Filizten Hanımefendi
| Filizten Hanımefendi | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Born |
Naime Filiz Çabalar-Çaabalurhva c. 1865 Pitsunda, Abkhazia, Russian Empire | ||||
| Died |
c. 1945 (aged 80-81) Istanbul, Turkey | ||||
| Burial | Yahya Efendi cemetery | ||||
| Spouse | Murad V | ||||
| |||||
| House |
House of Çaabalurhva (by birth) House of Osman (by marriage) | ||||
| Father | Şahin Çaabalurhva | ||||
| Mother | Adilhan Loo | ||||
| Religion | Sunni Islam | ||||
Filizten Hanımefendi (c. 1865 - 1945; birth name Princess Naime Filiz Çabalar-Çaabalurhva, other names Filistin)(Filizten meaning "tendril bodied") was the wife of Murad V, deposed Ottoman Sultan.
Early life, education and marriage
Filizten Hanımefendi was born in 1865 in Pitsunda, Abkhazia, to an Abkhazian princely family, Çaabalurhva. Born as Naime Çaabalurhva, she was the daughter of Prince Şahin Bey Çaabalurhva and his Abkhazian wife Princess Adilhan Hanım Loo.[1][2] Through her father she was also related to Peyveste Hanımefendi, ninth wife of Sultan Abdul Hamid II, whose mother Hesna was a relative of her father.[2]
At a young age, Naime was taken to Istanbul by her father, with his niece, where they were delivered at the court of the Ottoman Sultan. She was renamed Filizten and was given a thoroughly Turkish and Muslim education in the harem department of Yıldız Palace.[2] Receiving her education in the palace, Filizten was interested in playing piano and oud. She was medium-tall, had hazel eyes and long chestnut coloured hair, and was incomparably beautiful.[2]
Filizten grew into a into a young lady in the Yıldız Palace. Sultan Abdul Hamid wanted to arrange marriage for the young lady. Abdul Hamid's choice fell on his half-brother, the former Sultan, Murad V, lthough, he was twenty five years older than Filizten, but she consented to the will of their parents in the marriage proposal of the Sultan.[2] Abdul Hamid sent the young girl to the Çırağan Palace, dressed up in a light blue coloured dress with a silver waist belt and a dark blue coloured hotoz, and covered the hotoz with a wide tulle, where Murad married her in 1887.[2] Filizten spent seventeen years confined in the Çırağan Palace along with her husband, Sultan Murad V, and the other members Murad's entourage.[2]
Later years and death
After Murad's death in 1904, she moved to Bursa, where she was living in the palace of her stepdaughter Fatma Sultan.[2] After the abolition of the Ottoman Caliphate by the Parliament of the Republic of Turkey in 1924, Fatma Sultan went into exile in Nice, France.[2] As but an adjunct member of the Imperial family, Filizten was not exiled, and so remained in Turkey. Filizten returned to Istanbul and settled in Erenköy.[2]
In her seventies, Filizten also wrote memoirs, which constituted the majority of the biography of Murad compiled by the journalist and avocational historian Ziya Șakir under the title Çırağan Sarayında 28 sene beşinci Murad'ın hayatı (Turkish for "Twenty-Eight Years in the Çırağan Palace:The Life of Murad V").[3] She was in excellent health, in complete command of her faculties, and aware of what Ziya Șakir called her responsibility to history in retelling the events she witnessed in Çırağan Palace.[3] The memoir is an oral history by one who witnessed the events of many years earlier.[3] In fact Filizten stated in her memoirs that she did not keep a diary.[3]
Filizten died in around 1945 at Erenköy, and was buried in the royal Mausoleum of Yahya Efendi, Istanbul.[3][2]
Depictions in literature and popular culture
Ziya Șakir's idiosyncrasies notwithstanding, the authenticity of the memoir itself has never been in doubt.[3] Immediately after publication it formed a primary source for the articles on Murad V published by the eminent historian İsmail Hakkı Uzunçarşılı, who directly identified the memoir's author as Filizten Hanımefendi, Gözde of Murad V.[3] Today it continues to form a primary source for the life of this Sultan in particular, and for life in the lat Ottoman palace harem in general.[3]
In the 2012 Movie The Sultan's Women Filizten is portrayed by a Turkish Actress Deniz Aylan.[4]
References
- ↑ Günay Günaydın (2006). Haremin son gülleri. Mevsimsiz Yayınları. ISBN 978-9-944-98703-5.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Harun Açba (2007). Kadın efendiler: 1839-1924. Profil. ISBN 978-9-759-96109-1.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 The Concubine, the Princess, and the Teacher: Voices from the Ottoman Harem. University of Texas Press. 2010. ISBN 978-0-292-78335-5.
- ↑ "Cast of the 2012 movie "The Sultan's Women"". Retrieved 4 October 2014.