at the beginning of the 17th century the grand bazaar had already achieved its final shape. the enormous extent of the ottoman empire in three continents, and the total control of road communications between asia and europe, rendered the bazaar and the surrounding "han"s or caravanserais the hub of the mediterranean trade. according to several european travelers, at that time, and until the first half of the 19th century, the market was unrivaled in europe with regards to the abundance, variety and quality of the goods on sale. at that time we know from european travelers that the grand bazaar had a square plan, with two perpendicular main roads crossing in the middle and a third road running along the outer perimeter. in the bazaar there were 67 roads (each bearing the name of the sellers of a particular good), several squares used for the daily prayers, 5 mosques, 7 fountains, 18 gates which were opened each day in the morning and closed in the evening (from these comes the modern name of the market, "closed market" (). around 1638 the turkish traveller evliya çelebi gave us the most important historical description of the bazaar and of its customs. the number of shops amounted to 3,000, plus 300 located in the surrounding "han"s, large caravanserais with two or three stories round a porticoed inner courtyard, where goods could be stored and merchants could be lodged. in that period one tenth of the shops of the city were concentrated in the market and around it. for all that, at that time the market was not yet covered.