This coloured pen drawing on paper is an almost square map of Vienna. Its captions are in old Turkish in Arabic script. The map was found by the imperial troops after the conquest of Belgrade in 1688.
In the 19th century, the map was regarded as “amateurishly produced” sketch (Camesina) representing the topographical situation only vaguely. Later investigations proved this categorical statement to be wrong. The map indicates not only the exact topographical situation and military formation but also conveys the mystic concept the Ottoman besiegers associated with the Fortress of Vienna and some central buildings and places of this city. It gives an exact overview of Ottoman and allied military deployment during the siege. The map was in all probability completed after the siege and was meant to illustrate it in retrospect.
The most important components are Vienna’s fortifications -- they structure the representation. Inside the walls especially noteworthy buildings can be recognised which played a role in the historical myths of Ottomans about Sultan Süleyman’s Siege of Vienna in 1529. In contrast, the buildings outside the fortifications in the outskirts of Vienna are represented in a more general way. Apart from the exact topographical features the basic style follows typical Ottoman conventions. This becomes all the more obvious when one looks at views of towns and cities in miniature painting of Süleyman’s reign (1520 – 1566). The schematic representation of secular and sacral buildings of the Vienna map recalls also the rendering of buildings on widely used pilgrimage scrolls, such as of the shrines of Najaf and Kerbala and other pilgrimage centres of Islam. Literatury sources too, indicate how to place this genre of map drawing in the cultural and historical tradition of the Ottoman empire. The best example would be Evliya Celebi’s (1611 – 1685) travelogues with description of palces and cities which the famous Ottoman traveller wrote several decades before the map was produced.
Finally, the international influence on such military maps should also be taken into consideration -- promoted by an industrious copying of maps.
The Ottoman map of the fortified city of Vienna is one of the major show pieces of the Ottoman Wars Collection at this museum.

 

Based on German text by Alexandra Caruso

Bibliography: 

Kreutel, Richard F., Ein zeitgenössischer türkischer Plan zur zweiten Belagerung Wiens, in: Wiener Zeitschrift für die  Kunde des Morgenlandes, Wien 1953 / 55, S 212- 368.

Schausammlung, Historisches Museum der Stadt Wien, Wien 1984.

Camesina, Albert, Wien´s Bedrängnis im Jahre 1683, in: Berichte und Mitteilungen des Altertums-Vereines zu Wien, Bd. VIII. Wien 1865.

Kreutel, Richard F. / Prokosch, Erich, Im Reich des Goldenen Apfels, Des türkischen Weltenbummlers Evliyâ Celebi denkwürdige Reise in das Giaurenland und in die Stadt und Festung Wien anno 1665, Graz-Wien-Köln 1987.