To-day grey threatening clouds are passing over the Mosque of Eyub, where these sacred relics of a warrior race are kept; the brightness that sparkles on the Sweet Waters of Europe which flow into the Golden Horn at this place has vanished under the dull pall of a saddened sky, against which the dark cypresses stand like mourners among the graves of the faithful who are buried round this sacred spot. The gilt crescent on dome and minaret no longer sends answering flashes to the sun that has shone for centuries over the shrine that holds these relics of a fighting race of sovereigns. To many here in this City the sky is overcast, the prospect dark and cloudy, for the Crescent has been waning where it was once supreme, in the countries of Eastern Europe, and the crusade called by the kings of former subject people has reached the outer defences of Stamboul, but fifty miles from the Mosque of Eyub the favourite disciple of the Prophet. The fate of the City is yet undecided, for the arms of Othman have met with reverse after reverse, and no one can say whether recent attempts at implanting Western philosophy on an Eastern creed has left enough of Islam’s virility to defend the last foothold of the Turks on Europe. Here in Stamboul, where stand so many mosques of conquerors, where the Christian churches of the Eastern Empire have been converted into mosques, there is among some a dread uncertainty as to the future. In the bazaars and the narrow streets Turks and Greeks, Armenians and Kurds, Arabs, Georgians, full-blooded negroes, go about their business with the utmost unconcern, as if Europe were not face to face with epoch-making changes which affect the Ottoman Empire in Europe, and especially this City, its heart. Yet here in Constantinople, so full of memories of the great Christian Empire which shielded Europe’s development against the Pagan armies of the East for so many centuries, there is a feeling, subconscious but ever present, that the Turk is only in temporary possession. In all his ways, in all his views, he differs from those with whom he comes in contact in his Empire’s European possessions. He has few belongings and seldom desires more, and these can easily be stowed and transported elsewhere, whereas the races he has conquered and which have wrenched themselves free again are ambitious and greedy of gain. They have been carefully collecting for this final blow; while the Turk has been squandering his goods, they have constructed; whereas the Turk, if he has not destroyed what he found, has at last let it fall in ruins. Those other nations give of their best, put all their strength into the pursuit of one ideal, a great and prosperous Fatherland; the Turk knows only that “Allah is” and orders all things wherever the believer may be, and the ideal of Fatherland is quite beyond his comprehension. The very word, “vatan,” had to be explained to the Turkish people by the enthusiasts who broke the power of Abdul Hamid; but all explanation was useless, the Turk has not found his “vatan” in Europe, and those who broke the power of the Sultan were unable to replace it by anything which the Turk could understand. Devoid of art or science, incapable of political life, the Turk’s energies have been directed solely to works of destruction. Only in one direction has he shown constructive capacity and a desire to leave a lasting record, and that is in the mosques and turbehs, and almost all of these are monuments to men before whom nations went under in seas of blood, who trampled down all signs of prosperity, strangled growing civilization, and levelled homesteads and palaces, churches and strongholds with the ground, on their ruthless march to victory.
Towering over the wooden houses of Stamboul, overshadowing the broken walls of Byzantine defence, which proved vain against the might of Othman, these mosques make Constantinople what it is. Massive masonry, with clinging turrets, crowned by a mighty dome surrounded by the Crescent, and round about the building the bulbous roofs of the medresseh,[1] tetinune,[2] darul ziafet,[3] and darul shifa,[4] emblems of the sycophantic East living on the bounty of the great; thus rises the Mosque of Mohammed the Conqueror, out of the eternal squalor, filth, misery, and unconcern of an Oriental city. And other mosques are much the same, and stand as the only evidence of the Turk’s capacity for construction, and the finest, most imposing of these buildings are due to the most ruthless destroyers among the sons of Othman. Sultan Mohammed the Conqueror built his mosque on the spot where once stood the Church of the Holy Apostles; not a trace remains of that former sacred fane, where in the “Heröon” the rulers of ancient Byzant were laid to rest in coffins of porphyry, granite, serpentine, green, red, or white marble, from Thessaly, Paros, and the Proconessus. Indeed, these tombs were not destroyed by the Osmanli. Latin Christians, during their short tenor of the Imperial City, from 1204-1260, desecrated the shrine and plundered the tombs of the Emperors, but they left at least the building standing, and all traces of that are buried under the massive pile of the Mosque of Sultan Mohammed the Conqueror.
[1] “Medresseh,” academy for students.
[2] “Tetinune,” their dwelling-place.
[3] “Darul ziafet,” where the poor are fed.
[4] “Darul shifa,” hospital.
I have already mentioned the Mosque of Achmet. It is the most pronounced feature of Stamboul, rising in wonderful symmetry above the clustering houses that seem to tumble down to the sea-walls and are only arrested in their fall by the Kütshük (little) Agia Sofia, formerly the Church of St. Sergius and Bacchus. This little building stands stoutly by the sea, resting on the walls that for many centuries kept the foes of Christianity at bay, its flat cupola framed on one side by sturdy minaret, on the other by a weather-beaten poplar. Neither of the saints to whom the Greeks dedicated this church are familiar to me; of St. Sergius I know nothing, and the name of St. Bacchus came as a surprise to me when first I heard it, for Bacchus I had known for many years as an obsolete Pagan deity who made no pretence at sanctity, and was only a god because mortals chose to worship him. It is therefore strange to find him associated with St. Sergius, whose name has a somewhat severe sound to it, on this particular post, for, mind you, the men of the Middle Ages allowed their saints very little leisure, but assigned to each his duty. So, I take it, St. Sergius was entrusted with the defence of this section of the sea-wall, and he requisitioned the other gentleman to take over the social duties of the post and to make things merry and bright. However, as I say, I know very little about saints, so cannot give the real reason why these two gentlemen clubbed together to have a church to themselves, and therefore give the above explanation under reservation.