Recueil de costumes et vêtements de l'Empire ottoman au 18e siècle | Collection of costumes and clothing of the Ottoman Empire in the 18th century |
Auteur: Monnier, Joseph Gabriel (1745-1818 ; colonel du génie) | Author: Monnier, Joseph Gabriel (1745-1818, Colonel of the Engineers) |
Date: 1786-07-11 | Dated: 1786-07-11 |
Langue: français | Language: French |
Dimensions: 7.7 x 24.8 cm | |
Droits d'utilisation: Ville de Bourg-en-Bresse ; libre de droit et convention de prêt pour le fichier original | Rights of Use: City of Bourg-en-Bresse; Free of charge and loan agreement for the original file |
3.1.3. Istanbul Traveler Monnier's Album
The ones mentioned so far were the albums in which the works of the Greek painter were used as models. An original album by the artist's own hand could illuminate all the points discussed here. It was possible to reach the works of the artist himself by examining the albums -most of which are copies- scattered around the world. One of them will be mentioned here, an album in France that contains most of the works copied by European painters. This album completely explains what kind of an album the copied original will be. The album titled Recueil des Costumes Turcs (Turkish Costumes Series) is in the Municipal Library in Bourg-en Bresse, near Paris, and belongs to an engineer named Joseph-Gabriel Monnier (1745-1818).132
Born in Bourg-en-Bresse, as the son of a medical doctor, Joseph Gabriel Monnier was educated at the Ecole de Génie de Mézirèes and became a French Royal engineer. He came to Istanbul for the first time on 16 July 1784 as an assistant to Lafitte-Clavé. Monnier, who was the military advisor of the Ottoman armies, resided in Istanbul between 1784-1786 and for the second time between 1793-1797.133
Between 1783 and 1788, many French experts and officers came to Istanbul within the framework of cooperation between the Ottoman and France. The first to arrive were the fortification engineers, who started to strengthen the fortification of the Bosphorus against a possible Russian attack.
During these years, it was determined that experts in the fields of artillery, shipbuilding and more than fifty engineers, foremen and workers came to Istanbul.134 He contributed to the realization of modern engineering education in the Ottoman country by giving lectures on fortification. Lafitte-Clavé and Gabriel Monnier mapped the Bosphorus and Black Sea walls and presented them to the French government and the Grand Vizier Halil Hamid Pasha, in reports containing their other works.135
Monnier wrote the following in his diary on July 11, 1786, about the 152 illustrated watercolor albums he acquired while he was on duty in Istanbul: 136
"I organized my Eastern corpus which made up a collection of 152 pictures and classified them into 9 notebooks... This collection was painted by a Greek, and Turkish names were written partly by Mr. Trécourt, a French language student, and partly by Mustafa Kalyoncu, a Turk."137
As it turns out, Monnier, one of the engineers who came to the Ottoman country, ordered this album with 152 pictures, which includes Ottoman types from all walks of life, and had the opportunity to both keep a record of where he lived and get to know people from the protocol with pictures. Monnier also did not mention the name of the person he referred to as the Greek painter in his diary while naming the authors of the painting descriptions. This issue can be explained as follows: As mentioned above, in this period when ancient experts and enthusiasts increased, the word 'Greek' came before the name of the artist, so it was used to express a value, a more important concept that goes back to ancient origins. The authors expressed that they supported the policies of their countries, knowing the Greek culture and language for the travelers, and their missions. Therefore, if they talked about a 'Greek' friend and culture in their diaries and works to be published, it would have emphasized that they supported this, that they knew this culture or that they had made acquaintances.138
The album contains 152 paintings measuring 37.7 x 24.8 cm and begins with two portraits of Sultan Abdulhamid I, one standing and the other seated. One of these portraits resembles works attributed to Rafael Manas, one of the painters of the period. Ottoman descriptions are written on the lower right corner of each of the figures in the album. Again, French definitions written according to Ottoman pronunciation were included in a separate list in Monnier's diary. For example, he wrote halvadgi in the 132nd place in the list, which is the figure of the halva maker no. 132 in the album.
All of the paintings are single figures and there is no themed scene presenting a section from daily life. Monnier, who was trying to get to know the Ottomans, ordered them and returned to his country in 1786 with this album among the information he obtained and the notes he took.139
The creator of Monnier's album and, in our opinion, the producer of the albums copied in the Polish and Swedish albums mentioned above, the person we now call the Greek painter, used Vanmour's works while creating his own patterns and developed them as mentioned. The artist's use of sources other than Vanmour's works while creating his albums and the way he followed when creating original works became more visible with the discovery of his new albums. Since other European artists copied the Greek artist's albums exactly, they created the impression that they had compiled their albums by making use of Vanmour, various sources and the works of this artist separately.
Again, when we look at the style, it seems that the Monnier album was written by the same hand, e.g. başçuhadar, peyk, zülüflü baltacı, kayıkçı, kızlararğası, haznedar ağa, alay çavuşu, tercüman, müftü, another album containing figures in almost the same mould was found. It has been understood that this album, which is in the British Museum today and known as the Diez Album, and the Monnier Album are original examples made by the Greek painter. Therefore, painters working around the Polish and Swedish embassies made copies of an album similar to the Diez and Monnier Albums. At this point, it will be useful to introduce the Diez Album, which is from the collection of an orientalist.
Source: OSMANLI KIYAFET ALBÜMLERİ (1770-1810) by Nurdan KÜÇÜKHASKÖYLÜ