[Meric]

Flachat, who during his long life made many friends, both in the palace and among the general public, was even able to stroll in the palace because of his friendship with the Kizlaragasi, or chief of the Harem. He notes in his travelogue that he knew a Turk who was extremely intelligent and possessed a remarkable degree of technical knowledge.
The artist A de Favray, in the pictures he painted in 1762, made a great deal of effort to depict the beauty of Istanbul viewed from the sea, from Sarayburnu and particularly from the Bosphorus. Shortly afterwards, in 1763, the city was reduced to ruins by a terrible earthquake and because many buildings, among them the Fatih Mosque, had been damaged beyond repair, it was decided to demolish it. The mosque that was built in its place is the present one. However, in spite of its natural beauty, the magnificence of its buildings and the loveable quality of its more modest districts, Istanbul had not yet achieved the appearance of a really clean city. Baron de Tott, who lavishly praised the beautiful panorama he saw in 1755 went on to complain about the dirtiness of its streets. He described the fire he witnessed on October of the same year. This fire, which reduced Babiali and the surrounding neighbourhood to ashes, even threatened Ayasofia at one point. The heat of the flames melted the lead covering the cupola, and the molten metal ran down the drainpipes.
Two foreigners of a very different kind are known to have visited Istanbul during the second half of the 18th century, and their works occupy a special place in people's libraries. One of them was Casanova de Seingalt and the other was Donatien Alphonse de Sade, who gave his name to the cult of sadism. Casanova does not mention Istanbul a great deal in his memoirs, but among the rakish adventures filling these volumes is an unpleasant and rather comical incident that happened while he was here. On the other hand, the Marquis de Sade, in one of his books (which is filled with horrifying descriptions) recounts in disgusting detail various lustful scenes that are supposed to have taken place in the sultan's harem.
The Swede Jacob Jones Bjonstahl, who stayed in Istanbul in about 1778 during his trevels in the Ottoman empire, saw the great religious feasts which make the city even more colourful. He also had the horrifying experience of being present during a plague epidemic and was unfortunate enough to die on his return journey in Salonika without ever seeing his homeland again. Towards the end of that century an art academy was founded with the efforts of the French ambassador, Comte de Choiseul-Gouffier; this academy was a research centre where men of the arts and sciences engaged in recording the beauties and treasures of the city gathered. A topographer named Kauffer drew the very first plan of the city was f any scientific value and artists produced a number of large paintings. In 1786, an Englishwoman who had observed all this work, Lady Elizabeth Craven, remarked about it and expressed her own views about Istanbul in the following sentence: "The Turks revere the beauty of nature so much that they do not cut down trees in the places where they build their houses. On the contrary,they set aside a place for the tree inside their home and the branches of the tree are considered to be the finish adornment for the roof." She then remarks about the narrowness of the streets, saying that "as the houses become higher the people living on either side of the street could reach across and hold the hands of their neighbours on the other side." With this sentence she stresses a feature that many other travellers had noticed as well. However, the thing that angered the young Englishwoman most was the laziness of the people of Istanbul. "I have even seen people who sit on the seashore watching the kites in the sky or children getting into boats and taking trips for a whole day, from morning to evening." The English traveller Jacques Dallaway, who filled his work with pedantic observations, states that according to records, in 1975 there were 88,185 houses and 130 Turkish baths in the city and that its population was at least 400,000. He comments that a great deal of natural beauty was destroyed because of the interest in making gardens like the ones in Europe and states quite openly that an excessive love of luxury and display had spoiled Turkish tastes, which were based on tradition. European fashions and tastes were now quite openly dominant in Istanbul. According to Dallaway the streets were narrow and dirty and all this filth could be only partially cleared away by the large number of stray dogs in the city. The houses were made of wood and appeared to unsound. The streets, however, were safe and shops remained open all day, even if their owners were nowhere to be seen. "Offences such as theft are entirely foreign to the Turks," he concludes.
A number of pictures were produced that depicted the Istanbul of the 18th century in a far more realistic manner than the panorama of Merian, which was filled with imaginary details. One of these was painted by an officer names Loos who accompanied King Karl XII of sweden on his visit to Istanbul at the beginning of the 18th century. His pictures, which depicted the city and its monuments, were only discovered in recent years and are just like photographs of Istanbul taken three hundred years ago. The Austrian Baron von Gudenus drew a general view of Istanbul from the heights of Beyoglu with Taphane and Galata in the foreground, and the city divided into sections. Etchings of these different sections and published. Their most interesting feature is the houses in traditional Turkish architectural style with broad eaves and windows decorated with plaster ornaments. In later years, when Galata assumed a more cosmopolitan character, these houses disappeared. Apart from these persons, at the end of the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, two European artists, Antoine Louis Castellan and Ignaz Melling, were at work trying to record all the beauty of Istanbul. Castellan painted the New Mosque (Yen Cami), the Sultan Ahmet Mosque, Sarayburnu, the Shrine of Suleymaniye, Incili Kosk (the Pearl Summerhouse) and other suchplaces, thus having something by which to remember his journey to Istanbul, which he described as "a ravishing dream". Melling, who was rightly known as "the unrivalled painter of the Bosphorus", produced froty large paintings, each of which could be described as a work of art, of Istanbul and the Bosphorus. These pictures were obviously published, for, as stated in an anonymous travelogue written in about 1817, "Sometimes these pictures contain an excessive amount of detail in an endeavour to reflect the reilaty but they depict the modern buildings and landscapes of this city, every view of which is attractive, in a manner more successful than that achieved in the most sensitive written descriptions."
When two English travellers, William Wittman and D Clarke, arrived in Istanbul at the beginning of the 19th century they were disillusioned by the inside of the city. They considered that the streets were so narrow and so dirty that not even a breath of air could penetrate. In 1806 the famous French man of letters A de Chateaubrian stated that "there are three details that strike the eye in this extroardinary city." These were the fact that no women were to be seen in the streets, that there were no wheeled vehicles and the large number of stray dogs. The city was very silent. "It would seem that the shooping centres are followed by the graveyard. It is as if the Turks are entirely absorbed in buying goods, selling goods and dying. It is as if the graveyards, which are not bounded by any wall and resemble a graveful grove of cypress trees, extend to the very middle of the street. The wood pigeons nesting among their branches share in the peace of the dead." Although it was in keeping with his character, this atmosphere did not really suit the romantic man of letters and he immediately set out again in order to escape from a visit that was "stifling to the spirit". Another French ambassador, Comte Andreossy, wrote a book in 1812 about Istanbul and the Bosphorus which gave detailed information about the sea; this took place shortly after the departure of the famous Ottomanist J. von Hammer. Von Sturmer, the ambassador who was the cause of von Hammer's departure, described Istanbul in 1816 as "a city enthroned on seven hills". For Compte de Forbin, who was in Istanbul at about the same time, it was "a city that seems to have been built to give pleasure to the eyes". Charles Pertusier, another person who explored the city at about that time, wrote a long travelogue about it. According to Pertusier, "there is no need for all the animals and particularly the birds to pray to God to save them from the traps set by people here... and the birds make more noise than all its other inhabitants." The trees, roads and houses surrounded by gardens exercised a great attraction for this French artillery officer. Among Pertusier's accounts of life in Istanbul was an incident in which an inhabitant of Istanbul who had had the audacity to remark that 'a decree is a three is a three-day wonder', encountered the wrath of the Grand Vizier who was roaming the streets in disguise! In addition to Pertusier's three-volume travelogue, there is also an album containing engravings by the artist Preault. In this album the shipyard on the Golden Horn, Anadolu Hisari (fortress), the Goksu and Bebek lodges, which reflected the old Turkish architectural style and were surrounded by thick groves of trees, were depicted with great realism. Vicomte de Marcellus describes his departure from Istanbul, to which he had come as an ambassador, one autumn day in 1820: "Upon reaching the highest part of the hills above Eyub and turning round I bade a last farewell to the most beautiful city in the world, the ruins of Constantine's palace, the great city walls of the emperors, the gleaming domes of the mosques and the sea shimmering in the sunlight." The Western travellers who arrived in Istanbul in the 19th century had began to experience the city's inimicable attractiveness in a more immediate way. As MacFarlane stated during his journey in 1828, travellers stay here "in order to breathe in an entirely different air". The French poet and man of letters Alphonse de Lamartine, for his part, had this to say about the city in which he first set foot one May morning in 1833. "One looks at the most beautiful veiw to be found anywhere on earth, one which was created by the joint efforts of God and man, art and nature." For Lamartine there could be no place more beautiful, because "it would be an insult to creativity to seek any resemblance whatsoever to this graceful integrity," and this statement is followed by pages of cloured pictures. Istanbul, which he saw in all the glory of spring, was, according to Lamartine, "the most perfect and pleasurable view the human eye could possible partake of at any hour of the day or night." The same pleasure was experienced in 1820 by Colonel Rottiers, who described it as "a dreamlike state that would be induced by partaking lightly of laudanum," and stated in all sincerity that he was "lost for words" as far as his feelings towards Istanbul were concerned. It is sufficient to browse through the pictures in two books published at about this time to gain an impression of the "dreamlike state" induced by these landscapes. The finest of these were the pictures executed for Walsh's book by Thomas Allom, in which steel engravings were used for the first time. The pictures drawn by W Bartlett for Miss Julia Pardoe's book about Istanbul are not of the same quality but they are works of pictorial merit. These books were in such demand at the time that editions were published in German, French and Italian. These engravings were then coloured, framed and hung in many people's homes as decoration. It is worth noting that Miss Pardoe, a sensitive and refined young Englishwoman, was very fond of Istanbul and described it in a separate two-volume book of travels.
A general view of Istanbul from Galata Tower, printed in colour by a different method, was produced in a workshop especially setup for the purpose by Baker, an Englishman. This large picture depicts in great detail the area around the Golden Horn. In the foreground we can see Galata and its old houses, the walls and towers of Galata, which were still intact at that time, the mosques and mesjids behind them, its graveyards and treasures and the layout and features of the streets- all of which are extremely realistic.
The changes that were being made by Sultan Mahmud II also affected the appearance of the city. The Mekteb-i Tibbiye-i Sahane (Medical Faculty), which had been set up on Western lines, the Muhendishane-i Berri Humayum (Technical University) and other such extablishments were the first products of this westernisation. In parallel with this, buildings constructed on Western principles changed the architectural fabric of the city.
The students of the Technical University drew an excellent plan of the city in 1848, showing the locations of Istanbul 400 or so mosques and the street layout of the entire city. This was published as a lithograph. Shortly afterwards, the first photographs of Istanbul were taken between 1853 and 1855 during the Crimean War. These photographs, taken by Robertson, an Englishman who used time exposures, recorded for posterity the buildings of Istanbul, its people and their manner of dressing, the life of the city and the objective reality of that time.
A large number of men of letters visited Istanbul during the second half of the 19th century. In the books they wrote one can find reflections of a world that had unfortunately begun to disappear. The well-known American satirist Mark Twin was among these visitors and he recounts the journey in one of his books. Istanbul did not make a favourable impression on this visitor from the New World. There is also a book of travels by Reuter, whose works are difficult to understand because they are written in a dialect of German, not the standard language. However, just as we encounter foreigners who did not like Istanbul we also meet poets and men of letters who loved it very much. For Gerard de Nerval "its green and mobile horizons, houses of many hoes, lead-covered cupolas and slender minarets" made it "magnificent city." According to Maxime du Camp, it was "As if all creativity's works of art had been collected inside a semicircle". Charles de Mouy, who was resident in Istanbul between 1875, described his first encounter with the city in these words: "Suddenly, rising out of the waters like a dream from the world of fairies, a vague silhouette composed of cupolas, minarets, palaces and gardens becomes visible." Without doubt the city possessed muddy, unprepossessing streets "but one's eyes are constantly drawn to an attractive and fantastic picture in vivid colours". The Italian man of letters Edmondo de Amicis, who explored Istanbul in the same period, produced one of the most beautiful books ever to be written about the city." The corners of these quiet streets meet in a small square usually shaded by the spreading branches of an enormous plane tree. There is a drinking fountain on one side and on the other, a rush mat is spread in front of the cafe upon which men lie asleep or smoke and next to its door there is a large fig tree and a shady verandah. Between its leaves one can glimpse tiny patch of blue sea on which there are a few white sails in the distance. These lights and tranquil places draw one irressistibly towards Eyub, where one loses all conceps of time and distance... However, one is astonished to find that upon reaching the end of these little roads everything changes abruptly. You are now in one of Istanbul's main streets. You are surrounded on all sides by monuments that fatigue the eyes. You wander among mosques, mansions, vaulted corridors, marble fountains, shrines with inscriptions in gold leaf and walls covered with enameled tiles... There is a whiteness, an architectural beauty everywhere, the sound of running water and shady coolness, all of which caress one's senses like mysterious music. Amicis states that the dogs of Istanbul were "so many in number that they resembled a caste of city dwellers lower than its human inhabitants" and goes on to say that they were like "a gang of vagabonds that enjoyed extreme freedom", thus enriching the realistic aspects of his narrative with these vivid and colourful descriptions. Edmond about and De Blowitz, who came to Istanbul in 1883 with a largegroup as guests of the Wagon Lit company, rightly commented on the "invasion" by European fashions that was beginning to make its presence felt in Istanbul at that time. About, who felt that the neglect of elegant and tasteful Turkish goods on the one hand and the excessive demand for showy and tasteless articles imported from Europe on the other were inappropriate, made the acquaintanceship of Hamdi Bey, amuseum curator, to whom he regretfully confided that he had been unable to explore as he wished "thiscollectivity of miracles, Istanbul, a city full appreciated neither by European guides nor by its inhabitants." De Blowitz, for his part, was captivated by "this radiant world of dreams, a beauty the like of which can be found nowhere else, nor can it be imitated," to such an extent that he "had never seen a thing of such extreme beauty and had no desire to do so."
The eminent French man of letters Theophile Gautier, who visited Istanbul in the middle of the last century, dressed as a Turk of the Tanzimat (reform) period, (circa 1839), with a fez on his head, a redingote on his back and a six-month growth of beard; he explored the city in minute detail and his descriptions are unparalled in terms of colour and vividness. Gautier found Istanbul so beautiful that "one suspects this lovely view to be unreal". These lines of Theophile Gautier, in which he describes a view of the city from what is now Tepebasi one night in Ramazan from the crux of his modest anthology about this incomparable city: "On the other side of the Golden Horn the city was shimmering like the jewelled crown of an eastern emperor; each balcony of the minarets was adorned with bracelets of lanterns, and verses from the Kuran picked out in lights like the pages of a sacred book upon the dark blue sky were strung in the manner of bunting from one minaret to the other. Ayasofia, Sultan Ahmed, the New Mosque Suleymeniye and all the places of worship that rise along the coastline stretching from Sarayburnu to the heights of Eyub were blazing with light and announced the verses of Islam in sentences of fire. The moon in the form of a crescent with its accompanying star resembled the coat of arms of the state embroidered upon a heavenly flag."
A French doctor by the name of A. Brayer visited Istanbul in 1815 and remained here on and off over a period of thirty years. He studied the plague epidemic and came to the conclusion that it was not infectious! The first volume of his two-volume work contains a description of Istanbul and the second is devoted to his opinions abut the plague. Brayer begins with complaints about the dirtiness and narrowness of the only main street in Beyoglu and remarks that it is impossible to walk there at night without a lantern. After referring to the filthy state of the Kasimpasa Creek goes on to describe in some detail the districts and neighbourhoods of Istanbul and settlements along the Bosphorus. Hisdescriptions of the commercial and shopping centres in these neighbourhoods and of their craftsmen are extremely interesting. For this reason it could be said that it is this French doctor who was able to provide the most accurate information about certain districts of Istanbul at the beginning of the 19th century. He mentions that between Yenikapi and Samatya there were little summerhouses built on pies driven into the sea bed that had a wonderful view of the Sea of Marmara and a number of cafes along the sea front. The thing he enjoyed most of all were boat trips on the Bosphorus in one of those light, clean, graceful craft with three pairs of oars. His description of the clean and well-dressed appearance of the oarsmen and the gracefulness of these caiques occupies many pages.
Many men of letters visited Istanbul during the 19th century. In the books that they wrote it is possible to detect reflections of a world that was unfortunately beginning to decline. One of these men was Gerard de Nerval (1805-1855). During his journey to the Middle East in 1843 he was able to explore Istanbul and decsribe it in a romantic manner. The first thing to attract his attention in Beyoglu's main street was the fortress-like building of the Russian Embassy. The French Embassy, Which cost millions to build, was under construction at that time. Further down on the left was the Italian Theatre and the Galatasaray School, which he referred to as the university, and beautiful, houses with gardens lay between these two buildings. The picturesque, mysterious and cool park at the end of the street was in fact a graveyard. Nerval, who preferred to study the way of life of the city's Greeks and Armenians, gives a lengthy account of a punch and judy show. He also visited the Sahilsarayi Palace which stood on the site of the present Beylerbeyi Palace and gives detailed information about all the European items inside it and mentions its internal layout. For Gerard de Nerval it was the "green and mobile horizons, houses of many hues, lead-covered cupolas and slender minarets" that made Istanbul "such a magnificent city". Maxime du Camp, a less-known writer, stated that "all creativity's works of art had been collected inside a semicircle, and in his book of travels he recounts an interesting incident that he witnessed in Istanbul in 1850. While he was boarding a ship on the Golden Horn, a French merchant dropped a purse into the sea containing twenty five thousand golden francs. A driver was sent down and a search made, but the gold coins were nowhere to be seen; however, about twenty bronze cannonballs were discovered. Sultan Abdulmecid presented the cannonballs to the Frenchman to console him for his loss.
During the years when Theophile Gautier, who had appreciated the beauty of Istanbul, was writing his book of travels (this coincided with the Crimean War), there was also a by no means small number of foreigners who did not like Istanbul at all. In the memories of a doctor named F. Maynard, which was published in 1855 by Alexandre Dumas (1803-1870), this person was said to have found Istanbul incredibly beautiful when viewed from the sea.
However, "Alas, alas! 'Twas a dream that was painfully destroye before I had taken a hundred steps along its narrow, rutted, muddy, dark, filthy streets that never saw sunlight or fresh air... You begin to wonder if an evil genie has thrown a loathsome veil over this queen of cities, pearl of the east, the centre of beauty, dreams of which always appear in the misty skies of the north simply in order to deceive." The writer, in these words, expresses the worry of not being able to find the Ottoman city of old. This is an important opinion. The tendency towards westernisation that began in the Tanzimat period had meant that the Ottomans of those times had, without questioning their suitability, adopted a number of Western ideas, expressed mainly in fashion but also including architecture, bureaucrarcy and many other things that had changed the face of Istanbul. The same writer goes on to say that he had found the last of the old Istanbul, which no foreigner would dare to enter, in the Eyup district. "In some places the side of a street resembles a vine-covered verandah from one end to the other, and in others the branches of the of the lime trees reach down to cover the pavement; sometimes a plane tree with light filtering between its leaves spreads its gigantic shade; the cypress trees, of which many are to be found in this part of the city, give it an even more melancholy air with their dark green verdure. At every step one encounters a play of light and shade that no artist would ever be able to get out of his mind."
A. von Warsberg, who spent the summer of 1864 in Istanbul, expresses his feelings for the city in this single line printed on the first page of his travelogue: "This book has been written only for those who have lived in and loved the country in question." With these lines about the Eyup district of the city, which he explored on 23 May, von Warsberg gives us an idea of how he saw the city. "The street is paved with clean stones and to either side there are walls faced with marble to which a feeling of mobility is given by half-columns and archways. At the end can be seen shrines protruding into the street at intervals. Their windows are covered with gilded lattice-work; thick clumps of rose bushes lie between them and ancient plane, mulberry and maple trees form a cupola above. This is a city of the dead but instead of the horror of death one finds a place where those tired of living may take refuge in the tranquillity of being forgotten in the wonderful garden of sleep until they are awakened by the trumpets of the Last Judgement to a new and better eternal life."
The famous American satirist Mark Twain (1835-1910), who sailed to Istanbul in 1867, states in his book "Innocents Abroad" that he found Istanbul interesting viewed from afar; however, as soon as he disembarked, this incomparable view dissolved. Its inhabitants wore a motley assortment of clothing, some were dressed in traditional clothes with crimson fezzes on their heads, "their apparel being whatever happened to please them". Among the street sellers who aroused such astonishment in Twain was a goose herd who walked the streets driving a flock of up to one hundred geese in front of him. For the American writer, who found Ayasofia dark and dirty, the dance of the Mevlevi dervishes was "the most barbaric manifestation I have seen to this day". The most striking pages of his book of travels are those about the salve market. He states that female slaves were sold quite openly there, and tongue in cheek, records the price in dollars of the slaves bought and sold. This visitor from the new world did not enjoy his visit to a Turkish bath, either.
E. Jouve, a Frenchman who was an Istanbul in 1854 as correspondent of Courier de Lyon (this was during the Crimean War), found the city in a wretched state. The Turkish troops had European-style uniforms that did not suit them at all. He compared the shrine of Mahmut II, which had recently been built on Divanyolu to the Trianon and described this shrine with its gilded railings as "un joli palais Parisian" (a pretty Parisian palace). Jouve dwells on the famous stray dogs of Istanbul, recounting a strange piece of gossip as he does so: namely that of an English family of eight who had been foolish enough to walk in the city at night only the heels of his lordship's shoes and the handle of her laydship's umbrella had ever been found and that not of trace remained of their six children(!) The French journalist, however, had no complaints about these dogs. 'Rigoletto' wa on at the theatre in Beyoglu, the construction of the Dolmabahce Palace was under way and the Greeks of Istanbul, whom Jouve did not like at all, were of the one belief that it was the site of the emperor's palace of a recrudescent Byzantine empire. In criticism of a European diplomacy that was bent on creating a Greek state, he stressed that the Turks had created a city far more beautiful than the one exiting on their arrival in Istanbul on 29 May 1453. Jouve stated that many things in Istanbul were much better than the in the West and pointed to the superiority of the military hospitals. He went on to say that the attempts of the Turks to westernise had been unjustly criticised. He expressed the opinion that many things seemed to be a random nature but that the people who created this disorder were mainly Levantines guided by their own interests. These persons were "neither do nor wolf and they exploit the fortunes of both the Turks and the Europeans." L. Bunel, who spent several weeks in Istanbul at about this time, described the magnificence of the homes of the Greeks in the Fener district and the wealth of their inhabitants, contrasting them with the poverty of the Jews in nearby Balat. However, the thing that astonished him most was the fact that the residential area of Galata had a graveyard inside it. This was the "kucuk Mezaristan", or "Little Graveyard" of which no trace now exists, that was located between the Tepebasi and Sishane neighbourhoods. This was the place referred to by Europeans as "Le Petit Champs des Morts", a place where Turks sat in the shade of the Cypress trees to rest, a quiet corner in which to smoke a pipe. Bunel was able to explore the Dolmabahce Palace, which was still under construction and described the various sections of the building in considerable detail. The writer considered it to be magnificent, although its style was European. The part he admired most of all was the Throne Room (muayene salonu). He put the predominantly red, white and blue colour scheme down to the excessive nationalism of the French decorators working under the supervision of the person who had been in charge of the decorations in the Paris Opera. The name of this anonymous person was Sechan Bunel considered that, in spite of certain discrepancies of proportion, the Dolmabahce Palace was, in terms of art, superior to the Louvre and Tuilleries palaces in Paris. According to Bunel, there were things worth seeing in Uskudar, which was populated entirely by Turks; these were the convent of the Rufai dervishes the Karacaahmed Graveyard and the Selimiye Barracks. He stated that the graveyard resembled a magnificent forest of cypresses that "I have never seen such a vast and impressive cypress wood in the whole of my life"; he went on to say that it was a favourite place for walks of the women of Istanbul. Bunel gives us a detailed description of the ceremony preceding the Friday services attended by Sultan Abdulmecid, how he travelled from Dolmabahce to Sarayburnu by sea, and how the procession made its way to Ayasofia. He does not omit the street dogs of Istanbul and its famous fires, both of which are unfailingly mentioned by travellers. As the traveller describes the beauty of the Kagithane pastures, he also mentions the unkempt state of the waterside palace. As it is known that this palace was built by Mahmut II toreplace the old Sadabad Palace, subsequently neglected by Abdulmecid and finally demolished by abdulaziz, who had the Caglayan Pavilion built on the same site, Bunel's description can be considered an accurate one.
Xavier Marmier (1809-1892), who was famous for his travelogues and also a member of the French Academy, sailed to Istanbul from the Black Sea shortly before the Crimean War in 1846. "The beautiful views of the Bosphorus begin at Buyukdere," hesays, and goes on to complete his observations with this sentence: "No painter's brush would be able to convey the harmonious combination of the displays of colour, layout and light, no writer would be able to express this boundless beauty... Those who have houses built here in order to enjoy this beauty do not adhere to any system like the one in Europe, but build their houses upon piles driven into the bed of the sea. A person who owns a house in this place has acted according to his own tastes and upon his own impulses". Marmier did not neglect to briefly mention the famous triple-deck galleon Mahmudiye, which belonged to the Ottoman navy, in his descriptions of the Bosphorus. "when the Sultan's gilded caique, rowed by twenty oarsmen with arrow-like swiftness from the Old Palace, drew level with Mahmudiye the applause of the white-uniformed sailors lined up along the booms mingled with the gun fired in salute from the ship and those fired from the Tophane barracks. And this was perhaps the only great and wonderful landscape in the whole world that represented pomp and magnificence." However, Marmier was disappointed by the inner city. Naturally, the street dogs of Istanbul, which the Turks could not bring themselves to destroy, occupy a large part of his narrative. The writer did not care much for Pera (Beyoglu), the main street of which was full of potholes and the side streets extremely narrow and he considered that the palatial buildings of the foreign embassies did not beautify it, but, on the contrary, were an ugly contrast. His thoughts about the unkempt graveyards are expressed in these words: "The City of the Dead is no better maintained than that of the living." However, when the city is viewed not from its interior but from a little further afield the dazzling view materializes once more: "It is only then, when the large groups of buildings merge with the verdure of the trees, the picturesque hillsides covered with houses and gardens, the slender minarets rising from their peaks, the azure firmament that frames it all and the crystal-clear water in which it is reflected that this beauty reveals itself." Charles Roland came to Turkey to manage the farm at Burgazovasi near Izmir that had been given to A. de Lamartine as a present. While he was staying in Istanbul in 1852 he made the acquaintance of a number of well-known Turks such as Ahmed Vefik Pasa and was invited to stay in their homes as a guest. When the traveller saw the waterside residence of Resit Pasa at Baltalimani, which was being built at that time "in the Italian style", he revealed that although this house would, when completed, be one of the most splendid to be found anywhere on the Bosphorus, he still preferred the Turkish mansions of old, in spite of their unassuming appearance. He wondered why the Ottomans preferred "a style inferior to that of their own national tastes". Roland's view was a reflection of that expressed by many other foreigners who disliked the imitation of everything European that was so conspicuous during the 19th century. The only quay for passengers disembarking in Istanbul was at Tophane. Here the building of an Italian-style terrace, one of the products of modern taste, in place of the "monumental fountain" with its wooden eaves and roof was, as the art-loving Roland stressed, an affront to the eyes. A few pages further on he stated that he disliked Pera, which entirely resembled a Western city, and found it "characterless". When Roland was exploring the palace at Sarayburnu, which was completely destroyed by fire in 1863, he caught sight of a number of acajou armchairs, gilded clocks and imitation Boule furniture that had been imported from Paris and found them extremely ugly. Another famous French writer to visit Istanbul during the mid 19th century was Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880). He stayed in the city in the winter of 1850 for two months and tells us about it in sentences of telegraphic brevity: the old structure he liked most was "the ivy-draped walls of the city with greenery sprouting all over-they have never been praised sufficiently". He, too, mentions the incident of the golden coins falling into the Golden Horn, as recounted by Maxime de Camp. Although he explored even the most distant corners of Istanbul, he did not write any description of the city worthy of his fame in the literary world.
Fritz Reuter (1810-1874), who wrote in a dialect spoken in northern Germany, provides a brief description of a journey he made to Istanbul in 1864 with a group of colleagues in his book "Reis'nah Konstantinopel"; however, this book can only be understood by those with a knowledge of the dialect. E. About, a French writer whose actual profession was archaeology, showed no interest whatsoever in Byzantine or Ottoman structures during his visit to the city. In his book "De Pontoise a Stamboul" he does not show a great deal of interest in the beauty of the surroundings or in the historic past. About had come as far as the Balkans as a guest of the wagon Lit company on the very first Orient Express and had continued his journey to Istanbul by sea. The writer stayed at the Luxembourg Hotel in Beyoglu, which was run by F. Belon. He stated that his guide was Ahmet Pasa (Seker). The Pasa had taken him to the Dolmabahce Palace, which was furnished with items manufactured in France. About said he was frankly astonished to find that while Indian, Persian and Turkish carpets were the subject of much bidding in the auction rooms of Paris, in Istanbul furniture from Rue de Saint-Antoine and silk from Lyon were in demand. He states quite openly that the opulent French furniture to be found in Istanbul "could not hold a candle to a lamp in a mosque or an enamelled wall tile..." About also mentions the dogs. The Times correspondent De Blowitz was one of the persons accompying About. Blowitz took a great interest in the waterside residences of the ambassadors and in the summerhouse built by Ismail Pasa on the hills above Beykoz.
De Blowitz was trying to play a part in some of the political intrigues going on in Istanbul and for this purpose was doing all he could to insinuate himself into palace circles. During this time he met Namik Pasa, Sheikh Ebu'l Huda and Ahmet Vefik Pasa. As a matter of fact the English economist N. W. Senior(1790-1864), who visited Istanbul between 1857 and 1858, had already met this extremely original Ottoman Turk.
Edmondo de amicis, mentioned in the previous paragraphs, was the author of "Constantinopoli", a classic in the Italian language printed in 1874 and published in all the major languages, including Turkish. De Amicis describes the disappearing Turkish Istanbul and goes on to criticise the European tastes that were replacing it. He admired many of the things he had seen because of their good taste and refinement and it was namely these things that were on their way out at the time the book was written. Now they are no more, and live on in the illustrations in De Amicis's book so beautifully illustrated by C. Biseo. Perhaps it was because this Italian writer himself came from the Mediterranean that he was able to gain a better knowledge of the city than the other travellers and to describe it so vividly.
C. Guys (1802-1855), who was employed as an illustrator by The Illustrated London News was making illustrations of the Crimean War between 1853 and 1855 and his signature is also to be found on drawings depicting the streets of Istanbul and the clothing of its inhabitants. One of these, drawn in pencil and ink, which is to found in Musee des Arts Decoratifs, depicts a little-known corner of the city with its brothels and inhabitants. The number of artists who painted pictures of Istanbul in the mid 19th century was by no means small. Apart from the works of Schrantz, which show in a panoramic manner the beauty of both sides of the Bosphorus (published as lithographs) there were the paintings of the Maltese artist Preziosi, who acquainted the public with Istanbul, its streets and even some of its beggars in his coloured illustrations. A number of other artists from various countries depicted the parts of the city they found interesting in oils or watercolours. Some of these were reproduced in a book entitled Les Peintres du Bosphorus XVIII Siecle, which as its title states, was devoted to the 18th century, published in 1989. One also encounters in auction catalogues the works of 19th century artists who portrayed Istanbul. However, from the middle of the 19th century onwards it was the art of photography, which gave a more realistic impression of the city, that began to yield its first fruits. Robertson (referred to previously), who lived in Istanbul for many years, preserved Istanbul, its buildings and its people for posterity in his photographs, each of which is now a valuable historical document. A good plan of old Istanbul was drawn in 1870 where the layout of the streets at that time and the city's major buildings are shown. Istanbul was an object of considerable interest for Europeans and books on the subject were continually being published. Some of the most perfect descriptions of Istanbul were penned by Ahmet Rasim (1864-1932), a Turk. Such works as "Sehir Mektuplari" (letters from the city), "Fuhs-Atik" (Prostitution in the Old Days), "Hamamci Ulfet" (Ulfet of the Public Baths) and "Falaka" (Bastinado), all describe a world which was beginning to disappear into the depths of history, a forgotten Istanbul, at the end of the 19th century. The most valuable aspect of these descriptions is that they depict the Turkish and Muslim Istanbul, a world which no Western writer was ever able to enter. The journalist Mehmed Tevfik (1843-1932), who was also known by the nickname Caylak (kite) published a number of brochures, which had extremely simple illustrations, under the title of "Istanbul'da Bir Sene" (A Year in Istanbul). A series of booklets describing the people of Istanbul and their way of life is a valuable source in this respect. The appearance of Istanbul at the end of the 19th century was sometimes described by foreign writers in an extremely negative manner. This attitude is quite apparent in the travel notes kept by K. Krumbacher, the founder of Byzantine studies in the West, during his visit to Istanbul in 1884. Krumbacher, sees everything from the Greek point of view in this "greatest of Greek cities". The only items that interested him were the mosaics in the Kariye Mosque (Eminonu), and the newly-founded Archaeological Museum. A French doctor who nursed a particular grudge against the Ottoman state because he had become involved in a political intrigue at the end of the 19th century during the reign of Abdulhamid II published a series of books under the pseudonym of Paul de Regla. In a book entitled "Les Bas-Fonds de Constaninople" (The Shallows of Constantinople), he provides a description of Istanbul's ethnic composition, its stray dogs, Galata and Pera (Beyoglu at night), its intrigues, narcotics centres and disreputable taverns. G. des Godins de Souhesmes, in his books "Au Pays des Osmanlis" (In the Land of the Ottomans) and "Turks et Levantins" (Turks and Levantines) tells us what people ate and drank, how houses were built, describes the servants, the streets and the nature of the city; he then dwells on the stray dogs, guardians of the streets, the goods sold by street sellers and the hawkers cries-all of the 19th century and the early years of the 20th, when the Ottoman state was on the verge of collapse, a large number of people continued to visit the city and write about it. Istanbul also provided a background for a number of novels written at that time. The German novelist Kral May (1842-1912), in "Von Baghdad nach Stambul" (From Baghdad to Istambul), puts his hero through a number of adventures in the Istanbul of the 1870's; however, the city merely serves as a backdrop for the novel. On the other hand, there is a description of Istanbul in the famous novel "Aziyade" by J. Viaud, otherwise known as Pierre Loti (1850-1923). The descriptions of Istanbul adorning a love story that unfolds during the 1870's reflect the last traces of a city that was being lost forever at that time. However, Loti's novel contains so many things that do not fit in with the topography of the city that it is difficult to believe they are true. Many references to Istanbul are to be found in the European novels of the period. "Pages d'Orient" (Pages of the Orient), by an unknown writer named M. Noe is a mixture of travelogue and detective fiction. A similar technique is employed in "De L'Homme qui Assasina" by Claude Farrere (1876-1957), who, like Loti came to Istanbul as a naval officer.