The Çemberlitaş Hamam is probably both the most historically significant of the Turkish baths and the most visited by tourists visiting Istanbul. It is the one that you will find in the major guide books and recommended by area hotels. Some people even find themselves visiting it knowing nothing more than it was featured in one of the Indiana Jones movies. The historical significance is attributed to the fact that it was designed in the late period of the work of the famous Turkish architect Sinan in 1584. As a result of this work having been designed in the most experienced and mature period of the artist’s life, it is highly regarded for its functionality, tranquility and signature unassuming elegance.

The hamam was commissioned by Nurbana Sultan, the wife of Selim II and mother of Murat III as a way to provide subsidies for a charity complex located on the Asian side in Üsküdar.

It is located in the square of the Çemberlitaş area of Sultanahmet. There are many important monuments and tomb here, including the tombs of Ali Baba and Sultan Mahmut II.

While men and women both enter from the main street entrance, the baths are separate. There are three different package offers for you to choose from. There’s a self service option where you scrub yourself off. There’s a rub down package where an attendant scrubs you down. And there is a luxury package that includes a thorough scrubbing by an attendant, lazing about in the bath for as long as you please, and a thirty minute aromatic oil body massage in a separate chamber. I always go all out and opt for the luxury treatment. I am there so infrequently and the experience is truly one to be relished. And I deserve a little spoiling every now and again like any person, don’t I?

Once you enter the complex from the side door off the lobby, you walk through the warm transitional area. This is sort of like a weigh station between the dressing areas and the bath itself. There is an old stone fountain and a juice bar and seating areas with Ottoman style cushions. The space is naturally lit being under one of the three main domes of the complex.
In fact, the women’s dressing room area has the only remaining roof lantern that were once used to light the whole place. But most of the areas are lit from the domes which have what are called elephant eyes, or circular pieces of glass, pocking the domes.

Another interesting architectural aspect of this building is that while it appears to be square-shaped from the outside, it is actually a twelve-cornered polygon inside. The four outer corners of the polygon house the private bathing cubicles. A series of antechambers separates these areas from the bath section.

After entering the transitional area, you walk up the stairs and into the dressing area. This is a three story section looking down onto the inner courtyard. You find a locker with a key, remove your clothes and wrap yourself in the special hamam towel called a peştemal. You can remove your towel and go stark naked, or wear a pair of undies or even a bathing suit if you are very modest.

When you enter, you can lay yourself directly on the hot marble stone at the center, or you can wait for an attendant to grab you. These attendants tend to be big, burly no-nonsense women and do not be shocked that they are mostly naked. You wouldn’t want to wear clothes, either working in what feels like a giant sauna all day! But you will probably try not to giggle when your attendant brushes her sagging bosoms against you as she does her magic. With the luxury treatment, you are given a loofah glove that the attendant will use to slough off your dead skin. Even if you are freshly clean, even if you exfoliate on a regular basis, prepare to be appalled by the grey matter that results from this scrub down. But feel comforted by the fact that you will be baby soft when you leave that place.

There are 38 washing stalls positioned around the stone, including private cubicles set under archways. Women who want to wash their hair generally tuck themselves back into those cubicles. The washing stalls have marble sinks with both hot and cold water taps and small copper bowls that are used for pouring water onto you. The attendant will also take you to one of these sinks after she has given you a full soap down, post exfoliation.

When the attendant is done with your skin, let the lazing about begin! I personally like to lie as close as possible to the center of the stone where it is hottest because I am a sadist. (Actually, I am a big fan of dry heat, being of Swedish descent, the sauna people.) I will lie there and sweat and glow all the livelong day. I can lay there more than an hour and not tire of the exquisite pleasure of sweating out toxins.

Finally, I decide it is time for my massage and I re-enter the transitional area and bench myself outside the massage chamber. Finally a massage therapist comes to get me and I walk in to find six beds all lined up military hospital tent style and I climb on.
It’s worth mentioning that this massage would be worth it at half the price. It is already a bargain, if you ask me, considering all you get for this package. And true, there is no privacy and true, there is no incense or New Age music. What you get is an earful of village lady gossip instead, but it ain’t no lame-ass massage. These beefy women will tenderize you and I will take that any day over some tiny Asian lady with dainty little mitts, but to each her own, I suppose.

As we were leaving, my friend and I both feeling like princesses, she remarked to me, “Man, if I lived here, I’d make a weekly pilgrimage out of this experience.” And that’s a lovely thought, indeed, but unfortunately, I only find myself making the time when someone is visiting. Life for me here is not a permanent vacation, as attractive as that idea occasionally seems.