A number of other artists from various countries depicted the parts of the city they found interesting in oils or watercolours. Some of these were reproduced in a book entitled'Les Peintres du Bosphore au XVIII Siècle', which as its title states, was devoted to the 18th century, published in 1989. One also encounters in auction catalogues the works of 19th century artists who portrayed Istanbul. However, from the middle of the 19th century onwards it was the art of photography, which gave a more realistic impression of the city, that began to yield its first fruits. Robertson (referred to previously), who lived in Istanbul for many years, preserved Istanbul, its buildings and its people for posterity in his photographs, each of which is now a valuable historical document. A good plan of old Istanbul was drawn in 1870 where the layout of the streets at that time and the city's major buildings are shown. Istanbul was an object of considerable interest for Europeans and books on the subject were continually being published.

Some of the most perfect descriptions of Istanbul were penned by Ahmet Rasim (1864-1932), a Turk. Such works as "~ehir Mektuplari" (Letters from the City), "Fuh~- Atik" (Prostitution in the Old Days), "Hamamci (.Ilfet" (Ulfet of the Public Baths) and "Falaka" (Bastinado), all describe a world which was beginning to disappear into the depths of history, a forgotten istanbul, at the end of the 19th century. The most valuable aspect of these descriptions is that they depict the Turkish and Muslim Istanbul, a world which no Western writer was ever able to enter. The journalist Mehmed Tevfik (1843-1932), who was also known by the nickname 'caylak' (kite) published a number of brochures, which had extremely simple illustrations, under the title of "lstanbul'da Bir Sene" (A Year in Istanbul). A series of booklets describing the people of Istanbul and their way of life is a valuable source in this respect.

The appearance of Istanbul at the end of the 19th century was sometimes described by foreign writers in an extremely negative manner. This attitude is quite apparent in the travel notes kept by K. Krumbacher, the founder of Byzantine studies in the West, during his visit to Istanbul in 1884. Krumbacher sees everything from the Greek point of view in this "greatest of Greek cities'. The only items that interested him were the mosaics in the Kariye Mosque (EminönO), and the newly-founded Archaeological Museum. A French doctor who nursed a particular grudge against the Ottoman state because he had become involved in a political intrigue at the end of the 19th century during the reign of Abdülhamid II published a series of books under the pseudonym of Paul de Régla. In a book entitled "Les Bas-Fonds de Constaninople (The Shallows of Constantinople), he provides a description of Istanbul's ethnic composition, its stray dogs, Galata and Pera (Beyo~lu at night), its intrigues, narcotics centres and disreputable taverns. G. des Godins de Souhesmes, in his books "Au Pays des Osmanlis" (In the Land of the Ottomans) and "Turcs et Levantins" (Turks and Levantines) tells us what people ate and drank, how houses were built, describes the servants, the streets and the nature of the city; he then dwells on the stray dogs, guardians of the streets, the goods sold by Street sellers and the hawkers' cries - all of which goes to make a pretty realistic description of life in Istanbul about a hundred years ago.

During the second half of the 19th century and the early years of the 20th, when the Ottoman state was on the verge of collapse, a large number of people continued to visit the city and write about it. Istanbul also provided a background for a number of novels written at that time. The German novelist Karl May (1842-1912), in “Von Baghdad nach Stambul” (From Baghdad to Istanbul), puts his hero through a number of adventures in the Istanbul of the 1870's; however, the city merely serves as a backdrop for the novel. On the other hand, there is a description of Istanbul in the famous novel “Aziyade” by J. Viaud, otherwise known as Pierre Loti (1850-1923). The descriptions of Istanbul adorning a love story that unfolds during the 1870's reflect the last traces of a city that was being lost forever at that time. However, Loti's novel contains so many things that do not fit in with the topography of the city that it is difficult to believe they are true. Many references to Istanbul are to be found in the European novels of the period. “Pages d'Orient” (Pages of the Orient), by an unknown writer named M. Noe is a mixture of travelogue and detective fiction. A similar technique is employed in “De L'Homme qui Assasina” by Claude Farrére (1876- 1957), who, like Loti, came to Istanbul as a naval officer.