HISTORICAL CITY EVALUATION IN THE CONTEXT OF MORPHOLOGICAL THEORIES (ISTANBUL, LAST OTTOMAN PERIOD)

Elif Sarihan

doi:10.23968/2500-0055-2021-6-1-64-72

Abstract

Introduction: The historical city core of Istanbul developed under the influence of the religions and cultures that were brought in during the Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman periods. This study investigates the effect that the 19th-century modernization, urban arrangements, road system changes, and sociocultural textures had on urban morphology on the Historical Peninsula of Istanbul, which had symbolic value. We review the morphology of Istanbul during the 19th century, a historical period when the city was undergoing new development and restructurization. We also develop an analysis methodology in order to examine this process in more detail, by following the methods of the researchers who carried out morphological studies. Purpose of the study and methods: In our research, we apply three different urban morphology methods, examining the development of the city, its effects on the urban tissue, and the newly developed and demolished areas. Firstly, we investigate historical plans in line with the Conzenian method and discover the urban tissue typologies of the historical city by using the Caniggia approach. Furthermore, we use the space syntax method developed by Bill Hillier in order to interpret the changes, differences, and similarities in the urban form, and draw axial lines to illustrate the integration of settlements and street systems shaped in the context of the relationship between people and space. Results: We discover the effects of development practices on the morphological structure of spaces and show how urban forms and cultures intertwine over time.

Highlights

The historical city core of Istanbul developed under the influence of the religions and cultures that were brought in during the Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman periods
After the Ottoman conquest, the increasing Muslim community of Istanbul brought their own way of life to the city; the urban form was reshaped by this sociocultural system
Our research is based on the evaluation of this transformation’s impact on the urban form during this period, which is an aspect of studying the Historical Peninsula of Istanbul, the capital city of the Ottoman Empire

Summary

Introduction

The historical city core of Istanbul developed under the influence of the religions and cultures that were brought in during the Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman periods. In his works, Saverio Muratori researches various values inherent to urban formation stages: from buildings in historical city centers where the texture was compact, to the suburban, town, and district scale, where the texture was sensitive to a wide range of solutions. By focusing on the typo-morphology of the special architectural entity (which is far from theory), he examined the change of the core elements, such as type, texture, and shape, in the formation of the structure over the course of the historical process. The aim of his studies was to gain an understanding of the above (Cataldi et al, 2002). Based on Whitehand (2001) research, urban morphology can be demonstrated by working with the Conzenian approach of sharp analyses and their effective integration, which can answer and express various questions, such as how

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