More than a million visit Turkey’s Ottoman palaces

By Hilal Ustuk

ISTANBUL

More than a million people have visited the former palaces of Turkey’s Ottoman sultans, according to the agency running the sites.

National Palaces, an agency of the Turkish parliament, administers around a dozen palaces, mansions, pavilions, museums and factories around the Istanbul region.

According to the agency, 1.1 million local and overseas tourists visited in 2017, generating revenue of 20 million Turkish liras ($5.25 million).

The most popular site was Dolmabahce Palace on the European shores of the Bosphorus, built by Sultan Abdulmecid in the mid-19th century and the place where President Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, died.

The palace was visited by around 630,000 visitors.

Across the channel, Beylerbeyi Palace on the Asian side attracted 95,000 visitors. Opened as a summer retreat in 1865, the palace sits in wooded grounds dotted with kiosks.

Ihlamur Pavilions in the European neighborhood of Besiktas recorded 84,000 people coming through its doors while the National Palaces Painting Museum next to Dolmabahce received 65,000 tourists.

Last year, 920,000 people visited the palaces.