The history of lighting in the Ottoman Empire and Turkey
Would you like to take a look at the lighting history of modern Turkey? An article shedding light on the history of lighting in our country, starting from torches, candles, oil lamps, evolving into LED lighting today, travelling from palaces to streets, is waiting for you. The interesting stories of the gas houses established during the Ottoman Empire reveal the development of today's lighting technologies. We are now sharing with you the journey of lighting, which pioneered social life and cultural development, from kerosene to electricity in Turkey.
The journey of light from torch to electricity
If we ask what are the basic needs of humanity in order to survive, we are sure that ‘lighting’ would be in the first place. Indeed, mankind's effort to illuminate the night and darkness has been going on for thousands of years and this effort is one of the main actors in the development of today's world civilisation.
The illumination of villages, towns and cities, which are collective living spaces, is among the most important stages of modern urbanism.
In this article, we will take a brief look at the history of lighting within the framework of urbanism in Turkey. We have mentioned in our previous articles that the first illuminated street in history was Kurtuluş Street in Hatay, which is located within the borders of Turkey. This progress, which started with torches in the Roman period, continued during the Ottoman Empire. However, from the 17th century onwards, different practices were adopted, and the history that started with torches continued with candles and oil lamps, and then turned into a journey extending to gas and then to electricity.
First lighting in the Ottoman Empire: Torches, candles and oil lamps
Candles, oil lamps and torches were the main instruments of lighting in the Ottoman period. In outdoor spaces, certain central points were illuminated with torches. However, since the main material of Ottoman houses was wood, torches were a very uncontrolled and risky lighting method and were not preferred on streets and avenues. However, when darkness began to fall on the streets, lanterns would be lit and people would walk around with lanterns in their hands. These lanterns were portable oil lamps made of copper, bronze or silver with glass. Especially in the 17th century, during the reign of Sultan Murad IV (1623-1640), it was forbidden to walk the streets at night after Isha prayer without a lantern. This prohibition was a step towards ensuring security and order.
At that time, palaces, mansions and houses were illuminated with kindling, oil lamps and wax. In time, wealthy families started to hang oil lamps in front of their mansions. These lamps were lit at the evening prayer and left burning until the morning prayer. These oil lamps can be considered as the beginning of the first street lighting efforts in the Ottoman Empire.
Tulip period and çırağan pleasure
By the 18th century, Istanbul had experienced a very special period in terms of lighting: Tulip period. During the 12-year tulip period, which was called the period of debauchery and was the beginning of the decline of the Ottoman Empire, special entertainments called çırağan pleasure were organised. Hundreds of oil lamps would be lit, these oil lamps would be placed among the tulips, candles would be tied to the backs of turtles and even to the backs of concubines, who were called kalfa at the time, and the dignitaries of the time would enjoy themselves in the glittering gardens during these entertainments organised in the mansions on the shore of the Bosphorus where Çırağan Palace is located today. Perhaps the first widespread civil illumination in the open air in the Ottoman Empire was experienced in these çırağan parties.
If you are wondering what çırağan, which gives its name to the most beautiful shores of the Bosphorus, means, let us explain; In Persian language, lighting tools such as candles and torches were called çerağ/çırağ, and çırağan, derived from this word, meant oil lamp. The centre of Çırağan parties was the mansion of Nevşehirli Damat İbrahim Pasha, the son-in-law and grand vizier of Sultan Ahmet III, and the name of this mansion turned into Çırağan Mansion because of these illuminated nights.
Development of lighting in the world: The gas revolution
While candles and oil lamps were used in the Ottoman Empire, lighting technology was advancing rapidly in Europe. At the end of the 18th century, the gas obtained from coal created a revolution in the field of lighting. Firstly, Belgian pharmacist Jan Pieter Minckelers illuminated his room at the University of Louvain with gas in 1753. Later, the British inventor William Murdoch pioneered the widespread use of this technology by lighting his house with gas in 1792.
In 1807, 13 gas lamps connected by pipes were tested in London. Even though gas was criticised for its foul odour, it soon began to be used in important European cities. Cities such as Paris, Brussels and Berlin became modern cities lit by gas at the beginning of the 19th century.
Gas in the Ottoman Empire: Dolmabahçe Gas House
The Ottoman Empire was closely following these developments in Europe. In 1856, Istanbul's first gasworks, the Dolmabahçe Gasworks, was established. This gasworks, which can still be seen today in the area behind Dolmabahçe Palace, between Beşiktaş Stadium and Maçka Democracy Park, was originally built for the lighting and heating of Dolmabahçe Palace. However, in a short time, the surplus gas was also used to illuminate the Beyoğlu region.
Istiklal Street (then known as Cadde-i Kebir) was the first street to be illuminated with gas. Subsequently, neighbourhoods such as Galata, Tophane and Harbiye also benefited from this modern lighting. The Dolmabahçe Gasworks was one of the important steps Istanbul took towards becoming a modern city.
Lighting on the Anatolian Side: Kuzguncuk and Kadıköy Gas Houses
On the Anatolian side, the first modern lighting works started with the establishment of Kuzguncuk Gasworks in 1865. This gas house was used for the lighting of Beylerbeyi Palace. Then, in 1891, Kadıköy Hasanpaşa Gas House was built. This gas house contributed to the modernisation of the region by illuminating the streets and houses of the Anatolian Side. If you want to see Hasanpaşa Gas House, it is used as a museum and event space today.
The first lighting facility for social purposes: Yedikule Gasworks
The illumination of the walled areas of Istanbul was realised with the establishment of the Yedikule Gasworks in 1880. This gasworks was the first gasworks built for the use of the people of Istanbul and the city, not primarily for the palaces. By illuminating the important avenues and streets of the historical peninsula with gas, this gasworks revitalised the night life of Istanbul and played an important role in the social life of the city. The gas was also extended to Eyüp, Bakırköy and Yeşilköy.
If you are wondering what these gas houses looked like, today Yedikule Gas House and Kadıköy Hasanpaşa Gas House are open to visitors as a museum and event space.
The lighting provided by the Istanbul gasworks reached its highest level in 1914. The city's main avenues and all central streets (first and second order avenues and streets), government offices, railway stations and mansions were illuminated with gas lamps, and the lighting service, one of the most basic objectives of modern urbanism, was realised almost throughout Istanbul. The people of Istanbul became more socialised with the confidence and comfort provided by the lighting, and areas such as Beyoğlu, İstiklal Street, Şehremini and Direklerarası became the new addresses of nightlife. In 1914, Istanbul gas stations supplied a total of 8742 street lamps in Beyazıt, Fatih, Beyoğlu, Beşiktaş Yeniköy, Kadıköy, Üsküdar and Hisar regions. At the same time, there were 600 lamps in government offices, 300 of which were lit until morning.
Istanbul Şehremaneti (municipality) was responsible for the maintenance of these street lanterns. The monthly cost of lighting the lanterns every evening and extinguishing them in the morning, cleaning the lanterns and replacing their wicks regularly was around 85-90 thousand kuruş.
Izmir started to be illuminated in 1876
Izmir, one of the largest and most important cities of the Ottoman Empire in terms of trade and population, inhabited by a large number of Levantines, had also established a gasworks in the same years as Istanbul and started its lighting journey. In fact, the first step taken to establish a gasworks was at the same time as the Dolmabahçe Gasworks, but for various reasons the establishment of the gasworks was delayed until 1876. After this date, the streets and avenues of Izmir began to shine like those in Istanbul. Before the establishment of the gasworks in İzmir, lighting was provided by oil lamps and candles, as was the case throughout the Ottoman Empire.
The arrival of electricity: First electric lighting in Istanbul
Electricity generation in Turkey started for the first time in 1888 with the opening of an electricity factory at the Golden Horn Shipyard in Istanbul. Due to the security concerns of Sultan Abdülhamid II, the electricity produced here was not supplied to the city. In fact, the use of electricity was banned and the lighting of Istanbul with electricity was delayed. Despite this ban, institutions and organisations such as the Ottoman Bank and Pera Palas Hotel began to generate their own electricity and illuminate their interiors. Electric lighting, which started in Europe in the 1880s, reached Istanbul only in the early 20th century. After Sultan Abdülhamit's abdication in 1909, Istanbul welcomed electric lighting throughout the city with the concession granted to the Hungarian Ganz Joint Stock Electricity Company in 1910.
In 1914, with the establishment of the Silahtarağa Power Plant, the streets and houses of Istanbul began to be illuminated with electricity. This was a turning point in the modernisation process of Istanbul and Turkey.
When describing the history of lighting in Turkey, the examples are always based on Istanbul. Naturally, since Istanbul was the capital and the largest city of the Ottoman Empire, many firsts and innovations took place here, but there are also exceptions. For example, the first water-powered electricity was generated not in Istanbul, but in Tarsus, a city far away from the capital. In 1902, electricity was supplied to Tarsus with a dynamo connected to a water mill, and even in 1905, a power plant was established in Bentbaşı, 2 kilometres away from Tarsus, and thus the streets of Tarsus and some houses were introduced to electric lighting.
In 1909, one year before Istanbul, the people of the city began to experience the advantages of electricity and lighting, the greatest of its benefits.
When were the streets of Ankara illuminated?
Before the Republic, Ankara was a town known for its mud in winter and dust in summer, far from the modern technologies of the time. It did not even have a lighting system similar to the one in Istanbul, which was produced from gas. Ankara had to wait for the establishment of the Ankara government to be introduced to lighting. On 27 December 1919, Ankara became the centre of the national independence movement, and although the parliament was opened on 23 April 1920, it was only in 1921 that kerosene generators were purchased with a loan provided by the Ankara Government to the Ankara Şehremaneti (municipality) and the streets of Ankara began to be illuminated. In 1923, the Republic was established and Ankara was declared the capital city. In 1925, Ankara Municipality produced electricity for the first time with a 35-watt power plant established in Bentderesi, and this electricity was tested in its building on Anafartalar Street and in a few houses. However, this electricity was not generated by water power, but by a tractor-like wheeled vehicle called a locomobile turning a dynamo. Later, on 10 October 1928, with the approval of the Council of Ministers, Ankara Electricity Turkish Joint Stock Company was established and more buildings began to receive electricity and streets and avenues began to be illuminated.
Transition to lighting in other Anatolian cities
Other Anatolian cities switched to electric lighting step by step without ever being introduced to gas lighting. Before the Republic, Uşak in 1910, Isparta in 1917, Eskişehir in 1919, Adana, Artvin, İnebolu, Akşehir, Mersin, Trabzon in 1925, Aksaray, Ayvalık, Bursa, İzmit, Konya, Kütahya, Malatya and Sivas were electrified in 1926.
Light is a journey to civilisation
The history of illumination in Turkey is a journey from candles to gas and then to electricity. This journey is not only a technological development, but also a story of civilisation. From the oil lamps hung in front of mansions to the days when the streets of Istanbul were illuminated with the gas lamps of the Dolmabahçe Gasworks and the rickety electricity distributed from the Silahtarağa Electricity Factory, behind every period lies the human longing for civilisation and the search for the better and more beautiful.
Today, while walking under the bright lights of street lamps that cover our streets, squares, parks and gardens like pearl necklaces, remembering the history of this light will enable us to build a bridge between the past and the future. Working with an innovative vision in outdoor lighting, Light 34 works to illuminate the darkness in the light of this history.
The illumination of villages, towns and cities, which are collective living spaces, is among the most important stages of modern urbanism.
