{"id":8610,"date":"2015-09-14T03:54:32","date_gmt":"2015-09-14T06:54:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/culturedarm.com\/?p=8610"},"modified":"2015-11-05T09:44:06","modified_gmt":"2015-11-05T12:44:06","slug":"cultureteca-13-09-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/culturedarm.com\/staging\/5793\/cultureteca-13-09-15\/","title":{"rendered":"Cultureteca 13.09.15"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Cultureteca<\/a><\/p>\n

We meet Cultureteca in Petersburg\u00a0this week, as the State Hermitage Museum opens an exhibition on the explorer Ibn Battuta; in New York, as amid US Open tennis, trouble – in the form of a plainclothes police officer – runs into\u00a0former tennis star James Blake;\u00a0on the Newcastle-Gateshead Quayside, for the Great North CityGames; and finally in Sweden, to look at some of its leading women arm wrestlers.<\/p>\n

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Ibn Battuta’s Travels at the Hermitage in\u00a0Petersburg<\/strong><\/p>\n

This week the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg opened a new exhibition on the top floor of the Winter Palace. ‘A Gift to Contemplators’: Ibn Battuta’s Travels<\/a><\/em> will run from 9 September until 13 December.<\/p>\n

Ibn Battuta (1304-1369), a Moroccan descended from the Berbers of North Africa, set out aged twenty-one intending on a pilgrimage to Mecca. Instead he spent thirty years travelling the Islamic world and beyond, across the extent of Africa, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, and Asia. From his birthplace in Tangier, he reached as far north as Bolghar in modern-day Bulgaria, and Azov in modern-day Russia; as far south as the island communities of Kilwa Kisiwani off Tanzania and Sumatra in Indonesia; and as far west as the Chinese cities of Hangzhou and Beijing.<\/p>\n

Ibn Battuta frequently journeyed with caravans, and on his travels\u00a0met with rulers and religious leaders including Sultan Mohammed \u00d6z Beg, the longest-reigning khan of the Golden Horde;\u00a0Toghon Tem\u00fcr, Yuan Emperor of China and the last Khagan of the Mongol Empire;\u00a0<\/b>and for several years between was a guest\u00a0at the court of the Sultan of Delhi\u00a0Muhammad bin Tughluq.<\/p>\n

Returning home in 1354, Ibn Battuta dictated an account of his travels to the scholar Ibn Juzayy. The\u00a0manuscript’s title, \u062a\u062d\u0641\u0629 \u0627\u0644\u0646\u0638\u0627\u0631 \u0641\u064a \u063a\u0631\u0627\u0626\u0628 \u0627\u0644\u0623\u0645\u0635\u0627\u0631 \u0648\u0639\u062c\u0627\u0626\u0628 \u0627\u0644\u0623\u0633\u0641\u0627\u0631, translates as\u00a0A Gift to Those Who Contemplate the Wonders of Cities and the Marvels of Travelling<\/i>, though it is commonly referred to as \u0627\u0644\u0631\u062d\u0644\u0629, Rihla<\/em>, or The Journey<\/em>. Along with his impressions on the cities he visited and the people he met, the extensive account discusses\u00a0Ibn Battuta’s marriages and concubines,\u00a0transportation, clothes, and cuisine.<\/p>\n

Ibn Battuta appears to have taken few notes on his travels, and relied for his account on memory, which both he and Ibn Juzayy supplemented with\u00a0previously-written texts. Scholars therefore question the veracity of some of the recollections in Ibn Battuta’s Rihla<\/em>.\u00a0The work began to be noticed in Europe only at the beginning of the nineteenth century, with extracts published first in German, then French and English.<\/p>\n

The exhibition at the Hermitage incorporates around 300 items, drawn from the fourteenth century\u00a0and following the full breadth of Ibn Battuta’s route. On display are ceramics, metal objects, glassware, and architectural details; many of these from the courts at which Ibn Battuta attended.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile the National Library of Russia has provided more than 30 unique Islamic, Judaic, and Christian manuscripts, showing the intellectual life of the time and the development of the art of the manuscript. And the Moscow-based Mardjani Foundation has contributed a unique collection of costumes from the late-twelfth to fourteenth centuries.<\/p>\n

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Trouble Runs Into James Blake<\/strong><\/p>\n