Topkapi Palace, Istanbul

Topkapi Palace, Istanbul

Despite my best intentions to visit Topkapi Palace right after I arrived in Istanbul, it took me a few days to actually go inside. Every time I made my way to the entrance, I gasped at the amount of people and decided to do something else. But on my third day, I got my ticket at 9 am sharp and made a bee line to the treasure before the crowds lined up at its doors. That was the recommendation of a fellow Irish traveler and I am thankful for it. By the time I finished with my visit there and went through the harem, on the building across the street, there was over 200 people lined up.

Maybe it is the Easter Holiday, or maybe this is how Istanbul is these days, propelled by the tourist packages. Hordes of people come into this city everyday and we all seem to prefer to stay at Sultanahmet where the majority of historic Istanbul sites are. The scene is not very different from that at Disneyland. Tourists everywhere, eating, taking pictures, buying souvenirs, and lining up for the “rides.”

Topkapi Palace is a Unesco World Heritage Site, the official residence in the city of the Ottoman Sultans for about 400 years, from 1465 to 1856. It is a complex made up of four main courtyards, home to as many as 4,000 people, including a harem. Together with the treasure, this was the most interesting area of the palace for me.

It was interesting to note the precious stones of choice by sultans in those days: pearls, rubies, diamonds, jade, turquoises and emeralds. These happen to be some of my favorite stones as well. I would add sapphires and corals to that list though. The huge pendants studded with precious stones symbolized sovereignty and power.

The emerald and pearl studded daggers, specially Topkapi Dagger, was really amazing. Apparently the huge emeralds came from Colombia, the pearls from Venezuela and the gold and silver from Peru and Mexico. They were collected and shipped to Cuba, then Florida, then sent to Spain through the Atlantic Ocean. That is the exploitation of the new world for you. The Spanish then sold this goods for the rich empires of the time: Ottoman, Persian and Moghuls in India.

The sword of Suleyman the Magnificent and the Throne of Ahmed I, inlaid with mother-of-pearl and designed by the architect of the Blue Mosque were also jaw dropping.

The harem, literally, private, or “forbidden place” was another interesting concept of the time. A series of buildings connected through hallways and courtyards, this area was run by the Chief Harem Eunuch. It was the private home of the sultan, forbidden to everyone else, except his mother, wife, concubines and children. By the way, this an interesting factoid: the women in the harem had to be foreigners as Islam prohibited enslaving Muslims. Every detail of harem life was dictated by tradition, obligation and ceremony. Somehow the geisha culture comes to mind but I haven't figured out the differences and commonalities. The only “male” population allowed in the harem was the eunuch staff who ran the place.

The rest of the Palace was more ho-hum for me, specially because by that time there were so many tourists that I wanted to leave. But I forced myself to get into a line of people sticking up their necks to see the relics of the prophet Mohammed in the Sacred Safekeeping Rooms, aka Suite of the Felicitous Cloak. There we could see the several jars supposedly containing pieces of the beard of Prophet Mohammed, a golden casket containing his cloak, his footprint in clay, his tooth, sword and other objects.

The tower of Justice, the highest building in the complex was also interesting. Specially its concept: it symbolizes the eternal vigilance of the sultan against injustice. Everyone from afar was supposed to be able to see the tower to feel assured about the sultan's presence. Knowing a little history of the Ottoman
Empire, it is safe to say that justice in this case is relative at best. Maybe what it really symbolized was that the sultan had his eyes on things...control, rather than justice.