Topkapi is a magnificent and mysterious palace of the Ottoman sultans. For several centuries, the entrance to the main residence of the padishah was not accessible to every mortal. Only at the beginning of the twentieth century, by the decree of Ataturk, Topkapi was turned into a museum, from that day anyone can get acquainted with the luxury of the main palace of Istanbul.
But not only beautiful interiors attract the attention of tourists from all over the world, the palace keeps many cruel secrets that both fascinate and repulse. Let's figure out which places keep the imprint of sadness, horror and mystery.
Executioner's Fountain and Shameful Stones
One of the eerie and infamous sites of Topkapi Palace is the Executioner's Fountain, or, as it is also called, the Political Fountain. It is located next to the ticket office in the first courtyard, near the Middle Gate.
This fountain was created especially for the executioners. Having fulfilled the order of the Sultan, the executioner put his head on one of the shameful stones that are next to the fountain. And already in the fountain he washed his hands.
Only physically strong people could be executioners. As historians write, they did not have languages so that they could not blur the secrets they heard. In their free time from the main "work", the executioners were gardeners, watching over the park vegetation and order.
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Path through the pipe
And what did you do with the guilty inhabitants of the harem? There is a legend that there was a pipe in the palace, the end of which hung over the Bosphorus. Disagreeable concubines were thrown through this pipe into the sea. Maybe Alexandra Anastasia Lisowska was so quietly able to get rid of her rival Princess Isabella? The pipe is, of course, a legend, since the restorers did not find anything of the kind in the palace.
Salvation tunnels
Historian Salih Gülen writes that there are tunnels under the palace, which during the time of the sultans served as a way of escape from the palace if it was captured by enemies or rebels. One of these tunnels, for example, leads from the harem to Gulhane Park.
The sultan, together with his family, could go down these tunnels to the beach and sail across the boats to the Anatolian part of Istanbul. Some tunnels extend to the Eminonu area, to Bayezid Square.
Are these tunnels shown to us in the TV series "The Magnificent Century. Empire Kyosem "? When Anastasia wanted to escape from the palace, she found a secret exit, which led just to a park.
Prison for shehzade
Another sad place of Topkapi Palace is Kafes. To save the brothers' lives, the Sultan imprisoned them in a cafe - a pavilion consisting of several rooms, where shehzadeh lived separately from each other with their servants.
This could hardly be called life, although from the outside it seems that it was more humane and practical not to execute the heirs, but to keep them alive.
The hermits did not have the right to leave the walls of the palace; they could only contact their Valide, servants and concubines, who were carefully selected. Those categorically had no right to give birth to children from the shehzadeh.
Shehzadeh constantly lived in fear that the executioners would come for them. No wonder many of them went crazy. As we can see from history, the consequences of being in the prison-cafe were irreversible for the future sultans. Sad is the fate of Sultan Mustafa - brother of Ahmed, as well as Sultan Ibrahim I, nicknamed "insane". They say that it was precisely because of several years of being in the cafe that Sultan Murad IV became cruel.
Sultan Suleiman II, before becoming a sultan, spent thirty-nine years in a cafe. He said these words: “It is better to die at once than to die every day. What horror we endure with every breath."