Page - 467 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 1

467The Neugebäude With a lot of imagination this zokak might be considered as model for the wall and the round towers surrounding the upper garden at the Neugebäude. Certainly it is the tent-like roofs of these wall-towers that most contributed to the idea of the Neugebäude as an image of the Sultan’s camp.55 Less convincing as potential models are the desert castles suggested by Renate Wagner-Rieger or the Ibn Tulun mosque at Cairo suggested by Hilda Lietzmann.56 Neverthe- less the possibility that Ottoman architecture provided a source for the concept of the Neugebäude must not be completely discarded; more detailed research might possibly provide more convincing models. 9.8 Classical Sources: Roman Castrametatio and the Fortified Palace of Diocletian at Split 9.8.1 The Imperial Theme On the other hand Maximilian may well have opted to express the superiority of his rule over that of Sultan Selim ii, by replacing the camp of his opponent’s predecessor, Suleiman the Magnificent, by a building evoking the importance of his own illustrious predecessors, the rulers of the Roman Empire. Identifica- tion of contemporary rulers with the Emperors of ancient Rome—in political theory, in historiography, in the arts, in short in any sort of representation— had become almost a commonplace in the Renaissance. Clearly members of the House of Austria who bore the Imperial crown that had come to down to them from Charlemagne had even more right and reason to identify them- selves with the Roman Emperors than other monarchs. This revival of the universal aspirations of the Holy Roman Empire was mainly due to Habsburg of dwellings of the common people, and larger, grander tent complexes the place of the palaces and mansions of the ruling classes. Central to these nomadic cities was the otağ-ı hümayun or imperial tent complex of the sultan, surrounded by a zokak—a screen wall made of fabric known as seraperde. This ‘walled’ tent palace was as much a symbol of his power and splendour as the stone palace in the capital’. (quoted from www.turkish- culture.org/military/tents-176.htm, adapted from Nurhan Atasoy, Otağ-ı Hümayun: The Ottoman Imperial Tent Complex, Istanbul 2000, which I have not been able to consult. 55 It should be noted that the Ottomans themselves imitated tents—as the traditional resi- dence of their nomad ancestors—in their architecture, especially garden pavilions; see Atasoy 2004. This tradition doubtless stimulated acceptance of the Neugebäude as a simi- lar imitation. 56 Wagner-Rieger 1951, p. 144; Lietzmann 1987, p. 197.