Conclusion

In the end, we see how a site like the Dolmabahce Palace, which carries with it years of layers of history, can both influence the collective memory of a city like Istanbul and reflect the memory that a city like Istanbul instills in it. Like any lieu de memoire, it’s fascinating to examine how the wash of time tends to recontextualize the original memorial intentions of the site, sometimes providing ironic juxtapositions. Over its life, the Dolmabahce Palace has variously suggested the power of the Ottoman Empire, the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the nationalist fervor of the Turkish Republic, the modern Turkish self-understanding of history, and the sociopolitical unrest in contemporary Turkey. As such, the Palace demonstrates the dynamic nature of the lieu de memoire in its relationship to collective memory. The sites around which our collective memories gather do not exist in a vacuum and their significance changes and grows with us over time.