Kahyaoğlu, Mehmet

Yaşar Üniversitesi

Research Topic: The Ports Along the Shores of Asia Minor between 12th–14th Centuries in the Light of Portolan Charts and Notarial Acts

Colors on maps may convey different meanings as signifiers, as in the case of portolan charts, which provide us with visual elements of the trade network of the Mediterranean in the Middle Ages. Leaving debates about origins aside, portolan charts provide us valuable graphic data on how the geography of the period was perceived by society, especially by those who were dealing with overseas trade. In keeping with this theme, this research aims to take the ports written in red on portolan charts as starting points to draw a wider picture of the geography in question from the commercial point of view, comparing those ports with ones mentioned in notarial acts of the notaries from the Italian Maritime Republics active between the early 12th and late 14th centuries. Moreover the research will be completed with an attempt to correlate examples of material culture of the period (if there is any) found in excavations with data from both notarial acts and portolan charts.

Dr. Kahyaoğlu is a specialist in Byzantine art and received his PhD from Ege University’s Institute of Social sciences in 2010. One of the expected outcomes of his research at ANAMED will be the re-organization of data already collected and the deepening of research to be published as a book.