Ottoman Baths

The oldest bath buildings still in use in Budapest date from the Ottoman period, when Buda was under Turkish rule. Their domes, octagonal pools and shafts of light through small glass lenses give them a look found nowhere else in the city. This chapter describes the period, the main baths that survive, the layout of a hammam and how the baths were used. Names, dates and details are from general knowledge and flagged for checking.

The Ottoman Period in Buda

The Ottoman Empire took Buda in 1541 and held it until 1686 (check the dates), a period of around a century and a half. The Turks found the hot springs and, as bathing was part of daily and religious life for them, built bath-houses (hammams) around them. Some were new; others adapted earlier buildings (check which). The baths served the garrison, officials and the town's population, and some were attached to a pasha or a mosque (check the details).

This was a period of war and of religious and political conflict. The course describes the buildings and their use, and does not take a side on the history around them.

The Baths That Survive

Several other Ottoman baths were lost or turned to other uses, and some are ruins (check the examples). Only a few remain in use as baths, which makes each one an important survivor. See Hungarian Architecture for the broader story of the city's Ottoman buildings.

The Layout of a Hammam

An Ottoman bath followed a standard plan, based on movement through rooms of increasing heat:

• The entrance hall. Where bathers undressed and rested, sometimes with a fountain (check).
• The warm room. A transitional space, used to adjust to the heat.
• The hot room. The main room, domed and often marble-floored, with a heated central platform (görbe or göbektaşı in Turkish, check) on which bathers lay, sweated and were washed.
• The pool. In Buda, the thermal springs fed pools of warm water, which is a feature of the local type; a hammam elsewhere often had only basins (check the difference).
• The dome. Small round or star-shaped glass lenses in the roof let in light and kept the steam in.

How the Baths Were Used

For the Ottoman population the bath had religious and social roles: a place for ritual washing before prayer, for rest, for meeting, and for health (check each). Men and women used separate baths or separate times. The attendants washed and massaged bathers, a service that survives in some form today. Local people in Buda also used the baths, both during the Ottoman period and after it.

• After the Ottomans. When Buda was retaken in 1686, the baths passed to new owners, and some were used by the military or by religious orders (check).
• The long life. Their continued use for centuries is the reason the buildings survive at all, since baths were rebuilt and adapted again and again.

Exercises