Topkapi Palace
TOPKAPI PALACE
Governmental seat of the Ottoman Empire.
The New Palace (Saray-Cedid), now known as the Topkapi Palace (in reference to the eighteenth-century royal summer residence next to the seaside Cannon Gate), occupied the site of Byzantium's ancient acropolis in what was then the city of Constantinople (now Istanbul). Enclosed by protective walls, the Topkapi Palace stood in the middle of a vast woodland. It served for nearly four centuries as the principal center of governance for the entire Ottoman Empire.
The administrative functions of the government were located in the outer (birun) court of the fortress-palace, and the inner (enderun) court included space for the royal pavilions and the palace school. The quarters for the sultan's pages surrounded the inner court; the harem quarters were behind its northern wall, overlooking the section of Istanbul known as the Golden Horn.
The Topkapi Palace lost its importance when the court moved to the Dolmabahçe Palace in 1854. After that date, aside from certain ceremonial occasions involving the holy relics of Islam (kept in the privy chamber), it hardly ever was used. Since its renovation in the 1930s, the Topkapi Palace has been a museum.
Bibliography
Necipoğlu, Gülrü. Architecture, Ceremonial, and Power: The Topkapi Palace in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries. New York: Architectural History Foundation, 1991.
aptullah kuran
updated by eric hooglund