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T.R.H.
14-03-2005, 08.06.22
[See more at:
http://www.unf.edu/classes/byzantium/istanbul/Topkapi/?C=M;O=D ]

x0x Secret garden: Topkapi Palace Harem

By H. Canan Cimilli

As visitors enter the door of Topkapi Palace Harem their sense of
anticipation is tangible. Even today they envisage the possibility of
meeting an odalisque, her long skirt trailing on the ground as she
walks. The word harem originates from the Arabic harim, comprising the
concepts of secrecy, inviolability and sacrosanctness that pervade the
very walls of this place and marked life here over the centuries that
it was a closed book to strangers. The harem section of Topkapi Palace
was carefully situated so that it could not be seen from the state
apartments and the courtyards where public affairs were conducted.

Tursun Bey, a chronicler at the time of Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror
the feminine article, even the sun would not be admitted to the
harem.' Known in other eastern countries as perde (purdah), zenane or
endrUnr, the royal harem at the Ottoman Palace was known as the
Dar-us-saade, or Place of Felicity, while the section of the palace
known as the Imperial Harem encompassed both the harem proper,
the state apartments of the sultans, the quarters of his household and
the pavilions in the fourth courtyard. The secrecy associated with the
royal harem and the harems of upper and middle-class Ottoman houses
aroused the keen curiosity of foreign travellers and artists who
visited Ottoman Turkey, but their written accounts and pictures of the
harem were based for the most part on hearsay. With a few exceptions
it was not until the end of the 18th century, during the reign of the
enlightened reformist Sultan Selim III (1789-1807) that the architect
and draughtsman Melling, Daniel Clark and other artists were admitted
to the palace harem to draw from observation instead of imagination.

In 1909, following the deposal of Sultan Abdulhamid II, the Ottoman
historian Abdurrahman Seref Bey made a detailed study of the buildings
and apartments of the harem, and the women, princesses and princes who
lived there. His findings were published as a series of articles in
1910 and 1911 in the historical journal Encumen-i Osmani Mecmuasi. The
harem was home to the sultan himself, his mother, wives,
daughters, sons, brothers, the high ranking female officials who
managed the affairs of the household, hundreds of maidservants, and
black eunuchs. The earliest parts of the harem quarters are the Golden
Road, the sultn'sr private kitchen, and that section known as Eski
Hasekiler. The service sections of the harem included kitchen, food
cellar, baths, laundry, sick room and the dormitories of the
maidservants and black eunuchs. As the population of the harem
increased from the end of the 16th century onwards, mezzanines and
additional buildings were constructed containing bedrooms for the
serving women and self-contained apartments for the wives of the
sultan. The 17th century Ottoman writer Evliya Celebi records that
until the late 16th century the harem did not move to Topkapi Palace,
although the sultans conducted their daily business there and often
spent the night, going occasionally to the Old Palace to visit their
wives and children. Sultan Suleyman the Magnificient (1520-1566) took
only his wife Hurrem Sultan and some women-in-waiting to this palace,
the complete transferral of the harem from the Old Palace taking place
during the reign of Murad III (1574-1595). On 24 July 1665, while
Mehmed IV (1648-1687), his harem and household were at the palace in
Edirne, a great fire broke out at Topkapi Palace, destroying the
Palace of Justice, the Council of State, the Treasury, the Land
Registry Office, most of the harem from the Carriage Gate to the
Apartment of the Sultan's Mother, and the kitchens. The 17th century
Turkish scholar Katip Celebi wrote in his Takvimu't-Tevarih that the
fire was started by a maidservant who had stolen a ring. Mehmed IV and
his mother returned to Istanbul to inspect the situation, and the
sultan ordered the construction of a new harem building whose interior
walls were entirely decorated with tiles. This was completed in 1668,
but since Mehmed IV and his successors who reigned during the second
half of the 17th century lived for the most part at Edirne Palace, the
harem at Topkapi did not regain its importance until the reign of
Ahmed III (1703-1730), a period popularly known as the Tulip Era.

European baroque began to influence Turkish art and architecture at
this time, and the Tulip Era is characterised by a new naturalistic
style which is perhaps most strikingly exemplified by the painted wall
decoration consisting of vases of flowers and plates of fruit in the
Fruit Room of Ahmed III in the harem. The passion for garden flowers
became evident everywhere, on clothing, furnishings and in
architectural decoration, and extending even to the names of the harem
women, who began to be given melodious Persian names like Laligul
(Ruby Rose) and Nazgul (Shy Rose) that suggested they were as
beautiful and graceful as flowers. Later in the 18th century, rococo,
with its delicate colour schemes and light romantic motifs, began to
influence Turkish art, and the Pavilion of Osman III built on a
terrace facing the Hunkar Sofasi (Throne Room of the Harem) and the
gracefully decorated wooden structures known as the Gozdeler Dairesi
(Apartment of Favourites) above the Golden Road are typical of this
later style.

Life in the royal harem was very different from that imagined by
Europeans. As an institution in Ottoman society the harem reflected
the secluded privacy of family life. The cariyes or maidservants who
served the women of the household were trained and educated in the
skills and accomplishments thought appropriate for women at the time,
and after a certain number of years in service allowed to marry. In
the royal harem, under the guidance of the sultn's mother or the
principal officer of the harem household, a woman known as the *****
treasurer, the girls were taught to read and write, play music, and
the intricate rules of palace etiquette and protocol. Very few were
honoured even by the privilege of waiting at the sultn'sg table, and
still fewer became royal wives.

After nine years of service the harem girls were given their
manumission document, a set of diamond earrings and ring, a trousseau
and some gold as their marriage portion, and suitable husbands found
for them. They were renowned for their good breeding and for their
discretion, never being known to reveal any intimate details about the
royal family to outsiders. Nevertheless, graffiti on the harem walls
shows that not all cariyes were contented with their lot: 'Dilferib
whose heart burns / Is wretched / O God / Alas alas.'

* H. Canan Cimilli is a researcher and Keeper of the Harem at Topkapi
Palace Museum