Turkish Towels - hand loomed!

Canadian Jennifer Gaudet is doing her best to foster the traditional hand loomed Turkish towel.   She works with the remaining families doing this beautiful hand work and has a shop in the Sultanahmet section of Istanbul with their results.  The shop can be found in the Arasta Bazaar - look for the Canadian flag in the window.   The Arasta Bazaar is by the Mosaic Museum.

The shop's name is "Jennifer's Hamam" - the haman being the traditional Turkish bath.  The towels are both the looped towels, ...

as well as the flat weave towels called pestamel.  All towels are made of organic fibers and processed using organic materials and methods to get to the finished product.

A visit to Jennifer's Hamam is an educational, as well as a shopping experience, supporting the few families with the knowledge and skills to make these lovely hand loomed pieces.

www.jennifershamam.com has more information and pictures of the towels, the looms and the processes. 

Hagia Sophia

The Aya Sofia or Hagia Sophia is one of the archaeological treasures of Istanbul, built in the 6th century by Byzantine Emperor Justinian in his capital, Constantinople.  The building was used as a church from 537 - 1453, converted to a mosque and used in that capacity until 1931, before being established as a museum.

Hagia Sophia is located in Sultan Ahmet section of Istanbul and it a must see on all tourist itineraries as well as many local school groups.

The currrent building is believed to be the third Byzantine church constructed on this site.  A frieze of lambs is thought to be from the second building, built in 415, and destroyed by fire.

The entrance hall arched ceiling is covered with exquisite mosaics.

The dome was the largest built at that time and for the next 1000 years.  Not until St. Peter's in Rome, was a larger dome built.  The dome is 56 meters in height or about 20 stories.  This Byzantine dome had major influence in Ottoman mosque architecture as well as modern day mosque architecture.

In each of the four corners supporting the dome, is a seraphim - a six winged angel charged with caretaking of God's throne.  During the time period the building was used as a mosque, the faces of the seraphim were covered.  Archeaologists have now uncovered the face of one of the seraphim and it is very sweet.

The walls of Hagia Sohpia are covered in rare marbles from the region.  Marble was cut into two or four pieces and opened, like a book to display symmetric designs.

The volume of space in the building is as awesome today as it was to Emperor Justinian, when he first saw it. 

During the Byzantine time period mosaics were added to the walls in all the subsequent centuries.  Empress Zoe established a mosaic of herself, ... 

and her husband on either side of Jesus.  Pictured is Zoe's third husband, Constantine IX, who was on the throne from 1042 - 1055.  As the title of Emperor came through her line, her previous husbands were Emperors and were depicted in the mosaic in earlier years.  It is difficult to see, but Zoe is holding a scroll with Constantine's name, which being longer than the first two husbands, did not fit well and a few characters dropped to a second line.

Hagia Sophia always has some restoration work in progress with associated scaffolding. 

Bronze doors, dated to the 2nd century B.C., brought to Hagia Sophia in the 9th century by Emperor Theophilos were originally from a pagan temple in Tarsus.

If you are interested in reading more about the Byzantine time period, Judith Herrin has an excellent book, titled "Byzantium" with a chapter dedicated to The Church of Hagia Sophia.

Mosaic Museum

In Sultanahmet Square, if you find the correct small road, you are led to the Mosaics Musuem, which houses restored mosaics from a Byzantine period palace. Austrian and Turkish groups worked on the excavation and restoration of the mosaics. Unlike the mosaics in the churches, these have no religious themes. The most common theme was hunting, some rather bloody with animals gorging other animals. Here are some of the more pastoral scenes, including boys with a bird. The museum had an upper walkway, where we could look down on the massive mosic tiled floor below. This is just one half of the floor.

There were also some horses at pasture,...

boy playing with the ducks, ...

and boy holding a lamb. These last two boys may be the same boy. They look alike.

And this piece was titled "mask".

If anyone is disappointed that there are no bloody hunting scenes, send me an e-mail and I will send you the bear eating the lamb. I sure hope it was not the one the boy was playing with!