The Ancient Archive Forming the Damascus Documents Collection: Qubbat al-Khazna and its History
Betül Genan, Şeyma Genan, Elif Behnan Bozdoğan, Nevrin Nur AslanThe Damascus Documents in the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts is a collection of manuscripts that were transferred from Damascus to Istanbul in the early 20th century. In addition to Qur’anic manuscripts, this manuscript collection involves different types and languages, including manuscripts on the Islamic sciences, texts from other religions, official documents, and documents related to social life, and is of great importance for manuscript research, especially for the study of maṣāḥif [collection of sheets/copy of Qu’ran]. How this collection was formed can be revealed by elucidating upon the history of the building in which it had been preserved. Qubbat al-Khazna in the courtyard of the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus is a sheltered structure that has been used for different functions throughout history and in which a large collection of manuscripts has accumulated. Understanding the history of this building, as whether it was just a modern library, a giant archive, or just a warehouse remains unclear, will be essential for revealing the exact nature of the Damascus Documents. This article deals with the building known as Qubbat al-Khazna and the manuscript collection contained within. The research aims to reveal the chronological history of the Qubbat al-Khazna corpus and is based on Ottoman archival documents and written literature on the history of the Qubbat al-Khazna, as well as own personal research on the Collection of Damascus Documents. As a result, this article illuminates the story of the Qubbat al-Khazna, from which the Damascus Documents Collection had been formed, from its early years to the present day, and also reveals the actions Ottomans took to protect this collection. This study on the history of a manuscript collection that is considered cultural heritage has multifaceted importance in that it contributes to the research on manuscript culture and sheds light on the sociopolitical relations of the period.
Şam Evrakı Koleksiyonu’nun Teşekkül Ettiği Kadim Bir Arşiv: Kubbetü’l-Hazne ve Tarihi
Betül Genan, Şeyma Genan, Elif Behnan Bozdoğan, Nevrin Nur AslanTürk ve İslam Eserleri Müzesinde bulunan Şam Evrakı, 20. yüzyılın başlarında Şam’dan İstanbul’a nakledilerek muhafaza altına alınan bir yazma eser koleksiyonudur. Kur’an yazmalarının yanı sıra İslamî ilimlere ait yazmalar, diğer dinlere ait metinler, resmî evrak ve sosyal hayata dair belgeleri içeren, farklı türden ve dilden yazmalardan oluşan bu koleksiyon başta mushaf çalışmaları olmak üzere yazma eser araştırmaları için büyük bir önem taşır. Bu koleksiyonun teşekkül sürecini ortaya koyabilmek, içinde korunduğu yapı olan Kubbetü’l-Hazne tarihini aydınlatmakla mümkündür. Şam Emevî Camii’nin avlusundaki Kubbetü’l-Hazne tarih boyunca farklı işlevler için kullanılan ve bu işlevlerine bağlı olarak da içerisinde geniş bir yazma eser koleksiyonunun biriktiği korunaklı bir yapıdır. Modern bir kütüphane mi, dev bir arşiv mi yoksa sadece bir depo mu olduğu belirsiz olan bu yapının tarihî sürecini bilmek Şam Evrakı’nın mahiyetinin tam olarak ortaya konulması için elzemdir. İşte bu makale Kubbetü’l-Hazne isimli yapı ile içerisindeki yazma koleksiyonunu ele almaktadır. Kubbetü’l-Hazne külliyatının kronolojik tarihini ortaya koymayı amaçlayan araştırma, Osmanlı arşiv belgeleri ile Kubbe tarihine ilişkin yazılı literatüre ve Şam Evrakı Koleksiyonu üzerine gerçekleştirdiğimiz kişisel incelemelere dayanmaktadır. Sonuç olarak makalede Şam Evrakı Koleksiyonu’nun teşekkül ettiği Kubbetü’l-Hazne’nin ilk yıllardan günümüze uzanan hikayesi aydınlatılmış, Osmanlı’nın bu koleksiyonu korumaya yönelik aldığı aksiyon ortaya çıkartılmıştır. Kültür mirası olan bir yazma eser koleksiyonunun tarihine ilişkin bu çalışma, yazma eser kültürü araştırmalarına katkıda bulunmak, dönemin sosyopolitik ilişkilerine ışık tutmak gibi çok yönlü bir öneme sahiptir.
The Damascus Documents in the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts (TIEM) is a collection of manuscripts that had been transferred from Damascus to Istanbul in the early 20th century. This collection mostly consists of Qur’anic manuscripts and contains relatively fewer texts on fiqh, tafsir, hadith, Qiraat, theology, grammar, history, amulets, and prayer texts, as well as documents that shed light on the history of the region and daily life, such as letters, sales contracts, marriage contracts, appointment documents, foundation records, pilgrimage power of attorney, and some texts from the Bible written in Arabic. Due to the wide variety of manuscripts, this collection is of great importance for manuscript research, especially for the study of muṣḥaf. How this collection had been formed can be revealed by elucidating upon the history of the building in which it had been preserved, Qubbat al-Khazna. Qubbat al-Khazna is in the courtyard of the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus and is a sheltered structure that has been used for different functions throughout history and in which a large collection of manuscripts had been accumulated. Whether this building had been a modern library, a huge archive, or just a repository is unclear, and the subject of this article aims to reveal the history of this building and the how the manuscript collection preserved therein had been formed.
Since the early 20th century, much research has been conducted on the Qubbat al-Khazna and its collection of manuscripts, particularly on the Damascus Documents. The first research on Qubbat al-Khazna focused on the non-Islamic manuscripts. The German scholar Bruno Violet (d. 1945) first studied in the Qubba in 1901 and published articles on some of the manuscripts found inside the Qubba. However, Hermann von Soden (d. 1914) was the one who officially announced the collection to European academia. The most comprehensive study to date on both the history of the Qubbat al-Khazna and the contents of the Damascus Documents was published in 2020 edited by Rambach D’Ottone et al. and titled “Towards a History of the Qubbat al-Khazna Corpus of Manuscripts and Documents.”
Initially functioning as a bayt al-mal [house of money] in which the state’s income and expenditure records were kept, this building was later used to store documents pertaining to the mosque’s endowment. Later, when the Qubba was realized to have been unaffected by fires, it was transformed into a repository for valuable documents. This collection of documents survived many disasters such as fires and earthquakes during the many years it was kept in the Qubba.
In recent centuries, the collection has attracted the attention of European manuscript collectors, and for this reason, some artifacts have been removed from the Qubba on various occasions. This is confirmed by the presence of manuscripts in libraries around the world that appear to have come from the Qubba. Manuscripts were also lent with official authorization from the Ottoman administration. This process began in the early 1900s when German researchers became interested in the Christian manuscripts in the Qubba and conducted research there. When this initiative proved inadequate, the proposal was made to have some manuscripts be taken to Berlin for a short period of time to be photographed, and the Ottomans accepted this proposal. However, Abdul Hamid II took some measures to guarantee the return of the manuscripts, which included the preparation of a deed, the issuance of a receipt for the return of the manuscripts, and limited permission to photograph just for documenting the manuscript inventory. The costs of photographing the manuscripts were covered by Abdul Hamid II’s private funds. In the end, the Christian manuscripts that had been lent to Germany were returned to the Ottoman Empire.
Toward the end of World War I, the increasing difficulty of preserving the manuscripts in Qubbat al-Khazna prompted the Ottomans to move to protect them. As a result, the manuscripts were brought to Istanbul in 1917, one year before the fall of Damascus, and were accompanied by the army. The fact that this collection currently preserved in the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts under the name the Damascus Documents constitutes the largest portion of the manuscripts from Qubbat al-Khazna shows the Ottomans to have realized their aim of protecting these precious contents. Nevertheless, the fact that some manuscripts had been lent to Germany to be photographed and the good relations between the Ottoman Empire and Germany have led to claims that Abdul Hamid II had gifted some of these manuscripts to the German side. However, this claim not only contradicts archival documents and witness testimonies but is also incompatible with the importance the Ottoman Empire showed toward the documents.
As a result, the research has shown that the most prominent feature of Qubbat al-Khazna is that it is a sheltered structure that had preserved Qur’anic manuscripts almost like a safe. In this respect, the Qubba is understood to have been a kind of archive containing manuscripts. The current research has also revealed the actions the Ottoman Empire took to protect a manuscript archive under its domain, as this collection wasn’t brought to Istanbul until after the emergence of the conditions of war, the result of which being that most of the manuscripts in this collection have survived to the present day.
