Role of the The mother of a new sultan came to the harem with pomp and circumstance and assumed the title of valide sultan or sultana mother upon her son's ascension. She would become a prominent leader, whose power extended over the harem as well as the members of the dynasty. The who influenced the political life of the
Ottoman Empire during various periods of history (such as the
Sultanate of Women in the 16th and 17th centuries) had the authority to regulate the relations between the sultan and his wives and children. When a prince left the capital for his provincial governorate, he was accompanied by his mother. In this way, she was able to fulfill her duty of directing the prince's domestic household and provide training and supervision of harem inhabitants. The even influenced the way Ottoman sultans waged wars. The ethnic background of the valide sultan was a major determinant of whether a military target would be aimed at North Africa, the Middle East, or Europe. The sultans were likely to be mindful of their matrilineal descent when determining their next conquest. Matrilineal background was so important that a sultan descended from a European mother was more than 70 percent less likely to orient the empire's imperial venture in the West. There was no standard practice that determined what age girls entered the harem. Some arrived as children, while others entered at a later age. The
Circassian slave trade was formally banned in 1854 but the ban was on paper only. After 1854, almost all court lady-slaves were of Circassian origin. Circassians had been expelled from Russian lands in the 1860s and impoverished refugee parents sold their daughters in a trade that was formally banned but continued in practice. The s, often introduced into the harem at a young age, were brought up in the disciplines of the palace. This was the largest group of women in the harem. Inexperienced female slaves who newly entered the imperial palace were called acemi (novice), and their early period of service and training was known as acemilik (novitiate) before they were eligible for promotions. There was a strict hierarchical system of status and roles within the harem and s. They were promoted according to their capacities, intellect, and skills. The harem was broken into two main groups: those who directly served the sultan as consorts, and those who worked in the service of the sultan, the dynastic family, and other high-ranking members of the harem. All women and girls would enter the harem as acemi cariyes and work their way up to acemilik. The next step was sakird (apprentices), with the goal of being promoted to a gedikli (directly waiting on the sultan), usta (mistress), or even kadin (consort), if they were lucky. The s with whom the sultan shared his bed became a member of the dynasty and might rise in rank to attain the status of ('the favorite'),
ikbal ('the fortunate') or
kadin ('the woman/wife'). The highest position was the , the legal mother of the sultan who, herself, used to be a wife or a concubine of the sultan's father and rose to the supreme rank in the harem. No court lady could enter or leave the premises of the harem without the explicit permission of the . The power of the over concubines even extended to questions of life and death, with
eunuchs directly reporting to her. Court ladies either lived in the halls beneath the apartments of the
consorts, the and the sultan, or in separate chambers. The s, who numbered up to four, formed the group who came next in rank to the . Right below the s in rank were the s, whose number was unspecified. Last in the hierarchy were the s. During 16th and 17th centuries, the chief consort of the sultan received the title
haseki sultan or sultana consort. This title surpassed other titles and ranks of a prominent consort, known as (
hatun and
kadın). When the position of was vacant, a could take on the 's role, having access to considerable economic resources, and serving as the sultan's advisor in political matters, foreign policy and international politics. Such cases happened during the eras of
Hürrem Sultan and
Kösem Sultan.
Royal concubines of non- status Concubines who were not consorts of the sultan became "forgotten women" of the harem.Their status was inferior to the preferred concubines. They were also not identified among the family elite of the harem.
The legacy of Hurrem Sultan Hurrem Sultan, also called
Roxelana, was a female concubine who completely transformed the harem system and left a lasting impact on the Ottoman Empire. Roxelana is believed to have been kidnapped from Ruthenia or "Old Russia" located in modern-day Ukraine. She was renamed Hurrem, "the cheerful one," upon her arrival in Istanbul. As a concubine, Roxelana somehow caught the attention of Sultan Suleiman I and he continued to call for her to return to his bed. Roxelana bore her first son, Mehmed, in 1521, after the sultan's first two sons died. The couple soon had more children. That Roxelana was allowed to give birth to more than one son was a stark violation of the old royal harem principle of "one concubine mother — one son," and it signaled that a powerful woman was emerging in Suleiman's court. Sometime around 1533–1534, Suleiman declared Roxelana a free woman and married her, violating yet another 300-year-old custom of the Ottoman harem in which sultans were not to marry their concubines. It marked the first time a former harem slave was elevated to the powerful role of spouse. No other children were born to Suleiman from another concubine during his entire reign. Suleiman wrote love poetry and letters to Roxelana while he was away at war. He even had grand monuments built to exhibit his love for her. She became known as Haseki, "the favorite," but some accused her of seducing Suleiman with sorcery. Many in the Ottoman court were bewildered by Suleiman's total devotion to one woman and the ensuing radical changes in the harem hierarchy. But Roxelana's great perseverance, intelligence, and willpower gave her the edge over other women in the harem. She became a legendary and influential woman of her time. Roxelana established grand foundations to assist the needy, and showed special compassion towards slaves. She also ensured that the talented women of the harem left palace service to marry deserving partners. She transformed the royal harem at Topkapi Palace into a political institution, where royal women lived and worked at the center of the government. Roxelana completely changed the way in which women were treated within the harem and helped modernize the Ottoman Empire.
Role of the eunuchs Ottoman imperial palaces were managed by a legion of special employees and slaves, called eunuchs. Eunuchs were castrated men recruited and trained to serve in the apartments of the princes, also called (cage), as well as women's quarters of the harem at
Topkapı Palace. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the corps of Topkapı harem eunuchs numbered between 800 and 1,200. This was, and would remain, the highest number of eunuchs ever employed. These eunuchs were
Nilotic slaves captured in the Nile vicinity. The sultans were able to obtain these slaves because of the
conquest of Egypt in 1517, which gave direct access to slave caravans that used those routes. The conquest of northeastern Sudan in the 1550s further expanded the empire's reach and access to slave caravans. The harem eunuchs and the harem organization were under the command of the chief harem eunuch, also called the Master of the Girls () or
chief black eunuch. Castration meant they were the only males allowed and entrusted to be in the presence of the female population of the palace. As eunuchs also had direct access to the sultan and the sultan's family, they had great influence and power in the court and empire. The office of the chief harem eunuch was created in 1574. Meanwhile, the
chief white eunuch (), was in charge of 300 to 900 white eunuchs as head of the "Inner Service" (the palace bureaucracy, controlling all messages, petitions, and State documents addressed to the Sultan), head of the
Palace School, gatekeeper-in-chief, head of the infirmary, and master of ceremonies of the Seraglio, and was originally the only one allowed to speak to the Sultan in private. In 1591,
Murad III began to give a higher and more meaningful position to black eunuchs due to an increase of crime by white eunuchs. Despite all of this, many black eunuchs suffered oppression from white eunuchs because of their physical bodies and race. During the
Sultanate of Women (), eunuchs increased their political leverage by taking advantage of minor or mentally incompetent sultans. Teenage sultans were "guided" by regencies formed by the queen mother (), the grand vizier and the 's other supporters – and the chief black eunuch was the queen mother's and chief consorts' intimate and valued accomplice. Kösem Sultan, mother of Sultan Ibrahim (r. 1640–1648) and grandmother of Sultan Mehmed IV (r. 1648–1687), was killed at the instigation of the mother of Mehmed IV, Turhan Sultan, by harem eunuchs in 1651. A
haseki sultan had an important position in the palace, being the most powerful woman and enjoyed the greatest status in the imperial harem after the and usually had chambers close to the sultan's chamber. The had no blood relation with the reigning sultan but ranked higher than the sultan's own sisters and aunts, the princesses of the dynasty. Her elevated imperial status derived from the fact that she was the mother of a potential future sultan. This term haseki sultan was given to any woman who entered the sultan's bed.
Hurrem Sultan was the first to hold this title after she became legally married to
Suleiman the Magnificent, the first instance of a sultan marrying one of his slaves. The last was
Rabia Sultan, the of the sultan
Ahmed II. Over time, the term
haseki was no longer used because, it became very apparent that it didn't support the custom of honoring the
valide sultan. ''''
: Among the women of the Imperial Harem, the was the slave woman (or women) who had given the sultan a child, preferably a son. The kadıns
, or official concubines, were individually ranked by the sultan in order of preference. Most sultans kept four kadıns''. These women had the social, but not legal, status of wife. The first reported was during the reign of
Mehmed IV. ''''
: The first/most senior slave consorts were called baş kadın'' or . The consort who held the title was in the second rank and most powerful after the in the harem. She had a great influence in the harem. Before the creation and after the abolition of the title , the title was the most powerful position among the sultan's consorts. A sultan did not have more than four s (the same law used for legal wives in Islam). Their position as the possible mother of a future sultan gave them much influence and power in the harem. ''''
: These slave women needed not necessarily to have given a child to the sultan, but simply needed to have taken his fancy. Ikbals
were women who were chosen to become the new Kadin.'' Many of these women were referred to as (meaning 'favorite'), or 'in the eye', having done just that: caught the eye of the sultan. In some cases, they were also concubines. They, too, were ranked among one another by the sultan in order of preference.
Cariye: These were the slave women who served the , 's, 's and the sultan's children. They could be promoted to s which meant they earned wages, otherwise they were the property of the sultan and would reside in the harem. Newly arrived slave girls were called
Acemi (novice) and
Acemilik (novicitiate), and then
Sakird (apprentice).
Gedikli were the personal maidservants of the sultan. Cariye-women were manumitted to go after nine years of service, after which a marriage was arranged for them. The number of women in the harem is contested and only possible to estimate during some periods. Contemporaries claimed that in 1573, there were 150 women in the New palace and 1,500 in the Old Palace, and that there were 1,100 – 1,200 in 1604–1607, but these numbers are likely overestimated. The actual number of women are estimated to have been 49 in 1574 and 433 in 1633. In the 18th- and 19th-century, the official
mevacib register is sometimes preserved, and notes that the harem contained 446 slave women during the reign of sultan Mahmud I (r.1730–1754), 720 during sultan Selim III (r. 1789–1808), and 473 during sultan Mahmud II (r.1808–1839). == Western perceptions of the harem ==