Harem of European women forcibly taken into Oriental harems—evident for example in the Mozart opera "Die Entführung aus dem Serail" ("The Abduction from the Seraglio") concerning the attempt of the hero Belmonte to rescue his beloved Konstanze from the "seraglio"/harem of the Pasha Selim; or in Voltaire's "Candide", in chapter 12 of which the old woman relates her experiences of being sold into harems across the Ottoman Empire. Much of Verdi's opera "Il corsaro" takes place in the harem of the Pasha Seid—where Gulnara, the Pasha's favorite, chafes at life in the harem, and longs for freedom and true love. Eventually
Seraglio Seraglio A seraglio ( or ) or serail is the sequestered living quarters used by wives and concubines in an Ottoman household. The term "harem" is a generic term for domestic spaces reserved for women in a Muslim family, which can also refer to the women themselves. The Ottoman imperial harem was known in Ottoman Turkish as "Harem-i Hümâyûn". The etymology of this Italian word is unclear. The Italian Treccani dictionary gives two derivations: one from Turkish "saray", from Persian "sarai" (), meaning "palace", or the enclosed courts for the wives and concubines of the harem of a house or