Category talk:Consorts of Ottoman sultans

Wives or concubines?

Were they wives? When the Ottoman sultan married Roxelana in the 16th-century, this was such an unusual act as to create general disturbance and consternation among the public: [1] It seem as though the Ottoman sultans did not in fact marry after the 15th-century, but took concubines, though concubinage was regarded as respectable and the children was not regarded as illegitimate, which makes a misunderstanding of the term understandable. Most of the women included in this category was therefore not wives, but concubines. Most of them must therefore be removed from the category. --Aciram (talk) 13:32, 14 June 2014 (UTC)

Answer: with the exception of Roxelana and a handful others, the "wives" of the Ottoman sultans were in fact not their wives: it was the custom of the sultans to procreate with slave concubines instead. This category and its sub-categories are therefore incorrect. They sould be renamed. I suggest "consorts"; that can include both the few actual wives as well as the hundreds of slave concubine-consorts which are now in these categories. --Aciram (talk) 21:15, 10 August 2022 (UTC)