Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- List of maps
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Who's who
- Map 1 Istanbul and its environs
- Map 2 Locations within the city
- Introduction
- 1 Conquest
- 2 The palace and the populace
- 3 Fear and death
- 4 Welfare
- 5 The consuming city
- 6 Outings and excursions
- 7 The hamam
- 8 The nineteenth century
- Beyond the city
- Select bibliography
- Index
8 - The nineteenth century
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- List of maps
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Who's who
- Map 1 Istanbul and its environs
- Map 2 Locations within the city
- Introduction
- 1 Conquest
- 2 The palace and the populace
- 3 Fear and death
- 4 Welfare
- 5 The consuming city
- 6 Outings and excursions
- 7 The hamam
- 8 The nineteenth century
- Beyond the city
- Select bibliography
- Index
Summary
During the nineteenth century, Istanbul was to witness many changes that were to alter the lives of its citizens. New fashions arrived from Europe, new political ideas and concepts of state began to permeate the political circles of the capital, and even views on how a city should be laid out altered. Yet for all this innovation, Istanbul remained the lively, disorganised, chaotic and dynamic metropolis it had always been, and novelties arrived, were absorbed and became part of the Ottoman fabric just as they always had. What was different was the increasing political and financial weakness that delivered the empire into the rapacious hands of western imperialism, which squeezed ever tighter round the Ottoman windpipe until, with the First World War, all hope of survival was gone.
The traditional city
While much changed in the life of the city during the nineteenth century, much remained the same. Fire and plague constantly assailed the population of the late Ottoman empire and drove them to distraction. Mahalle life continued much as it always had: those who sat behind the steamed-up windows of the coffee house in their entaris
were grandsons of those in the [nearby] graveyard. Only the waters of their water pipes moved while the people themselves seemed less mobile than those gravestones. All frozen and insensible like the Seven Sleepers, they seemed untrammelled by cares. Their little mosque was just next door, their graveyard was there, the grocer and the butcher were near, the baker came every day, the water seller brought the water and God even provided them with neighbours.
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- Information
- A Social History of Ottoman Istanbul , pp. 271 - 327Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010
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