serife (noble hi lye) and hilye-i saadet (felicitous
hilye) denote the features or appearance of the Prophet
Tim Stanley has suggested thatwhile the
Muhammad.
arisen as theMuslim counterpart of the
have
may
hilye
Orthodox Christian icon, inview of the fact that a figural

representation of the Prophet would have been frowned

upon in the Sunni tradition, itwas most likely inspired by
the celebrated poem of the sixteenth-century Ottoman
poet HakanT Mehmed Bey known as Hilye-i Hakan?
(the hilye of HakanT).9 This latterwas in turn based on
9. Tim Stanley, "From Text to Art Form in theOttoman
Hilye,"
in Studies in Islamic Art and Architecture
in Honor ofFiliz

to appear

Icons: The Hilye-i

(forthcoming). See also his "Sublimated
?erife as an Image of the Prophet," paper read at the 21 st Spring

gagman

RES 53/54 SPRING/AUTUMN 2008

214

sees my
primarily as objects of contemplation: "whoever
were
the
the
words
Prophet,
reportedly spoken by
hilye/'
not "whoever reads my hilye." Once again, then, the
as to be seen. As
hilye ismeant not so much to be read,
one
an
it
is
albeit
made
such,
up of plain text.
image,

(It has been noted, incidentally, that the composition

of the hilye bears some resemblance to the ground
or not thiswas
plan of an Ottoman mosque;11 whether
remains to
if
what
that
mean,
so,
intentional, and,
might
be determined.)
Peircean

Figure 3. Hafiz Osman Efendi,Hilye-i $ertfe (Word-Portrait

of the Prophet), 1109 A.H. (1697-1698 ce) Topkapi Palace
Museum Library,G.Y.1430. Photograph courtesy of Faruk
Taskale.

a possibly spurious tradition, according

Prophet is reported to have said:

towhich

the

Whoever sees my hi lye afterme isas though he has seen

me. And whoever is true tome, God will spare him the fire
of Hell, and hewill not experience the trialsof the grave,
and he will not be driven naked on theDay of Judgment.10
IfHafiz Osman did indeed draw his inspiration from
the Hilye-i Hakani, then he created his hilye panels

Studies on "The Byzantine Eye:Word and

On the
University of Birmingham, March 21-24,1987.
see
W.
A
E.
Mehmed
(d.
J.
1606),
Gibb,
History
Bey
vol. 3, pp.
of Ottoman Poetry (London: Luzac & Co., 1900-1909),
193-198, where the name is transcribed Khaqanv, Bursali Mehmed
Symposium

of Byzantine

Perception/'
poet Hakani

Tahir Bey, Osmanh Muellifleri, ed. A. Fikri Yavuz and ismail Ozen
vol. 2, pp. 171-172.
(Istanbul: Meral Yaymevi, 1972?-1975),
10.
Amire],

[Hakam Mehmed
Bey], Hilye-i Hakani
1264 a.h. [1848 ce]),
p. 12.

([Istanbul: Tabhane-i

iconicity

Figure 1 is unmistakably a picture, and figures 2 and 3

are essentially plain inscriptions that present themselves
as images. In none of these examples, however, does the
form of thewriting echo itsmeaning. Thus, for example,
the stork by Mustafa Rakim illustrated in figure 1 spells
out the formula: "In the name of God, most gracious,
most merciful" with which Muslim believers begin
every task, and which obviously has nothing whatsoever
to do with storks.On the other hand, there is another
well-known calligraphic stork, this one designed by an
in 1763, where
Ottoman calligrapher named Abdulgani
the text forming the bird is a couplet about a certain
dervish known in his day as "Seyyid Hasan Leylek
Dede."12 Here, "Hasan" was the dervish's given name,
a direct
"Seyyid" is a title denoting the fact that he was
indicates his
descendent of the Prophet, and "Dede"
rankwithin the dervish order towhich he belonged. As
for "Leylek," it isTurkish for "stork" and was a nickname
that he reportedly earned because he was very tall and
lanky.The poem that composes the image celebrates
the devotion of this dervish to his master, the thirteenth
century patron of the order of whirling dervishes
ismost important
Mawlana
Jalaluddin Rumi. What
here is that the text and the image are related at a very
basic level. The text speaks of a dervish known by the
nickname "the Stork," and it is also shaped like a stork.
in this example, text and
In thewords of Gonzalez,
a
referent.
share
image
single

11. Stanley, "From Text to Art Form" (see note 9) inwhich a

is acknowledged.
suggestion to this effect by Gulru Necipoglu
12. See A. Suheyl Unver, Leylek Dede /Dede Stork (Istanbul:
ismail Akgun Matbaasi,
Resim,
1958); ?ahabettin Uzluk, Mevlevilikte
Resimde Mevleviler
(Ankara: Turkiye Is Bankasi Kultur Yaymlan,

1957), pp. 67-68. Unfortunately, these two publications

give radically
different information about the work and the artist. The stork has been
in several books,
reproduced numerous times and appears
inAksel, Turklerde Dint Resimler (see note 4), p. 78.

for example

Schick: The iconicityof Islamic calligraphy inTurkey 215

ha shaped like a tearful eye, sometimes pierced by an

arrow.15A particularly sophisticated instance appears in
figure 4, which shows a calligraphic image by Mustafa
text in the form of a hand is a
Halim Ozyazici.16The
well-known verse from theQur'an, which reads: "And
we have not sent you but as mercy to theworlds" (a/

Anbiya21:107). ItisspokenbyGod to theProphet

Muhammad
and is taken to mean that the latter'smission
is evidence of God's grace. Under the hand are two lines
of poetry inTurkish, which say:
No matter how great a sinner Imay be, Ido not grieve
So longas proof of mercy is inhand: "Andwe have not sent
,

..."

you

The Qur'anic verse stating that the Prophet has been

sent to humanity by God as an act of mercy iswritten
in the form of a hand, then, just as the affirmation it

represents is "in hand" by virtue of the sacred revelation.

Inall these cases, the text and the image share a single
referent,and the meaning of the text corresponds exactly
to the meaning of the image intowhich the text has
been woven.

Figure4. Mustafa Halim Ozyazici, calligraphic image

incorporatingtheQur'anic verse: "Andwe have not sent you
but as mercy to theworlds" (al-Anbiya21:107), 1348 a.h.
(1929-30 ce). Author's collection.

There are many such examples. Ali, son-in-law

of the Prophet Muhammad
and the fourth caliph
to
Sunni
Muslims
(and his first legitimate
according
successor according to Shi'ites) was nicknamed Haydar

formermeaning "lion" and the

For this reason, many calligraphic
compositions containing invocations and prayers to
him are shaped like a lion.13 Inother cases, the letterya
inAli's name is forked, to resemble his fabled sword,
dhulfiqar. Many panels declaring "Ah min al-'ashq"
and Asadullah?the
latter "lion of God."

fromlove)have the letter

(Ah! [How Ihave suffered]

also see
(note 4), pp. 85-89;
J.M. Rogers, Empire of the Sultans: Ottoman Art from the Collection
London: The
a"Art et d'Histoire;
of Nasser D. Khalili (Geneva: Musee
13. Aksel,

Turklerde Dint Resimler

Foundation and Azimuth Editions, 1995), p. 259.

14. See, for example, M. Ugur Derman,
"Osmanli Hat Sanatmda
Hz. Ali," in Tarihten Teolojiye:
islam inanglannda Hz. Ali, ed. Ahmet
(Ankara: TurkTarih Kurumu, 2005), pi. 5.
Ya?ar Ocak
Nour

When
thewritten text is not simply pictorial but
to itsmeaning, it
furthermore bears a visual equivalence
can be said to have an iconic character in the semiotic
sense of theword, as formulated by Charles Sanders
Peirce. For Peirce, an icon signifies itsobject by sharing

certain attributes with it?that is, through resemblance

and similarity, as would be the case with a painted
portrait as the sign of a particular individual. Another,
often-cited example of iconicity isonomatopoeia,
since using words that sound like their objects amounts
to acoustic iconicity. Indeed, until not so long ago,
form of
onomatopoeia was the only acknowledged

linguistic iconicity?though by now, iconicity has been

shown to operate at many levels in language and in the
in typography and calligraphy17
literarytext?notably,

15. Aksef, Turklerde Din? Resimler (note 4), pp. 136, 137, and 139.
Such panels often hung on the walls of coffeehouses
and the like. Some
featured two lines of poetry inArabic: "Ah! From love and from its
states / Ithas burned my heart with its heat." Most blended calligraphy

with pictures, such as a river of tears and erupting volcanoes.

16. On the calligrapher Mustafa Halim Ozyazici
(1898-1964),
The Art of Calligraphy
(note 6), p. 251; inal, Son Hattatlar
Derman,

see

(note 6), pp. 104-106.

17. See, for example,
Iconicity in Language, ed. Raffaele Simone
(Amsterdam and Philadelphia:
John Benjamins,
1995); Form, Miming,
Iconicity in Language and Literature, ed. Max Nanny and
Meaning:

and Philadelphia:JohnBenjamins,1999);
Olga Fischer(Amsterdam
Sign: Iconicity in Language
and Olga
Fischer (Amsterdam
2001).

The Motivated

Max

Nanny

Benjamins,

and Literature 2, ed.

and Philadelphia:
John

216

RES 53/54 SPRING/AUTUMN 2008

:
^^^^^

Figure 5a. Elhac Mehmed Nazif Bey, calligraphic panel on the virtues
of the Basmala, 1319 a.h. (1901-2 ce). Author's collection.

Interestingly,works of Islamic calligraphy that

are iconic in this particular sense are not limited to
figurative pictures such as those of birds and animals.
There are, once again, examples of plain text inwhich
iconicity ispresent, albeit

in an extremely subtle way.

Figure5a showsa magnificentpiece of calligraphyby

Elhac Mehmed Nazif Bey,18 composed of a short poem

inTurkish extolling the virtues of the formula "In the
name of God, most gracious, most merciful," known
in abbreviated form as the Basmala or Bismillah. This

formula isvery important, in that by reciting it,the

believer invokes the name of God upon undertaking any
task. Indeed, there is a saying attributed to the Prophet,
to the effect that any action not initiated by reciting this
formula isdoomed to fail.19The poem isof no great
literaryvalue, and reads as follows:
18. On thecalligrapherElhac [al-hajj]Mehmed Nazif Bey

and on this panel in particular, see Derman,

The Art of
see
inGold
Letters
also
(note
6),
242-243;
Derman,
pp.
Calligraphy
(note 3), p. 152.
19. See, for example,
ibn
Jalal at-Dm Abu al-Fadl 'Abd al-Rahman
Abf Bakr al-SuyutT, al-Jami' al-saghlr min hadlth al-bashlr al-nadhlr,
(1846-1913),

kaf: 233.

Figure 5b. Detail fromthe panel in Figure 5a.

As soon as Sultan Bismillah raises his flag

The angels become the pillars of the court of Bismillah
Interpretitsequator as the Sirat-iMustakfm
The short routeof Bismillah leads towardsGod
Before discussing the calligraphy, letme note that the
phrase al-$irat al-Mustaqrm, or "the straight path,"
appears in the very firstchapter of theQur'an, and is
taken to mean the true faith, that is, Islam. In addition,
however, Sufis believed that there isa bridge by this

Schick: The iconicityof Islamic calligraphy inTurkey 217

name that every person is required to cross after death; it

is "thinner than a hair and more trenchant than a sword,"
in thewords of the poets, and those who fail to reach the
other side fall down into the eternal fires of Hell. Those
who can cross the bridge, on the other hand, reach the

side of God. In the poem, a visual analogy isdrawn

between the bridge of $irat and thewords Bismillah, as I
will now attempt to explain.
Figure 5b shows a close-up of thewords Bismillah in
the first line of the poem. Here, bismi, or "in the name,"

is shaded horizontally, and Allah, the proper name of

God, vertically. Together, these two words read bismillahi
and mean "In the name of God," the beginning of the
Basmala formula. The poem plays on the lengthened
arc in thewords bismi. In an
ordinary text, these words
would be written with a short arc; however, calligraphers
traditionally lengthened the arc when writing this
particular formula. Such lengthened Basmalas are very
common and are termed oklu Besmele (Basmala with
arrow) inTurkish.
With its lengthened arc, which the poet qualifies as
an "equator," the formula is likened to the
bridge of $irat,
which, going from right to left, leads straight toAllah.
So we have here a bit of visual iconicity. The formula
Bismillah leads the believer to God, and itactually looks
like the very bridge over which the believer is to reach
God in the afterlife.Moreover, in the last linewhere the
poem refers to the Basmala as a "short route" that leads
to God, the calligrapher has shortened the arc, so that
once again the form of the
writing echoes the meaning of
the text itself.
Another example of visual iconicity in Islamic
calligraphy appears in Figure 6a, a panel by the great
Ottoman calligrapher Mehmed ?efik Bey.20Why it is in
the form of a pear, Ido not know.21What
Iwant to stress
is a bit more subtle. The text says:
"Mercy Ali, Fatima,
Hasan, Husayn," that is, itaddresses itselfto Islam's

20. On thecalligrapher
Mehmed ?efikBey (1820-1880),

see Derman,

Letters inGold

(note 3), p. 122; Derman,

Calligraphy(note6), pp. 233-234

21.1

should point out that ?efik Bey wrote

The Art of

several pear-shaped

Forotherexamples signed
panels; perhapshe just likedthefruit?

Hat" in Tulips,
by him, see Heath Lowry, "Calligraphy?Husn-i
& Turbans: Decorative
Arts from theOttoman
Arabesques
Empire, ed.
Yanni Petsopoulos
(New York: Abbeville
Press, 1982), p. 179; Hiiseyin
Gunduz
and FarukTaskale, Dancing
Letters: A Selection of Turkish
Calligraphic

equivalent of the "Holy Family": the Prophet's daughter

Fatima, his son-in-law AM, and his two grandsons Hasan
and Husayn. (In fact, the name of the Prophet himself
is also hidden in the composition, as theword aman,
mercy, is numerologically equivalent to the name
Muhammad.)
In Figure 6b, the first letterof the name AN, theArabic
'ayn, is shaded vertically, and the first letterof the name
is interesting is that the
Fatima, fa, horizontally. What
name of the first letterof Ali is a homonym of theArabic
word for "eye." Furthermore, there is, in both Arabic and
Turkish, the expression "to be in someone's eye," which
means to be loved, to be esteemed, to be valued. So
by
placing Fatima into the 'ayn/eye of Ali, this inscription
is in fact giving the message that the Prophet's daughter
was greatly beloved and esteemed
by her spouse, the
Ali.
the
Caliph
Visually,
calligraphic composition makes
Fatima "the apple of Ali's eye"?an
expression that has
the same meaning inTurkish (Ali'nin goz bebegi) as
itdoes in English. A clever visual pun, then, thatwas
imitated by several later calligraphers, and another nice
instance of visual iconicity.
Many more examples could be given in support of
the claim that compositions made up of Arabic letters
can be iconic in both the
general and the Peircean
sense. These examples are
perhaps not "typical" of
Islamic calligraphy, but they do represent a subset of
some significance and show the
degree of semiotic
art
that
the
sometimes
reached,
sophistication
particularly inOttoman Turkey.

The Republican

rupture

As Umberto Eco has noted, icons are

culturally
coded.22 For readers of the present article who are not
Islamicists, I suspect this fact has been driven home
all the more clearly by themyriad references towhich
I have alluded inorder to expose the
iconicity of the
calligraphies; without those references, these would just
have been plain inscriptions?or, worse,
indecipherable
scribbles. It is this culturally coded nature of icons that
Iwish to underscore, as I now move from theOttoman
Empire to the Republic of Turkey, that is, to the nation
state that emerged from the ashes of theOttoman
Empire
and set itseyes firmlyon the path of westernization. This
path deliberately severed Turkey's historical connections
with its imperial predecessor and
thereby altered the

Art (Istanbul: Antik A. ?. Kultur

Yaymlan, 2000), p. 83. A
version (this one signed by the cut-out artist but not

lovely decoupage

by ?efikBey himself)is inRogers,Empireof theSultans (note13),

p. 266.

22.

Umberto

University

Press,

Eco, A Theory of Semiotics

1979), pp. 191-217.

(Bloomington:

Indiana

218

RES 53/54 SPRING/AUTUMN 2008

cultural matrix inwhich the icons I have been describing

had operated.
in 1923, the
Soon after the Republic was proclaimed
new regime convened a commission to study a vexing

question that had generated considerable controversy

over the preceding decades, namely the issue of
abolishing Arabic script and adopting Latin script in its
stead. The revealing cartoon in figure 7 was published in
1926, as the debates continued. The caption says: "Off
join the ruins of theMonarchy!" Since the
original image is inblack and white, it is impossible to
determine whether the shading on the face of the man
on the rightwas meant to indicate that he is blushing,
or?more
likely?if thiswas a racist reference to theArab

with you! Go

in colloquial Turkish) origins of Arabic script.

his
handlebar mustache was meant to connote
Certainly
unfashionable, "oriental" grooming, as opposed to the
new clean-shaven, Western
look of the time.
In 1928, the government officially announced that
Latin scriptwould henceforth be used in the Republic of
Turkey; indeed, publishing Turkish works inArabic script
was actually criminalized. A cartoon published that very
year in the daily Ak?am,23 was subtitled "h/cref"?the
("darkie"

Figure 6a. Mehmed ?efik Bey, calligraphic panel with the

names
ce).

"Mercy Ali, Fatima,

collection.
Author's

Hasan,

Husayn,"

1292

a.h.

(1875

Turkish pronunciation of the Arabic word hijrah,

to
which denotes the Prophet's migration fromMecca
in the year 622. Irreverentlymaking lightof this
Madina
momentous occurrence
in Islamic history?the very
event that became the starting point of the new Islamic
cartoon shows an anthropomorphic
calendar?the
Arabic letterwearing the fez?another
rejected relic of
a long procession of Arabic
theOttoman past?leading
letters, leaving modern Turkey for an undetermined,

presumably eastbound, destination. Another cartoon

published in 1928 in the daily Cumhuriyet,24 then the
semi-official mouthpiece of the Kemalist administration,
appeared the day before the obligation to use Latin
scriptwent into effect, and depicted a very angular car
speeding past a very cursive camel sporting the Arabic

letterdal, the first letterof the Turkish word for camel,

deve. Itwas situated atop the following text:

which we are burying

The differencebetween Arabic letters,
today,and theTurkish lettersthatwe shall startusing
tomorrow, isas big as thatbetween a camel and a car. Just
as the camel, which comes fromthe deserts ofArabia, is
the symbol of primitivity,
backwardness, and sluggishness,
23. This cartoon
of Kadir Misiroglu],
p. 71.
24.

Figure 6b. Detail fromthe panel in Figure 6a.

inCuneyd
has been reproduced
Emiroglu [pseud,
islam Yazisma Dair (Istanbul: Sebil Yaymevi, 1977),

Both the cartoon

ibid., p. 46.

and the accompanying

text are reproduced

in

Schick: The iconicityof Islamic calligraphy inTurkey 219

Figure 7. Cartoon published in 1926 in the humormagazine Akbaba. Reproduced from

Cuneyd Emiroglu [pseud, of KadirMisiroglu], islam Yazisma Dair (Istanbul: Sebil Yaymevi,
1977), p. 21.

so is the car,which we have taken fromtheWest, the

emblem

of progress,

civilization,

and

speed...

.The

camel

brought pilgrims to the Kaba inorder forthem to fulfilltheir

obligation to perform the ha]]. The car will bring our nation,
which is thirstingforprogress and advancement, to theKaba
of civilization.
One might think that this absolutely remarkable
statement, which so unselfconsciously seeks to replace
Islam by a new, secular religion of progress centered
in theWest, was an aberration?little more than
enthusiastic hyperbole understandable, perhaps, in
the climate of revolutionary fervor that followed the
establishment of the Republic of Turkey. Yet a book cover
designed and published as recently as 2006 depicts
an hourglass inwhich the passage of time is
expressed
not as the flow of sand, but as the
morphing of the
Arabic letters in the upper chamber into Latin letters in
the lower one!25 This is as eloquent a representation of
25. The cover in question appeared on the second edition of Recep
Modern lesme ve Toplumbilim: Turkiye
?enturk, islam Dunyasmda
ve Misir
(Istanbul: izYaymcilik, 2006). The title translates as
Ornegi
"Modernization
in the Muslim World: The Case of
and Sociology

Turkeyand Egypt/'

the meaning of Arabic script inmodern Turkey as one

could imagine: Arabic letters signify the past, theOrient,
backwardness, sessility, political reaction. Littlewonder,

then,thatthe 1928 photographby Jean

Weinberg (fig.8)

depicting the founder and firstpresident of the Republic

of Turkey,Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, teaching citizens Latin
script became one of the most celebrated and widely
recognized icons of the young nation-state.
Calligraphy

today

So what happened, one might wonder, to the art of

calligraphy, so rich and widely practiced during the
Ottoman period and so laden with layers and layers of
meaning, afterTurkey adopted Latin script?26 It isalive

26. A questiort that might pose

has to any degree replaced Arabic
written religious (and other public)
Emin Barm,
calligraphers?notably
first two of whom

were

classically
considerable

as well)?have
done
Arabic script remains the medium
some time ago: "The
holy mission

itself iswhether or not Latin script

for beautifully
script as a medium
texts. Though a small number of

Savas ?evik, and Etem ?aliskan

(the
inArabic-script calligraphy
work
along these lines, overall
trained

of choice.

with which

this point, Iwrote

Arabic writing is ...

On

220

RES 53/54 SPRING/AUTUMN 2008

Weinberg, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk teaching Latin script,

Figure 8. Jean
1928. Reproduced fromJean
Weinberg, Gazi'nin Eseri (Istanbul:
Published by the photographer, 1933), unpaginated.

a good
andwell today,but ithas had togo through

deal of trials and tribulations over the decades, and its

a
meaning now can be very different from itsmeaning
century ago.
To be sure, there always existed in the Republic of
Turkey a counter-culture, and a counter-elite to go with
it,that continued to value calligraphy as well as other

arts inherited from theOttoman period. They patronized

those calligraphers who did not abandon their craft,

itwith a special status in Islamic culture:

charged has in turn endowed
is perceived as a Godly
the script that preserves the word of God

script. In this regard, the identification of Arabic script with the religion
of Islam is profound and perhaps unequalled....
By symbolizing
a metonym for the divine order, for the
Islam, Arabic writing becomes
connection between God and His creation." Schick, "Writing the Body
in Islam" (see note 4).

large and
published books and articles, and assembled
precious collections of original works. But to do so
without being stigmatized as political reactionaries and
enemies of modernity, they had to cloak their passion in
the appropriate garb. Thus emerged the idea that in this
modern age, calligraphy is not to be read, but rather to
be enjoyed as a form of abstract art. The painter Nurullah
Berk, who was born in 1906 and therefore surely knew
well how to read Arabic script, said that artists such
as Kandinsky, Klee, Hartung, and Miro had "extracted
new linear forms and compositions fromArabic letters"
and thus that "calligraphy, which was a most influential

art form in theMuslim East, has been embellished by

European artistswith various and rich examples of
abstract expression." He concluded that "[i]t is no longer
necessary to read and understand these inscriptions.
us
Writing has become picture, and what concerns

Schick: The iconicityof Islamic calligraphy inTurkey 221

in them is theirmelodic and musical

lines, the plastic
appearance of their compositions/'27
An apparently apocryphal story also began to
circulate around that time, according towhich, upon
seeing a work of Islamic calligraphy, Picasso had

exclaimed: "This iswhat I have sought to achieve my

entire life.This is truemodern art." The publisher ?evket
the
Rado, a conservative intellectual who accumulated

largest private collection of Ottoman calligraphy in the

world, quoted this statement in his book, and wrote:

Ithas now become clear that the art of Islamic calligraphy,

which was fora long time regarded as merely the craftof
beautifulwriting, is in facta magical pictorial art thatwas
born more than a thousand years ago and evolved ina
totally mystical

context.

Today,

western

critics

view

as

it...

an artof abstract painting thatmust be taken seriously.28

In all these statements by authoritative Turkish artists
and critics, the role of time is extremely noteworthy. They
all say, essentially, that calligraphy used to be writing,
but now is abstraction, that itused to be read, but now is
only to be contemplated visually. What they did thereby
is to exaggerate the pictorial quality of calligraphy, but
entirely deny its iconicity, that is, its role as sign. Or

perhaps to redefine itas the indicator/index of an Eastern

creative genius that had discovered abstract art before
Europe had done so?the East as more Western than the
West itself.
Over time, this attitude has changed. The cultural
moment towhich it is customary to referas "the
postmodern turn" in Europe and North America has
taken different forms in societies outside theWestern
metropoles, but they have certainly all shared many
common elements: a loss of confidence in the
metanarrative of modernism; cultural atomization;
proliferating experimentation and bricolage with
non-mainstream cultures; an inward turn inspired by
communalism, nativism, and spirituality; and a growing
interest indetemporalized
history as part of an eternal
In
this
context,
present.
calligraphy was suddenly driven
back

27.

into prominence,

Cited

in the exhibition

at istanbul Devlet
p. 4.
28.

but, in the absence

Giizel

of a single

catalogue of the calligrapher

Sanatlar Akademisi, May 25-June

of the economically and culturally dominant class had

been slowly shifting throughout the second half of the
twentieth century, as remnants of the lateOttoman
and early republican elite, concentrated mainly in the
largest cities (particularly Istanbul), were gradually swept
aside by provincial upstarts. By the 1990s, these new

and even multibillionaires had reached

the top of the economic
ladder, but they seemed to feel
a certain malaise?a
need for roots and even legitimacy.
This they found inOttoman antiques. Photographs
of such families in theirmansions, surrounded by
in the shadow of calligraphic panels
Ottoman opulence
hit the tabloid press daily (fig.9). For these generally
conservative, but for the most part secular collectors,
calligraphy was not a matter of religion but of heritage.
Itwas their ticket to a glorious past, not unlike wealthy
European commoners who purchased titles from
impoverished aristocrats. Itshould come as no surprise
multimillionaires

thatmost of these super-rich collectors made no effort

to learn how to read these works; they simply basked
in their splendor. Indeed, calligraphic genres like the
imperial edict (ferman) and the hilye became status

symbols par excellence, because their distinctive forms

made them so easy to recognize without the need to
read them. Today, such works can fetch several tens of
thousands of dollars at auction. It is noteworthy that
the children of these first-generation multimillionaires
seem to show much less interest in antiques; not prey
to the sense of rootlessness or the impostor syndrome

apparently feltby their parents, they have found new

ways to achieve "distinction" in the sense proposed by
Bourdieu.29 In particular, the modern Turkish art market
has skyrocketed in recent years.
The super-rich were not the only modern Turks to feel
the need for forging a new identity not entirely severed
from theOttoman past. A good number of contemporary
artists that handsomely deserve the qualification of

Emin Barm
15, 1978,

Jevket Rado, Turk Hattatlari (istanbul: Yayin Matbaacilik

Ticaret Limited ?ti., n.d. [ca. 1982]), p. 7. Ugur Derman
(private
confirmed to me that Rado told him at the time:
communication)
"What can Ido, dear Sir? To have this art accepted
no other choice/'

dominant culture, itcame to be infusedwith widely

differentmeanings by different cultural communities.
On the one hand, collecting Ottoman antiques, and
a class
signifier for
calligraphy inparticular, became
the newly affluent strata that emerged as a result of the
laissez-faire policies of the 1980s and 1990s. The core

in our time, we

29.

To the best of my knowledge,

this process has not yet been
in detail in the
scholarly literature. My spouse, the sociologist
Nilufer isvan, and I have been engaged
in a long-term research project
results we hope eventually to publish.
whose
discussed

have

222

RES 53/54 SPRING/AUTUMN 2008

Figure 9. From the sublime to the ridiculous, two examples of society pages fromthe early 1990s. Left:
fromthemagazine V, the lateSakip Sabanci at home, in frontof a selection of imperialedicts fromhis vast
collection ofOttoman calligraphy; the headline reads: "The collection theworld is talkingabout." Right:
fromthemagazine Fame, Aysegiil Nadir inher (leased and freshlyrestored)historicalmansion on the
Bosphorus, strikingan "Ottoman" pose for the tabloid press; Nadir's collection also included numerous
imperialedicts, as well as rareexamples ofOttoman marbled paper and other precious antiques.

"postmodern" began to integrateOttoman motifs

into theirworks, particularly calligraphy. The painter
Erol Akyavaj was the firstto do so, thus achieving
infinitelygreater commercial success than he had
done throughout his career. Ergin Inan and Suleyman
Saim Tekcan are two other prominent artistswho use
calligraphy

in theirwork.30 The

important point to note

here is that their use of calligraphy would never be

mistaken forworks of calligraphy proper. What they have
done is to use calligraphy principally as an element of
texture?Nan
Freeman has suggested, extremely aptly,
I think, that their use of calligraphy is akin to the use of
newsprint inCubist painting.31 The text that they use is
inconsequential, and it is not at all unusual for them to
write an inscription backward, ifthe graphic composition
warrants

in Erol Akyavas: Yasami

30. Examples of Akyavas's work appear
(Istanbul: Bilgi
Yapitlan, ed. Beral Madra and Haldun Dostoglu
for inan, see Ferit Edgu, Ergin inan
Oniversitesi Yaymlari, 2000);
([istanbul]: Ada Yaymlan,
1988); forTekcan, see Semra Germaner,
Suleyman Saim Tekcan: 45 Years of Arts [sic] (Istanbul: Turkiye is
ve

Bankasi, 2006). An exhibition was held recently in London, focusing

on similar works from elsewhere
in the Middle
East. Though many
in the show were wonderful,
of the works
the complete absence of

Turkish artists among nearly eighty?ranging

fromMorocco
and even China
(!)?is nothing short of incomprehensible.

to Iran

For the

it. In their hands, calligraphy has become pure

not
But
icon: At most, ithas become symbol.
sign.
At the same time, Islamic calligraphy has also become
something of a rallying point and source of identity

see Venetia Porter, Word

into Art: Artists of theModern
catalogue,
East (London: The British Museum
Middle
Press, 2006).
31. Private communication.

Schick: The iconicityof Islamic calligraphy inTurkey 223

for religious youth inTurkey.32 In fact, calligraphy is

eminently well suited for such a role, precisely because
the majority of Turkish citizens today cannot read it.
Thus, Arabic script acts to some degree as a password or

"secret handshake" that performs boundary maintenance

on the community, distinguishing insiders from outsiders.
One of the effects of this new role assumed by Islamic
a
calligraphy inTurkey has been the emergence of
new orthodox formalism?not only in calligraphy, but
also in some of the allied arts, particularly illumination
and marbling. The neologism "traditional art"33 has
and unquestionable
emerged as an unchallengeable
diverse
fields and
these
concept encompassing
an
with
them
inviolability that borders on
endowing
toward
Attitudes
these arts have become a
sacrality.

test of political correctness and even moral rectitude.

a
Underlying this new orthodoxy is historicist, indeed
art
of
Darwinian, conception
according towhich styles

and techniques evolve inmonolinear progression,

and the survival of the fittest is accomplished
through
compatibility and congruence with the "soul of the
nation"?a
concept that is,of course, never defined. As
a result of what we might call "aesthetic Darwinism," the
entire history of each so-called "traditional art" isviewed
teleologically, a single mainstream practice is recognized
as the correct one, and all practices that deviate from it
are viewed as undesirable mutations and perversions of
the national essence thatmust be snuffed out, so that the
art?and the nation?can
be restored to the "correct"

course.

To give just one example: It is a long-standing practice

in calligraphy for a master to give the student a license
called icazet (Arabic: ijazah) upon completing the
standard course of study. This practice has historically
been scrupulously enforced, and, with a handful of
exceptions, students who had not yet earned their
license were not permitted to sign theirwork?in
other

32. On

June 23, 2007,

I took part in the

Symposium

education

and vocational
of
training associated with the municipality
Istanbul. A good 90 percent of the audience was female, and of those,
easily 95 percent were veiled.
33. Traditional

currently dispose of no historical evidence whatsoever

to indicate thatmaster marblers might have once granted
licenses to their apprentices. Be that as itmay, in the
last decade or two, a small number of Turkish marblers

have invented the tradition of granting licenses for

marbling.34 This has permitted them to gain a doctrinal.
monopoly of sorts over an art that isbecoming more

popular, and hence less centrally controlled, by the day.

There iseven a web site inwhich, by clicking on some
links,one can hear the recorded voice of their common
teacher, the lateMustafa Duzgunman,
describing his
methods and recipes.35 The context makes itclear that

his is the only legitimate artistic lineage, as far as they

are concerned, and forwhat they consider legitimate
marblers, his methods and recipes and they alone are the
correct ones. Any experimentation with "nontraditional"
pigments, sizes, mordants, or designs isviewed not only
as beyond the pale of Turkish marbling, but indeed as a
betrayal of it.Yet what constitutes "traditional" materials
and techniques derives only from the verbal testimony of
a couple of twentieth-century masters of the art, and not
from laboratorywork and scientific analysis of historical
Inother words, this tradition?like all others,
examples.
of course?is merely a modern invention that projects
itself into time immemorial. Thus, it is not only through
form but also through practice that new meanings have

been ascribed to calligraphy and other arts of the book

modern Turkey.
Whether a status symbol for the rich, a source of
identity for the postmodern, or a test of orthodoxy
for Islamists, calligraphy remains a problematic icon
inTurkey today, one that has become part of the
raging "culture wars." The daily Hurriyet reported on
September 21, 2005, that, as a bit of "happening" or
conceptual art, some unidentified persons suddenly
unfurled a large banner in the Karakoy neighborhood

on the Arts

of theBook organizedby iSMEK,a highlysuccessfulprogramof art

arts are

generally known inTurkish as geleneksel

irony in this, however: The suffixes sel/sal
to tradition+al) are
is equivalent
(gelenek+sel
strongly disliked by
not entirely without
traditionalists, who view them?and
justification?
as an artificial construct of
Republican
linguistic engineering. On
sanatlar. There

words, to function as professional calligraphers. In the

art of paper marbling (Turkish: ebru; Persian: abr\),
however, therewas never such a practice. At least,we

is some

the other hand, the Ottoman

isobsolete and very
adjective an'anev?
The term gelenekli sanatlar ("arts with
unlikely to replace geleneksel.
traditions") has recently been proposed by Ugur Derman, and has
within the arts of the book community.
gained some acceptance

34.

For examples of these documents,

some of which
curiously
traditionalist verbiage with recent-vintage nationalism, see Muin
Nursen Eris,Mustafa Esat Duzgunman
and Ebru (Istanbul: istanbul
Buyuksehir Belediyesi Kultur A. ?. Yaymlan, 2007), pp. 164-165,
blend

176-177.

35. The URL of this site, maintained

by the marbler Alparslan
is http://www.gelenekselebru.com/.
There is also an
Babaoglu,
In particular, the
English version of the site, but it is incomplete.
pages entitled Reddiye (refutation) in the Turkish
hyperpolemical
section remain untranslated. The Turkish section even includes a
son
(testimonial) from Duzgunman's
?ehadetname
attesting to the fact
that the information presented therein is faithful to his father's
practices.

in

224

RES 53/54 SPRING/AUTUMN 2008

Istanbul. On itwere two pieces of

inTurkish. One said gel keyfim gel,
both
calligraphy,
which ismore or less untranslatable but could best be
described as an invocation to pleasure, to hedonism.
of downtown

The other said bu da geger ya HQ, which roughly

means "Lord, this too shall pass." Both, inother words,
were nonpolitical, secular, and
entirely unthreatening
expressions that any average Turk might have uttered
on a suitable occasion.36 Alas, people in the street
below could not read them. They interpreted the banner
as some sort of Islamist battle cry, and much anxiety
was reportedly experienced, until the municipality

it removed?a
tragicomical twist in the saga
of Islamic calligraphy inTurkey. Indeed, this saga
shows the art, taken in toto, to have had a powerfully
indexical quality, particularly during the Republican
period. Its suppression, reemergence, redefinition,
and reappropriation provide clues as to the profound
sociocultural transformations that have taken place since
the collapse of theOttoman Empire.
ordered

Ipresented this material at MIT, Caroline

Jones
if"Lord, this too shall pass" might not be intended as a
to the invocation to pleasure above
it?that is, if itmight

36. When
wondered

response
not represent a conservative
rejoinder to the hedonistic practices of
Iagree that this possibility cannot be ruled out,
modern society. Though
I strongly doubt it,as the phrase bu da geger ya HQ does
a censorious
inTurkish.
connotation

not have such