Note 427 — Chapter V · THE RULING INSTITUTION: AS A NOBILITY AND A COURT
Reading edition
Postel, i. 31, says that Suleiman occasionally sent for one of his women to visit him in the principal palace. Nicolay, 62, reports that about 1551 Roxelana was residing within the palace grounds. By 1585 the principal ladies of the harem had been transferred to the new palace, leaving the old palace to the function of a training-school for recruits. These steps illustrate the rapid increase of the importance of the harem in the Ottoman scheme.