138. Today in 1920s Turkey: 30 January 1926 (Discarded Fezzes: Collectibles for Tourists)

(Cartoon, Karagöz, 30 January 1926, no. 1865, page 4.)

English:
Tourists’ Curiosity toward Antiques
Tourist: So these are antiques, huh!
Karagöz: So much so that they are piping hot antiques, monsieur. If you come back in a few years you won’t even be able to find them anymore!

Türkçe:
Seyyahlarda Antika Merakı
Seyyah: Demek bunlar antika ha!
Karagöz: Hem de dumanı üstünde antikadır, mösyö. Birkaç yıl sonra gelirsen bunları da bulamazsın!

Comments
Today’s small-sized cartoon subverts the obsolete fez—an accessory or article of clothing banned by recent reform legislation. Just over two month prior to the publication of this image, on 25 November 1925 the Turkish Republic passed it famous/infamous “hat reform” law or şapka inkilabı making it illegal to wear the fez, which is the object at the center of the gripping discussion between Karagöz and the unnamed tourist. Turkey indeed has a sordid history with headgear as the fez itself was a novelty meant to “modernize” Ottoman appearances in the nineteenth century when it was introduced to the people by Sultan Mahmud II in 1829 as part of his own “reform” efforts. Thus, after barely a century of adoption that, too, became associated with an older, Ottoman “identity” now discouraged in the 1920s.

The straightforward cartoon consists of Karagöz—his namesake magazine’s mascot and Turkish shadow theater character—holding a fez up to a man for inspection. The man’s clothes, facial features, and tobacco pipe all mark him as a tourist, presumably visiting Istanbul. As is the case with many tourists, he seeks to take a souvenir home with him and Karagöz has the perfect candidate for such an object: an old fez. In this way, the cartoon locates the fez in the past by calling it an “antique” and even suggests that the “market” for such objects is quickly shrinking… Like any good salesman, he instills a sense of urgency with his “limited time only” offer. After all, in the future, as Karagöz points out, fezzes will no longer be available for purchase.

Of course, Karagöz is actually wrong on this last point. Indeed, while fezzes still are not worn by Turks today (except for those working in various areas of the tourist industry), the “market” for kitschy, cheap tourist knock-offs is alive and well! Any tourist today can easily find and acquire a fez for as little as 10-15 YTL or roughly 3-5 USD. Some even bear the official Turkey logo associated with the tourism industry.

Last year Today in 1920s Turkey featured several posts about hat reform. Links to them can be found below:

4. Fezzes, Turbans, and Planes

18. Oldest Man Alive is also Modern

38. Bird-Brained Bigot or Principled Protester?

(Entire page, Karagöz, 30 January 1926, no. 1865, page 4.)