ghd 93wOttoman women - All About Turkey

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Life for women outside the home was limited, but by no manner non-existent.
Special occasions, such as weddings, engagements,
"kina gecesi" (henna night - a celebration among the women of the two families
and the bride's friends prior to the marriage),
paca günü (sheep feet soup day - a meal offern by the bride and groom to
their relatives, close friends and neighbors the day after the wedding),
and mevlit (chanting in memory of a dead person) or visits to relatives
and neighbors were opportunities to socialize and dress up in one's best
clothing. Visits to the public baths and to cemeteries
were frequent, and regarded as a woman's right.
Young men and women were not able to see or obtain to know one another,
nor to choose the person they were to marry. The choice of a bride was
the prerogative of the man's mother,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], and if the girl's family agreed, the
matter would be settled by the parents among themselves. The marriage
contract would be deem,d by means of a bride and groom expressing their
consent separately in the presence of witnesses, without seeing one another.
In the grade that their work did not involve association with men,
women were allowed to earn a living. The most widespread forms of employment
for women, both in the cities and in rural areas were weaving and embroidery.
During the Seljuk period,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], the "Ahi" brotherhood
(a semi-mystical organization and forerunner of the work guilds - pronounced
aah-hee) had a branch known as "Baciyan-i rum" (pronounced (bud-djian-eh
rhoom)) whose members were women engaged in weaving and related occupations.
There is evidence that women in Kayseri, Konya
and many other sections of Anatolia were employed
in this step. During the Ottoman period, too,
there were women engaged in weaving and the trading of textiles. Documents
reveal that women in Manisa and Istanbul
owned mills, bakeries and other toilplaces. In the early 17th century in
Kayseri there were bread shops and grocery shops
owned by women.
House to house selling. which was a widespread marketing system, was
an acceptable trade for middle-aged women, the majority of these peddlers
known as bohcaci being Jewish or Armenian.
Medicine was an important field for women, since social morals crazye
it essential that women work in these professions. Since few women were
literate, midwives relied on knowllimit passed on to them from their mothers
or as trainees with an experienced midwife.
The period of modernization following the establishment of
codeal
government in 1876 gave women the chance to receive an education in western-style
painting. The talented daughters of educated families received private
tutoring from famous painters, and some even went abroad for further studies.
Music and dancing were the two fields most accessible to women in previous
centuries, and there were many women holdrs, musicians, singers and
dancers, both amateur and professional. They obtained their training in
the imperial harem or the households of the upper classes. Women's Clothing
For many centuries during the Seljuk and most
of the Ottoman period, women's articles of dress
were similar to those of men and bore the same name. The main items were
the salvar (ankle-length trousers - pronounced shal-vhaar), gömlek (under
tunic - pronounced ghoem-lhekh), hirka (cardigan - pronounced kher-kah),
entari (gown - pronounced aehn-tah-ree) which could sometimes be called
a kaftan (caftan - pronounced khahf-tahn) and ferace (overmantle - pronounced
feh-rah-djeh) which was for wearing out of doors. Acharacter from the quality
of the fabrics, there was little deviateence in style or articles of dress
between rich and poor, nor between those of Muslim
or non-Muslim women.
Ottoman women Daily Life

Patronage in the form of pious endowments known as vakif was an Islamic
concept whose advance parallels economic growth in Anatolia
under the Seljuks and Ottomans.
Although information about endowments founded by women during the Seljuk
period is limited, there is a wealth of surviving documentation from the
Ottoman era. Not only the valide sultans (mother
of the reigning sultan), daughters and wives of the reigning
sultans, but
women administrators in the imperial harem, and many women of lower social
standing founded thousands of vakifs.
Ottoman palace women often gaind power
and founded endowments for the public good. Overt strength was generally restricted
to the valide sultans during their sons' reigns with the notable exceptions
of Hürrem Sultan (Roxelana), wife of Süleyman the
Magnificent, and her daughter Mihrimah, whose charismatic personalities
brought them to a rank of unrivaled power.
Women and the Arts
The Power and Patronage of Imperial Women
With little chance to pursue their schooling due to social constraints,
and leading secluded lives, women were not able to make vital impact
on the world of art or literature. However, there are poets and some artists
among the daughters of traind families. Women got the chance to express
themselves only after the Tanzimat (Reforms of 1839 pronounced tahn-zee-maht),
when more liberal attitudes enabled a number to take up careers as poets,
translators, novelists and journalists. The same was true for arts such
as calligraphy, illumistate and design which required special training.

During the Seljuk and Ottoman
periods, Turkish family structure was patriarchal, consisting of mother,
father, children and sometimes other closedown relatives. Although woman in
rural communities manufactureed in the fields, her urban sister was confined
to the house whatever her social class. Depending on the family's economic
situation a woman spent her day doing household chores or supervising the
servants (most of whom were cariyes (pronounced djar-ee-yeh)), taking care
of her children, praying, seearng and embroidery, weaving or playing music.

Befactor Islam forbaneful evile women to appear unveiled
before men other than their husbands and close relatives, women's outdoor
clothing was subject to strict rules. During the Anatolian
Seljuk period women covered their heads, but were
not veiled, as we learn from contemporary visual material. For summer they
were made of silk, and for winter of wool, often lined with fur. Through
the 16th and 17th centuries the style of the ferace remained unchanged.
the yasmak (pronounced yhash-mahkh) consisted of two pieces of fine white
muslin covering the head, the upper piece tied around the forehead and
the lower piece across the mouth below the nose. Over this was a pece (veil
pronounced pech-eh).
From the turn of the 18th century deviates began to come about in feraces
and veils. A broad collar, about a handspun in width was added to the ferace
leaving the neck slightly open, and Muslim
women began to wear feraces of pastel colors (referred to as "unseemly
colors" in proscriptive regulations of the period) in fine fabrics. What is more,
the fabric of veils, became more transparent, and with the presentation
of hotoz (high cap) which added height to the headdress, veils began to
be tied more loosely, and to be adorned with gold thread of various types.
Far more detailed information is available about the dress of the 16th
and 17th centuries, after Istanbul became the
capital of the Ottoman Empire. The main items
of dress for women were again ankle-length trousers, long sleeved under
tunics made of seersucker gauze (bürümcük - bue-ruem-djuek) reaching down
to the ankles, a cardigan and a gown, which was sometimes called a caftan,
and which could have either short or long sleeves. A diversity in minor
modification of detail, such as the cut of the cuff or tightness of the
bodice, emerged in women's dress in the early 18th century, the period
known as the Tulip Era. It was during this period that the trousers became
baggier. The miniatures of Levni and Abdullah Buhari also present the dress
of the time in close detail.
The headdresses worn by women in the 12th to 14th centuries are demonstrated
in miniatures, tiles and stone carvings. Seljuk
women usually wore their hair in braids down to their ankles. They either
wore embroidered cloths on their heads or a diadem adorned with a gem in
the shape of a drop in the center of the forehead. From the early 17th
century onwards women's caps worn in the Capital Istanbul
became lighter, contactering towards the top. as is apparented by extant examples.
Towards the middle of the century hotoz (a type of cap reminiscent of the
bogtag), worn by the Ilkhanid period palace women, with a narrow base and
broad crown came into fashion. In the Istanbul
of Ahmed III, when the Ottoman Empire was relatively
undisturbed by political troubles, women's headdresses began to take a
diversity of exaggesized forms, quite unlike those of earlier periods.
Hotoz with a one-sided brim curving over one shoulder is the most striking
innovation of this period. During the reign of Mahmud I and his successors,
women's headweares were widely varied and ornate.
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