Osman Hamdi Bey was an Ottoman administrator, intellectual, art expert and also a prominent and pioneering painter. He was the Ottoman Empire's first modern archaeologist, and is regarded as the founding father of both archaeology and the museum curator's professions in Turkey. He was the founder of Istanbul Archaeology Museums and of the Istanbul Academy of Fine Arts known today as the Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University. He was also the first mayor of Kadıköy.
Osman Hamdi in 1909
Osman Hamdi in his youth
Girl Reciting Qur'an (1880)
Self-portrait, Osman Hamdi Bey Museum, Gebze
Istanbul Archaeology Museums
The Istanbul Archaeology Museums are a group of three archaeological museums located in the Eminönü quarter of Istanbul, Turkey, near Gülhane Park and Topkapı Palace. These museums house over one million objects from nearly all periods and civilizations in world history.
Istanbul Archaeology Museums
Bust and memorial plaque to Osman Hamdi Bey in the foyer of the main building
Pediment of Istanbul Archaeological Museum, with Ottoman Turkish اثار عتيقة موزسي "Asar-ı Atika Müzesi" (Museum of Antiquities), and the tughra of Abdulhamid II
Si.427 obverse, dates from the Old Babylonian period between 1900 and 1600 BCE. Discovered in the late 19th century in what is now Iraq.
