Sahaflar Market Street, Istanbul

Original Watercolour 15" x 11"

The famous Sahaflar Carsisi, in Bayzil Square, is directly opposite the covered bazaar’s Spoon Makers’ Gate. This historic area has about 50 small shops. This site was the Chartoprateia of Byzantium, the Book and Paper market during the Byzantine period. After the conquest of Istanbul in 1453, fez makers and metal engravers used the area. Booksellers were in the covered bazaar, now housing bedspread makers and vendors. Sahaflar’s fame reached beyond the Ottoman Empire to Europe, where writers and historians such as Antoine Galland, Hammer, Busbecq and Charles White gave special attention to this antique book center.