The Life in Harem

The word harem stems from the Arabic haram or harim, meaning sacred and forbidden. Principally aimed at holding the royal womenfolk away from prying eyes, the Imperial Harem of the Ottoman Empire grew into a gilded cage where women were trained and raised to serve the royal purpose. The harem was populated with the Sultan’s mother, wives, other female relatives, concubines and slaves. They were zealously guarded by eunuchs. In the course of time, as we shall see later, the residents of the harem started moving beyond their homely duties of producing heirs and moved closer to the seat of power.

Exquisitely beautiful, harems were physically spots of idyll in the palace, set apart from the rest of the palace by complex designs which made contact with the world outside difficult. There was nothing wanting in the way of worldly pleasures – the architecture and gardens were unparalleled in beauty. From a modern perspective though, this was nothing short of a golden cage housing birds with clipped wings. The women residing within had only one purpose – to serve the Sultan on the throne. The life in the harem was thus designed to this end. They offered the requisite female influence in the lives of the Sultan, in terms of emotional attachments, social standing and the securing of the future of the throne.

Hierarchy within a harem

The women occupying the harem followed a distinct hierarchy. The establishment was rallied around the Valide Sultan – in other words, the mother of the reigning Sultan. This matriarchal setup was tied to the longevity of the Sultan himself; his death would spell the end of the dominion of the Valide Sultan in the harem, and she would be secluded. The other women in the harem served the Valide Sultan and her observations about them decided their fate. She selected the appropriate concubines for the Sultan, her son. The second best were married off to the court nobilities. The lacking and belligerent were punished, either by being left penniless and without a visible prospect, or by summary execution in some cases. This centralisation of power meant that the women usually tried to cosy up to the Valide Sultan, so as to survive comfortably and further their personal – and in some cases, political – ambitions.