Transportation of smaller goods in Istanbul, Turkey, has always been a marked feature in the urban landscape. The unique urban morphology contributed to the development of idiosyncratic ways of transportations. In the myriad of steep and narrow streets in old town Fatih, for example, notably in the artisanal enclave between Mısır Çarşısı (‘the spice bazaar’) and Kapalı Çarşı (‘the big, covered bazaar’), both established in the 17th century, there has hardly been any space for horse carriages, pushcarts, cars, or other ways of cargo transportation. Consequently, goods were moved from one place to another by hamallar (porters: men carrying bales and boxes on their backs, sometimes nearly double their body weight, lugging them with their heads bowed and their knees bent to local shops). ...
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