Szilágyi András (szerk.): Ars Decorativa 16. (Budapest, 1997)

PÁSZTOR Emese: „Tafota, melyre az virágokat írták"

intended for buttons. As the envoy was unsure of what to choose from the trader's stock, the smaller or the bigger ones, as well as being unsure as to the colour of the pearls to select, greenish or yellow, he asked for the loan of four pearls for a month, against security, from the Jewish trader who held them, and sent them to his master in Transylvania. However, despite repeated urging on the part of Réthy, the pearls did not come back in time, with the result that the trader would wait no longer and sold his stock of pearls to the wife of the Grand Vizier. The prince stuck to his order for pearls, and thus the envoy, having completed his official duties, looked into the market-hall (bedesten) daily when returning from the divan, in order to find a pearl of a size identical to that of the wax model sent by the prince.

6 He was unable to find one quickly, since pearls were sold on strings of 100, most of which were smaller, and with only a few larger ones among them. Finally, he decided to ask a genuine pearl from Transylvania as an example, in order to purchase piecemeal the desired quantity from selected pearls of suitable colour and size. Other ways of sending measurements can also be found in the correspondence. For example, a ruby was ordered by the prince on the basis of a lead model,

7 or the shape of a precious stone given by sending a drawing on a "piece of paper".

8 Carpets were bought not according to pattern or colour, but on the basis of "cotton-thread measure" at the Sublime Porte.

9 It is also clear that orders came from Transylvania more easily than did the money to pay for the completed work, presenting many problems to the envoys who mediated between the prince and the traders and craftsmen. Let us mention the case of one of the prince's more unusual wishes, in connection with which he sent back to Istanbul two silk-threaded bird-nets that had already been made, with instructions that they should be undone and the threads made finer. Naturally, the work was not accepted on account of its immensely laborious nature.

10 The household documents of Gábor Bethlen are interesting from other angles.

11 Although they lack the informal tone of the correspondence, the accurate lists, broken down into items, of purchases from the Porte illuminate the process of the making of these goods. We are given information about the weight, size and type of material it was necessary to purchase for a masterpiece to be made at the Porte. From the mass of data available we shall select a few details which are interesting and relevant with regard to the techniques used in embroidery. Saddles, horse blankets, saddle cloths , quivers, etc. embellished with embroidery on a base of metal-threaded silk fabric (for example, seraser), silk velvet (kadife) or leather constitute a significant percentage of ornamental objects and objects for everyday use made at the Porte in the 17th century. These embroidered textiles are called in the specialist literature "heavy embroideries", as opposed to the canvas-based "light embroideries". The "heavy" embroideries, which were made using gold or silver wire - in the word usage of the time "yellow" and "white" skofium (sim and sirma in Turkish),

12

13 or by using narrow strips of gold or silver (klaptan) wound round yellow or white silk thread respectively, were invariably made by men.

14 As metal wire was expensive, a special stitching technique was used, so-called wire thread laid and filled out from underneath. In this technique a cluster of metal threads consisting of three to four threads was fixed to the base textile with strong silk threads. In this way the metal thread ran on the surface, while the thread stitching it down ran on the reverse side, only to come to the front side occasionally to tie the metal thread to the base. The surface of the embroidery was then raised into relief against the background by the insertion of padding consisting of cotton yarn made from a number of threads. The technique applied when the coloured silk threads tying down the metal threads in small sections to the base textile is visible is called the zerdûz technique, which was used by the embroiderer-craftsmen working for 4M