Shirine Hamadeh. The City's Pleasures: Istanbul in the Eighteenth Century. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2007. 368 pp. $60.00, cloth, ISBN 978-0-295-98667-8. Reviewed by Fariba Zarinefab Published on H-Urban (September, 2009) Commissioned by Alexander Vari (Marywood University) Shirine Hamadeh’s book is a timely contribu‐ calls it a process of "décloisennement," or opening tion to the architectural history of Istanbul in a lit‐ up culturally and socially. Further, she underlines tle-known yet crucial period of its history. In a the importance of the ruling elite--particularly the creative attempt and in the absence of architec‐ grand vizier Damad Ibrahim Pasha (1718-30)--Ot‐ tural plans and few surviving buildings (palaces), toman princesses, as well as the average citizens Hamadeh uses various mediums such as poetry, of Istanbul, whom she defines as the "new bour‐ chronograms, and Ottoman and European paint‐ geoisie" in this construction boom. Moreover, she ings to reconstruct the architectural and social shows that in the post-Carlowitz period and after history of imperial palaces, palatial gardens, and 1699, the sultan and his grand vizier were con‐ fountains that were built by members of the royal sciously engaged in the projection of imperial family. Many of the palaces, such as the famous power within and outside the empire, exemplified Sa’dabad built during the Tulip period (1718-30), by relentless building activity and the conquest of were destroyed either by the rebels in 1730 or at the waterfront in Istanbul. the order of Sultan Mahmud I. Hamadeh convinc‐ The book is divided into eight chapters and ingly puts to rest many myths regarding the Tulip contains three maps, numerous illustrations and period. Critiquing the paradigm of Westerniza‐ paintings by European and Ottoman artists, as tion, she draws our attention to both continuity well as photographs taken by the author herself. It and change in Ottoman architectural forms as also contains the author’s translations of Ottoman well as the rise of an "Ottoman idiom" that was a chronograms and poetry. It is a well-written and combination of Eastern/Ottoman and Western well-documented book, sumptuously illustrated, forms in architecture and decorative patterns. She that displays the author’s multiple skills and pas‐ points to receptivity and fexibility in the adop‐ sion for her subject. tion of new motifs in art and architecture and H-Net Reviews Chapters 1 and 2 focus on the relocation of brick-and-stone base in contrast to the old imperi‐ the imperial seat of power from Topkapi Palace to al palaces, following the pattern set in the rest of the suburbs on the waterfront. The royal family the city. Unlike Topkapi Palace, they were not iso‐ built and restored more than 300 imperial lated and enclosed behind walls and trees nor did palaces, numerous palatial gardens, pavilions, they follow a formal pattern. They were exposed fountains, bridges, water infrastructure, and to the public who viewed the palaces from their roads in 150 years. Sultan Ahmed III and his boats on the Bosphorus. Moreover, many of the grand vizier Ibrahim Pasha commissioned the new palaces and residences like Çirağan were building of the palaces of Sa’adabad and Hür‐ also used for diplomatic purposes and other af‐ remabad in Kağithane, Çirağan in Beşiktaş, Hü‐ fairs of government. The monarch and his family mayunabad in Bebek, etc. Beşiktaş was the strate‐ came out from the confinement of Topkapi Palace gic location for most for these palaces due to its and openly participated in festivities and ban‐ proximity to Topkapi Palace. The relocation of quets. non-Muslims and the demolition of their build‐ Chapter 4 focuses on the emergence of public ings sometimes preceded the rise of new palaces gardens built by members of the ruling class on and gardens. the waterfront in Emirgan and Kağithane. They This trend followed the relocation of the rul‐ represented an extension of the burgeoning ur‐ ing class from Topkapi Palace to the waterfront ban culture of coffeehouses, taverns, and street suburbs. The excursions of the imperial family to performances. The royal family played an impor‐ the waterfront resorts occasioned elaborate pro‐ tant role in converting some royal and palatial cessions, pageantry, and displays of state splen‐ gardens into public gardens as the court lost inter‐ dor. The waterfront had been transformed into an est or stopped using them. Fountains and coffee‐ imperial processional stage. A large convoy of im‐ houses were the focal point of public gardens and perial women and children, slaves and servants squares (meydan), which reflected a growth in the moved to the suburbs during the summer season, recreational activity of the public. The state built participating in banquets and festivities and plac‐ mosques on the waterfront that created fuidity ing Ottoman grandeur on public display. This also between sacred and recreational space, encourag‐ prompted the enclosure of suburban palaces ing more sociability. The boundary between impe‐ within walls and gardens, state control of public rial and non-imperial and private and public gar‐ space, and greater policing of the shores along the dens became fuzzy as the royal family became waterfront. more visible and displayed its wealth and ritual to Chapter 3 underlines the ceremonial, festive, public gaze. Its sense of pleasure trickled down to and practical aspects of the new palaces and pala‐ all segments of society. At the same time, the state tial gardens along the European shores of the contained public life and ritualized leisure by cre‐ Bosphorus. Following perhaps their pastoral ating sumptuary laws and converting the royal ethos, members of the ruling dynasty found nu‐ gardener’s corps (bostancı) into moral police to merous occasions to retreat, feast, and celebrate, dictate the new forms of public life, maintain or‐ such as Ramadan and the births and weddings of der, and enforce sumptuary laws. Appealing to Ottoman princesses. What was different was the sensual rather than spiritual sensibilities in order open display of festivity, which projected Ottoman to gather the congregation was the new trend. power--no longer concealed within the confines of The creation of a new poetic discourse on the Topkapi Palace--along the waterfront. The new theme of the garden was specific to the eighteenth palaces and residences were built with timer on a century, as the author demonstrates in chapter 5 2 H-Net Reviews with numerous examples of beautifully translated created an architectural idiom that was highly hy‐ divan poetry. Most of this poetry has to do with brid and reflected the religious and ethnic diversi‐ the seeking of forbidden (homosexual) love in ty of the capital. She does not agree wholehearted‐ palatial gardens and public parks, away from the ly with the dominant view that Ottoman palaces gaze of the public. The author argues that this po‐ like Sa’dabad were modeled after French palaces. etry was more in touch with popular culture and She also stresses the continuing influence of Per‐ reality than the idealized idioms of the classical sian poetry, art, and culture on Ottoman aesthet‐ cannon, which had to do with the diffusion of pa‐ ics. Ottoman novelty in art and architecture re‐ tronage and more open forms of sociability. The mained connected to what was familiar. Here, the image of the garden is that of a public hangout, a author could have used a broader comparison social and open space for ordinary men, women, with similar artistic and architectural develop‐ and children. The active presence of women in ments in late Safavid Iran, a topic that deserves a the garden was novel in both verse and painting. comparative study. Moreover, the encounter be‐ Chapter 6 and 7 focus more specifically on tween the Ottoman Empire and the West was mu‐ building chronograms in verse, particularly on tual as the Europeans became more receptive to hundreds of fountains, waterfront palaces, and Ottoman artistic expression and material culture exteriors of mosques, which became a feature of and settled in the imperial capital in growing eighteenth-century Istanbul. A genre of poetry de‐ numbers. veloped which the author describes as an "archi‐ Nevertheless, Hamadeh offers a convincing tectural discourse" that praised the founder and argument in deconstructing long-held myths his patronage, the building, and its visual aspects, about the eighteenth century and the Tulip period with a novel appreciation for architecture. The as a turning point in the Westernization of Ot‐ dramatic use of poetic idioms like light and reflec‐ toman art and architecture. She instead under‐ tion in describing the waterfront palaces and pub‐ lines continuity, receptivity, and fuidity in aes‐ lic fountains, and their sumptuous decoration thetics that resulted in a hybrid Ottoman idiom in with images of fowers, fruits, and trees, were the capital that was bound to tradition as well as drawn from nature. The author argues that mime‐ novelty. What was new was the increasing role of sis and the realistic analogy between art, poetry, non-courtly residents in this process. This book is and nature in a shared idiom that permeated ar‐ indispensable to urban historians and historians chitectural landscapes were peculiar to the eigh‐ of Ottoman art and architecture. The author as teenth century although the naturalistic foral well as the University of Washington Press must decoration and motifs had been part of the Ot‐ be congratulated for producing a fne and elegant toman visual repertoire. Moreover, she rightly book that will be read and considered for some notes in chapter 8 that the Ottoman-European cul‐ time. tural and artistic interaction was not new to the eighteenth century and had existed for over two hundred years.