Artuklu Palace or Artukid Palace or Artuqid Palace was the palace of Diyarbakır

Diyarbakır

Diyarbakır is one of the largest cities in southeastern Turkey...

 branch of the Turkish

Turkish people

Turkish people, also known as the "Turks" , are an ethnic group primarily living in Turkey and in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire where Turkish minorities had been established in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Romania...

 Bey

Bey

Bey is a title for chieftain, traditionally applied to the leaders of small tribal groups. Accoding to some sources, the word "Bey" is of Turkish language In historical accounts, many Turkish, other Turkic and Persian leaders are titled Bey, Beg, Bek, Bay, Baig or Beigh. They are all the same word...

lik and dynasty of Artukids who ruled eastern Anatolia

Anatolia

Anatolia is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia, comprising the majority of the Republic of Turkey...

 and Jazira in the 12th and 13th centuries and situated in the present-day İçkale neighborhood Diyarbakır urban zone within the compound of Diyarbakır City Walls. Built during the reign of the Bey

Bey

Bey is a title for chieftain, traditionally applied to the leaders of small tribal groups. Accoding to some sources, the word "Bey" is of Turkish language In historical accounts, many Turkish, other Turkic and Persian leaders are titled Bey, Beg, Bek, Bay, Baig or Beigh. They are all the same word...

 of Artuklu Nasreddin Muhammed (1200–1222) and partially excavated in the 1960s, the main body of the palace is today still buried under a mound.

This palace was also where, as his father before him, the groundbreaking Arab Muslim

Islam

Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

 scholar, inventor, and mechanical engineer

Mechanical engineering

Mechanical engineering is a discipline of engineering that applies the principles of physics and materials science for analysis, design, manufacturing, and maintenance of mechanical systems. It is the branch of engineering that involves the production and usage of heat and mechanical power for the...

 Al-Jazari

Al-Jazari

Abū al-'Iz Ibn Ismā'īl ibn al-Razāz al-Jazarī was a Muslim polymath: a scholar, inventor, mechanical engineer, craftsman, artist, mathematician and astronomer from Al-Jazira, Mesopotamia, who lived during the Islamic Golden Age...

 had worked for 30 years and was the place, inspiration and context of many of this inventions and devices. Surrounded by gardens, rich in amenities as well as in decorative and artistic elements (such as statues, with a number of scholars defining a period of less strict observance of ban on human representation in the early centuries of Islam) and also in eccentricities, itself perhaps inspired by a tradition dating back to the Umayyad

Umayyad

The Umayyad Caliphate was the second of the four major Arab caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. It was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty, whose name derives from Umayya ibn Abd Shams, the great-grandfather of the first Umayyad caliph. Although the Umayyad family originally came from the...

 palace of Khirbat al-Mafjar in Jericho

Jericho

Jericho ; is a city located near the Jordan River in the West Bank of the Palestinian territories. It is the capital of the Jericho Governorate and has a population of more than 20,000. Situated well below sea level on an east-west route north of the Dead Sea, Jericho is the lowest permanently...

, the palaces of the Artukids provided models for the Mameluks later. There are further Artukid palatial residences in Mardin

Mardin

Mardin is a city in southeastern Turkey. The capital of Mardin Province, it is known for its Arabic-like architecture, and for its strategic location on a rocky mountain overlooking the plains of northern Syria.-History:...

, Hasankeyf

Hasankeyf

Hasankeyf is an ancient town and district located along the Tigris River in the Batman Province in southeastern Turkey. It was declared a natural conservation area by Turkey in 1981...

 and Palu

Palu

Palu is a chartered city on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, located 1,650 km northeast of Jakarta, at . It is the capital of the province of Central Sulawesi. The city sits on the mouth of Palu River, at the head of a long, narrow bay. Because of its sheltered position between mountain...

 whose remains stand, but this one in Diyarbakır is usually referred to as the "Palace" of the sons of Artuk. The palace was used as a prison in the beginning of the Ottoman

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

 rule (16th century) until it fell into decay and gradually disappeared under the present-day Virantepe mound.

Partial excavations on the palace site were carried out in 1961

1961 in archaeology

The year 1961 in archaeology involved some significant events.-Excavations:* April 24 - Work starts on salvage of the Swedish warship Vasa, sunk on her maiden voyage in 1628, from Stockholm harbor....

 under the direction of the art historian and Ottoman archaeologist Oktay Aslanapa. Important ruins found during the excavation, such as part of the palace garden and the clear outlines of the architectural system of Turkish baths were not conserved and disappeared over time. The vestiges were also externally studied of recent date using computer technologies.

The Door and the Door-Knockers

Door knocker

Door knocker

A door knocker is an item of door furniture that allows people outside a house to alert those inside to their presence. A door knocker has a part fixed to the door, and a part which is attached to the door by a hinge, and may be lifted and used to strike a plate fitted to the door, or the door...

s, often cast in bronze

Bronze

Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...

, had a symbolic significance across eastern Anatolia

Anatolia

Anatolia is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia, comprising the majority of the Republic of Turkey...

 and were part of a thematic program that was prominent in the region especially during the 12th - 13th centuries. The tradition, although evolved, survives to this day in such centers as Kemaliye

Kemaliye

Kemaliye is a both a town in and one of the nine districts of Erzincan Province in the Eastern Anatolia region of Turkey.The town is known for its historic architecture, including many Ottoman-era houses...

. Along with the door in its entirety, they were also a distinctive feature of the palace in Diyarbakır.

The door knockers of Artuklu Palace, which united the figures of a double dragon, a lion

Lion

The lion is one of the four big cats in the genus Panthera, and a member of the family Felidae. With some males exceeding 250 kg in weight, it is the second-largest living cat after the tiger...

 and a snake

Snake

Snakes are elongate, legless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes that can be distinguished from legless lizards by their lack of eyelids and external ears. Like all squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales...

, are known, along with the whole structure of the four meter high door where they were attached, through the descriptions made by the designer al-Jazari in his manuscript and the drawings within, as well as on the basis of similarities that can be established with the door and the double-dragon

Dragon

A dragon is a legendary creature, typically with serpentine or reptilian traits, that feature in the myths of many cultures. There are two distinct cultural traditions of dragons: the European dragon, derived from European folk traditions and ultimately related to Greek and Middle Eastern...

 figured door-knockers of the Great Mosque of Cizre

Cizre

Cizre is a town and district of Şırnak Province in the Southeastern Anatolia Region of Turkey, located at the border to Syria, just to the north-west of the Turkish-Syrian-Iraqi tripoint....

, built 1155-1160 by the Atabeg

Atabeg

Atabeg, Atabek, or Atabey is a hereditary title of nobility of Turkic origin, indicating a governor of a nation or province who was subordinate to a monarch and charged with raising the crown prince...

s of Musul

Musul

Musul may stand for:* The city of Mosul, Iraq.* An alternate name for Wushu, a Chinese martial art.* Korean martial arts...

, with Kubadabad Palace

Kubadabad Palace

Kubadabad Palace or Kubad Abad Palace refers to a complex of summer residences built for the sultan and his court during the reign of the sultan of the Sultanate of Rum Kayqubad I...

 tile

Tile

A tile is a manufactured piece of hard-wearing material such as ceramic, stone, metal, or even glass. Tiles are generally used for covering roofs, floors, walls, showers, or other objects such as tabletops...

s and with the dragons in relief in Susuz Han caravanserai

Caravanserai

A caravanserai, or khan, also known as caravansary, caravansera, or caravansara in English was a roadside inn where travelers could rest and recover from the day's journey...

 near Burdur

Burdur

Burdur , is a city southwestern Turkey and the seat of the Burdur Province of Turkey. It is located at , on the shore of Lake Burdur...

. The embracing dragons of Cizre Mosque door knockers are on display today in İstanbul

Istanbul

Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...

's Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts (Ibrahim Pasha Palace). Another similar knocker, also with dragons, is exhibited in Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

's Museum of Islamic Art and was, according to early literature, bought in Tbilisi

Tbilisi

Tbilisi is the capital and the largest city of Georgia, lying on the banks of the Mt'k'vari River. The name is derived from an early Georgian form T'pilisi and it was officially known as Tiflis until 1936...

 on behalf of Berlin Museums in 1912. However, later publications claim that it originated from south-east Anatolia/North Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia is a toponym for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran.Widely considered to be the cradle of civilization, Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the...

 and smuggled through Tbilisi. The similar dragon figures with the knotted bodies like those on the door-knockers are also seen on some coins of the Artuqids of Hısn Keyfa (Hasankeyf

Hasankeyf

Hasankeyf is an ancient town and district located along the Tigris River in the Batman Province in southeastern Turkey. It was declared a natural conservation area by Turkey in 1981...

). An imaginative drawing of Artuklu Palace door was made by Michael Meinecke on the basis of Al-Jazari's sketch and the cited similar works.

Al-Jazari's 1206-dated manuscript of "Al-Jami Bain Al-Ilm Wal-Amal Al-Nafi Fi Sinat'at Al-Hiyal" (The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices), also includes such other artifacts conceived specially for the Artuklu Palace as clock

Clock

A clock is an instrument used to indicate, keep, and co-ordinate time. The word clock is derived ultimately from the Celtic words clagan and clocca meaning "bell". A silent instrument missing such a mechanism has traditionally been known as a timepiece...

s, human and animal shaped toy

Toy

A toy is any object that can be used for play. Toys are associated commonly with children and pets. Playing with toys is often thought to be an enjoyable means of training the young for life in human society. Different materials are used to make toys enjoyable and cuddly to both young and old...

s, automatic jug

Jug

Jug may refer to:* Jug , a vessel for liquids* Jug , used for rhythmic bass accompaniment* Jug , cross breed between a Pug and a Jack Russell Terrier...

 and pools, water equipment, alarm clock

Alarm clock

An alarm clock is a clock that is designed to make a loud sound at a specific time. The primary use of these clocks is to awaken people from their night's sleep or short naps; they are sometimes used for other reminders as well. To stop the sound, a button or handle on the clock is pressed; but...

 and protractor

Protractor

In geometry, a protractor is a circular or semicircular tool for measuring an angle or a circle. The units of measurement utilized are usually degrees.Some protractors are simple half-discs; these have existed since ancient times...

.