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fledgedpets,buttheyarenotcompletestrayseither.Inanycase,theiruncommitted“owners”
never take them for walks. This reluctance to take in the animals can't really be due to the
size of the apartments; in a society where the single lifestyle is practically unknown, almost
all residences are designed for families, and rarely measure less than 80 square meters. So
what is the reason?
In Turkey, relationships to dogs are complex. In his novel My Name Is Red , Orhan Pamuk
enters the mind of a dog and asks himself about the origins of mankind's enmity:
Whydoyoubelievethatthosewhotouchusspoiltheirablutions?Ifyourcaftanbrushes
against our damp fur, why do you insist on washing that caftan seven times like a fren-
zied woman? Only tinsmiths could be responsible for the slander that a pot licked by a
dog must be thrown away or retinned. Or perhaps, yes, cats . . .
Although there is no clear basis for this belief in the Quran, strict Muslims consider
dogs—especiallytheirdrool—tobeunclean.Peopledon'tlettheanimalsintotheirhomesbe-
causetheycoulddirtytheprayerrugandbecause,eventoday,littletraditionexistsofkeeping
dogs as pets. Furthermore, a common belief holds that köpekler , as dogs are called, prevent
angels from visiting. Not all Turks share these views. In parts of Istanbul influenced by the
West, all sorts of purebred dogs can be found, including traditional fighting breeds. In these
cases, dogs are highly desirable status symbols, and many stores sell pet supplies. However,
problemswithreligiousneighborsdisturbedbythepresenceofdogscanarise.“Manypeople
want a dog, but don't know how to go about it,” says Bilge Okay of the dog protection soci-
ety SHKD, which works toward better treatment of the animals.
Althoughkeepingpetsinthiswayisaveryrecentdevelopment,thebreedingofdogshasa
longtraditionintheregion.Oneoftheoldestpiecesofevidenceforthedomesticationofdogs
at all comes from Çayönü—in eastern Turkey, near the border with Syria—from approxim-
ately 12,000 years ago. Well-known breeds like the Kangal, a very large shorthair, come to
mindaswell.KangalswereherddogsusedbyAnatolianshepherdsevenbeforeIslamspread
throughout the region; they were associated with one of the 12 months of the year. But back
to the wild dogs of Istanbul. Their presence in the city stretches far back, but their origins are
the matter of legend: Do they hail from Turkmenistan? Did they arrive with the troops of the
conqueror Mehmed II in the 15th century? Wherever their roots may lie, they have been an
established part of the city for centuries, skulking in the shadows of the buildings.
Accounts of travelers—sometimes baffled, sometimes disconcerted or frightened—rarely
fail to mention the dogs. In the 17th century, Jean de Thévenot noted that rich citizens of
Istanbul bequeathed their fortunes to the city's dogs to ensure their continued presence. And
his contemporary Joseph Pitton de Tournefort heard from butchers who sold meat specially
intended for feeding the dogs. He also saw how the city's residents treated the animals'
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