Jax Stumpes: İstanbul, Turkey III (4/22/2025)

Tuesday, April 22, 2025

İstanbul, Turkey III (4/22/2025)

Tuesday, April 22, 2025 (continued)

Continuing from the Grand Bazaar:

Nuruosmanıye Camii/Mosque (1748-1755,
in Ottoman Baroque style)

Cat food vending machine

Constantine's Column or Burnt Column
(330 CE for a statue of Constantine);
the porphyry column burned in 1779

The "younger" man is loading up his elder with folded carpets

Sultanahmet Meydanı/Square was the former Hippodrome
(203-330 CE), a public area for chariot races that
was the sporting and social center of Constantinople

Stone obelisk (c 4C) was later covered with
gilded bronze plates that were later
stolen during the Fourth Crusade in 1204,
along with the Quadrigia of Four Horses
that were taken to Venice

Serpent Column (478-479 BCE) was brought
here from Delphi in 330 CE by Constantine

Obelisk of Theodosius (15C BCE) was taken
by Theodosius from the Amon-Re Temple
in Karnak, Egypt in 390 CE; only
the upper one-third survived the journey

There was a two-hour wait to get tickets to
enter the Blue Mosque, and we did not have time

The Blue Mosque was commissioned by Sultan Ahmet I, and it was built with six minarets. Before that time, the only mosque with six minarets was in Mecca. Apparently Sultan Ahmet I then gifted another minaret to Mecca, so that it has seven.

Alman Çeşmesi/German Fountain was
presented to the Ottoman Sultan Abdül Hamit II
in 1898 by the visiting German Kaiser Wilhelm II

Surprising mosaic dome of the German Fountain

Kent at the actual German fountain

Cherry blossoms and tulips; we missed the
peak of the Lale Festivali/Tulip Festival

View of the Blue Mosque from the park between it and
Ayasofya-i Kebir Cami-i Şerifi/Hagia Sofia Grand Mosque

View of Hagia Sofia Grand Mosque from the park

Roasted chestnuts and roasted corn vendor

Apparently roasted corn is
spritzed with lemon juice

Yerebatan Sarnıcı/Basilica Cistern (1523)
stored the water supply for the Byzantine
emperors, up to 80,000 cubic meters/21,133,774
gallons; we forewent the one-hour wait

Alstom Citadis 304 tram (2011)

Simit vendor

We shared a simit/Turkish sesame bread ring

We also missed entering the Hagia Sofia because
of a two-hour wait

Wall of the Topkapı Sarayı/Palace (15C)

Entrance to Topkapı Palace

Gülhane Parkı/Park tulips

Alay Köşkü/Procession Pavilion (1819)
on the outer wall of Topkapı Palace was
where the sultan could watch processions

Now we are catching the tram after having
learned we can use any credit card in the turnstile

From the tram, we caught F1 Tünel (1875) subway, the
second oldest underground railway system in the world
(after the London Tube 1873),
which went a distance of 573 m/1,880', uphill!