RENAISSANCE FACEBOOK RETURNS!
When I stayed at the Greek island of Chios in 2010, I was so close to Turkey my mobile sometimes automatically switched over. Look at the map, and you'll see what I mean. Since I was writing about the Medicis, I visited the Medici Archive a lot. One day I checked out if the area I was in was present in the Medici archive at all. Indeed it was. And in many of these documents the name Pera also showed up.
Digging a bit further, Pera turned out to be the old name of Beyoğlu, an area in the European site of Istanbul. This was where Europeans traveling to the Ottoman empire stayed, and some had a permanent life here. The modern name Beyoğlu actually arrives from the Italian word "Bailo", which was the name of the Venetian ambassador and his splendid palace in Pera.
Pera was also the base of Italian merchants. From here Italians bought exotic food like caviar and fruits, coffee, sweet wine, carpets, skins and furs, horses, and even slaves. Caviar from the Black Sea appears in many documents, and seems to have been important.
I'm less sure about what the Ottomans traded in return. I know Italian fabrics was considered finer than Ottoman ones, even by the Ottomans, because it was woven in different heights and had a tighter pile. Many of the finest kaftans were made of Italian silk. So that is definitely a part of the trade. Pearls also appears in some documents, as well as weapons ar armory. But a much sought-after product, which the Ottomans hadn't cultivated themselves, was portrait painters. This was indirectly a part of the trade between Italians and Ottomans. But less flattering, the Italians also sold slaves to the Ottoman empire.
Back to Renaissance Facebook... Here are some tidbits of the contact between the East and West. It makes me realize how narrow a view some of us (or at least me) has had on the past, where the world has been divided into the Christian west and the Muslim east. There is so many nuances to that story. The extensive trading, where foreign food, clothes and objects was sent back and forth, is at least traceable.
The immaterial cultural impact is harder to trace. What impact did it have on culture that Italians were always invited to important events in the Ottoman empire, like circumcisions of the heirs, celebrations and political debates? That many Italians lived in Istanbul their whole life, and told about their life to their Italian family? That Ottomans also visited Italian courts, and brought home Italian goods and traditions? It's harder to trace this, but the everyday tone many of the letters have makes me think Italians at least considered the Ottomans on the level of foreign European courts, and that they weren't considered as exotic as we think today.
December 19, 1547
Cosimo I receives "Muleibucchere" [possibly Mulay Bakr?], Prince of Tunisia, son of the blind Sultan of Tunisia, Mulay Hassan, in Florence.
http://documents.medici.org/document_details.cfm?entryid=4604&returnstr=orderby=SendName@is_search=1@result_id=20
May 30, 1550
Alfonso Berardi asks for an exemption from the ducal rule against working foreign gold in Florence, so that a new garment can be made for Rustem Pasha. He also awaits instructions regarding pearls.
http://documents.medici.org/document_details.cfm?entryid=6387&returnstr=orderby=SendName@is_search=1@result_id=10
March 20, 1553
Giovanni Battista Buondelmonti sends Eleonora de Toledo various luxury articles from Istanbul, including "bolo armeno" [a type of clay] and "terra sigillata" guaranteed by the doctor Amon at the Ottoman court and by Bernardino Porcellini, Florentine apothecary in Pera. Buondelmonti also proposes a way to relieve the plight of the Florentine subjects [mostly from Elba and Pianosa] sold as slaves in Istanbul.
http://documents.medici.org/document_details.cfm?entryid=3073&returnstr=orderby=SendName@is_search=1@result_id=10
March 6, 1568
From Edirne comes a detailed description a diplomatic reception in Constantinople of an ambassador [possibly Shah Quli Khan] representing Tahmasp I of Persia. His clothes, weapons, horses, animals, servants, and musicians are discussed, as are the gifts brought for Sultan Selim II [including two golden field canopies, two history books, valuable jewels, hunting birds, and other items totalling 164,000 scudi].
http://documents.medici.org/document_details.cfm?entryid=21587&returnstr=orderby=SendName@is_search=1@result_id=0
December 29, 1569
Cosimo Bartoli responds to a request from Prince Francesco for hunting falcons and reports on the difficulty of obtaining them. A German brought a number of them from Sweden to Venice but intends to send them on to Sultan Selim II in Constantinople.
http://documents.medici.org/document_details.cfm?entryid=5117&returnstr=orderby=SendName@is_search=1@result_id=0
July 21, 1578
Bongianni Gianfigliazzi reports to Grand Duke Francesco I de' Medici about his reception in Istanbul and the gifts he delivered to Sultan Murad III Othmanli. Among the gifts were weapons, sheathed scissors, flowers made of gold, flowers made of feathers, flowers made of silk, and sugary confections in the shape of fruit. A detailed description of the reception protocol in the sultan's rooms is included.
http://documents.medici.org/document_details.cfm?entryid=18053&returnstr=orderby=SendName@is_search=1@result_id=10
May 17, 1606
The Prince of Poland Wladyslaw IV Wasa has started to dress himself according to the Polish fashion, instead of the Italian one. (...) Count Alessandro Rangoni is back from Moscow, where he was warmly received by the Tsar Dmitry. The members of the tsar's household dress the Italian way, their livery is red, and in the tsar's household there are some three hundred cooks.
http://documents.medici.org/document_details.cfm?entryid=24445&returnstr=orderby=SendName@is_search=1@result_id=0
June 14, 1639
The Venetian Bailo to Constantinople [probably Alvise Contarini] sent a gift of confectionary sweets and golden weave fabrics to the naval general of the Ottoman navy, a favorite of Sultan Murad IV, upon hearing that the general was in Izmit. The general officially refused the gift, then privately took the best fabrics, promising to pay for them when he reached Constantinople.
http://documents.medici.org/document_details.cfm?entryid=22207&returnstr=orderby=SendName@is_search=1@result_id=10
I am of course talking about court environments. Working class people probably had little to do with this, apart from producing the items meant for export. They lived their lives as before.