The slave market of Istanbul

Description

Featured in the 1836 collaborative work of Thomas Allom and Robert Walsh, this steel engraving depicts the historical Slave Market (Aurut Bazaar) in Istanbul. While the composition presents the traditional market architecture with wooden porticoes and two-story galleries alongside a mosque silhouette in the background; it illustrates enslaved people of various ethnic backgrounds, merchants, and customers in the foreground. The artwork is a critical historical cross-section that objectively documents the multinational structure of the 19th-century Ottoman capital, the challenging social classes of the era, and the physical reflection of the institution of slavery in urban space.