Through the Outer Gardens of the Saray - Strolling Through Istanbul: The Classic Guide to the City - page 101

of the arch, they display an inscription in an incredibly stylized, one
might say geometricized, type of Cufic calligraphy. On the three faces
of the vault at the height of the lintel of the door, there is a long
double Persian inscription in the beautiful cuerda seca technique. The
main inscription is in white letters on a dark blue ground. Above
and entwined with this is a subordinate inscription in yellow, with
the tendrils of a vine meandering in and out between the letters,
the whole encased in a frame of deep mauve with flowers of dark
blue, turquoise and white. Appropriately, Çinili Köşk now serves as a
museum to exhibit Turkish tiles and ceramics.
The interior consists of a central salon in the shape of an inverted
Latin cross with a dome over the crossing. The cross is extended by
a vestibule at the entrance end, an apse-like room at the far end, and
two eyvans, or open alcoves (now glazed in), at the ends of the shorter
arms; additional chambers occupy the corners of the cross. All these
rooms were once tiled and many of them still are, with triangular
and hexagonal tiles of turquoise and deepest blue, sometimes with
superimposed gold designs; these tiles are very similar to those in the
Yeşil Cami at Bursa.
Until the present age of nationalism, foreign wares tended to be
more highly prized than domestic products. Such appears to have
been the case in the Ottoman court as regards the local pottery of
Iznik - with the exception of wall tiles. At all events, the exhibition
of china in the Çinili Köşk, though interesting, is far less extensive
and varied than several of those in foreign museums and private
collections, especially the Victoria and Albert and the unrivalled
Godman collection; and most of the present display did not belong
to the sultans, but was subsequently acquired by the museum. In the
first room, to the left of the entrance vestibule, is a small collection
of Selçuk tiles - mostly wall tiles of enamel and majolica ware - of
the twelfth to fourteenth centuries. Entering the central salon, one
is at once struck by the superb mihrab from the mosque of Ibrahim
Bey at Karaman, one of the most splendid works from the height of
the great Iznik period. Also in this room are two fine lunette panels
in the cuerda seca technique from the medrese of Haseki Hiirrem,
dated 1539. The second room, to the left, has tiles of the transition