A Day Full of Old City Istanbul Tourism: Stop 2: Hagia Sophia

The mosaic image of the Holy Family, with St. John the Baptist (R) inside Hagia Sophia

The next stop was to one of the most historically significant buildings on this or any other planet: Hagia Sophia.

Hagia Sophia was built in the 530's. The crucial design element is the enormous dome. Nothing like that had ever been attempted. And the first two attempts were unsuccessful and the building collapsed from the weight of the enormous dome.

But much like the construction of the Gothic Cathedrals in Western Europe several hundred years later, the builders learned by trial and error. They learned how much they push design to the limits. And the third time was the charm since Hagia Sophia is still standing. And this is earthquake country.

Hagia Sophia started life as a Catholic basilica. The Emperor Constantine had made Christianity the state religion of the Roman Empire and the town that bore his name, Constantinople (not Istanbul) was Catholic Country. The Ottomans conquered Constantinople in the mid 1400'. The Ottomans were Islamic. Thus, the Christian churches -- by this time there had been schism in the Christian Church and Constantinople not only was an Orthodox Christian town, it was the center of Orthodox Christianity -- then were converted into mosques.

Interesting "circle of life" issue. In the same general time period that the Ottomans were converting Christian churches into mosques, you had the reverse happening in Reconquista Spain, where grand mosques, such as the one in Cordoba, were being converted into Catholic cathedrals. 

Hagia Sophia is both enormous and under construction.

This isn't like Sagrada Familia in Barcelona where a hundred years later they are building the initial structure. This is a major renovation. The building is a millennium and a half old. And the renovations are supposed to make it more earthquake proof in earthquake country.

Let's take a break for a tourist posing inside Hagia Sophia.

Break's over. Time to resume the tourism lecture.

 

The renovation project only started recently and is expected to continue, according to my guide, for about 25 years. Given my age -- and let's be real here -- it is very unlikely that I will ever have the opportunity to see Hagia Sophia free of construction scaffolding.

But, then again, when the great Gothic cathedrals of Europe, the builders and the financiers knew they would never live long enough to see the completed work.

Below is graffiti:

Thousand year old graffiti carved into the stone by a Swedish soldier. (Crusader, perhaps?) (The crusaders used Constantinople as a base for the attempts to liberate the Holy Land in the centuries before the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople.)

But even construction scaffolding does not diminish the size and grandeur of this structure.

Mosaics.

Islam forbids depictions of humans and animals, especially in Moslem holy space, such as a mosque. A lot of these mosaics were plastered over when Hagia Sophia was re-purposed into a mosque after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople. (I definitely appreciate the fact that the Moslem conquerors simply plastered over the mosaics rather than destroyed them. That's why they are still there.)

So Hagia Sophia is a Catholic basilica that became an Orthodox church that became a mosque.  Then, in the 1920's, when Mustafa Kemal Atatürk created the modern secular Turkish state, Hagia Sophia became a museum. It was at that time that the plastered-over mosaics were uncovered, a process that still is ongoing even though, a few years ago, the current Turkish president decreed that Hagia Sophia once again would serve as a mosque.

And here is one mosaic that uncovered and obscured.

It is a depiction of the Virgin Mary in the dome, It is covered by fabric so that it is not visible to the Moslem faithful praying on the first floor. It is visible, however, to the tourist horde on the second floor. If you know what you're looking for. Which I did. But only because I had a guide who could point out this sort of stuff to me otherwise I'd have missed it.

And this is maybe the most famous of the mosaics depicting Jesus inside Hagia Sophia.

Why look who's here taking in the scene!

Just another American tourist enjoying tourism.

Even without the scaffolding it would be impossible to take the enormous grandeur of this 1500-year old building.

The Blue Mosque was meant to mock the Christian-built Hagia Sophia or, to use a more positive term that probably better described the matter, the Blue Mosque was designed specifically to pay homage to Hagia Sophia.

The above mosaic depicts two Roman emperors presenting gifts to Jesus. Constantine presents the City of Constantinople. Justinian presents Hagia Sophia.

Hagia Sophia is the major reasons I decided to visit Istanbul.

I believe that is a foot-washing station that is useful now that Hagia Sophia has been repurposed (again) into a mosque. The Islamic directive to get clean before going to church, especially getting the feet cleaned, is a tenet of that faith that I wholly 100 percent support. If only people would clean themselves up before going to church in America!

And when you leave Hagia Sophia, there's the Blue Mosque.

Time to move on to the next stop in this whirlwind tourist day.