GALATA - ISTANBUL

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GALATA - ISTANBUL | ARTICLE : Ilber ORTAYLI

GALATA - ISTANBUL - TURKEY
There are cities which are eternal, bewitching generation after generation with their beauty and splendour, their names turning up again and again in the epic story of mankind. And there are districts as famous as the cities of which they are a part. However small they might be, they are stages where history has strutted for long centuries. Galata is such a place. Wherever you look in Istanbul, capital to two empires, whichever page of history you turn, it declares, ‘Yes, me again’. Yet the people of Istanbul have always looked on Galata with suspicion as a stranger in their midst. Galata represented the western Mediterranean, and even the Atlantic, and did not belong here.
Galata istanbul

The Byzantines called it Pera, the ‘opposite shore’, and the Ottoman Turks used the ancient name Galata, for which two etymologies are posited: either the Italian calata meaning ‘streets of steps’ or galactos meaning milk. But there is no need to go into that debate here. Galata was home to a Venetian trading colony that the Byzantines viewed with mistrust. In 1185 mistrust boiled over into outright hostility, and fighting between the populations of Constantinople and Galata went on for some time. In 1204 the Republic of Venice got its revenge by diverting the Fourth Crusaders against Constantinople.

From that time on hatred of the ‘opposite shore’ increased still further. After over half a century under Latin occupation, Constantinople was restored to the victorious Paleologan dynasty, who now granted privileges to the Genoese of Pera instead of the Venetians, although this failed to dispel public ill-feeling. The Genoese podesta, leader of the colony, and wealthy Genoese inhabitants of Pera consolidated their new status by erecting the famous Galata Tower. Galata was surrounded by its own walls enclosing the area from the sea up to what is now Sishane and Tünel. During the reign of the Turkish conqueror of Istanbul Mehmed II (1451-1481) the first settlement commenced beyond these walls. First the district of Kasimpasa, where the naval arsenal was situated, grew apace, and then the Venetian bailos, as their ambassadors were called, who had formerly lived within the walls of Istanbul settled outside the walls of Galata.
Their Palazzo Venezia was built after the Turkish conquest, and it was probably in reference to the Venetian bailo that the area above Galata became known as Beyoglu, meaning ‘Son of a Lord’. The Italians of Galata had numerous churches, including St Anne’s, St Benedict’s, St John’s, St Sebastian’s, St Anthony’s, St George’s, St Mary’s and St Francis’. Arap Mosque, which became visible after the extensive demolition along the waterfront in Karaköy, also dates from this period. Galata istanbul

In the 19th century, this area became Istanbul’s financial centre, and Banks Street (Bankalar Caddesi) is lined by buildings in neo-renaissance, oriental and Byzantine-Moorish style.
Some of these buildings still house their original institutions,while others have changed hands and now belong to institutions like the Central Bank and Sabanci University. In Byzantine times the Latin population of Pera was in the majority, but under the Ottomans they were outnumbered by both the Muslim and Greek communities. The Latins, or Levantines as they later became known, consisted of people from diverse European countries, predominantly those of the western Mediterranean. Their shared language was Italian until the 19th century, when it was superseded by French, which became the lingua franca of newspapers, theatres and business life of Pera. The walled district of Galata, however, retained its own individual character, and the people here thought of themselves as Istanbulians, whatever their race or creed.

Climbing Camondo Steps to the street of Kurt Çinar brings you to the Austrian Lycée of St George, the apartment in St Pierre Han where the renowned poet Andrea Chenico is thought to have been born, and on the corner of Eski Banka Street the Church of Sts Peter and Paul, the most vivid and nostalgic reminder of old Galata. Galata was the dock area behind the harbour, and gradually acquired a notorious reputation for crime and debauchery. It was a place of merchants and seamen, and in 1853 during the Crimean War, when allied troops poured into Galata, it was here that the Ottoman government formed the first modern municipality to keep the streets clean and well lit.
The decision to tax gambling saloons, music halls and similar establishments here rather than close them down angered conservative Muslims. But there were other reputable institutions in the narrow streets of Galata, such as Catholic mission schools and hospitals. The British built a hospital here for its soldiers during the Crimean War, and a British police station to keep order. Ashkenazi Jews fleeing eastern Europe and Russia in the 19th century who took refuge in the Ottoman Empire formed a large community in Galata. The Ashkenazi Synagogue is just one of numerous Jewish sites in an area which still has its Jewish tailors, the tofre begadim. The Zolfaris Synagogue in Karaköy is now being renovated as a Turko-Jewish museum. Yüksekkaldirim, the steep street leading up from Galata Tower, is famous for its music shops, and above all for Galata Mevlevihane, or dervish lodge, today the Museum of Divan Literature, where the dervishes still perform their whirling ceremonies.
Galata istanbul

At one time the Italians of Galata included such illustratious Venetian families as Perone, Fornetti, Doria, Negri, Draperis, Navoni, Samsoni, Cavalorsa, Salvagi, Alessio, Paterio and Testa (whose members were famous interpretors). All the languages of the Ottoman Empire could be heard in this polyglot area, and the inhabitants tended to mix up several languages in one sentence, as Eduardo d’Amicis noted with surprise in the late 19th century. Galata has preserved its historic buildings to a greater extent than most of the districts of Istanbul, and 19th century pictures reveal no startling changes.

But the same is not true of the cultural and social structure of Galata, which sinking into poverty from the 1960s, is now on the upturn and attracting a new influx of intellectuals, artists and foreigners. The famous Germania apartment block (now Murat Apt. on Serdar-i Ekrem Sokak) is a typical example of this upward trend.
The area around the Galata Tower is gradually losing its shabby appearance, and Galata promises to soon become a picturesque district with a flavour of southwest Europe, looking out across the Golden Horn to old Istanbul. As it attracts young people, the area is joining the process of rejuvenation which has transformed Beyoglu in recent years, so perhaps we should all go before the crowds move in.