A life on the Bosphorus
Sinan Genim
Known more for his architectural and restoration projects, Sinan Genim recently published an important book on Istanbul as well
http://www.thy.com/en-INT/corporate/skylife/article.aspx?mkl=301

While most of what's interesting dates from the past 100 years or so, the area's history predates that of the European shore. The oldest settlement in the Istanbul metropolitan area, Chalcedon, was discovered near Kadıköy and dates from neolithic times, much earlier than anything on the European side. The first Greek city was also founded at Kadıköy in 675 BC -17 years before the founding of Byzantium. But, separated by water from their more powerful European neighbour, the Asian settlements suffered badly over subsequent millennia; the work of various invading armies explains the lack of substantial early remains.

Before the 19th century, only Ãœsküdar saw any significant development. That changed in 1852 when a steam ferry company, Sirket-i Hayriye (literally 'the good deeds company'), started plying its trade across the straits. Rich Levantines from Beyoğlu began constructing elaborate summer mansions along the shore to the south and east of Kadıköy.

For the first 50 years of the service, the ferries were all products of British shipyards. In fact, trade between the Ottoman and British empires was at such a level that by the end of the 19th century the Kadıköy suburb of Moda was more or less an English colony.

Under the republic, most of the mansions were demolished and replaced by apartment blocks. These retained the mansion garden settings, though, something which gives the Asian shore, especially between Kadıköy and Bostancı, a more spacious feel than the European side.

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süper
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Beyağaç
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my pleasure!

In old Turkish yülü meant shaving, yölgüç was a razor, yölügen a barber, yülemek to shave, and yülük a person who had shaved. But later, if the terminology is anything to go by, foreign influences came to dominate in the sphere of shaving and hair dressing. Two Turkish terms for barber, berber and perkârn, derived from the Italian barbierre and the French perruquier respectively, while kuaför for a ladies' hairdresser comes from the French coiffieur, and týraþ, meaning shave, from the Persian terâþ, to scrape or make smooth. If all the information, documents and pictures relating to the barbers of Istanbul from the second century AD until the mid-20th century were to be gathered together it would make an extraordinary historical archive. Legend has it that the butcher Hesperos was Byzantium's first barber thanks to his dexterity with the kuika ergaleia (razor), which was why the city's barbers were known as the 'drudges of Hesperos'. Most Byzantine barbers set up their stalls in churchyards, as so much of their trade consisted of shaving the heads of monks

Until the recent past no neighbourhood of Istanbul was without its fountains, and if the districts outside the city walls and the villages along the Bosphorus are included these numbered many hundreds. Here local people obtained their drinking water, so at all times of day groups of people were to be seen waiting their turn. The city had several water systems, the largest being the Kirkcesme or Forty Fountains. Piping water from springs and constructing fountains were regarded as among the most honourable acts of charity, and no charge was made for using the water. Since, like the mosque and coffee house, fountains served as meeting places for local people, they played an important social role. Here news and gossip were exchanged, and flirtations between young people took root and flourished.

The oldest fountain to which we can put a date in the city is that next to Davut Pasa Mosque built in 1485 during the reign of Bayezid II (1481-1512), and the loveliest is the Ahmed III Fountain which stands before the Imperial Gate of Topkapi Palace on the site of a former Byzantine fountain known as Géranion. This was built in 1728/29 by Mehmed Aga, chief architect to Ahmed III (1703-173, whose reign corresponds to a period known as the Tulip Era because of the popularity of this flower in gardens and as a motif. The fountain is in the form of a miniature pavilion roofed by a lead-covered central dome and four smaller domes, which flare out into broad eaves. There are taps in each of its four faces, and at each corner is a sebil, or kiosk where drinking water was distributed in cups to passers-by. Encircling the fountain is an inscription band in letters of gold on turquoise tiles. This inscription is an ode by the poet Seyyit Vehbi praising the fountain and comparing its water to that of the holy Zemzem well near the Kaaba in Mecca.

One of the loveliest fountains outside the city walls is Tophane Fountain, built in Turkish rococo style in 1732, during the reign of Mahmud I (1730-1754) by the architect Ahmed Aga.
Originally this fountain stood in the crowded square beside Tophane quay, but the shoreline here was later filled in, so that it is now set back from the sea. Another elegant fountain is Saliha Sultan Fountain in front of Sokollu Mehmed Pasa Mosque which stands at the northern end of the Unkapani Bridge in Azapkapi on the Golden Horn.

In the Munzur Mountains in eastern Turkey is the small town of Kemaliye, known in Ottoman times as Egin. It lies on the River Karasu, a tributary of the upper Euphrates, which over the ages formed a natural barrier between the states warring for supremacy in Anatolia. The valley of the Karasu, which in this region is largely rugged and rocky, here widens slightly, allowing the town a foothold. But the real source of life for the town is the spring of Kadigölü at the foot of the mountains. The streams fed by the spring wander all through the town, along the edge of the streets and beneath houses where they cool the larders; pour from fountains in gardens, courtyards and squares, occasionally forming pools and turning water mills; and lend their background music to the singing of birds. The earliest mention of the town in written records dates from the 11th century, when it is thought to have been founded.

Foreign travellers always spoke eloquently of the town, as in the case of Helmuth von Moltke, who visited Kemaliye in 1839 and described it as the loveliest town that he had seen in Asia, equalled only by Amasya. The limited amount of land available for farming and its remoteness from the main trade routes were the main factors in the social, economic and cultural destiny of Kemaliye.