Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1890-08-21
GENUINE TURKIsH BATHS.
bathing an All.Day Diversion With
the Women of Constantinople.
from Constantinople Letter.1

Bathing an All.Day Diversion With
the Women of ConstantinOple.
[From a Constantinople letter.
Just outside the limits of Constantine
pie, up in the Golden Horn, is Aga-Ham-
mann, bath frequented by many ladies of
the highest position, not because they have
no baths of their own, but because they
are sure to meet their friends there with
out restriction and have good time. It
has always been great place for mothers
to take their marriageable daughters, and
for other mothers to go to choose a bride
for their sons, and, as wives are not chosen
for their mental, but physical beauties
alone, certainly this is the place to choose,
where beauty is quite unadorned, and,
therefore, of this bath we will speak. >
The ladies arrive, each one attended by
her own personal servant and another who
bears very substantial lunch basket and
a handsome gold-bordered bathing wrap.
The eunuchs remain outside or go away,
and come back at the hour the bath is end
ed, as it occupies several hours.
First, the ladies are Invested of their
clothing and receive Grape sheet, which
they drape about them while they sit the
this time they chat with each other,
though not very Familiarity, and they keep
up the pretense of the drapery until they
reach and pass the next room, after which
the sheet and modesty are thrown off, and,
with their abundant hair streaming loose
and unconfned, they walk erect into the
last room, as Eve did about the garden of
Eden There they stretch themselves out
upon the marble slabs while two attend
ants rub them and lather them and pour
hot water over them until it seems as if
they would be boiled. Each lady is laid
on marble slab which is slightly inclined
and two attendants begin their labors, one
at the feet and the other at the head.
They use sort of clay called pilo, which
raises thick, white lather, which some
times grows several inches thick. The at
tendants use nothing but this soapy clay
and their hands to cleanse their subject
with, and they rub and knead and punch
until it seems they would reduce the flesh
to pulp, all the while leaving this lather
to accumulate until the bather looks like a
SNOWFALL. Another kind of soap is used
| for the hair, and another again for the
face, but the lather is always left to gather
| thick, as the worker rubs and tolls, the
perspiration rolling in streams down her
| own glistening body.
4
| after the ladies have soaked in soap long
enough they take quite hot water, entirely
too hot for anybody but Turkish woman
| who is used to it, and pour it gently ovel
them, not dashing the water, but softly
emptying it, SO that it soon washes off al
the lather, leaving the flesh rosy and fresh
This pouring of water is continued some
times half an hour, and the rubbing, roll
| ing and kneading of the body, after which
the lady is at liberty to plunge into tn.
basin if she wishes among the other laugh
ing and frolicking women, black and whit
| mingling indiscriminately.
/ Words cannot depict the utter abandon
ment to fun and sport that takes posses
sion of these women, and children, too
for after girl is nine years old she is ad
mitted to women's society unrestrainedly
The young girls are all plumper than oul
young girls, and they have in the mair
fine figures, though the knees are Away
big and prominent, which is probabl,
caused by the habit of sitting crossed
legged as they do. Their skin is yer.
white and pure, in spite of their unwhole
some diet and indolent habits.