An exceptional Ottoman dagger with gold-inlaid blade, 16th century, with silver gilt and niello hilt, Turkey, 17th century

This dagger exemplifies the golden age of Ottoman art and is an early, unique example within the select group of magnificent arms created during the height of Persian-inspired Ottoman artistry in the first half of the sixteenth century. The influence of the Tabrizi masters can be clearly seen and it is of a quality rarely found outside the established institutions.

The inscription is in fine nasta'liq calligraphy placed over a rolling scroll with interspersed flowers and leafwork. The inscription is a poem formed from two couplets on either side of the blade:

I am love and will shed your blood And keep you alive in my heart In death, do not be embittered For I will be indebted to you

As long as the account is in my grasp As long as my dagger is merciful Which is said to be done when the morning breeze Is in view on the flowing waters

The poem plays with words that are not easily rendered in English. It extols the lyrical virtues of the dagger, in that even as the bringer of death it remains both gracious and compassionate to those it encounters. The breeze on flowing waters is in reference to the rippling effect on the surface, a descriptive term used often in association with the meandering pattern of wootz steel. The early Arab poet ‘Awas ibn Hajar described the wavy streaks of a wootz blade as a "pond over whose surface the wind is gliding". The legendary sword al-Ṣamṣama was described by the thirteenth-century court poet Ibn Yamin as having the "temper of its steel flashing on the blade like ripples of clear water".

The dagger’s unusual blade features, with its distinct bordered paneling, cannot be found within the inventories of the major institutions including the extensive collection of Ottoman arms in Istanbul. The style of gold-inlaid decoration, with the chinoiserie split leaf running down the length of the blade interspersed with myriad floral motifs, is based upon a Persian and Timurid aesthetic and this could either be a Persian blade that found its way to Istanbul or an early and unique example of imperial Ottoman craftsmanship based upon a Persian concept, created within the court workshops of the sixteenth century. The Ehl-i Hiref was the craftsman’s guild of the Ottoman Empire and was developed in Istanbul under Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II, attracting the most talented artisans to join the flourishing atelier. Although there are accounts of Tabrizi craftsmen in the court workshops during the fifteenth century, it was after the Battle of Caldiran in 1514 that Selim I sent a large body of highly skilled artisans to Istanbul – both native Tabrizis and Timurid masters from Khurusan who had previously settled in Tabriz under Shah Isma'il. Their influence was to have a dramatic effect on all aspects of art created within the Ottoman capital. Amongst the many different guilds listed in the court documents of the sixteenth century, the Ehl-i Hiref employed the karidgeran (dagger and knife makers), zernisan (inlayers) and zergeran (gold/silver-smiths, niello and enamellers), all of whom would have contributed to the creation of this dagger.

The gilded silver and niello hilt is of the late seventeenth century, probably the period of Mehmed IV (r.1648-87). Amidst the variety of flora and leafwork, the front side of the hilt has four carnation fan palmettes of a traditional geometric form, often found as a repeated design on seventeenth-century Ottoman textiles (Metropolitan Museum of Art inv.17.29.11). The pommel is decorated with a central sculptural flower with two radiating leaves, all of which are inset with red stones. A spectacular silver-gilt and niello pen case with similar decoration bearing a tugra of Mehmed IV sold in these rooms, 9 April 2014 lot 160, as does a dagger in the collection of the L.A.Mayer museum, and a dagger in the Furusiyya Foundation of Art (Mohamed 2007 inv. R-328 p.167).

Comparative gold inlay of the fine quality applied to this blade can be found on a dagger formerly in the Sultan’s treasury in Istanbul (Elgood 1979, p.66, fig.61). That blade is also divided down its centre with a pronounced midrib which divides the decoration, which is composed solely of poetic couplets set inside lobed cartouches. This dagger is probably fifteenth century and entirely Persian, and of a style that was to be influential to the later arms created within the Ehl-i Hiref. A rare Persian blade of the late fifteenth with fine split leaf arabesques and mounted on an eighteenth century Ottoman hilt is in the Furusiyya Foundation of Art (Mohamed 2007, inv R-269 p.159) and another with a Persian-influenced blade of the sixteenth century is in the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen in Dresden (Schckelt 2010, inv. nr. Y 115 p.210). The Dresden blade, captured after the siege of Vienna, has a pronounced midrib dividing one side with a Persian poem set within lobed cartouches and the other with a rolling design of saz leaves and floral motifs. The poem similarly makes reference to the dagger and to the whirls in water which was clearly a theme repeated on arms created within this short period. The scabbard, like the hilt on our dagger, is mounted with silver niello fittings which date to the period of Mehmed IV.

A number of related highly decorative daggers created within the Ehl-i Hiref have survived, which were developed later in the second half of the sixteenth century following this early concept, and these were adorned with composed Persian poetry set within lobed cartouches and Persianised designs in fine inlay. A group of these had blades that were somewhat frail with open-work grooves, indicating they were more likely made as gifts and not as fighting weapons, intended to be presented to European rulers and court members of the high nobility. Two good examples are in the Treasury of the Teutonic Order in Vienna, one of which was presented to the Archduke Maximilian by his brother in 1599.