The Grand Turk: Sultan Mehmet II - Conqueror of Constantinople and Master of an Empire (38 page)

The graveyard behind the mosque contains the tombs of Sultan Mehmet and his wife Gülbahar, both of which were reconstructed after the 1766 earthquake though on the old foundations. Mehmet’s tomb is very baroque and its interior decorations extremely sumptuous in the Empire style. Gülbahar’s is simple and classical and must reproduce the original fairly closely.

Old prints show that Mehmet’s tomb was filled with captured weapons and other trophies, placed there by sultans after victorious campaigns. When newly girded sultans visited Mehmet’s tomb they are said to have prayed to him to endow them with the courage he exhibited in his many conquests, particularly in his capture of Constantinople. Anatolian peasants still offer their prayers to the Conqueror when they visit his tomb, continuing a practice that dates back to the time of his death.

Gülbahar’s tomb has never been open to the public, which legend says is due to the fact that she was a Christian who never converted to Islam, a tradition first recorded by Evliya Çelebi in his
Narrative of Travels
:

I myself have often observed, at morning prayer, that the readers appointed to chant lessons from the Kuran all turned their backs upon the coffin of this lady, of whom it is so doubtful whether she had departed in the faith of Islam. I have often seen Franks [Europeans] come by stealth and give a few aspers to the tomb-keeper to open her
türbe
for them, as the gate is always kept locked.

The same story is told by the Italian traveller Cornelio Magni, in a work published at Parma in 1679, in which he says that the custodian of Gülbahar’s tomb told him that it remained closed and shuttered because the deceased was a Christian princess who lived and died in her faith. ‘The
türbe
,’ he says, ‘remains always shut, even the windows.’ He asked the reason for this and was told by the custodian: ‘The sepulchre of her whose soul lives among the shades deserves not a ray of light!’ After much entreaty and the intervention of an emir who was passing by, the custodian finally let him in. ‘I entered with veneration and awe,’ he writes in conclusion, ‘and silently recited a
De Profundis
for the soul of this unfortunate princess.’

The oldest extant mosque in Istanbul that retains its original form is Mahmut Pasha Camii, erected in 1462 on the Second Hill. The market quarter in which it stands is still named after Mahmut Pasha, the greatest of the Conqueror’s grand vezirs.

Besides the great mosque, Mahmut Pasha’s original
külliye
included a
medrese
, an
imaret
, a primary school, a
türbe
, a
hamam
, a
han
and a
mahkeme
, or Court of Justice. All that remains of the medrese are its lecture hall and one or two ruined cells in a corner of the garden. The
imaret
,
mektep
and
mahkeme
have vanished, but the
türbe
,
hamam
and
han
survive. Mahmut Pasha’s magnificent and unique
türbe
stands a short way to the south-west of his mosque, dated by its inscription to AH 878 (AD 1474), the year in which he was executed by the Conqueror.

The other two surviving structures of the
külliye
are some distance to the west of the mosque, both of them on or near a street named Mahmut Pasha Yokuşu, which leads past the Kapalı Çarşı on its way down to the Golden Horn.

A short way down Mahmut Pasha Yokuşu after leaving the Kapalı Çarşı one comes on the left to a turning that leads to an imposing domed building. This is what remains of Mahmut Pasha’s
hamam
, which is now used as a market hall. The building, dated by an inscription to the year AH 871 (AD 1476), was completed by his heirs two years after his death.

A short way further down Mahmut Pasha Yokuşu one comes on the left to an archway that leads to the Kürkçü Hanı, the Han of the Furriers. This is the
han
of Mahmut Pasha’s
külliye
, the oldest building of its kind in Istanbul. The furriers for whom it is named have been doing business here since at least 1638, when Evliya Çelebi describes them in his
Narrative of Travels
. Evliya mentions more than twenty-five
hans
by name that still stand in Istanbul, most of them in the area in and around the Kapalı Çarşı, some going back to the time of the Conqueror, many of them built on Byzantine foundations. They were designed as inns for merchants, with storage space for the goods that they brought to Istanbul on camel caravans, later replaced by lorries. Typically they are buildings of two or three storeys around a central courtyard, or even two courtyards, as in the case of the Kürkçü Hanı and one or two others.

A number of mosques and other structures founded by the Conqueror’s vezirs are still standing. The earliest of these are Murat Pasha Camii and Rum Mehmet Pasha Camii, which rank just after Mahmut Pasha Camii as the second and third oldest mosques in the city that retain their original form. Like Mahmut Pasha, Murat Pasha and Rum Mehmet Pasha were of Greek origin and converted to Islam when they joined the service of Mehmet the Conqueror.

Murat Pasha Camii was built on the Seventh Hill in 1469, a date recorded in an inscription over its main doorway. The founder, Murat Pasha (also known as Hass Murat), was from the Byzantine imperial family of the Palaeologues, and attained the rank of first vezir under the Conqueror, who numbered him among his special favourites. He died as a relatively young man in 1473 during Sultan Mehmet’s campaign against Uzun Hasan, commanded by Mahmut Pasha, whom the sultan blamed for the death of his favourite.

Rum Mehmet Pasha Camii is on the Asian side of the city in Üsküdar, standing on a hill above the point where the Bosphorus flows into the Marmara. According to an Arabic inscription over the door of the mosque, it was founded in 1471 by Rum Mehmet Pasha, the year that he became grand vezir, only to be executed the following year by the Conqueror. The founder is buried in an octagonal
türbe
in the garden behind his mosque. Josef von Hammer, the nineteenth-century Austrian historian, wrote of Rum Mehmet Pasha that ‘he left in Ottoman history no other memories than those of his crimes’.

The oldest functioning Turkish bath in the city is the Gedik Pasha Hamamı on the Third Hill, built c. 1475. Its founder was Gedik Ahmet Pasha, who served as grand vezir in the years 1473-4 and again in 1476, commanding victorious armies for both Mehmet II and Beyazit II, who executed him in 1482. The whole bath glistens with bright new marble; it is much patronised by the inhabitants of the surrounding district, as indeed it has been since the days of the Conqueror.

Another ancient
hamam
, now unfortunately disused, forms part of a little
külliye
just outside the walls of Topkapı Sarayı on the Marmara slope of the First Hill. The
külliye
consists of just the
hamam
, a monumental structure now partially in ruins, and a much-restored little mosque. Both were built in 1476 by Ishak Pasha, who served as the Conqueror’s grand vezir in the years 1468-71 and held the office again under Beyazit II. His contemporary Kritoboulos describes Ishak as ‘a man of the wisest sort, experienced in many spheres, but especially a military leader and a man of courage’. The mosque is of the simplest sort, a square room covered by a dome, the same style as the earliest extant Ottoman mosques of the 1330s. The mosque has been restored several times, not very well, and it has lost its porch in a street widening.

Ishak Pasha Camii is one of eight small mosques in Istanbul dating from the time of the Conqueror that have been rebuilt so that they no longer have their original form. Only two of these mosques are definitely dated, though the others are almost certainly from the first quarter-century after the Conquest, when Sultan Mehmet was rebuilding and repopulating his new capital.

Yarhisar Camii is on the slope of the Fourth Hill leading down to the Golden Horn. According to the Register of Pious Foundations, it was built in 1461, thus antedating Mahmut Pasha Camii by a year or so. Its founder, Musliheddin Mustafa Efendi, was chief judge of Istanbul under the Conqueror. It was once a handsome edifice, but it was badly damaged in the great fire of 1917 that consumed most of this district, and then in 1954-6 it was restored so badly that it lost all its original character.

Another ancient mosque ruined by an appalling restoration is Kumrulu Mescit, which stands on the Fifth Hill. This mosque is of interest because its founder and builder, Atik Sinan, was chief architect to Sultan Mehmet II and built the original mosque of Fatih Camii. Kumrulu Mescit, the Mosque of the Turtle Dove, takes its name from a fragment of Byzantine sculpture used in the adjoining fountain. Atik Sinan’s grave is in the garden of the mosque; the inscription records that he was executed in 1471, the year after Fatih Camii was completed, but the reason for his execution is not given.

The other five ancient mosques from the Conqueror’s time are all on the slope of the Third Hill leading down to the Golden Horn, a district that has been the city’s principal market area since Byzantine times and which, under Mehmet II, became the city’s first Turkish quarter.

Yavaşça Şahin Camii is a small mosque on Uzun Çarşı Caddesi, the Avenue of the Long Market, which follows the course of an ancient Byzantine colonnaded way that led down from the summit of the Third Hill to the Golden Horn. The mosque was founded soon after the Conquest by Yavaşça Şahin Pasha, who was captain of the Ottoman fleet in the Conqueror’s siege of Constantinople. It is one of a small group of early mosques that form a distinct type. The mosque was badly damaged by fire in 1908 but well restored in 1950.

Just opposite Yavaşça Şahin Camii a street leads steeply uphill, and at the first corner on the left it comes to Samanveren Camii, the Mosque of the Inspector of Straw. This ancient and dilapidated structure was built in the time of the Conqueror by a certain Sinan Ağa, who was the sultan’s
samanveren
, or inspector of straw - hence the name of the mosque. Though in a very advanced state of decay it is a quaint and interesting building of brick and stone construction; what is left of the minaret has some curious leaf-like decorations in brick.

Across from Samanveren Camii a street with the picturesque name of Devoğlu (Son of the Giant) rambles downhill to the north until it debouches opposite another ancient mosque, Timurtaş Camii, which was completely restored in the 1960s. The Turkish architectural historian Ayverdi has established that the mosque was built in the time of the Conqueror by a certain Timurtaş Ağa, who may have been an associate of Sinan Ağa, the founder of Samanveren Camii, since their two mosques are (or were) almost identical.

Two other old mosques from the time of the Conqueror stand on the shore road that runs along the Golden Horn between the Galata Bridge and the Atatürk Bridge. One of them, Kazancılar Camii, the Mosque of the Cauldron Makers, is midway between the two bridges in the district of Küçük Pazar (the Little Market) while the other, Sağrıcılar Camii, the Mosque of the Leather Merchants, is beside the Atatürk Bridge in the quarter known as Unkapanı (the Flour Store), the names of the mosques and the areas in which they stand going back to the time of the Conqueror, when Turks first settled in this part of the city.

Kazancılar Camii is also known as Üç Mihrablı Camii, the Mosque of the Three Mirhaps. Founded, according to a document known as the
Hadika
, by a certain Hoca (Teacher) Hayrettin Efendi in 1475, it was enlarged first by the Conqueror himself, then by Hayrettin’s daughter-in-law, who added her own house to the mosque, which thus came to have three
mihrabs
- whence its name. The main body of the building seems to be original in form though heavily restored. South of the main building is a rectangular annex with a flat ceiling and two
mihrabs
; it is through this room that one enters the mosque nowadays. According to Ayverdi, this section is ‘wholly new’, which may be true, but so far as form goes it might well be the house added by Hayrettin’s daughter-in-law, in which case this is the only ordinary dwelling place left in the city from the time of the Conqueror.

Sağrıcılar Camii was founded c. 1455 by Yavuz Ersinan, who was standard-bearer in Mehmet’s army at the time of the Conquest and an ancestor of Evliya Çelebi, who was born in a house beside the mosque. The founder is buried in a little graveyard that was laid out between the mosque and his house, now vanished. Buried beside Yavuzer Sinan is his old comrade-in-arms Horoz Dede, Grandfather Rooster, one of the most famous Muslim folk saints of Istanbul. Horoz Dede received his name during the siege of Constantinople, when he made his rounds at dawn each day and roused Mehmet’s troops with his loud rooster call. He was killed in the final assault on the city, and then after the conquest Yavuz Ersinan buried him beside his mosque, with Sultan Mehmet among the mourners at his grave. The mosque is of the simplest type, a square room covered by a dome. It was restored in 1960 with only moderate success.

Mehmet’s example was followed by his successors as sultan as well as by the great men and women of their courts, who built mosque complexes and other structures throughout the city. The most notable of the imperial mosque complexes crown the six hills above the Golden Horn: Sultan Ahmet I Camii on the First Hill, Nuruosmaniye Camii on the Second Hill, Beyazit II Camii (the Beyazidiye) and Süleyman I Camii (the Süleymaniye) on the Third Hill, the new Fatih Camii of Mustafa III on the Fourth Hill, Selim I Camii on the Fifth Hill and Mihrimah Camii on the Sixth Hill, not to mention the scores of other Ottoman mosques,
medreses
, schools, libraries, hospitals, refectories,
hans
, baths, markets, palaces and fountains that adorn not only the old city but its present extension along both shores of the Bosphorus.

Some of the other structures in the city remaining from the Conqueror’s time are in Topkapı Sarayı, most notably Çinili Köşk and two complexes in the Third Court, namely the Privy Chamber and the Conqueror’s Pavilion. Çinili Köşk now serves as a museum of Turkish tiles; the Privy Chamber is the Pavilion of the Holy Mantle, containing sacred objects associated with the Prophet Mohammed; while the Conqueror’s Pavilion houses the Treasury of Topkapı Sarayı, an extraordinary collection of precious objects once owned by the Ottoman sultans, including a number that belonged to the Conqueror.