Çıkrıkçılar Yokuşu

About Çıkrıkçılar Yokuşu

Çıkrıkçılar Yokuşu is a short, steep shopping street in the old town below Ankara Castle, running about 200 metres from Anafartalar Caddesi up to the junction of Saraçlar and Salman streets. It is one of the traditional bazaar lanes that, with Samanpazarı nearby, still draws people looking for local, everyday shopping in Ulus. The name means "Spinning-wheel Makers' Slope". In Ottoman times the area was a centre of the sof trade, one of the mainstays of Ankara's economy: in workshops here the wool of the Angora goat was worked on spinning wheels into the fine cloth called sof. Until the late 19th century the street formed part of a long commercial axis, then known as Uzun Çarşı, where craftsmen of the same trade kept shops side by side, stretching from Tahtakale below the castle towards the Hacı Bayram Mosque. The great fire of 1916 damaged much of the quarter, destroying historic buildings on the slope such as the İplikçiler Mosque (1745) and the Çanakçılar Mescidi (1732), along with neighbouring residential quarters. From 1982 the metropolitan municipality declared the area a priority for conservation and renewal, though planners criticised how slowly those projects progressed. Today the slope is lined with small shops; recent local shopping round-ups point visitors here for hardware, glassware and household goods, and photographs of the street show nut and dried-fruit sellers. The lane has also found its way into literature, in İlhan Berk's poem "Çıkrıkçılar Yokuşu" and Metin İpek's short story "Çıkrıkçılar Yokuşu'ndaki Gemi". Expect a busy, working bazaar rather than a polished tourist street, and combine it with Samanpazarı, the castle and Hamamönü on foot.