An Ottoman military banner

The green-gold ground with inscriptions reserved on silver coloured metal thread brocade within roundels, the central panel with the inscription in supplementary wefted pale rose pink silk on metal thread brocade, the borders and cross-panel with a crimson ground.

The inscriptions in the borders are a repetition of:
Qur’an, surat al-ikhlas  ‘Purity’ (CXII)

The two columns of three roundels are variously inscribed:
“God. May His sublimity be exalted”
“Muhammad, the Prophet, Peace be upon him”
“Abu Bakr. May God be pleased with him”
“ ‘Umar. May God be pleased with him”
“ ‘Uthman. May God be pleased with him”
“ ‘Ali. May God be pleased with him”

In the two larger roundels above and below the central rectangular panel:
1) “May blessing of the exalted God be upon them all”
2) Qur’an, al-saff (LXI), parts of 13, as well as:
‘The Preserver is God. The Helper is God”

In the central panel:
“Contentment is a treasure that does not perish. Şevki wrote it.”

The reknowned Ottoman calligrapher Mehmed Şevki (1829-1887) was born in Kastamonu in north-western Anatolia, but brought up in Istanbul, from the age of three.  Whilst at school he took lessons in calligraphy from his uncle Mehmed Hulusi Efendi (d.1874) and by the age of twelve, he had obtained his ijāzah. Şevki was also a noted bookbinder and illustrator. 

A Mufradāt album by Şevki, see Safwat, Nabil F., The Art of the Pen, The Nasser D. Khalili Collection of Islamic Art, Noor Foundation, 1996, Cat.No.12, pp.28-30, on the basis of a colophon at the bottom of folio 11a, where he refers to himself as halife (junior clerk) in the office of a maktūbī (the chief secretary of an Ottoman Government Department), is dated to 1866, when Şevki was working for the Ministry of War.

It seems reasonable to suppose that the calligraphy for this banner was also amongst the commissions Şevki executed for the Ministry, dating it too, to circa 1866 (the first year of the Crete Uprising of 1866-68).  Other related banners which are dated are also mostly 19^th century, for example the banner in Kraków, Poland at the Panstwowe Zbiory Sztuki na Wawelu (Inv.no.514,17682), dated 1225 (1810-11); see also Rogers, J.M., Empire of the Sultans, Ottoman Art from the collection of Nasser D. Khalili, Musée Rath, Geneva 7^th July-24^th September 1995, cat.no.76, for a banner dated 1235 (1819-20).  The design of these banners is however, stylistically very 17^th century in character, see for example the rendition of the Iznik style tulips to the corners of the cross-band in the present lot.  It has been suggested that the 19^th century examples were woven as facsimiles of 17^th century examples which had worn out or been captured and that they continued to serve their traditional purpose for use in military campaigns, see Rogers, op.cit., cat.no.77. They may also have been intended to be deliberately reminiscent of the heyday of the Ottoman Empire as inspiration for the 19^th century Ottoman army.