An Ancient Luxury, the Turkish Baths

Our guide in Istanbul asked if he should get tickets to a Turkish bath so we could experience the ancient social ritual of hamam. The idea enticed with as little as its name, “Yes.” I said, recalling how my mother used to say, she felt in such a bath during the humid Minnesota Julys of my childhood. Now, decades later, I’d eased my body into the hallowed tradition, rooted in Ottoman and Islamic culture, where it had started.

The bath, Ҫemberlitas Hamami, was located within a famous mosque that had been built in 1584. What a salubrious way to celebrate life, as women here had done for centuries—cleansing their bodies, lifting their spirits, conversing with friends. No responsibilities.

We, four, extended family, had arrived separately in Istanbul and met at our rented apartment. In our 20s, 30s and a decade older, we were all attracted to the idea of a Turkish bath. Entering the historic complex, we accepted a palm-sized transparent bag, shot through with silver threads, that held a rough cleansing glove or kese; disposable black briefs; and a peştamal, a light-weight, filmy tea towel-sized wrap.

Motioned through a narrow hallway and beyond a thick wooden door, I felt the overstimulation of Istanbul ease with every step. A city of 15 million people situated at the crossroad between Europe and Asia, Istanbul is an amalgam of these, blended with the pull of its fertile and ancient perspectives. We felt welcomed but sometimes needed respite.

Here, calm reigned as we entered the bath’s expansive interior courtyard, soaring beyond wooden balconies of a second and third floor to a rounded dome. The first floor held lounging chairs and divans and tables at which to sip an iced drink or Turkish tea before or after bathing.

This was the women’s bath, separate from the men’s. It was quiet. Those who spoke did so in a low hum. Each bather seemed in her own realm of rejuvenation, something my mother was all for in life. Whether diving into a lake, floating on the dead Sea, ferrying to the Aran Islands, or bathing an infant in a summer cabin’s sink, water charmed her.

An attendant directed us up a graceful staircase to a disrobing area. Passing through its glass door, we found a narrow-aisled locker room, where we hung our clothes in slim cupboards, and then donned the briefs and wrapped the delicate cloth under our arms. With keys and scrub gloves in hand, we slid into rubber sandals and descended. Another assistant led us toward one of many marble arches that graced the first floor’s periphery, and through a massive wooden door to the hot room, the sicaklik.

The magnificent space effused antiquity, and its heat enveloped me like a second skin. I entered with the wonder of the child I’d once been—enchanted to be in this Turkish bath my mother had only imagined. Hundreds of small circular openings in the domed ceiling tunneled daylight into the room and centered it over the vast marble platform, the göbek taşi or the navel stone. It was heated through the floor by wood furnaces. 

The marble stone rose to thigh height and supported three prone women as we approached. It looked as if it could hold eight or nine recumbent bodies at once. The göbek taşi’s backdrop drew my eyes around the welcoming room. A score of graceful archways circled it with marble basins, kurna, between arches, and behind them half-circle private cubicles. 

Following the lead of the supine women, we removed our wraps, splayed them on the platform’s smoothness, and lay face up. No one spoke. My body loosened. The sultry air started to melt tensions, transude sweat, release toxins, and ready my body for the scrub. The multitudes of women who had reclined in this same spot on this navel stone crossed my mind as I succumbed to near unconsciousness with falling lids.

The scrubber—kesciler—arrived with a nudge to my leg. What time was it? Opening my eyes, I saw a burly woman with short red hair, probably in her fifties, dressed in a black cummerbund-like top and mid-thigh length black shorts—no-nonsense attire for the heat and the wet of a scrubbing.

“Turn.”

I rolled to my stomach, limp, and grasped that her terse directives were her usual conversation with a bather.

She threw a generous silver bowl of warm water on me and took my abrasive kese and started a scraping massage, sloughing off dead skin and the soil that adheres with travel. Her rub was strong and firm, so the massage was marked by considerable turbulence. But I didn’t quite feel flayed, and never directed her—by yelping—to ease up. Her undivided attention felt expert and sumptuous. My mind floated, as if outside my body, and the roll and give of muscle, bone, and tissue surrendered to any directive from her hands. 

My mother would have relished all this personal care. She appreciated and made frequent use of mavens, who were available to freshen and beautify hair, nails, face, body—and through those restore the soul.

“Turn.”

Again, water drenched me, and she excoriated my front and continued down my left leg. When she released the limb, it was so slack that I had to haul it in with my hand. 

Then came the bubbles. What delight. Lying on my back, they fell on me in dense mounds of foam burying my body in their luxury. As weightless as a whisper, the lather adhered and worked its magic by softening my skin. So taken by the lush globules, I sighed with pleasure. How did she make this lavish show? I’d noticed, by the absence of her touch, that she’d left me briefly after the scrub. When she returned, the bubbles descended. My masseuse began kneading me with a rhythm that felt enhanced by the slip of the oil and soap. Any remaining kinks and knots responded to her pressure.

“Turn.”

A mass of bubbles fell on my backside. She pressed down, working on me another five minutes. Could the women of old have had such a comfort as these billowing suds? I hoped so.

Another masseuse stood at a marble basin near my niece, Alex, a brief distance from the slab. Slipping a bar of olive oil soap into a fine woven Turkish cotton bag the size of a pillowcase, she submerged it into the water, stimulating the production of bubbles. She pulled the bag from the water, removed the bar, and shook the pouch delicately to let the air do the work of making more bubbles. Returning to Alex, the masseuse held the sack’s sewn end near her shoulder. With her other hand, she squeezed, aiming the suds along Alex’s body. A thick stream of bubbles floated down to reach her.

To know that women came here to be rejuvenated, to recognize the similarity of my hamam compared to the women who’d bathed in the 16th century, turned my mind to how alike we are in St. Paul and in Istanbul. We all appreciated feeling refreshed, energized, and perhaps, being made young again, if only within the sacred marble interior of that bath.

My masseuse told me to sit so she could access my neck, shoulders, and arms. I twisted my body and dropped my legs to face her, flaccid, and said, “This is wonderful.”

Her reserve broke. She smiled.

That finished, bowls of warm water sluiced over me and the lather slid away. She directed me to the half circle of privacy wall with an attached seat, everything carved from marble. I sat on a low step at a 90-degree angle, left of the sink, and glimpsed my daughter, Rachel, descending the navel stone for her shampoo. 

Behind and above me, my keseciler pulled my back against her knees, doused my head, and lathered my hair. Two or three rinses from the deep bowls finished the shampoo. As my scrub came to an end, she gestured me farther beyond the hot room.

Languid and draping the peştamal across my breasts, I strolled in that direction. The smooth planes of my arms felt like satin as I entered a room with a pool.

My sister, Randy, and Alex slouched against the wall on a marble bench. Into the water I slipped, enveloped by warmth, stroking its considerable length back and forth. We had the pool to ourselves, as Randy joined me. Socializing is part of the bathing tradition, and the hamam remains a public meeting place. We murmured and laughed, feeling pampered and pristine. Did I hear the sighs of ancient women reverberating from the walls or was it a prescience of those who would come?

We baked awhile in no rush to end this invigorating feast. Then sauntered to the cool room and lounged, drinking a cold beverage. Clothed again, we returned to the hot room’s door and asked for our masseuses by their number and tipped each. Generosity spurred me for this luxurious time under the care of someone so accomplished.

Despite the glory of this ancient building and the fragrant soaps and fine towels in its gift shop, this hamam was a no-frills affair. My mother, expert diver, water enthusiast, hadn’t been in a Turkish bath, but would have enjoyed this relaxation—the abbreviated time of restoration to a new vigor, the momentary returning to bodily youth, the recovered outlook.

Originally published in themantelpiece.org. Issue 9, March 2024.