Topkap Saray - Strolling Through Istanbul: The Classic Guide to the City - page 76

THE FOURTH COURT
The Fourth Court is not really a courtyard but a garden on various
levels, adorned with köşks or pavilions. In the centre of the balustrade
of the marble terrace stands the Iftariye, a baldachino with a
magnificent gilt-bronze canopy erected by Sultan Ibrahim in 1640.
The balcony receives its name from the iftar, or evening meal, which
is taken after sunset in the holy month of Ramazan. Beyond it stands
the famous Baghdad Köşkü, a sort of grander replica of the Rivan
Köşkü, built by Murat IV in 1639 to commemorate his capture
of Baghdad. Cruciform like the other, it, too, is sheathed in tiles
both within and without and is surrounded by a columned portico.
The tiles are chiefly blue and white and some may antedate the
köşk itself. Its enormous bronze chimney-piece is very fine and its
dome splendid with elaborate arabesques on a crimson ground,
painted on leather.
A staircase beside the pool leads down into what was once the tulip
garden of Ahmet III. This garden was the site of the famous tulip
festivals of the Lâle Devri, the Age of Tulips, that delightful epoch
in the first half of the eighteenth century. It is still a pretty garden
and on the north side is a charming rococo köşk called Sofa Köşkü,
or sometimes, for no good reason, the Köşk of Kara Mustafa Paşa. It
seems to have been built or thoroughly reconstructed by Ahmet III,
doubtless to enjoy his tulips from, and again redecorated in 1752 by
Mahmut I; it is a very pretty example of Turkish rococo. Farther on
is a low tower called variously Başlala Kulesi and Hekimbaşı Odası,
the Tower of the Head Tutor or the Chamber of the Head Physician;
it doubtless served diferent purposes at diferent periods. Across a
road that leads down to the outer gardens, there stands on a marble
terrace the Mecidiye Köşkü, the latest addition to the buildings of
the Saray. This was constructed in about 1840 by Abdül Mecit I, not
long before he built the Palace of Dolmabahçe on the Bosphorus; it is
entirely western in style. On its lower floor and terrace, overlooking
the Marmara, there is an excellent restaurant; if one has spent the
morning in the Saray one would do well to fortify oneself here before
visiting the Harem.