BACK TO THE HISTORY
When you come to Ayvansaray you will first notice the old buildings and you feel yourself like living times of old. I have been living in Istanbul but everytime i am very exciting to see these historical places.
Firstly, we went Blaherna Holy Spring. It looked like very peaceful place and the employee of the church informed us some important things about the holy spring. He said; in Byzantium, it was the holy spring of Blaherna Palace. Queen Pulcheria wanted to built church near this spring. Later on, two Byzantine had come to church with some clothes which was thought to be Mother Mary’s clothes. Thereby the church became more important. Before the conquest (1453), this church was on fire so the clothes burned, too. Then, this church had been built and the holy spring is in there. In addition, he tell us that, the water arise out of rock cliffs. I think it was pretty good and small church compared to others. The different thing is the holy spring and in my opinion, the most interesting thing is the epigraph which is in front of the spring. It is the ambigram and it says; “Not only wash your face, but alsowash your sin”.
Our second place was Kazasker Ivaz Efendi Mosque.But we couldn’t get in because it was closed. So that our teacher told us some information about the mosque. In the garden of the mosque there should be some big holes and tunnels, we couldn’t see. Maybe, this architecture had been built for church then demolished to built this mosque. Besides, it is near the Prison of Anemas’ remains.
Passing through the old Turkish houses, we came to Ferruh Kethuda Mosque. Imam of the mosque said that in the period of Suleiman, Ferruh Kethuda had wanted Sinan (the artchitect) to build a mosque. When we got in to the mosque, we saw some ceramics which are belong to Tekfur Palace. The intereting thing we noticed that, there was a sun clock at the back wall of the mosque.
After long walking, we arrived Bulgarian St. Stephen Church, also known as the Bulgarian Iron Church. When i heard our teacher, it is famous for being made of cast iron, i was shocked. Because the story is very interesting, The Bulgarians of the Ottoman Empire, used to pray at the churches of the Phanar Orthodox Patriarcy, but due to nationalistic movements, Bulgarians were allowed to build this church only 1 month. There were some iconastasis as all the churches, and the main difference is iron of course, it made me excited. But when came to the garden, i realized that watching Istanbul from there could be very magnificant.
When we walked through Phanar’s side streets and i saw a red castle, i supposed we arrived patriachate but i understood it was Phanar Greek Orthodox College. Getting into the school was very challenging but we succeed. Then a student told us some historical information about this school. It first established in 1454, but there was a fire. So the current school building is located near the church of St. Georgh in Phanar in 1881. The bricks came from France. I was facinated with this red castle and i wonder how different will become student in there.
Our last stop was Church of St. George. It is principal Greek Orthodox Cathedral stil use in Phanar since about 1600. It has been the seat of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. I think it was very small church, particulary given its status in world Christanity, this however could be explained by the Islamic laws which all non-islamic buildings must be smaller than islamic buildings. In addition there were lots of iconastatis, the fragment of the pillar of flagellation on the South side of iconastatis which made me very excited.
Istanbul has got so many historical places and Phanar-Balat district is one of the oldest part i Istanbul. I wanted to travel this district because of the book named “Istanbul Hatırası” and i was glad to see there through our lecture.
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