TurkeyTravelPlanner.com Galata Whirling Dervish Hall
 

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The Galata Mevlevihanesi, or tekke (TEHK-keh), is a Mevlevi Whirling Dervish hall on Galipdede Caddesi just south of Tünel Square, at the southern end of Beyoğlu's Istiklal Caddesi in Istanbul (map).

Officially, it is now used as a Museum of Divan Literature (Divan Edebiyat Müzesi), preserving examples of Ottoman literary works, inscriptions and calligraphy, but most visitors came here in recent years to see where the dervishes whirled.

Unfortunately, the dervish hall is CLOSED for restoration. It's scheduled to re-open in December 2010.

You still have four opportunities to see the dervishes whirl in Istanbul, however. Here they are.

About the Galata Mevlevihanesi
The Galata tekke has a long and revered history, having been founded in 1491 by a Ottoman grandee from the palace of Sultan Beyazit II. The tekke's first seyh (sheikh, leader) was Muhammed Semaî Sultan Divanî, a descendant of Mevlâna Jelaleddin Rumî himself.

The building you see is not the original, which burned in 1765, but its replacement, which dates from 1796 and was extensively restored during the 19th century, also between 1967 and 1972, and again in 2008. (Another photo.)

Galip Dede, a renowned 17th-century sheikh of this tekke, is buried in an ornate tomb to the left as you enter from the street.

Kumbaracıbaşı Ahmet Paşa, better known in the west as the Claude Alexandre, Comte de Bonneval (1675-1747), a French nobleman who converted to Islam and entered the sultan's service as a bombardier general, is also buried on the tekke's grounds.

Nearby is the tomb of Ibrahim Müteferrika (1674-1745), an ethnic Hungarian Unitarian from Transylvania who converted to Islam and established the first Arabic/Ottoman moveable-type printing press in the Ottoman Empire in the 1720s.


Mevlâna Jelaleddin Rumî

Mevlevi Whirling Dervishes

Tours to See the Dervishes

Tünel Square

Istiklal Caddesi

Taksim Square

Galata Tower

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Backpackers Travel, Istanbul, Turkey
 
Whirling Dervishes, Istanbul, Turkey
Above, Mevlevi dervishes whirl during the sema in the Galata Mevlevihanesi.

Below left,
crowds wait outside the tekke to see the dervishes whirl.
Turkey: Bright Sun, Strong Tea, by Tom Brosnahan
Read about my personal experiences with the dervishes in my humorous travel memoir. Click here!