Daily Life In The Ottoman Empire

by Mehrdad Kia

  For the Ottomans, the First World War came to an end when British troops, supported by Arab fighters under the leadership of Prince Faisal, the son of Sharif Husayn of Mecca, entered Damascus in August 1918. The Ottoman Empire sued for peace in October 1918. With Russia out of the picture, the British were the only power with troops in the Middle East who could dictate the terms of an armistice to the Ottomans. On 31 October 1918, after a week of negotiations, the terms of the Armistice of Mudros were presented to the Ottoman government. They included Allied occupation of Istanbul and the forts on the Bosphorus and Dardanelles. Two days later, the three Young Turk leaders, Enver Paşa, Talat Paşa, and Cemal Paşa, fled the country for Berlin. On 15 May 1919, with support from the British, the French, and the Americans, the Greek government, which had joined the Allies at the end of the First World War, landed troops in Izmir.

  In the midst of this chaos and humiliation, Mustafa Kemal Paşa (1881–1938) was appointed “Inspector General of Ottoman forces in northern and northeastern Anatolia” and dispatched by the sultan to disarm and disband the remaining Ottoman army units and pacify the local population. Having enrolled in the Ottoman military academy, Mustafa Kemal had joined the Young Turks before the 1908 revolution but had refused to assume political office. An Ottoman army officer who had fought with distinction at Gallipoli (1915), the Caucasus (1916), and Palestine (1917), Mustafa Kemal had emerged as a hero of the First World War and was considered to be the ideal officer capable of diffusing a rebellion against the sultan and the allies.

  By the time Mustafa Kemal arrived in Samsun on the northern coast of Anatolia on 19 May, he had already decided to disobey his orders and organize a national resistance movement. Support came from other Ottoman commanders and officers who shared his determination to remove all foreign forces from Anatolia. After creating a national congress and launching a series of successful military campaigns against the newly established Armenian state in eastern Anatolia and the Greek forces in western Anatolia, the Turkish nationalists forced foreign troops to evacuate the “Turkish homeland” in the summer of 1922.

  The military victories of the nationalist movement resulted in a shift of attitude by the European powers, which recognized the new reality on the ground. Having witnessed the decisive defeat of Greek forces in August 1922 and realizing that their allies, particularly the French, did not intend to fight the Turkish nationalists, the British convinced the Greek government to withdraw from eastern Thrace and sign the Armistice of Mudanya with the Turks on 11 October 1922. On 1 November, the Grand National Assembly in Ankara abolished the Ottoman sultanate. Shortly after, a Turkish delegation led by the hero of the war of independence, Ismet Paşa, arrived in Lausanne, Switzerland, to negotiate a peace treaty with the allies, which was concluded on 24 July 1923.

  Following the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne, British troops evacuated Istanbul in October 1923, and Mustafa Kemal and his victorious army entered the city. The time had come to deal with the Ottoman royal family, who had collaborated with foreign occupation forces throughout the war of national liberation and had condemned Mustafa Kemal to death in absentia. On 29 October 1923, the Grand National Assembly proclaimed the establishment of the Republic of Turkey, with Mustafa Kemal as its first president, while a member of the Ottoman ruling family, Abdülmecid, remained the caliph. Determined to cut the country’s ties with its Ottoman past and to create a secular republic, the new government moved the capital from Istanbul to Ankara and on 3 March 1924, the Grand National Assembly abolished the caliphate and the last member of the Ottoman royal family was sent into exile. The 600-year Ottoman Empire had ceased to exist, replaced by the Republic of Turkey.

  2 - SULTAN AND THE PALACE

  The Ottomans divided their society into two distinct classes; the rulers (askeri or the military) and the ruled (reaya or the flock). Because “the state was organized as a war machine” geared toward conquest, “the ruling classes were deemed to be part of the military organization.” The three major strata within the Ottoman ruling class were “the men of sword or the military, the men of the religious sciences (ilm) known as the ulema (or the religious establishment), and the men of the pen or bureaucrats.” High officials in the Christian communities such as the patriarchs of the Orthodox Church were also included as members of the ruling class. The reaya consisted of merchants, craftsmen, peasant farmers, and nomads. They produced the goods and paid the taxes that sustained the state. The guild tradesmen or craftsmen constituted an important segment of the urban reaya. Other urban reaya included the saraf (money changers) and the merchants who organized the caravan and overseas trade. The peasant farmers constituted the overwhelming majority of the population in the empire. The “Ottoman state preferred peasants to nomads” because those who cultivated the land “were settled, paid taxes and could be recruited for the army, whereas nomads, who were not settled, disliked and avoided both.” As “an armed and mobile group, the nomads were unruly and difficult to bring into line, and the Ottomans struggled throughout their history to settle them and turn them into peasants.”

  At the top of the power pyramid stood the sultan, an absolute divine-right monarch. Since in theory the sultan enjoyed ultimate god-given authority to rule, his subjects considered him the sole source of legitimate power; he could, therefore, demand absolute obedience from them, including complete control over their lives and possessions. He owned all state lands and could dispose of them as he saw fit. Despite his absolute power, the sultan could not violate the Islamic law or custom; the opinion of the Muslim community, expressed through the ulema, could strongly influence his decisions and actions. God had entrusted his people to him and the sultan was responsible for their care and protection.

  As the Ottoman state transformed from a small principality into a full-fledged imperial power, the political, social, and military institutions that had given rise to the early Ottoman fiefdom underwent a profound transformation. The principality founded by Osman and his son Orhan was based on the active participation of charismatic rulers or gazis, religiously driven warriors who fought in the name of Islam. Under this system, power and authority derived from military units organized and led by the gazis who fought with the Ottoman ruler. The Ottoman army was not only the backbone of the state but was the state itself. The seat of power was the saddle of the sultan, who organized and led raids during time of war. His leadership required him to visit and inspect the territory under his rule.

  The early Ottoman sultans relied heavily on fortresses they had seized as defense against enemy attack and as a territorial base for further expansion. The North African traveler Ibn Battuta wrote that the Ottoman ruler Orhan visited these fortresses frequently to put them in good order and examine their condition but never stayed for more than a month. The sultan rode from one fortress to the next and fought the Byzantine Greeks and other Christian powers of southeast Europe, attacking them continually and keeping their towns under siege. Thus, the everyday life of the early Ottoman sultan did not differ greatly from the commanders and soldiers who fought in his armies. Their wealth and power depended on the taxes they collected and the booty they accumulated from various raids into enemy territory.

  Principal square in Grand Cairo, with Murad Bey’s Palace, Egypt, c. 1801. A column of soldiers crossing a large square surrounded by buildings with domes and minarets. Other people are in the square in the distance. From Views in Egypt, Palestine, and Other Parts of the Ottoman Empire. Thomas Milton (London, 1801–1804).

  PALACE

  As their territory expanded, new urban centers were added to the emerging empire, allowing Ottoman sultans to build palaces, mosques, bazaars, bedestans (covered markets for the sale of valuable goods), schools, bathhouses, hans (inns), and fountains. Only after the conquest of Constantinople in May 1453 did the Ottoman sultan Mehmed II, known as the Conqueror (Fatih), introduce the idea of a permanent residence for the sultan. The construction of Istanbul’s world-renowned Topkapi (Canon Gate) Palace, built o
n “Seraglio Point between the Golden Horn and the Sea of Marmara,” began in 1465 and ended 13 years later in 1478. Built on a hill looking down at the Bosphorus, the location of the new palace offered both defensibility and stunning views. A high wall with several towers and seven gates surrounded the palace. At the height of Ottoman power, the palace housed 4,000 residents.

  The palace was a complex of many buildings centered on four main squares or sections: “an area for service and safety also known as the Birun, or outer section”; an “administrative center where the Imperial Council met”; an “area used for education, known as Enderun, or inner section”; and “a private living area, dominated by the Harem or women’s section.” Three monumental gates marked the passages of the palace. These began with the first or Imperial Gate (Bab-i Hümayun); followed by the second or Middle Gate, known also as the Gate of Salutation (Bab-üs Selam); and finally the third gate, known as the Gate of Felicity (Bab-üs Saadet).

  The first palace courtyard was the largest of the four, and functioned as an outer park that contained fountains and buildings such as the imperial mint. At the end of this courtyard, all those riding a horse had to dismount and enter the second court, or the Divan Square, through the Gate of Salutation, or the Middle Gate. With exception of the highest officials of the state and foreign ambassadors and dignitaries, no one could enter the second courtyard, which housed a hospital, a bakery, army quarters, stables, the imperial council, and the kitchens. This courtyard served principally as the site where the sultan held audience. At the end of this courtyard stood the Gate of Felicity, which served as the entrance to the third courtyard, also known as the inner court, or the enderun. It was in front of this gate that the sultan sat on his throne during the main religious festivals and his accession, while his ministers and court dignitaries paid him homage, standing in front of their royal master. It was also here that, before every campaign, the sultan handed the banner of the prophet Muhammad to the grand vizier before he departed for a military campaign.

  Beyond the Gate of Felicity lay the inner court and the residential apartments of the palace. No one could enter this court without special permission from the sultan. In this inner section of the palace, the sultan spent his days outside the royal harem surrounded by a lush garden and the privy chamber (has oda), which contained the royal treasury and the sacred relics of the prophet Muhammad, including a cloak, two swords, a bow, one tooth, a hair from his beard, his battle sabers, a letter, and other relics.

  The audience chamber, or chamber of petitions (arz odasi), was located a short distance behind the Gate of Felicity in the center of the third courtyard. The chamber served as an inner audience hall where the government ministers and court dignitaries presented their reports after they had kissed the hem of the sultan’s sleeve. The mosque of the eunuchs and the apartments of the palace pages, the young boys who attended to the sultan’s everyday needs, were also located here. Another “important building found in the third courtyard was the Palace School,” where Ottoman princes and the promising boys of the child levy (devşirme) “studied law, linguistics, religion, music, art, and fighting.” From its inception in the 15th century, the palace school prepared numerous state dignitaries who played a prominent role in Ottoman society. Only in the second half of the 19th century did the ruling elite cease using the palace school. The fourth and the last courtyard included the royal harem, which comprised nearly four hundred rooms and served as the residence for the mother, the wives, and children of the sultan and their servants and attendants.

  In 1856, a new palace called Dolmabahçe replaced Topkapi as the principal residence of the sultan and his harem. Dolmabahçe “embraced a European architectural style” and “was designed with two stories and three sections, with the basement and attic serving as service floors.” The “three sections of the palace were the official part . . ., the ceremonial hall . . ., and the residential area (HAREM).” The “official section was used for affairs of state and formal receptions,” while the second section “was used for formal ceremonies.” The harem or the “private residential area of the palace” occupied “the largest area of the palace” and included “the sultan’s personal rooms: a study, a relaxing room, a bedroom, and a reception room.” The mother of the sultan also had her own rooms “for receiving, relaxing, and sleeping.” Each of “the princes, princesses, and wives of the sultan (kadinefendiler) also had his or her own three-or-four room apartments in the palace, living separately with their own servants.”

  In 1880, the Ottoman sultan Abdülhamid II moved the royal residence to the Yildiz (Star) Palace, where an Italian architect Riamondo D’Aronco was commissioned to build new additions to the old palace complex. The new structures, built of white marble, were European in style and contained the sultan’s residence, a theater and opera house, an imperial carpentry workshop, an imperial porcelain factory to meet the demands of upper-class Ottomans for European-style ceramics, and numerous governmental offices for state officials who served their royal master. The only section of the Yildiz Palace accessible to foreign visitors was the selamlik, or the large square reception hall, where the sultan received foreign ambassadors. In the royal harem, which was hidden within a lush and richly wooded park and was known for its rare marbles and superb Italian furniture, Abdülhamid II received his wives and children. At times he spent the evening there with a favorite wife and children and played piano for them. Within the park, there also lay an artificial lake, on which the sultan and his intimates cruised in a small but elegant boat.

  Reception at the court of Sultan Selim III at the Topkapi Palace, Istanbul. Anonymous, 18th century.

  HAREM

  In Europe, the “oriental harem” conjured up images of exotic orgies and violent assassinations, in which a turban-clad monarch acted as a bloodthirsty tyrant, forced by his “oriental” instincts to murder his real and imagined enemies while sleeping with as many concubines as he fancied every night. According to this wild and romantic image, the sultan’s power over all his subjects was unfettered and his control over the women of the harem unlimited. Thus, in the European imagination, the harem not only symbolized free sex but also a masculine despotism that allowed men, especially the sultan, to imprison and use women as sexual slaves. The meaning of women’s lives was defined by their relationship to the male master they served. They dedicated their entire lives to fulfilling the fancies of a tyrant who viewed them as his chattel.

  In this imaginary world, constructed by numerous European stories, travelogues, poems, and paintings, Muslim men appeared as tyrannical despots in public and sexual despots in private. In sharp contrast, Muslim women appeared as helpless slaves without any power or rights, who were subjected to the whimsical tyranny of men. Not surprisingly, therefore, the Europeans who travelled to the Ottoman domain were shocked when they realized how different the reality was. First, they quickly recognized that the notion of each Muslim man being married to four wives and enjoying a private harem of his own was absurd and laughable. If Islam allowed Muslim men to marry four wives, it did not follow that the majority of the male population in the Ottoman Empire practiced polygamy. As late as 1830s, the number of men in Cairo who had more than one wife did not exceed five percent of the male population in the city. By 1926, when the newly established Turkish Republic abolished polygamy, the practice had already ceased to exist.

  Far from being devoted to wild sexual orgies, the Ottoman palace was the center of power and served as the residence of the sultan. As already mentioned, the palace comprised two principal sections, the enderun, or the inner section, and the birun, or the outer section. The two sections were built around several large courtyards, which were joined by the Gate of Felicity, where the sultan sat on his throne, received his guests, and attended ceremonies. The harem was the residence of the sultan, his women, and family. A palace in its own right, the harem consisted of several hundred apartments and included baths, kitchens, and even a hospital.

  Three separa
te but interconnected sections formed the harem. The first section housed the eunuchs, while the second section belonged exclusively to the women of the palace. The third and final section was the personal residence of the sultan. The apartments of the imperial harem were reserved for the female members of the royal family, such as the sultan’s mother (valide sultan), his wives, and his concubines. Many concubines in the royal harem came from the Caucasus. The “sultans were partial to the fair, doe-eyed beauties” from Georgia, Abkhazia, and Circassia. There were also Christian slave girls and female prisoners of war who were sent as gifts to the sultan by his governors. These girls underwent a long process of schooling and training, which prepared them for a new life in the imperial palace. The most powerful woman of the harem was the mother of the sultan, who lived in her own apartment surrounded by servants and attendants. Her apartment included a reception hall, a bedroom, a prayer room, a resting room, a bathroom, and a bath. It was second in size only to the apartment of the sultan.

  Topkapi Palace, harem (interior). Hall of the Padisha (Throne Room).

  EUNUCHS

  As in other Islamic states, in the Ottoman Empire, the ruler maintained eunuchs or castrated males who were brought as slaves to guard and serve the female members of the royal household. As Islam had forbidden self-castration by Muslims or castration of one Muslim by another, the eunuchs were bought in the slave markets of Egypt, the Balkans, and southern Caucasus. In the palace, there were two categories of eunuchs—black and white. Black eunuchs were Africans, mostly from Sudan, Ethiopia, and the east African coastal region, who were sent to the Ottoman court by the governor of Egypt. They served the female members of the royal family who resided in the sultan’s harem. The white eunuchs were mostly white men imported from the Balkans and the Caucasus and served the recruits at the palace school. The black eunuchs “underwent the so-called radical castration, in which both the testicles and the penis were removed,” whereas, in the case of eunuchs from the Balkans and the Caucasus, “only the testicles were removed.”