Leather bookbindings, pigments for paints and majolica (white-glazed pottery) all came from the East, although the Venetians never succeeded in imitating the perfect ruby glaze of Iznik pottery.

ECONOMIST: Venice and the East

In keeping with the historic theme, blog commenter "Pamela Ann Smith" said that Turkey's exquisite Iznik pottery, which has blue floral motifs, owes much to the development of rare blue ceramic dyes in China.

CNN: How you connected China and Turkey

The block-long Arasta Bazaar in the shadow of the Blue Mosque is also easier on the nerves and has a few particularly good shops--notably Maison du Tapis d'orient, which sells antique Central Asian tapestries (its nearby sibling, Mehmet Cetinkaya Gallery, has exquisite carpets and ceramics), and the Iznik Foundation shop, which retails reproductions of classic 15th- and 16th-century Ottoman ceramics.

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