Do monuments have lives that justify writing their biographies? And if they do, are their lives punctuated by events and structured by relationships, similar to human lives? Do they have an identity of their own, and does this identity change over time? In addition to introducing the Çemberlitaş Hamamı briefly and providing a literature review of the topic of hamams, the introduction takes up these questions and examines the notions of individuality and biography within the Islamic and Ottoman context. Furthermore, it justifies applying the format of a biographical narrative to the history of the hamam.
