Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
THE HAREM
We now return to the Court of the Divan to visit the Harem, the
public entrance to which is through the Carriage Gate under
the Divan tower. The Harem is a veritable labyrinth of passages,
courtyards, gardens, staircases and rooms - some 300 of them almost
all surprisingly small - on half a dozen levels. It includes not only the
women's quarters or Harem proper, but also the quarters of the Black
Eunuchs who were in charge of the Harem, rooms and schoolhouses
for the young princes, the Sultan's private apartments, and the
apartments called the Cage (Kafes) where the Sultan's brothers lived
in relatively honourable confinement. To inspect it all even cursorily
would take many days of arduous exploration. Perhaps fortunately,
only about two dozen rooms, passages and courtyards are at present
open to the public, including most of the more important and
impressive ones; the rest of the area is still undergoing restoration.
We shall therefore confine this account principally to those rooms
which are now open.
The Harem was not an original part of the Palace as laid out
by Fatih Mehmet. Fatih seems to have designed Topkapı Sarayı as
a kind of glorified office-building for the transaction of the public
business of the Empire and for the training of the Civil Service,
reserving the Eski Saray on the Third Hill for his domestic life, his
wives and concubines. His immediate successors, Beyazit II, Selim
I and Süleyman the Magnificent for most of his reign, maintained
this arrangement. Süleyman is said to have allowed his wife Roxelana
(Haseki Hürrem) to install herself in Topkapı Sarayı, but probably
in wooden pavilions, like many of those at the Eski Saray; and their
son, Selim II, seems to have followed suit. At all events, the earliest
buildings in the Harem which can be definitely dated belong to the
reign of Selim's son and successor, Murat III (r. 1574-95).
The Carriage Gate receives its name from the fact that the Harem
ladies here entered their carriages whenever they were allowed to
go for an outing. Above the gate there is an inscription giving the
date A.H. 996 (A.D. 1588). The gateway opens into a small, dark
room called Dolaplı Kubbe, the Dome with Cupboards, and this is
followed by a room revetted with quite fine tiles, which served as a
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