The Topkapi palace is structured around different courtyards. The outermost courtyard, which comprises of the stables and the gardens, is the most accessible to outsiders. As you move in from courtyard to courtyard, things start getting more and more restrictive. After the third gate, only the sultan and his close advisors are allowed in. Here's a picture of our guide Leslie Pierce, an Ottoman period historian from Princeton, guiding us through the third gate:
This most private section of the palace was called a harem in which only the sultan and a few other men could enter; harem in English has the connotation of a group of women devoted specifically to the sultan; in reality, the harem is a very private, isolated section which was only accessible by certain women. Women were allowed into the palace after some time but lived in a specifically designated area labeled, of course, the harem. The women of the harem were "protected" from the outside world by African eunuchs who lived right inside the harem entrance. Here is a picture of the entrance of the womens' harem, with the eunuchs' quarters on both sides:
The eunuchs could only go so far into the harem. After that point, the only male allowed in the harem was the sultan. He had a secret entrance from his own harem in the third courtyard, and even shared a bathroom with the queen mother, who was in charge of the women of the harem. This is the famous "living room" of the harem where the women hung out:
The rooms inside the harem were very elaborate and beautiful, and the decoration for the administration rooms was very ornate, but overall the palace was very bland in comparison to other European palaces I've visited. Interestingly, most of the fine art and detail went into mosques like the Blue Mosque and Sulemaniye because it was considered more appropriate to decorate public spaces. Another room in the palace:
The part of the palace I thought was most interesting was a special set of rooms in the third courtyard which housed relics of Islam, Christianity and Judaism obtained through Ottoman expansion into Egpyt. Among the things we saw were David's (as in David and Goliath) sword, Moses' rod (as in the one he parted the Red Sea with), the arm of John the Baptist, Muhammed's footprint and beard, and Jacob's saucepan. Here is Muhammed's sword and bow:
Obviously, most of us were very skeptical that all these objects had survived and were in the Sultan's private collection - I mean, Jacob's sauce pan... really? But Professor Shields' told us to take the objects as they were, not really to question their legitimacy but to accept that the Ottomans (and contemporary visitors) see these artifacts as the real deal. It was all very interesting.
But anyway, I'll wait to go into more of the stuff that I've done this week tomorrow - this post is long enough as it is. Here are some more pictures - enjoy.
The entrance to the administrative center of the empire:
A side view of the third courtyard overlooking the Bosphorous.
The dome inside the relics museum.
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