Understanding traditional residential architecture in Anatolia

Traditional architecture and associated environments created by residential buildings provide an important focus of interest in contemporary Turkey.1 1. The main thesis of this article is based upon my paper ‘Traditional Residential Architecture in Anatolia’, presented to a seminar on Conservation and Rehabilitation of Half-Timber Structures, Ankara: METU, 1989 and the doctoral thesis submitted to METU, Faculty of Architecture, Program of Restoration in 1994. The concepts have, however, been revised according to more recent surveys. They are generally accepted as physical witnesses of the past to be preserved and studied. Continuity in the traditional characteristics of the social group living in these environments has been observed in many of the extant settlements in Turkey. The reciprocal relationship between the dwelling and its owners, or users, has led to a dual definition of the ‘traditional dwelling unit’: the social unit being the ‘family’, the architectural unit the ‘dwelling’. The existing, modest-scaled, traditional dwellings in Turkey, which constitute the subject of this study, were mostly constructed after the seventeenth century, but more recent buildings exhibiting similar characteristics are also covered by the term ‘traditional’.2 2. The concepts of ‘tradition’, ‘culture’, ‘vernacular’, ‘historical’, ‘regional’, ‘pre-industrial’, ‘popular’ and ‘folk’ fall outside the limits of this study. The term ‘traditional’ has been used throughout the text; the term ‘Ottoman’ has not been adopted due to its attribution to the 1923 constitution of the Turkish Republic — it cannot, consequently, be used as reference to the continuation of tradition, which is one of the main ‘givens’ of this study. A term referring to a geographical distribution of archetype under investigation has been sought. There is an important building stock incorporating similar architectural characteristics within contemporary political boundaries of other countries, such as Iran, Bulgaria, Greece, etc., which had once formed part of the Ottoman Empire. ‘Turkey’ has not been preferred for its reference to the political boundaries of the Republican era for the same reason. Instead, another geographical term ‘Anatolia’ is considered in a widened context throughout the text to refer to a more generic concept than it implies geographically. Anatolia is considered to be the land of origin on which many cultures have emerged, generated and spread to the affected lands throughout history. Furthermore, the concentration of this study focuses specifically on extant dwellings in Anatolia. Within the confines of the term ‘traditional residential architecture in Anatolia’, there are further limitations. The origin of traditional residential architecture in Anatolia, its typological evolution, its social, cultural and/or historical aspects are not the major concerns of this study, which focuses on existing examples. A limitation of the period covered by this study accords with the construction dates of extant buildings from the seventeenth century onwards. This is an open-ended period because of the continuity in ‘traditional’ aspects in many of the settlements. The concept of ‘privacy’ serves as the basis of evaluation in analysing the interrelation of any two units. The interface of two units can be defined as an hierarchy of privacy represented sociologically by the interrelations of person/family/neighbourhood relationships and architecturally through the interrelations of room/dwelling unit/street/neighbourhood.3 3. This dwelling unit was the subject of the studio course ARCH 405 in 1989—1990, Autumn semester. The project was supervised by the author and Res.Asst. Ertuğrul Morçöl; the students were Önder Kaya, Ufuk Serin, Murat Ayaş, Deniz Kutay and Gül Vanlı. This approach will include a brief summary of some previous studies of traditional residential architecture (Fig. 1).