Catalogue of Turkish Manuscripts pdf download

Catalogue of Turkish Manuscripts in the Library of Leiden University and Other Collections in the Netherlands

Minor Collections

By Jan Schmidt

CATALOGUE OF TURKISH MANUSCRIPTS

The museum, formerly the Amsterdam Historical Museum, first opened its doors to the public in 1926. It houses the city’s art collection brought together from the 17th century onward.

The collection was later expanded with donations. Among the holdings of the museum is a part of the collection of fine and applied art of Abraham Willet (1825–1888), which includes a library comprising some manuscripts, among them one Turkish item (described below), acquired through his widow, Louisa Willet-Holthuysen (1824–1895), who bequeathed her possessions to the city of Amsterdam.

Two modern Turkish letters, composed for the museum for an exhibition in 1985 by two anonymous refugees describing their painful experiences in the Netherlands, are still kept in a fifle tentoonstellingsdocumentatie Allemaal Amsterdammer found in a box labelled 1985/5b.

Literature: Geert-Jan Koot & Fransje Kuyvenhoven, “The ‘Willet-Holt-huysen’ Collection of Books”, in Art Libraries Journal 12/1 (1987), pp. 32–38.

A 16th-century illustrated copy of a narrative poem in mes̱nevī rhyme on the story of Yūsuf and Züleyḫā by Meḥmed Ḥamdullāh, who used the pen-name of Ḥamdī (d. 909/1503). It was the first Ottoman version on this theme and was completed by the poet in 897 (1491–1492) according to the concluding chronogram: ‘in exactly 897 the poor Ḥamdī fifnished this poem’ (sekiz yüzle toḳsan yedide temām/ bu naẓmı temām etdi Ḥamdī faḳīr, f. 222a:2).

 The last word of the fifnal chronogram (quoted below) results in the same number. The title is written in white in a gilt headpiece on f. 1b; the name of the author, Ḥamdī Çelebi b. eş-Şeyḫ, also in white occurs in another headpiece on f. 2a.

The last chronogram is followed by a riddle colophon (cf. below). A description on the author and contents in Dutch is found on the last flfyleaf, recto; it states that the manuscript was completed in 1562 (but cf. below). The manuscript contains nine coloured miniatures (23a, 47b, 60b,