Princes 4

(initially ‘WHAT REALLY HAPPENED TO THE PRINCES IN THE TOWER’)

By Pueros

(Hist)

Chapter 4 – Topkapi

(Constantinople, January 1484)

One of the magnificent structures the wagon passed was a huge domed edifice with a narrow but tall pointed brick tower in the south-eastern corner. The boys would later learn that the main structure was the Hagia Sophia, formerly a Byzantine Christian cathedral commissioned centuries before by the Emperor Justinian I, which at this time still retained frescoes and mosaics of Christian saints despite being converted to be a Moslem mosque, with its new apse and altar, or ‘mihrap’, facing Mecca. The tower was a minaret, the first of four that would eventually appear at each corner. The boys themselves would, over the next few years, occasionally spy the second tower gradually appear on the city skyline at the north-eastern corner as Sultan Bayezid repeated his father’s earlier minaret construction.

The wagon eventually arrived at the gates of a huge complex of splendid buildings, which the boys were soon to discover was the ‘Saray’, Persian for ‘palace’, vast sumptuous home of the Sultan. It was known at the time to Europeans as the ‘Grand Seraglio’ but would later be called the ‘Topkapi Palace’. ‘Topkapi’ means ‘cannon gate’, a name derived from the two large cannons that guarded the Imperial water gate on the Bosphorus.

The sprawling pastiche of different architectural styles had been begun in 1453 by Mehmet II, the ‘Conqueror’, and additions would be made by his successors over subsequent centuries. The many thousands who dwelt within the walls were answerable only to the Sultan, who was answerable only to God. The complex, veritably a city within a city, comprised a large group of big beautiful buildings and lovely garden courtyards, connected by gates. There were three distinct areas, the Outer Palace, Inner Palace and the Forbidden Palace or Harem, also known as the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Courts.

The Saray’s many guards, gardeners and craftsmen dressed in distinctive colour-coded garb for identification and resided in dormitories within the Outer Palace, a busy colourful place that even possessed its own zoo, with bears, elephants and lions. The Inner Palace included accommodation for a large number of Imperial bureaucrats who conducted the central administration of the expanding Empire. The Forbidden Palace, or Harem, included the Sultan’s private home. It comprised a series of luxurious suites, many elaborately tiled in blue, turquoise and aquamarine or lined with charming still-life frescoes, that housed the Imperial family. The running of the Imperial household would be typically organised by the Sultan’s mother or the senior of his wives, of whom he was permitted up to four by Islamic law. The Imperial children and concubines, of both sexes, would also be housed within.

For the female members of the Imperial family and female and male concubines, the Forbidden Palace was actually a gilded cage because they led a completely cloistered life, guarded by a corps of black eunuchs who served as go-betweens with the outside world where they were not allowed to go. Privacy and silence were the main rules to be observed. The only entrance to this 3rd Court was called the ‘Gate of Felicity’, through which access was controlled by the Kapi Agha or Chief White Eunuch. He also oversaw the Palace School and commanded the Inner Palace services including, most importantly, all messages conveyed to the Sultan. Outsiders were granted permission to enter the Forbidden Palace only by invitation of the Sultan, conveyed via the Kapi Agha, and assignations were always ritualised and usually limited to a few officials. For other outsiders, the 3rd Court was strictly off-limits.

Nevertheless, the Forbidden Palace was still a busy place as it accommodated two other groups of people, both mainstays of the Ottoman Empire, besides the Imperial family and their black eunuchs. The corps of White Eunuchs and the Imperial Pages were both residents of the Courtyard of the White Eunuchs within the 3rd Court. The courtyard was small by palace standards and was located to the left of the Gate of Felicity. At its centre was a fountain where the eunuchs and their charges washed.

The responsibilities of the white eunuchs were twofold. First, they assisted their leader in the performance of his duties, especially by acting as the Sultan’s personal guards. Second, they supervised the Imperial Pages, boys training for important posts within the Empire, usually in groups of ten youngsters. Palace eunuchs were invariably either Caucasian or black because it was against Islamic law to emasculate a Muslim. They would be castrated at an early age and some would spend time first as male concubines until they became too old to satisfy the Sultan’s tastes. Most of the white eunuchs came from the Balkans and Greece, conquered by the Ottomans over the last century, although some, like the Kapi Agha himself, had been secured from more distant European lands and were therefore rare and highly prized.

At the north-eastern corner of the 3rd Court was the Treasury, which had formed the original palace and was perhaps still the most beautiful of its structures. The building was the Sultan’s personal quarters. The exterior was rather simple and serene, giving little hint of its dazzling interior, which comprised four rooms, two porches, one facing the Sea of Marmara, and two basements. Each of the main rooms had a throne for the Sultan’s comfort, each solid gold and inlaid with ebony and mother-of-pearl or set with emeralds and rubies. One had been made by melting down 80000 gold ducats. The rooms were decorated with many other rich splendours, such as jewelled armour and weapons and miniature paintings. The ‘Topkapi Dagger’ was to play a major role in a 20th century film. The basements formed the Sultan’s depository for his personal immense fortune, enormous by any standards. The rooms were full of tributes and war booty, including the 5th largest diamond known to the world, even today.

This was the new world to which the six beautiful fair-skinned, blonde-haired, blue-eyed boys from north-western Europe, including the rightful King of England and his brother, were now destined.

(To be continued in Chapter 4 – ‘Eunuchs’)