{"id":1158,"date":"2017-09-26T23:45:56","date_gmt":"2017-09-27T04:45:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/?page_id=1158"},"modified":"2021-11-16T16:09:09","modified_gmt":"2021-11-16T21:09:09","slug":"ottoman-turkish-houses","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/ottoman-turkish-houses\/","title":{"rendered":"Ottoman Turkish Houses"},"content":{"rendered":"

Outside the heart of the city, most houses in 16th-century Istanbul were a semi-rural type: One to three rooms, on average, with a small courtyard and possibly a veranda-like indoor\/outdoor room called a sofa<\/em>. The courtyard and sofa were as much a part of the house as the enclosed rooms were. They were where all the dirty work was done, and where a woman would spend much of her day.<\/p>\n

Indoors, each room was a self-contained living unit. It had everything the family needed to socialize, dress, bathe, eat, and sleep. A fireplace or brazier offered warmth, and built-in cabinets and display niches stored all the family’s belongings.<\/p>\n

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A winter room in a 19th-century house in Gebze. Although the room is unquestionably post-period, its simplicity helps to suggest what a modest home of the 16th century might feel like.<\/p><\/div>\n

There are no residences surviving from the 16th century or earlier except for Topkapi Palace and the G\u00fcpg\u00fcpo\u011flu Mansion<\/a>, both heavily rebuilt and remodeled over the centuries. The houses below are early enough and intact enough to be useful in reconstructing 16th-century houses:<\/p>\n