The figural stages of cintemani motif in Ottoman fabric art

Çintemani which is one of the most important patterns in Ottoman fabric art has been used in various fields of decoration arts for centuries thus becoming the symbol of religions and teachings with its different meanings. Çintemani is described as a pattern which is composed of three circles of the same diameter whose centers are placed on the three corners of the imaginary triangle, the two being below and the one on the top and used together with two undulating linear forms called pelenk (pelennor) or tiger fur skin in paralel with each other in occassional intervals.Quite different from those comparables in Far East in terms of its symbolic meaning and the way it has been used in Turkish art and symbolising power and strength, the pattern has managed to survive since prehistoric ages until Ottoman Empire. The purpose of the present thesis is to study its contuinity where çintemani has prevailed since early times of the Central Asia until XIX th century Ottoman Empire, monitor its development with religious and cultural interactions, associate it with other patterns and styles, establish its symbolic evolution with various elements which are correlated and believed to be correlated with aspects of the pattern itself and finally define it in formal and symbolic meanings.Within the context of the above knowledge, the present study aims to examine Ottoman fabric arts based on çintemani pattern, determine palatial fabrics in which the pattern is seen most and study çintemani-patterned fabrics considering their design, color, composition and symbolism. Accordingly, the literature has been scanned and the related database studied. In addition, Ottoman miniatures have also been used as visual documentation with the expectation that they would to shed light on fabric patterns of the period, from which the fabrics with çintemani patterns have been found. Such fabric examples have been considered in terms of their design, style, color, composition, decorational charasteristic and their combination with other patterns to finally establish the museums where they are exhibited and their inventory numbers and form the related tables.