What Is under the Veil of Ottoman Women - Essay Example

What is Under the Veil – Ottoman Women Todays society thinks of the Near-Eastern/Middle Eastern/Muslim women as figures covered up mostly in black long dresses. But studying the history of their culture and values makes people more aware of why they dress like they do. What many people might find interesting is that these women probably wore and owned the most extraordinary and stunning jewelries and clothes of their time. In this research paper, I want to go back in time to the Ottoman Empire and examine what the traditional Ottoman woman wore - jewelries, clothing etc. - and show that there is so much more to discover about them under the veil. Over the centuries, the most important feature of a Turkish female dress was that they wore traditional clothing. We know about the various aspects of a woman’s dress between the 12th to 14th centuries because of tiles, miniatures and the stone carvings that they have left behind and have been discovered. Ottoman clothing is the fashion followed and worn by the Ottoman Turks. It changed over time, but it remained as lovely as ever. Even though the women covered themselves with the ferace – a black long upper dress like a cardigan with full sleeves and no collar – before going outside, they were dressed up beneath this layer (Inal 263). They wore the most beautifully made clothes with exquisite jewelry. The styles and designing of the clothes were the same, the class and religious difference only being apparent due to the quality of the cloth used to make their clothes. The rich made their dresses of a fine cloth called barami. Guillaume Postel, a professor, was sent to Istanbul by King Francois the First. He kept a travel log in which he has written: “The materials used are gold and silver satin, brocade, damask and many kinds of silk. These are the fabrics chosen by the rich and the city aristocrats, the city poor and villagers dress very badly” (Ministry of Culture and Tourism). The women, in hopes for making a way for themselves in the Empire, did embroidery. They wove intricate designs and used these cloths as headscarves, etc. They were quite proud of their appearance and wanted to look their best. Later in the period, they started wearing a two-layer long entari, too, which is a gown. They also wore tül, a shawl of velvet around their heads. Even later on in the century, an entari was worn inside beneath a caftan-shaped dress which was short-sleeved (Bessé and Morris 176). The basic accessories worn by the Ottoman women were jeweled belts made of gold, crystal, silver, mother-of-pearl or even ivory. Belt buckles were worn around the waist or at times over the hips. These had floral or geometric designs and were bedecked with gems like diamonds, turquoise, emeralds and others. Beneath it they wore salwar ­– a kind of loose pants (Inal 252). These were mostly made of taffeta. They wore leather shoes which were usually yellow in color, probably because of the gold embroidery (Kia 216) and the toes were quite narrow and so very tight. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, the wife of the English ambassador to Turkey had this to say about their clothing whilst her stay over there: “The first piece of my dress is a pair of drawers, very full, that reach to my shoes and conceal the legs...They are of a thin rose color damask brocaded with silver flowers, my shoes of white kid Leather embroidered with Gold. Over this hangs my Smock of a fine white silk Gause edgd with Embroidery...The Antery is a waistcoat made close to the shape, of white and Gold damask, with very long sleeves....My Caftan of the same stuff with my Drawers is a robe exactly fitted to my shape and reaching my feet...” (Kamps and Singh 101) As Muslim women have been advised to cover themselves in front of any male who is not their husband or close relative, the women used to wear veils or, at least, covered their heads. These were made of silk for the summers and of wool, lined with fur for the colder seasons. Over time though, changes started to be made. A broad collar was added to the ferace which left the neck open and the women started wearing pastel colored ferace. Also, the cloth used to make veils became even more translucent and the hotoz – a high four cornered cap – was brought out. Embroidery was done on the cap with metal threads and it was stiffened to stop it from crinkling. This added height to the headdress so the veils were started to be tied loosely and were also decorated with different kinds of gold threads. Phillippe du Fresne-Canaye, a French traveler sums it up by saying: “They wear clothes not so much as to look different, but to cover themselves” (Ministry of Culture and Tourism). Over time, the dressing style became extravagant. The women’s clothes were very well tailored. There were slight modifications made in the way the cuff was cut or how tight the bodice was to be. This was known as the Tulip Era and it was during this time that the salwars became even baggier. 17th century onwards the caps they wore became lighter and tapered on the top. The women braided their long hair till it reached their ankles. They wore cloths which were embroidered on their heads or a diadem with a gem placed in the centre of it. Later on more changes were brought in the women’s headdresses. They were adorned with gemstones and in every other way possible. The Ottoman Empire was famous for the gold and its silversmiths, especially the jewelry they produced (Abazov 122). The jewelry was thought to be important as it was usually given to newlyweds as presents. The women wore lots of jewelry to embellish their dress. They wore items like: tiaras on their heads, earrings, and pearl necklaces around their necks, their arms and even ankles were adorned with bracelets. The jewelers used an assortment of metals to make one set of jewelry. They also gave attention to the nature of the stones and metal instead of keeping it in a particular symmetry. Aigrettes were worn by the women. These were of plain floral or drop designs and were made such that they showed the brightness of the gems which were on them. Later in the period, the aigrettes became huge. The women wore one or more aigrette. One they used to put on the centre of their forehead and the other on the back of their head. Another significant piece of adornment in women’s head jewelry were pins. They were pinned to the crests or otherwise put on their hair or sometimes even put on the brooches which they wore on their dresses. Two classic Ottoman pins are the: Titrek or Zenberekli which dangled every time the person wearing them moved. The patterns were chosen from things in nature such as flowers like tulips and roses or birds or butterflies, etc. The jewelry with motifs of flowers was often used on the hair (Little 2). Earrings were quite popular over the centuries. They were of many shapes ranging from tiny pearl drops to the long, dangling earrings. These held an important position amongst the Turkish jewelry as they highlighted the prettiness of the hairstyle and even the dress the Ottoman women wore (Boyar and Fleet 299). The earrings were put in classes depending on how they dangled. The ones which were double dangling ones had three drops and were three feet high. The women adorned their wrists by wearing simply made gold bangles. They also wore some of other styles like the twisted bracelets. They wore signet rings which had precious gems encrusted on them like emeralds and rubies or even the semi-precious gems such as jade and amethyst. They wore the rings on more than one finger. The most favored ring styles were the solitaries and the diamond rings shaped as a rose. These had another diamond layer surrounding the rose shaped ring. Another motif quite popular was the Dinahane çivisi which was made with recurrent rows of diamonds surrounding one huge diamond placed at the crest. This design was often used to make bracelets, silver and gold rings as well as in necklaces. The Ottoman women also wore long necklaces and even chokers. Coins made of gold were put together on long silver or gold chains or even on a string of pearls. These kinds of necklaces could only be afforded, and thus worn by the rich women. The British Ambassador in Istanbul in the 18th century wrote that the Sultan’s wife wore a string of pearls which reached her knees and had a very big diamond and even two more strings of emeralds. The women adorned their hair buns or had their hair in plaits. In his travel book, Fynes Moryson tells us that: “Their hair is plaited in an unusual way, and then decorated with pearls, gold flowers, jewels and ornaments worked in silk” (Ministry of Culture and Tourism). A plate was made in Iran’s city Rey in the 12th to 13th century which shows a woman of those times. This is displayed in New York in The Metropolitan Museum of Arts. It shows a woman with her long hair in a braid. There is a string of pearls around her head and there is a round stone placed in the middle of her forehead to form a diadem. She is shown wearing an earring on one of her ears and from it dangle three gold rings. She is clad in an overdress which is open downwards from the front. This results in a V shaped neckline and at the top of the sleeves there is a band. The women’s dress can also be followed back to the palace art. The Kulliyat-I Katibi miniatures show the Ottoman women in the times of Fatih Sultan Mehmet. One of them depicts female musicians playing at the Sultan’s Assembly. The most prominent clothing in the miniature is the headgear. One of the girl who is playing the harp is shown wearing a head covering which is thrown at the back and has a conical hat on top of it. She has tied a band around her brow. Another woman snapping her fingers is shown wearing a similar kind of headdress. The musician with the tambourine is only wearing a tight band around her forehead. The collars of the musicians’ overdresses are small and the front of it has buttons which are open till the waist. The Ottoman women’s outfits on the outside were simple and plain. But at their homes when they were around their family and were able to be comfortable in their clothing, their attractive clothes and jewelry were out in the open to be seen by their near ones. Works Cited Abazov, Rafis. Culture and customs of Turkey. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2009. Bessé, Alfred de and Edward Joy Morris. The Turkish empire, embracing the religion, manners and customs of the people, with a memoir of the reigning sultan and Omer Pacha. the New York Public Library, 1855. Boyar, Ebru and Kate Fleet. A Social History of Ottoman Istanbul. Cambridge University Press, 2010. Inal, Onur. "Women’s Fashions in Transition: Ottoman Borderlands and the Anglo-Ottoman Exchange of Costumes." Journal of World History 22.2 (2011): 243-273. Kamps, Ivo and Jyotsna G. Singh. Travel knowledge: European "discoveries" in the early modern period. Palgrave Macmillan, 2001. Kia, Mehrdad. Daily Life in the Ottoman Empire. ABC-CLIO, 2011. Koç, Fatma and Emine Koca. "The Clothing Culture of the Turks, and the Entari (Part 1: History)." Folk Life - Journal of Ethnological Studies 49.1 (2011): 10-29. Little, Carl. "Masterpieces of Ancient Jewelry." Ornament 32.3 (2009). Ministry of Culture and Tourism. Dress of Muslim women in the Capitol City . n.d. 06 December 2011 . Yetim, Fatma. "Embroidered Bindallı Garments Worn by Women in the Town of Beypazarı, Ankara, Turkey." Journal of Ethnological Studies 47.1 (2009): 20-31. Read More