Decorated Marriage Contract, Haskoy [Istanbul, Turkey]: 1828

Ink and gouache on parchment (33¼ x 18¼ in.; 845 x 464 mm).



Recording the marriage of David ha-Levi son of Raphael Jacob ha-Levi to Rachel daughter of David Profita on Friday 21 Av 5588 (= 1 August, 1828).

Shalom Sabar, Ketubbah: Jewish marriage contracts in the Hebrew Union College Skirball Museum and Klau Library, Philadelphia: 1990: Shalom Sabar "Decorated Ketubbot" in Sephardi Jews in the Ottoman Empire: aspects of material culture, edited by Esther Juhasz, Jerusalem:1990

Ink and gouache on parchment (26 x 18 in.; 660 x 460 mm). Recording the marriage of David ha-levi son of Raphael Jacob ha-levi to Rachel daughter of David on Friday 21 Av 5588 (=August 1, 1828). Of arched rectangular form, surmounted by a palmette, the text within a floral border below panels embellished with further orange and green colored flowers and the Hebrew inscription "He who finds a wife (finds a good thing)" (Proverbs 18:22).
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The city of Istanbul and its environs have been home to an important Jewish population since before the days of the Roman Empire. In 1453,  Ottoman Turks conquered the city, then known as Constantinople, as the cilmination of their conquest of the Byzantine Empire.  The rise of the new Ottoman regime ushered in an unprecedented era of tolerance and prosperity. Sultan Mehmet II invited the Jews to live in the neighborhood of Haskoy, on the east bank of the Golden Horn and successive Sultans continued to welcome into their capital, the Jews who were fleeing the Iberian expulsions and the persecutions of Europe. The Jewish community of Constantinople  flourished in the following centuries and many of the most beautiful ketubbot from the Ottoman Empire were produced there during the nineteenth century.

This elaborately ornamented  ketubbah is of arched rectangular form surmounted by a palmette. The document is divided into two sections. The upper section is embellished with abstracted floral designs drawn in broad strokes and painted in bright colors.  The two sections are divided by a horizontal band containing a portion of the verse from Proverbs (18:22) "He who finds a wife [has found happiness and has won favor from the Lord"]  inscribed in large, square gold letters. The bottom half of the document contains the text of the marriage contract. The wedding took place in Haskoy, one of the Jewish neighborhoods in Istanbul and is recorded in this document as having taken place "here in Haskoy which is near Kushtandina".  The town of Istanbul is referred to as Kushtandina, after an old Arabic version of its former name - Constantinople.