434 



CONSTANTINOPLE 



to the ancient inhabitants ; in the present day 

 a safe harbour, capable of accommodating 1200 

 sail, and so deep that the largest ironclads of the 

 Turkish navy, which may be seen there during a 

 great part of the year, find enough water for their 

 draught quite close to the shore. Stambol or 

 Turkish Constantinople lies on the southern side of 

 the Golden Horn, and Christian Constantinople 

 lies on the north side : the two are connected by a 

 couple of rude but convenient bridges, from the 

 larger of which steamers start for various points on 

 the Bosporus and Sea of Marmora. Stambol is 

 on the site of Byzantium, and the old walls, in 

 courses of stone and red brick, which Constantine 

 built and Theodosius and others restored, show that 

 the modern Turkish city occupies much the same 

 area as the capital of the first Christian emperor. 

 The walls run a circuit of 14 miles from the grim 

 but now r ruined and disused castle of the Seven 

 Towers where many sultans met their deaths at 

 the hands of their mutinous soldiery, and where 

 foreign ambassadors were imprisoned upon declara- 

 tion of war to the Golden Horn, then along its 

 southern shore to Seraglio Point, and so back to 

 the Seven Towers close along the margin of the 

 Propontis. Within these walls the city rises, like 

 Rome, upon seven low hills, crowned by noble 

 mosques, with a wilderness of picturesque, tumble- 

 down, filthy, wooden houses, and lane upon lane 

 of even more picturesque and scarcely less dirty 

 bazaars, climbing up their sides from the Golden 

 Horn to the Hippodrome. Years ago Stambol 

 was more beautiful and more filthy, but fire, the 

 great purifier of the East, has so repeatedly laid 

 low its thousands of dwellings, that the old streets 

 are becoming few, and their place is being taken by 

 more sanitary but not equally pleasing thorough- 

 fares and brick or stone houses. In the bazaars 

 and some of the less reformed byways there is quite 

 enough of the old Mussulman leaven to make one's 

 eye and one's nose aware of the charms and the 

 drawbacks of an oriental city. Very few of the 

 goods, however, which the admiring tourist carries 

 away from the bazaars are made there ; many 

 come from Vienna, and not a few from Manchester, 

 whither they are faithfully brought back by the 

 travelled citizen. 



In Stambol are nearly all the monuments and 

 antiquities worth seeing in Constantinople. In 

 the row of some half-dozen mosques, whose con- 

 glomeration of domes, like a clustered jelly-mould, 

 and tall and exceedingly slender minarets, crown 

 the summits of the hills, we see some of the most 

 famous and magnificent monuments of Christian 

 and Saracenic art. First, next the Seraglio, 

 stands Agia Sophia, Saint Sophia, the church 

 dedicated by Constantine to 'Eternal Wisdom,' 

 and rebuilt with added splendour by Theodosius 

 (415) and by Justinian (538-568), and now con- 

 verted into a cathedral mosque. Outside it is not 

 worth a second glance ; but within, the airy grace 

 of its stupendous dome, and the beauty of its 

 marbles and mosaics, despite all the ravages of 

 Moslem, and, worse than Moslem, tourists' dese- 

 crations, fascinate and amaze the vision (see 

 BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE). Next, but not less 

 beautiful, is the Suleymaniya, the mosque which 

 the Great Suleyman and his architect Sinan 

 erected in 1550-5 on the model of St Sophia, 

 but with Saracenic ornament and a loftier though 

 not quite so expansive dome. Some of the mono- 

 lithic columns are remarkable for their size and 

 beauty, and the general effect is even more im- 

 posing than that of St Sophia. Scarcely less stately 

 is the mosque of Sultan Ahmed I. in the Hippo- 

 drome ; distinguished without by its six minarets 

 (instead of the usual four), and within by the four 

 gigantic columns, 36 yards round, which support 



the dome : here the official celebrations and formal 

 processions take place at the great festivals. The 

 mosque of the conqueror Mohammed II. is also 

 worth seeing, though it has been greatly altered in 

 restoration. There are over two hundred other 

 mosques in Constantinople, and an even larger 

 number of chapels (besides hundreds of medreses 

 or mosque colleges, and mektebs or elementary 

 schools ) ; but very few of them present features of 

 special interest, except sometimes in the beauty of 

 their wall tiles, of the Khodian style, for the manu- 

 facture of which the suburb of Eyyftb was famous. 



The remains of the Greek churches are more in- 

 teresting, and the Fanar, or Greek quarter of Stam- 

 bol, recall the memories of many distinguished 

 Fanariote statesmen ; but among the relics of 

 ancient Constantinople none is more striking than 

 the Hippodrome (now called At-Meydan, or 'Horse? 

 Manege ' ), originally a circus surrounded by marble 

 seats, long since removed, but still showing remains 

 of antiquity, such as the famous column of the 

 Three Serpents which once stood at the Temple of 

 Delphi, and supported a gold tripod made out of the 

 spoils taken by the Greeks at the battle of Platrea,. 

 but was removed to his new capital by Constantine. 

 The serpents' heads are broken oft" ; one was said 

 to have been struck off by the scimitar of Mohammed 

 the Conqueror, and one is still preserved in the 

 museum of antiquities. In the Hippodrome also- 

 stands an obelisk brought from On ( Heliopolis ) in. 

 Egypt, and re-erected by Proclus the Praetor in the 

 reign of Theodosius ; hard by are the Burnt Column, 

 the column of Theodosius, and the Seraskier's- 

 Tower, whence watchmen survey the city and give 

 warning of conflagrations. Among the remains of 

 Mohammedan splendour the Old Seraglio (Eski 

 Serai) is the most important, though it has not 

 been a royal residence since the days of Mahmud 

 II. Its first gate, Bab-i-Humayun or ' Sublime 

 Porte,' has given its name to the Turkish govern- 

 ment in its foreign relations. Within its three 

 spacious courts, full of beautiful trees and pic- 

 turesque in their gray decay, are various stables 

 and offices of the court, the old council chamber, 

 the armoury (once the Church of St Irene), the 

 museum, mint, and the celebrated treasury, where 

 uncut jewels, gold-embroidered vestments, and 

 gorgeously mounted arms are preserved in fabulous, 

 value. In the neglected gardens overlooking 

 Seraglio Point, whence a lovely view is gained of 

 the Bosponis, the Asiatic shore, and the Sea of 

 Marmora, are various kiosks, one of which, called 

 that of Baghdad or Murad IV. , is lined with exqui- 

 site tiles, another contains the imperial library, 

 and a third is the ominous Kafes or ' cage ' where 

 the unhappy princes who menaced the peace of 

 sultans were immured for all their lives. 



Christian Constantinople, on the north side of 

 the Golden Horn, comprises Galata, Pera, and 

 Top-hana. Galata is pre-eminently the merchant 

 quarter, the seat of customs, and the steam com- 

 panies' agencies; it was founded by a colony of 

 Genoese merchants in 1216, and originally was in- 

 closed by walls of 4 miles' circuit, now destroyed. 

 Traces of Genoese architecture may still be found 

 in the narrow dirty streets, and in the Tower of 

 Galata, a Genoese erection, which serves the same 

 purpose as the Seraskier's Tower on the opposite 

 side in giving alarms of fires. Of late years Galata. 

 has been considerably improved ; stone and brick 

 houses have superseded the dangerous w r ooden con- 

 structions of the past ; a good thoroughfare pro- 

 vided with a tramway extends for a mile to 

 Beshiktash, and a tunnelled railway drags passen- 

 gers up the steep ascent to Pera. Pera is the 

 aristocratic quarter ; here are all the embassies 

 and legations and consulates, and here every one 

 of position has his town-house. Two-thirds of 



