Strolling Through Istanbul: The Classic Guide to the City (56 page)

Opposite the end of the street on which we have been walking we come to a great mosque complex which is one of the loveliest and most masterful of the works of Sinan. It was built in 1554 for Kara Ahmet Pa
ş
a, one of Süleyman’s Grand Vezirs. We enter by a gate in the south wall into a spacious and charming courtyard shaded by plane trees. The court is formed by the cells of the medrese; to the left stands the large dershane with pretty shell-shaped pendentives under the dome; beside it a passage leads to the lavatories. The porch of the mosque has unusually wide and attractive arches supporting its five domes. Over the embrasures or niches of the porch are some rather exceptional tiles, predominantly apple-green and vivid yellow, done in the old
cuerda seca
technique. They are the latest recorded examples of the second period of the Iznik potteries, the only other important examples being those in the türbe of the
Ş
ehzade and the fine series of panels in the mosque of Sultan Selim. A few more such panels, but with blue and white inscriptions, will be found inside the mosque on the east wall. The marble revetment around the entrance portal evidently belongs to a restoration carried out in 1896; fortunately, though very
Empire
in style, it is restrained and does not clash badly with the rest.

On entering we find that the plan of the mosque is a hexagon inscribed in a rectangle. The four semidomes lie along the diagonals of the building and each rests on two small conches; six great columns support the arches, and there are galleries on three sides. The proportions of the building are unusually fine, as are many of the details; for example, the polychrome voussoirs of the arches and the elegant mihrab and mimber. But what is rarer are the wooden ceilings under the western galleries, painted with elaborate arabesques in rich reds, dark blue, gold and black. This is perhaps the most extensive and best preserved example of this kind of painting in the city; it is singularly rich and beautiful. Unfortunately, the ceiling on the left has recently been spoiled by an attempt at restoration, but the one on the right still retains its sombre brilliance.

Outside the precinct wall, towards the west, is the türbe of the founder, a simple octagonal building, unfortunately ruined inside. Beyond it stands the large mektep, double and of very interesting design, a long rectangular building with a wooden roof; it is still used as a primary school.

We now find ourselves in the large, irregular and picturesque square in front of Topkap
ı
, the Cannon Gate. Until a few years ago, when the new breaches in the walls were made, this was one of the two main entrances to the city and, like the other one, Edirnekap
ı
, hopelessly narrow and impossible for traffic. One pleasant result of the new breaches for the modern highways is that the districts around the ancient gates have become backwaters, to some extent, and are no longer so congested with traffic. Topkap
ı
was anciently known as the Gate of St. Romanus, from a nearby church of that name. Its Turkish name, the Cannon Gate, comes from the fact that outside it in 1453 Sultan Mehmet placed his largest cannon, the famous Urban. Here too the Conqueror pitched his tent to direct the siege operations, which were chiefly concentrated against the stretch of walls between the Seventh and Sixth Hills. Inside the gate are suspended some of the stone cannon balls fired by Urban during the last siege.

TAKKEC
İ
IBRAH
İ
M A
Ğ
A CAM
İ
İ

Before we stroll along the next stretch of walls we might take a short detour along the road that faces Topkap
ı
and leads into the Thracian downs. After about 500 metres we see on our left an extremely picturesque mosque, Takkeci Ibrahim A
ğ
a Camii. This is the only wooden mosque in Istanbul that appears to preserve essentially its original appearance. It is rectangular in form, with a wooden roof and porch. This is the simplest and cheapest to build and is therefore the commonest of all mosque types; but in almost all surviving examples the wooden roof and porch have succumbed to fire and have been reconstructed even more cheaply, losing thereby their charm and distinction. Doubt less because of its isolation in the country outside the walls, Takkeci Ibrahim A
ğ
a Camii seems to have escaped the fires and has pre served its original porch and roof. It was founded in 1592 by a certain Ibrahim who was a maker of the felt hats called
takke
or
arakiye
, especially the long conical kind worn by the dervishes.

A stone wall with grilles and the remains of a fine sebil at the corner surrounds the mosque courtyard-garden. The deeply projecting wooden tiled roof of the porch is supported by a double row of wooden pillars. Since the porch extends halfway round both sides of the mosque, the pillars give the effect of a little copse of trees, the more so since the paint has long since worn off. The roof itself has three dashing gables along the façade; a very quaint and pretty arrangement. On the right rises the fine minaret with a beautiful stalactited
ş
erefe. Handsome but rather heavy inscriptions adorn the spaces over the door and windows. Within, a wooden balcony runs round the west wall and half of the side walls; it has a cornice which preserves the original arabesque painting, such as we have just seen at Kara Ahmet Pa
ş
a Camii. The ceiling is of wood painted dark green and in the centre is a wooden dome on an octagonal cornice; one sees how greatly the dome adds to the charm of the interior and what a disaster it is when these ceilings are reconstructed flat. Two rows of windows admit light; the tiny one over the mihrab preserves some ancient, brilliant stained glass. Beneath the upper row of windows the walls are entirely revetted with tiles of the greatest period of Iznik in great panels with vases of leaves and flowers. These are celebrated and are as fine as those we have seen at Ramazan Efendi Camii.

TOPKAPI TO ED
İ
RNEKAPI

We now return to Topkap
ı
and resume our stroll along the walls toward Edirnekap
ı
, the next of the Byzantine public gates. This section of the walls, anciently known as the Mesoteichion, was the most vulnerable in the whole defence system, since here the walls descend into the valley of the Lycus, which entered the city midway between the two gates. During the last siege the defenders on the Mesoteichion were at a serious disadvantage, being below the level of the Turkish guns on either side. For that reason the walls in the Lycus valley are the most badly damaged in the whole length of the fortifications: and most of the defence towers are mere piles of rubble or great shapeless hulks of masonry. It was this section of the wall which was finally breached by the Turks on the morning of 29 May 1453. The final charge was led by a giant Janissary named Hasan, who fought his way up onto one of the towers of the outer wall. Hasan himself was slain, but his companions then forced their way across the peribolos and over the inner wall into the city, and within hours Constantinople had fallen.

The course of the ancient river Lycus is today marked by the brash new Vatan Caddesi, which breaches the walls midway between Topkap
ı
and Edirnekap
ı
. Just inside the walls between here and the Fifth Military Gate, about 400 metres beyond, is the little neighbourhood called Sulukule, the site of a gypsy village which has been here since the fourteenth century but is now being demolished. This section of walls was anciently called the Murus Bacchatureus: according to tradition this is where the Emperor Constantine Dragases had his command post during the last siege. He was last seen there just before the walls were breached, fighting valiantly beside his cousins Theophilus Palaeologus and Don Francisco of Toledo and his faithful comrade John Dalmata. The Fifth Military Gate is known in Turkish as Hücum Kap
ı
s
ı
, the Gate of the Assault, preserving the memory of that last battle. On the outer lintel of the gate there is an inscription recording a repair by one Pusaeus, presumably in the fifth century.

The Edirne Gate stands at the peak of the Sixth Hill and is at the highest point in the city, 77 metres above sea-level. This gate has preserved in Turkish form one of its ancient names, Porta Adrianople, for from here started the main road to Adrianople, the modern Edirne. It was also known in Byzantium as the Gate of Charisius or sometimes as the Porta Polyandrium, the Gate of the Cemetery. This latter name undoubtedly came from the fact that there was a large necropolis outside the walls at this point. Several ancient funerary steles from this necropolis can still be seen set into the courtyard wall of the Greek church of St. George, which stands just inside the walls near the gate.

It was through the Edirne Gate that Sultan Mehmet II made his triumphal entry into the city on 29 May 1453, and a modern plaque beside the gate commemorates this event. Evliya Çelebi, whose ancestor Yavuz Ersinan was present at the time, gives this vivid description of that historic moment: “The Sultan then having the pontifical turban on his head and sky-blue boots on his feet, mounted on a mule and bearing the sword of Mohammed in his hand, marched in at the head of seventy or eighty thousand Moslem heroes, crying out ‘Halt not conquerors! God be praised! Ye are the conquerors of Constantinople!’ ”

M
İ
HR
İ
MAH CAM
İ
İ

Just inside the Edirne Gate to the south stands the magnificent mosque of Mihrimah Sultan, which dominates the Sixth Hill and can be seen for miles about in all directions. It is one of the architectural masterpieces of the great Sinan, built by him for the Princess Mihrimah, the favourite daughter of Süleyman the Magnificent. The külliye was built between 1562 and 1565 and includes, besides the mosque, a medrese, a mektep, a türbe, a double hamam, and a long row of shops in the substructure of the terrace on which it is built. Unfortunately the complex has been very severely damaged by earthquakes at least twice, in 1766 and 1894. Each time the mosque itself was restored but the attendant buildings were for the most part neglected; in recent years some not altogether satisfactory reconstruction has been carried out.

We enter from the main street through a gate giving access to a short flight of steps leading up to the terrace. On the right is the great courtyard, around three sides of which are the porticoes and cells of the medrese. The west side, which stands just opposite the Theodosian walls with only a narrow road between, has only had its portico restored, and it is difficult to be sure how many cells there were along this side and whether the dershane stood here as one might expect. In the centre of the courtyard is an attractive
ş
ad
ı
rvan. The mosque is preceded by an imposing porch of seven domed bays supported by eight marble and granite columns. This porch was originally preceded by another, doubtless with a sloping wooden roof supported on 12 columns, traces of which may be seen on the ground. This double porch was a favourite device of Sinan’s, found again at Mihrimah’s other mosque at Üsküdar and in many others.

The central area of the interior is square, covered by a great dome 20 metres in diameter and 37 metres high under the crown, resting on smooth pendentives. The tympana of all four dome arches are filled with three rows of windows. To north and south high triple arcades, each supported on two great granite columns, open into side aisles with galleries above, each of three domed bays; but these galleries reach only to the springing of the dome arches. The plan thus gives a sense of enormous space and light. Altogether Mihrimah Camii is one of the very finest mosques in the city and must be counted as one of Sinan’s masterpieces. It is curious that this mosque, although imperial, has but one minaret, while Mihrimah’s other mosque in Üsküdar has two.

The interior stencil decoration is modern, insipid in colour and characterless in design. The mimber, however, is a fine original work of white marble with a beautiful medallion perforated like an iron grille. The voussoirs of the gallery arches are fretted polychrome of verd antique and Proconnesian marble.

From the exterior the building is strong and dominant as befits its position at the highest point of the city. The square of the dome base with its multi-windowed tympana, identical on all sides, is given solidity and boldness by the four great, weight-towers at the corners, prolongations of the piers that support the dome arches. Above this square rises the dome itself on a circular drum pierced by windows.

If we walk around to the south side of the mosque, we find a small graveyard at the end of which stands an unusually large sibyan mektebi with a central dome flanked by two cradle-vaults. Beyond this and entered through it is the türbe of the Grand Vezir Güzelce Ahmet Pa
ş
a, Mihrimah’s son-in-law. (Mihrimah herself is buried in her fathers türbe at the Süleymaniye.) Ahmet Pa
ş
a’s türbe is like only one other built by Sinan, that of Pertev Pa
ş
a at Eyüp. It is rectangular, more than twice as long as it is wide, covered by a large dome and two cradle-vaults. A third example of a classical türbe of this form is that of Destari Mustafa Pa
ş
a at the
Ş
ehzade. Ahmet Pa
ş
a’s türbe contains a large number of sarcophagi of members of the family of Princess Mihrimah, many of them children.