| Résumé : |
(Auteur) Piri Reis (ca 1480-1553) was an Ottoman-Turkish corsair, admiral in the imperial navy, and, most importantly, author of portolan charts and sailing directions as well as of two world maps. His early life as a gazi-corsair, approximately from 1490 to 1510, was spent by the side of his uncle Kemal Reis, a renowned corsair with whom he criss-crossed the Mediterranean, gaining unparalleled knowledge of this sea. After the death of Kemal Reis in 1510, Piri Reis spent more time at the naval base of Gallipoli where he engaged in cartographic and hydrographic activities. He drew two world maps, the first in 1513 and the second in 1528. Neither exists in its complete state: that of 1513 was torn longitudinally in such a way that only its western third, showing the Atlantic fringe of Europe and Africa, the ocean, and the eastern fringe of the New World has survived, while the map's eastern two thirds are lost; that of 1528 shows only about one sixth of what a complete world map would be, but its state of preservation indicates that unlike its predecessor, it had not been mutilated but was left unfinished. Piri Reis also compiled the Kitabi Bahriye, a volume of portolan texts and charts for the Mediterranean (a preliminary, shorter version in 1520, and a definitive, longer one in 1526). The mariner slipped into obscurity after 1528, to reemerge in 1547 as commander of the Ottoman Suez fleet. In 1549 he recovered Aden, won in 1538 but lost again, for the empire. Three years later, however, he failed to conquer Portuguese-held Hormuz, and withdrew to Basra where he left the greater part of his squadron and returned with two galleys to Suez. Accusations surrounding the failure at Hormuz led to a death sentence by Suleyman the Magnificent, which was carried out at Cairo in 1553. Piri Reis's importance is anchored in several aspects that make his work and person unique. One is the intensely personal and specific nature of the manner in which he presents his work: he explains how, where, and why he drew the charts and wrote the texts. Another is the uniqueness of the works themselves. In order to produce the 1513 map, he used both Western (mainly Portuguese) and Oriental (presumably mainly Arab) sources. The Kitabi Bahriye has no equal as a comprehensive and detailed volume of portolan charts and texts covering the entire Mediterranean. Finally the personal lot of Piri Reis makes him unique when compared with his peers among Western cartographers and cosmographers. While most of them were employed by monarchs and companies eager to use their expertise, in this capacity he was ignored, before being executed by the monarch to whom he had dedicated the Kitabi Bahriye. |
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La cosmographie universelle de Guillaume le Testu (1556) : Au croisement de la géographie savante et de la science nautique des portulans in Cartes & Géomatique, n° 216 (juin 2013)
