{"id":3080,"date":"2025-04-07T19:16:41","date_gmt":"2025-04-08T00:16:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/?page_id=3080"},"modified":"2025-04-07T19:16:42","modified_gmt":"2025-04-08T00:16:42","slug":"womens-names-in-foundation-records","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/turkish-names\/muslim-names\/womens-names-in-foundation-records\/","title":{"rendered":"Women&#8217;s Names in Foundation Records"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Both men and women endowed <em>vakfs<\/em>, charitable foundations that bore their founder&#8217;s name and could endure for centuries. When I started reading a table of the names of women who endowed vakfs in the city of Ankara in the 14th through 16th centuries, I expected to find the usual [name] bint [father&#8217;s name] pattern, but instead I found&#8230; madness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It started slow, with plenty of women described simply as &#8220;Lady [name]&#8221;:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Cansuz Hatun<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Devlet Hatun<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Emine Hatun<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Samade Hatun<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>But some of the women&#8217;s names were male:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Bahtiyar Hatun<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Beyrek Hatun<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u0130skender Hatun<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Mirsad Hatun<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Pir Nebi Hatun<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Maybe they were a variation on the names that meant &#8220;[male name]&#8217;s lady&#8221;?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Bah\u015f\u0131 Hatunu<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Hac\u0131 Ahmed Hatunu<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u0130mam Hatunu<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>But there were also names that meant &#8220;a lady called [male name]&#8221;:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Kad\u0131 Ayas nam Hatun, <em>a lady called Judge Ayas<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>O\u011ful Pa\u015fa nam Hatun, <em>a lady called Pasha&#8217;s Son<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u00d6renku\u015f nam Hatun, <em>a lady called \u00d6renku\u015f<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Did some women go by their husband&#8217;s name, the way English and American women used to be Mrs. Robert Smith? Did some women have male names?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then titles went wonky:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Ay\u015fe Bac\u0131, <em>Sister Ay\u015fe, a female religious title<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Bac\u0131 Hatun &#8211; <em>Now Bac\u0131 is a personal name<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Bac\u0131 Bula &#8211; <em>Now Bac\u0131 is a personal name and the title is Bula, which literally means &#8220;older sister&#8221; but is also an early title for certain ranks of court ladies<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Katun Bula<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Fadik Bula &#8211; <em>Okay, I&#8217;m getting the hang of Bula<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Hatun Bula &#8211; <em>You&#8217;re joking, right?<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Bula Hatun &#8211; <em>FML.<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>There were multiple ways to say a woman was a daughter:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Ay\u015fe Hatun binti Halil Baba, <em>Lady Ay\u015fe daughter of Halil Baba<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Hamamc\u0131 Cafer k\u0131z\u0131 Usul, <em>Bathhouse-Keeper Cafer&#8217;s daughter Usul<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Ni&#8217;medan k\u0131z\u0131, <em>Ni&#8217;medan&#8217;s daughter<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Or a wife:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>M\u00fcezzin Hatunu<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Kamir \u00c7omlu kar\u0131<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>\u0130skender Hatun?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Kad\u0131 Ayas nam Hatun?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Or a sister:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Abd\u00fclkerim ve k\u0131zkar\u0131nda\u015f\u0131 Hatice, <em>Abd\u00fclkerim and his sister Hatice<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Sefer Hem\u015fire, <em>Sefer&#8217;s Sister<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>There were personal names that were probably nicknames:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>\u015eerbet Hatun, <em>Lady Sherbet<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>K\u00fc\u00e7\u00fck Hatun, <em>Lady Little<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>There were personal names that referred to where the woman came from:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>M\u0131s\u0131rl\u0131 Hatun, <em>Egyptian Lady<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Rum Hatun, <em>Turkish-Greek Lady<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Haymanal\u0131 Hac\u0131 Hatun, <em>Lady Pilgrim-from-Haymana<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>And there were names that further research showed were misleading:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Efendi Hatun, <em>which looks like &#8220;Lady Sir&#8221; but is short for Eftendise<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Ayni Hatun, <em>referred to elsewhere as S\u00fcleyman k\u0131z\u0131 Ayni\u015fah<\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Sultan Hatun &#8211; <em>Sultan is a common female name, but this particular Sultan Hatun is Melike Hatun, daughter of a 13th-century Seljuk sultan. She&#8217;s not a lady named Sultan (&#8220;imperial&#8221;), she is literally Imperial Lady.<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Both men and women endowed vakfs, charitable foundations that bore their founder&#8217;s name and could endure for centuries. When I started reading a table of the names of women who endowed vakfs in the city of Ankara in the 14th through 16th centuries, I expected to find the usual [name]\u2026<\/p>\n<p class=\"continue-reading-button\"> <a class=\"continue-reading-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/turkish-names\/muslim-names\/womens-names-in-foundation-records\/\">Continue reading<i class=\"crycon-right-dir\"><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":2956,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[108],"tags":[5],"class_list":["post-3080","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","category-muslim-names","tag-female-names"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3080"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3080\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3082,"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3080\/revisions\/3082"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.issendai.com\/16thcenturyistanbul\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}