Bayt Farhi and the Sephardic Palaces of Ottoman Damascus in the Late 18th and 19th Centuries

One of the largest and most important palatial houses of late 18th- and early 19th-century Damascus, Bayt Farhi belonged to the Farhi family, who served as financial administrators to successive Ottoman governors in Damascus and Acre.

Lavishly illustrated with extensive colour photographs, plans, and reconstruction drawings the book brings to life the home environment of the lost elite Sephardic community of Ottoman Damascus. It will be an essential resource for those studying the architecture, history, and culture of Syria and the Ottoman Empire.

Bayt Farhi’s outstanding architecture and decoration is documented and presented in this first comprehensive analysis of it and Damascus’s other prominent Sephardic mansions Matkab ‘Anbar, Bayt Dahdah, Bayt Stambouli, and Bayt Lisbona. The Hebrew poetic inscriptions in these residences reveal how the Farhis and other leading Sephardic families perceived themselves and how they presented themselves to their own community and other Damascenes. A history of the Farhis and the Jews of Damascus provides the context for these houses, along with the architectural development of the monumental Damascene courtyard house.

Co-published with Manar al-Athar, University of Oxford.