Eastern overtures War and Peace: Ottoman Relations in the 15th to 19th centuries', an exhibition at the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts, Istanbul, 1999 by Philip Mansel
For 500 years the Polish elite was obsessed with all things Ottoman. Yet a brilliant exhibition celebrating this passion went sadly unnoticed.
Turkish musicians at the British embassy in Istanbul, 1779. This miniature, a copy now in Warsaw University Library, belonged to King Stanislaw August Poniatowski of Poland
Archaeology
Under the volcano James Mellaart and the discovery of Catalhuyuk Photographs by Ara Güler and Gillian Warr. Illustrations from Mr Mellaart's archives
Nine thousand years ago, the plain of Konya was a hive of activity, for it was here, in the shadow of Hasandag, that the history of commerce began. Before the Mesopotamians, Minoans or Egyptians, the people of Catalhuyuk created one of the first cities known to man. Built from the profits of their trade in obsidian, the glassy volcanic rock used to make early implements, this was a flourishing settlement that has forced archaeologists to rethink the chronology of civilisation. James Mellaart, who unearthed the city and its stunning wall paintings, recalls the stages of a momentous discovery.
Cornucopia first major article on Anatolian prehistory tells the story of Mellaart's momentous discovery and includes photographs of life and work on the dig and in the surrounding villages of the Konya plain, as well drawings of the murals during the excavation.
James Mellaart celebrated his eightieth birthday in November 2005. Read the tribute by Christian Tyler in Cornucopia 35.
Top: Arlette Mellaart and Ian Todd photographing a wall painting
Middle:This painting shows a pantheon of female deities with birds, leopards and black panthers in a mountain landscape. In the kilim-like border a stream issues from the mouths of bulls (Level IV)
Below: Level IV, An extraordinary perspective from the mountains to the sea, from Karadag, Karacadag and Hasandag across the Konya plain, over the Taurus mountains to the south coast and the Mediterranean Sea
Click image for the full portrait by Charles Hopkinson Cornucopia 35for Christian Tyler's tribute to James Mellaart on his eightiesth birthday.
Also see Cornucopia 26for the ninth-millennium temple art of Nevalicori and Gobekli Tepe
Cornucopia 25 for Arlette Mellaart's article on the family's Bosphorus summerhouse
People & places
Rhapsody in blue The tiles of the Murad II Mosque in Edirne by John Carswell with photographs by Selamet Taskin and John Carswell
Soon after blue and white ceramic was born in China, it made its first glorious appearance in a mosque in the early Ottoman capital of Edirne. John Carswell unlocks a well-kept secret.
Like a patchwork of snowflakes, these hexagonal tiles come in an extraordinary variety of geometric patterns, drawing on both Chinese and Islamic sources.
John Carswell is the author of Blue and White: Chinese ceramics around the world, which was highlighted in a special 16-page feature in Cornucopia 25. He has also written frequently about Iznik ceramics: see his article on the tiles of the 16th-century Rustem Pasha Mosque in Cornucopia's special Gardens Issue, Cornucopia 13
Cornucopia 39 for the Blavitt exhibition in Stockholm, the culmination of John Carswell's study of Blue & White porcelain.
The earthquake
The fatal flaw Izmit 17 August 1999
A special report by rescuers and writers on the August 1999 earthquake and its aftermath with articles by Norman Stone, Andrew Finkel and Suna Erdem
The earthquake that struck northwestern Turkey on August 17, killing at least 17,000 and making hundreds of thousands homeless, could not have come at a worse time. At three in the morning, most people were asleep. With top officials on holiday or themselves under the rubble, and all communications down, there was no one to take charge. As this issue of Cornucopia was going to press, disaster struck again. Mercifully, many lessons had been learnt in the four months since August. This time people were prepared: the rescue operation was fast and coordinated. But it simply underlined the longer-term needs - to bring survivors lasting help, and to acknowledge nature's devastating power
Aykut Barka, Turkey's internationally respected earthquake authority, died in 2002. Andrew Finkel pays tribute.
Interiors
Safranbolu: A 20-page celebration of Safranbolu: a blueprint for living by Elizabeth meath Baker with photographs by Jean Marie del Moral
The lovingly maintained Mumtazlar Konagi is just one of the many handsome old houses that distinguish the Anatolian market town of Safranbolu. With iron deposits, lush forests and fields growing the valuable saffron croci that gave the town its name, Safranbolu prospered quietly for 1500 years.
Top: Several houses have large indoor pools like this one at the Havuzlu Konagi. Some even have a separate pool building for entertaining in the garden. Fresh water came to the town from the northwest via the still extant Incekaya Aqueduct
Below: A panelled sitting room with window seats that pull out to make beds, and blinds and covers edged in crochet work.
For more on Anatolia's rich architectural heritage, read John Carswell on Amasya Cornucopia 11 Patricia Daunt on the Black Sea konaks of Camlihemsin Cornucopia 12 Roger Williams and Jean Marie del Moral's portrait of Kula, on Turkey's Aegean hinterland Cornucopia 22 Ali Konyali's masterful study of eastern Black Sea houses Cornucopia 34.
At Home in Turkeyby Solvi dos Santos and Berrin Torolsan features one of these beautiful houses
Profile
The brothers Mango by David Barchard with photographs by Charles Hopkinson
Cyril Mango has long been an authority on Byzantium. Now Andrew Mango has published an important biography of Ataturk. Yet the brothers were brought up in Istanbul between the wars in a pool of European culture barely touched by Turkish politics.
Bringing back Babylon text and photographs by Berrin Torolsan
The leek, friendly and fragrant, is about to enter its fourth millennium as a favourite ingredient of cooks around the globe. Berrin Torolsan traces its history and offers ways to cook it to perfection.
For a complete list of Berrin Torolsan's cookery stories in Cornucopia, see our cookery index. Selected recipes are also available online: menus.
The Whittalls in winter Moda Bay by Yolande Whittall
In the first of a new series on family photograph albums, Yolande Whittall looks back at 1930s life in Moda, across the strait from the domes and minarets of Istanbul.
The author as a child, dazed by a snowball.
More dramatic weather in Moda Bay: The Great South Wind Cornucopia 21
