#history #trukey #ottoman #ottomanempire #topkapipalace
Without any doubt, Topkapi Palace is probably the most famous of all Ottoman heritage in Istanbul. Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror commissioned its construction shortly after the conquest of Constantinople in 1453. It was an imperial court and residence of Ottoman sultans and their families for 375 years. Sultan Abdülmecid I moved the court to the Dolmabahçe Palace in 1856. Certainly, it’s a magnificent historic site. But I think that the harem within the palace is its most fascinating part. A mysterious place where many people lived completely segregated lives, over many centuries.

I visited the palace and the harem during my last stay in Istanbul. The harem occupies a big part of the palace. It consists of over 300 rooms, bath houses, mosques, dormitories, a hospital and a laundry. But only a small part of the harem is open to visitors. Although the open section includes some of the most important rooms, I would also like to see the currently closed areas of the harem.

The whole complex is big, it housed many people and there is so much more there to see. Apparently, they are restoring other sections, so I hope that we will be able to see them in the future. The more we can see of this magnificent palace, the better.

This post is about the harem as you can see it is at the moment. The place is beautiful and it gives you a good idea of the life at the time when Ottoman sultans demonstrated their power and wealth through their ownership of numerous slave women.

eunuchs of the Abyssinian (Egyptian) origin, from the central African wing of the Ottoman empire. Then, they would train them in the rules of the palace and the harem, with the strictest discipline.

The black eunuchs guarded the gates of the harem, monitored who enters and exits, escorted coaches and they also surveyed premises to prevent anyone unauthorised from getting inside of the harem.

The Chief Black Eunuchs (Kızlar Ağası) were at the head of command and supervised the whole harem. Within the palace protocol, they were immediately after the Grand Vizier and Sheikh al-Islami. They earned relatively high incomes and consequently they donated part of that money to various charitable causes such as building of the mosques, madrasas and fountains.

I mentioned Gazanfer Ağa in my post Ottoman Istanbul, the Chief White Eunuch and the Chief Chamberlain of Sultan Mehmed III. He constructed the Gazanfer Ağa Madrasa in Istanbul.