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Category Archives: Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology
drinking on the job
Drinking, and fighting in heavy armor, high speed horse chases, bowstring accuracy, and axe-swinging don’t apparently mix well together. The Battle of Nicopolis was the last great battle of the Crusades; and with it also marked the beginning of the … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Augustine Just War, Battle of Nicopolis, Evliya Effendi, Evliya Etendi, Madame Pickwick, madame pickwick art blog, Michel Pintoin, Morand-Metivier, Ottaviano Bon, Phillippe de Mezieres, Sam Huntington, Sultan Bayazid, Sultan Beyezid
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no naughty bits
The life of a eunuch. Its from a bygone era, but one not form a so-distant past. In Ottoman Turkey, the eunuch, both white and black enjoyed a certain status of the social scale, and those scales seemed to be … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Evliya Effendi, George Antoine Rochegrosse, Jean Claude Flechet, John Mole, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Lord Baltimore, Ottaviano Bon, The Black Eunuchs Ottoman, The White Eunuchs Ottoman, Thomas Dallam
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messy antics
Passion unchained. Does absolute power equate with absolute bliss? For the Sultan’s of the Ottoman Empire for the most part; the effort to reconcile two antagonistic ideas seemed to almost take a perverse pleasure. Seraglio life could be characterized as … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Georges Antoine Rochegrosse, Grand Seraglio, Jean Claude Flechet, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Madame Pickwick, madame pickwick art blog, Michel Baudier, Ottaviano Bon, Ottoman Turkey history, Sir Paul Rycaut, Sultan Ibrahim I
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caucasian cream of the crop
In selecting a concubine, a Sultan held a regular weekly levee at which the virgins of the harem were brought in for his inspection; he dropped a hankerchief at the feet of the one who pleased him most, indicating she … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Alan Aldiss, Antonio Maria Fabres y Costa, Evliya Effendi, Georges Jules Victor Clairin, Grand Seraglio, Jean Claude Flechet, John Mole, Khurrem roxelana, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Lord Baltimore, Madame Pickwick, madame pickwick art blog, Michel Baudier, Ottaviano Bon, Paul Alexandre Alfred Leroy, Roxelana and Suleiman, Sultan Ibrahim I, Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, Thomas Dallam
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a happy home
The inner and residential part of the Seraglio was called the House of Happiness. It was hard to imagine who was happy there. Certainly not the fifteen hundred women of the harem. For most of them life was like that … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Evliya Effendi, Georges Jules Victor Clairin, Giles Milton, Grand Seraglio, J.A.D. Ingres, Madame Pickwick, madame pickwick art blog, Moritz Stifter, Ottoman Empire harem, Ottoman Empire History, Roxelana and Suleiman, Selim the Sot, Seraglio First Mistress of the Coffee, Seraglio House of Happiness, Suleiman the Magnificent, Sultan Mohammed the Conqueror
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dinner is served: lonely at the top in the HMS Sultan
The social life in the Grand Seraglio was not all it had been cracked up to be. The power exercised there by the Sultan was absolute to be sure. But did it bring bliss? … When the Sultan got back … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Evliya Effendi, Franz Xavier Simm, Grand Seraglio, Jean-Claude Flachat, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Lord Baltimore, Madame Pickwick, madame pickwick art blog, Ottaviano Bon, Ottoman Empire Sultans, Suleiman the Magnificent
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suspicious minds
Good to walk around with a mirror just to see who may be sneaking up on you. Hard to find a Sultan who wasn’t suspicious and didn’t keep a food tester on the payroll. And lets not talk about the … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Aya Sofia mosque, Conquest of Constantinople, Fabbi Fabbio, Gentile Bellini, Grand Seraglio Istanbul, Hagia Sophia church, Jean Joseph Benjamin Constant, Jean Leon Gerome, Jean-Claude Flachat, john frederick lewis, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Lord Baltimore, Madame Pickwick, madame pickwick art blog, Ottaviano Bon, Selim III sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, Valide Sultans
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thebaid
Monasticism at its most simple and essential level. At the time of the Thebaid, the Levant was sprinkled generously with ascetic extremists, the types who immured themselves in caves, those that wore theit time away in prayer and meditation and … Continue reading
peeping thomas and the organ grinding sultan
The comings and goings in the Grand Seraglio would make a Dostoevsky novel look like a child’s short story. No, call this Persian Goth mixed with a surreal world that was so over the top so as to seem like … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Gentile Bellini, Jean Claude Flechet, Jean Leon Gerome, John Mole, Madame Pickwick, madame pickwick art blog, Ottoman Sultan Mehmed III, Queen Elizabeth Ottoman Empire, Thomas Dallam, William Harborne
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royal etiquette: eye of the Sultan
His Majesty’s seamy service.Throne Room Without and Within. Modern Turkish history contains much to be proud of, but it was preceded by a long and unbroken seamy past of plots hatched and destinies decided within the walls of the Grand … Continue reading
Posted in Art History/Antiquity/Anthropology, Feature Article, Ideas/Opinion
Tagged Ahmed I and Mustafa, Anton Hickel, Charles II England, Grand Seraglio Istanbul, Jean Leon Gerome, Jean Leon Gerome Ferris, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Lord Baltimore, Madame Pickwick, madame pickwick art blog, Murad III Sultan, Mustafa the cage, Selim III sultan
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