City of Countless Names- Galata p3

 Here are a couple more famous locations from the Galata quarter of Constantiople:

Isaac Camondo & Cie

The streets in the western end of Galata hold a variety of financial institutions, such as banks, counting houses, and loan offices. The Turks do not trouble with money matters, so the majority are run by the Armenian and Jewish families living in Haskeui, the village northwest of Galata.

In 1802, Isaac Comondo opened his bank Isaac Camondo & Cie (“Cie” meaning “company”, or rather the French “compagnie”). His bank prospered, but Isaac died childless in 1836, leaving his fortune and business to his brother, Abraham. The Camondo’s fortune grew under Abraham’s shrewd leadership through real estate deals, tenant housing, and his influence in the court of Sultan Abdulmejid. During the crisis in the Crimea, Abraham loaned fantastic amounts of money to the Ottoman government to fund their military. Many worry the Camondo family practically is the Ottoman treasury.

Although his family owns many warehouses, tenements, and banks through Pera-Galata, Abraham still runs the business from his departed brother’s Isaac Camondo & Cie. Inside, Clerks and accountants shuffle papers and perform the bookkeeping necessary to a growing financial empire. Locked drawers and safes protect deeds, firmans, and other paperwork invaluable to Camondo holdings, but local tongues wildly rumor of more secure rooms under the bank, and more interesting valuables entrusted to Abraham by the Sultan, his viziers, and the Austrian government. Magical Yehudite sigils mark certain locked drawers. Who knows what other wards guard the most important bank in Constantinople?

The Galata Mevlevihanesi

Just west of Tophane, a stone archway decorated with the Imperial seal leads away from the Grand Rue De Pera to the courtyard containing the Galata Mevlevihanesi. Built in 1491, the Mevlevihanesi is the oldest Mevlevi tekka in Constantinople. Their sheik, a well respected Dholefolk named Kudretullah Dede, has led his Dervishes in the tekka for 37 years and was a confidant of Sultan Mahmud II. Many high ranking officials of the Ottoman government patronize the tekka.  Sultan Abdulmejid funded the most recent renovations necessitated by a destructive fire in the past year. 

The tekka sits directly across from the archway entrance in the courtyard, a large rectangular wooden building with two stories. Reddish brown tiles cover the roof. A scattering of tombs, graves, and trees surrounded the tekka along with the dervishes’ library, laundry, kitchen, school, and a public fountain open to any thirsty soul.

A massive octagonal room in the tekka’s center extends into the upper floor. Here the dervishes perform their famous ritual whirling as a part of their religious ceremonies. The sheik and dervishes’ dormitories crowd into the building’s corners.  

Unusually, the tekka opens its doors to spectators desiring to gawk at the spinning dervishes and listen to their music. On Tuesday and Friday after midday prayer, attendees and sightseers watch the performance from the galleries surrounding the octagonal chamber in exchange for a 2 ½ piastre donation. The Sultan and Turkish women watch from a private room, obfuscated by latticed windows. Much like entering a mosque, visitors must leave their shoes at the door, but slippers are provided.