Silva Rerum | 17.12.2016 The official news about the end of the siege of Vienna reached Rome on the 23rd September 1683, that is eleven days after the relief. The triumph of the allied forces was confirmed and also announced was the arrival of the secretary of John III, Tommas Talenti, who was supposed to bring a special gift from the king for Pope Innocent XI – “the banner of the grand vizier”, that is the holy banner of Muhammad, personally won by the monarch on the battlefield. Talenti set out from Vienna on the 13th of September at dawn. He supposedly travelled in such a hurry that – as recorded later by Roman diarist Carlo Cartari – he took with him only one shirt. In Rome, the already famous banner was awaited impatiently, and the victory over the Islam was celebrated noisily: church bells rang, thanksgiving services were held, canons fired, and at night, in the scenery of richly illuminated representative buildings of the city, fireworks were shown and heroes of the battle were applauded.
When on the 25th of September „Talenti from Lucca, a man of middle class, but of a great spirit” reached Rome, the Pope in a festive procession went to the basilica of S. Maria Maggiore, where a litany was sung, and then the hymn Te Deum laudamus, during which artillery salvos could be heard, supposedly exactly at the moment when the secretary of John III was riding through Porta del Popolo.
On the next day, Talenti together with protector of the Commonwealth, Carl Barberini, went to an audience granted by the Pope. First, the cardinal in emphatic words described the joy and gratitude of all Christianity for Innocent XI, who, like Moses, raising his hands to heaven, opened it with his apostolic goodness and pleaded by God for a victory, so that the king of Poland, like a new Joshua, could show his bravery, and now, as an expression of gratitude for the Almighty and his earthly steward, present the banner won from the infidels. Next, Talenti gave the Pope the famous letter by John III, starting from a passage paraphrasing the words of Cesar: „Venimus, vidimus, Deus vicit”. In the letter, the king showed both refined modesty and political cunning. Although in the header he ascribed the victory to God, next words he wrote already as the highest commander of the allied armies, dedicating his great success to the head of the Church. He also offered the Holy See the possibility to officially acknowledge its participation in the victory, which in fact it supported morally and financially. It is worth mentioning that Sobieski had already used this famous quote in the oration given on his behalf by Jan Chryzostom Gniński on the occasion of passing the banner won in the battle of Chocim to Clement X.
After the audience, on the initiative of cardinal Barberini, procedures for the celebratory presentation of the banner to the Pope were discussed, and the date of the ceremony was set on the 29th of September, the day of Saint Michael Archangel. The cardinal was to prepare the banner, which for a better impression needed to be refreshed and stuck on a new shaft. Also, the Arabic inscriptions on the banner needed to be explained.
The immediate sending of Talenti to Rome with the banner and the letter to the Pope was an excellent propaganda move by Sobieski. In an anonymous print, published already in September 1683, it is written that king’s secretary like a dove of peace arrived with an olive branch “on the seven hills” to bring the news about the Turkish deluge being stopped by the brave arm of John III, compared to Zeus defeating the Giants in the valley of Phlegra. The banner was the only material, but a truly spectacular proof of the victory, even more so, as the monarch was said to have personally taken it from hands of an infidel.
His deed became a symbol for the plebs, hungry for legends, who saw in the king a new Christian hero and celebrated the victory in the battle of Vienna in their own way. In the streets of Rome, the crowd dressed “in the Polish fashion”, armed in sabres and lances, mutilated dummies of “Turks, pashas and viziers”, and through the city, accompanied by “war music”, triumphal carriages rode with a “figure of John III”. Sobieski became the undisputed hero of anonymous folk poetry, in which he was almost always listed first. Only later in such verses there appeared General Starhemberg and Prince Charles of Lorraine, and very rarely the Emperor, who left the capital long before the battle. Numerous works praising mostly the Polish king were presented also at meetings of intellectuals from Rome’s “academies”, and then printed in special volumes. Unknown music compositions, recreating the battle of Vienna “for the glory of His Majesty” were performed on the 30th of September on the initiative of Giovanni Battista Pamphili, Prince of Carpinetto, at the church of S. Agnese at Piazza Navona.
On the 29th of September, in the evening, at the chapel of the papal palace at the Quirinal Hill, celebrations of handing over the banner took place. During the service, just before the offering, assisted by the master of the ceremony and the pontifical guard, entered the king’s resident in Rome, abbot Jan Kazimierz Denhoff, and Tommaso Talenti, carrying the Turkish banner. When the procession approached the throne of Innocent XI, Denhoff held a short, but perfectly structured Latin oratory. At the beginning, he mentioned ancient traditions, when banners of defeated enemies opened the path to glory for the victors. Next, he emphasized that the Polish king triumphed not for his own glory, but in order to defend the whole Christianity. Then, referring to the first words of the famous letter of Sobieski to the Pope, the abbot argued that the monarch appointed by God “came”, abandoning his kingdom and his family, “saw” fearless armies of the Turks, which threatened the whole world, and “defeated” the enemy under the auspices of the Pope. Denhoff did not refer to God’s victory, mentioned in the letter, diplomatically determining the only authors of the victory in the battle of Vienna to be the king, who defeated the enemy with sword, and the Pope, who “fought” through prayers and generous financial support. Next, he asked that for the banner to be accepted for the eternal glory of the pontificate of Innocent XI and as a proof of John III’s bravery. When Denhoff was saying the last words of the oratory, Talenti waved the banner, and then lowered it before the Pope, who, symbolically, put his foot on it.
The banner with mysterious Arabic inscriptions awoke much interest in Rome. A supposed history was published of how it was handed over by sultan Mehmed IV to Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa, when he was setting out for Vienna. A translation of the inscriptions was also published, together with their philological interpretation, by Ludovico Mariacci, a scholar specializing in oriental languages, featuring an illustration of the banner, and distributed in other ephemeral prints. The banner given to the Pope was made of red and green brocade. It was rectangular, about 180 cm wide, and narrowing triangularly to reach the length of ca. 270 cm. In the main field, framed with a narrow gold-weaved band with floral ornaments and with a green border, embroidered twice with a gold thread was the main creed of Islam, next to the narrowing, featured was a half-moon and two eight-armed stars, and on the border, there were three sentences from Koran.
Although the then knowledge about the Muslim religion was relatively extensive, no one asked whether the banner is the authentic flag of the Grand Vizier, that is Muhammad himself. Nobody dared to doubt the words of John III, who in the letter to Maria wrote “in vizier’s tents on the 13th of September at night” – “The vizier ran from everything so hastily, that barely on one horse and in one dress. […] I have all his vizier signs, which were carried above him. The Muslim banner, which was given to him by his emperor for the war, and which today I sent to Rome to the Holy Father by post through Talenti”. This letter was translated, as ordered by the monarch, into many languages and distributed throughout the whole Europe, which proves how much Sobieski appreciated the propaganda effect of printed word.
Today, it is difficult to determine whether John III, having excellent knowledge of the Turks and their insignias, but acting in much haste after the won battle, was aware of what he is actually sending to the Pope through his secretary. In reality, the banner was probably one of a dozen or so banners won in the battle of Vienna, belonging to Turkish, sultan and pasha dignitaries, called sanjaks. According to the diary of the Vienna expedition, written by an anonymous master of ceremony of the padishah, the main battle sign of the Turkish army – the holy banner of Muhammad – was saved during the battle by one of the sipahi and in December 1683, it was returned to Istanbul.
According to Sobieski’s wish, the „banner of the Prophet” was to be hanged at the Vatican basilica. However, the ceremony was delayed due to unknown, probably organizational and ceremonial difficulties. It took place only on the 17th of October 1683. First, a solemn service was held at the church of the Polish nation of St. Stanislaus, and in the evening, after vespers, at Pope’s orders, the banner was passed to cardinal Carlo Barbernini, archpriest at the Basilica, who, after consulting the church elders, ordered it to be hanged above the main entrance to the most important Christian temple, next to the balustrade of the Loge of Blessings, between the banner won earlier in the battle of Chocim and offered by Sobieski to Clement X, and the coat of arms of Paul V. Carlo Cartari, who participated in the celebrations, observed that the first, green banner is larger than the “Vienna” one and that a huge crowd wished to see it. At the end of November both Turkish pennons were hanged much higher in order to prevent them from being stolen, which was feared since there were rumours that the Turks want to recover them at any price.
This is the last information we have about the „banner of the Grand Vizier”, which probably was lost in the 19th century. Its absence was noticed only on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the relief of Vienna. It is possible that until the II World War, the banner was kept at the basilica of S. Giovanni in Laterano, but today it is considered forever gone.
Literature:
J. Pasierb, M. Janocha, Polonica artystyczne w zbiorach watykańskich, Warsaw 2002, p. 114-128.
H. Osiecka-Samsonowicz, ‘Venimus, vidimus...’. Kto zwyciężył? Rzymskie uroczystości na cześć wiktorii wiedeńskiej w 1683 r., [in:] Polska i Europa w dobie nowożytnej. [...] Prace dedykowane Juliuszowi A. Chrościckiemu, Warsaw 2009, p. 47-54.
H. Osiecka-Samsonowicz, Polskie uroczystości w barokowym Rzymie 1587-1696, Warsaw 2012, p. 294-306.
[Il. Banner won in the battle of Vienna by John III, sent to Pope Innocent XI to Rome; a drawing from the study by Józef Łoski „Jan Sobieski, jego rodzina, towarzysze broni i współczesne zabytki", Warsaw 1883]