Strolling Through Istanbul: The Classic Guide to the City (70 page)

Kuruçe
ş
me, the next village on the European shore, was up until recent years disfigured by coal, sand and gravel depots, but these have now been removed and replaced by an attractive park and promenade, part of a programme to restore the shores of the Bosphorus to their former beauty. There are three old churches in the village, two of them Greek and the other Armenian. The Greek churches are St. Demetrios and St. John the Baptist, both of which were first mentioned in 1684. The present church of St. Demetrios dates from 1798, while St. John was rebuilt in 1834. Both of them have sacred springs, that of St. Demetrios dating back to Byzantine times. The Armenian church, Surp Haç (Holy Cross), may date from the Byzantine era, though the present structure is due to a rebuilding in 1834 by Karabet Balyan. The wooden mosque on the shore road in the village was built in the eighteenth century by Tezkireci Osman Efendi, with a handsome çe
ş
me in front.

ARNAVUTKÖY

Arnavutköy, the Albanian Village, has one of the most picturesque harbours anywhere along the Bosphorus; its sea-front is lined with picturesque old wooden houses. The oldest house along the shore is the red yal
ı
, or seafront mansion, of Halet Çambel, the distinguished archaeologist, which was built in the years 1820–30. Along the shore there are several excellent fish restaurants.

There are two Greek churches in the village, which still has a small Greek community. Both churches in their present form date from the late nineteenth century. The one near the shore road, the Taxiarkes, is dedicated to the Archangels Michael and Gabriel; the one in the upper village to Profitis Elias (Prophet Elijah). Both churches have sacred wells. The large mosque on the seafront, Tevfikiye Camii, was commissioned by Mahmut II and built in 1832 in the neoclassical style.

The interior of Arnavutköy is also quite charming and picturesque, particularly if one takes the back streets and lanes and climbs the slopes of the hills and valleys on which they are perched. On the hill above in a superb position are the buildings of Robert College, an American coeducational lycée, founded in 1871 as the American College of Girls. The American College for Girls was the first modern lycée of its kind in Turkey and produced many women who played a leading part in the life of their country, the most famous being the writer Halide Edip Ad
ı
var. In 1971, on the occasion of its centennial, the American College for Girls was amalgamated with the boy’s lycée of the old Robert College, a little farther up the Bosphorus, with the new institution taking the latter name and occupying the site in Arnavutköy.

Off the point of Arnavutköy, Akinti Burnu (Cape of the Current) is the deepest part of the Bosphorus, over 100 metres in depth at the centre of the strait. Here the current flows so fast that it is very hard for sailing vessels to round the point. Apparently crabs also found it difficult and leaving the sea walked overland across the point, for Gyllius, after quoting Dionysus Byzantius and Aelian in his support, says: “I myself saw there stones worn down by the long procession of crabs;” and he adds: “And even if I had not seen it, I should not have thought it far from the truth that stones should be worn down by the hard claws of crabs, since we see that ants can dig out furrows and make a path by the continuous attrition of their feet.”

Rounding Akinti Burnu, we enter the calm waters of Bebek Bay, one of the most beautiful on the Bosphorus. Lush rolling hills with groves of umbrella pines and cypresses rise up to form a verdant backdrop to the bay, a green frieze of trees between the blues of sea and sky. Just before the village we see on the water’s edge the old Egyptian Embassy; then, just past the landing-stage, a little mosque built in 1913 by Kemalettin Bey, a leader of the neoclassical school of Turkish architecture. Like most of his buildings it is a little lifeless and dull, although the setting is quite pretty. The village itself is still attractive, though it is rapidly being ruined by the proliferation of restaurants, cafés and bars. There are still a few old wooden houses of the late Ottoman era in the back streets; the oldest is the Kavafyan Kona
ğ
ı
, dated 1751. There is also a Greek church dedicated to St. Haralambos, dating from the mid-nineteenth century; in times past this was a dependence of the Iviron Monastery on Mount Athos in Greece.

BOSPHORUS UNIVERSITY

On the hill between Bebek and Rumeli Hisar
ı
, the next village along the shore, stand the buildings of Bo
ğ
aziçi Universitesi, or Bosphorus University. This Turkish university was established in 1971, occupying the buildings and grounds of the old Robert College. Robert College, which in its time was the finest institution of higher learning in Turkey, was founded in 1863 by Cyrus Hamlin, an American missionary who had baked bread and washed clothes for Florence Nightingale’s hospital in Üsküdar. The College was named after Christopher Robert, an American philanthropist who provided the funds to build and run the institution. During the 108 years of its existence the College had on its staff or itself produced a number of men of some importance. Several of its professors occupied themselves with the antiquities of this city, and some of their works have been much used in the preparation of this guide. The most important of these were the works of Alexander van Milligen (1840–1915); his two great books,
The Walls of Constantinople
and
Byzantine Churches in Constantinople
are still the standard works on their subject. Largely through the munificence of van Milligen, the University has a very important and extensive library of books about the city, including a remarkably complete collection of foreign travellers to the Levant in ancient and rare editions. Graduates of Robert College–Bosphorus University include two prime ministers of Bulgaria and two prime ministers of Turkey, Bülent Ecevit and Tansu Çiller, the latter being the only woman ever to hold that post.

The site of the University is superb and from its terrace one commands a stunning view of this most beautiful part of the Bosphorus. Just below the terrace is the attractive house which once belonged to Tevfik Fikret (1867–1915), for many years professor of Turkish Literature at Robert College and one of the leading poets of his time. His house, which is now a memorial museum, is called A
ş
ı
yan, or the Nest; it is on the left of the graveyard road which leads up to the University. Like most house-museums it is a little dreary, but the man was not. He was an idealist and utopian socialist, convinced that the salvation of Turkey lay in its youth, which he idealized in the person of his son Haluk, to or about whom he wrote a moving series of poems. But the young man had his own ideas about his future, for when he came of age he went off to the USA. and became a Presbyterian minister!

RUMEL
İ
H
İ
SARI

After Bebek Bay the Bosphorus quickly diminishes to its narrowest stretch, about 700 metres in width. It was here that Darius chose to construct his bridge of boats, designed by the Greek engineer Mandrocles of Samos, when in 512 B.C. he led an army of 700,000 men against the Scythians. While his army crossed the Great King watched from a stone throne cut into the cliff about where now stands the north tower of the castle. The throne of Darius and the two commemorative columns which he erected on the site used still to be shown in antiquity.

The village of Rumeli Hisar
ı
is dominated by and takes its name from the fortress of the same name built by Fatih Mehmet in 1452, the year before he conquered the city. It is a splendid late medieval fortification, the object of which was, in cooperation with the older castle on the other side, Anadolu Hisar
ı
, to cut the city off from communication with and possible aid from the Black Sea; hence the castle was originally called
Bogaz-kesen
, a sort of pun which means both “cut-throat” and “cutter of the strait”. In this object it was perfectly successful, but after the fall of the city it had no further military function, and the north tower was used as a prison, especially for members of foreign embassies. The castle spans a steep valley with two tall towers on opposite hills and a third at the bottom of the valley at the water’s edge, where stands the sea gate protected by a barbican. A curtain wall, defended by three smaller towers, joins the three major ones, forming an irregular figure some 250 metres long by 125 metres broad at its maximum. Fatih himself selected the site, drew the general plan of the castle, and spent much time in supervising the work of the 1,000 skilled and 2,000 unskilled workmen he had collected from the various provinces of his empire. He entrusted each of the three main towers to one of his vezirs: the north tower to Saruca Pa
ş
a, the sea tower to Halil Pa
ş
a, his Grand Vezir, and the south one to Zaganos Pa
ş
a, with the three of them striving with one another to complete the work with speed and efficiency. Over the door to the south tower an Arabic inscription records the completion of the castle in the month of Recep A.H. 856 (July–August 1452); it had been begun just four months previously. The castle was restored in 1953, in connection with the celebration of the 500th anniversary of the Conquest of Constantinople. Unfortunately the restoration demolished the little village of picturesque wooden houses inside the fortifications, but this was probably inevitable. The area inside has been made into a charming park, and the circular cistern on which once stood a small mosque (part of the minaret has been left to mark its position) has been converted into the acting area of a Greek-type theatre: here in summer productions of Shakespeare and other plays are given against the stunning background of the castle walls and towers, the Bosphorus, and the glittering lights of the villages of Asia.

There are three mosques along the shore in Rumeli Hisar
ı
. The first of these that we see is Kayalar Mescidi, built in 1877 by
Ş
eyh Ahmet Niyazi Efendi to replace the mescit of the dervish tekke that had been erected there in the second quarter of the seventeenth century. The second is Hac
ı
Kemalettin Camii, commissioned by Mahmut I in 1743 to replace the original mescit from the time of Fatih. The third is Pertev Ali Pa
ş
a Camii, at the foot of the main street in the village; this was erected in the mid-seventeenth century and restored in 1972. There is also an Armenian church dedicated to St. Santuht; the present building was erected in 1856, but the original church may go back to the time of Mehmet the Conqueror.

FAT
İ
H MEHMET KÖPRÜSÜ

Fatih Mehmet Köprüsü, the second Bosphorus Bridge, spans the strait just above the two fortresses of Rumeli Hisar
ı
and Anadolu Hisar
ı
, the same place Darius constructed his bridge of boats in 512 B.C. The new bridge opened in 1988, exactly 2,500 years after Darius first spanned these straits between Asia and Europe. The palatial seaside mansion just before the bridge is the Zeki Pa
ş
a Yal
ı
s
ı
. This is believed to have been built by the French architect Alexandre Vallaury in the last quarter of the nineteenth century.

BALTAL
İ
MAN AND EM
İ
RGAN

From Rumeli Hisar
ı
onwards the Bosphorus, even on the European side, becomes more and more rural, a succession of picturesque villages following one another with wider and wider spaces of open country between. At Baltaliman, which comes next, there is a long and fertile valley watered by a perpetual stream and flanked by a long avenue of plane trees. Contiguous is Emirgan, named after that Persian prince, Emirgüne who sur rendered the town of Erivan to Murat IV without a battle. Emir güne later became the Sultan’s favourite in drinking and debauchery and was rewarded by the gift of a palace in this village. There are still the remains here of an ancient yal
ı
, parts of it possibly going back to Emirgüne’s time, but mostly built later by a
Ş
erif of Mecca, Abdullah Pa
ş
a. The
Ş
erifler Yal
ı
s
ı
, as it is now called, has recently been restored. The village square is very picturesque, shaded by plane trees beneath which throngs of people are continually imbibing coffee which the excellence of the local water makes particularly delicious. Beside the square stands a baroque mosque, partly of wood, built in 1781–2 by Sultan Abdül Hamit I. It consists of a large almost square room curiously unsymmetrical, and its decor is quite elegant in its baroque way. Just above the village are the famous tulip gardens of Emirgan, well worth a visit in spring.