The gate is situated just below the entrance to the citadel, in the wall on the east. It too is furnished with double doors, which, like their neighbours, have been riddled by musket fire. South of this gateway there is just enough room between the wall and the edge of the eastern ravine to permit of a narrow road. Leaving the interior of the fortress, one is taken along this road, with the wooded precipice on one hand and on the other the ivy-grown battlements. Peasants, carrying baskets, pass by on their way to market; and beneath a fig tree, teeming with fruit, some Mussulman women, resting from their wayfaring, cower within their veils as we approach. The colossal angular tower projects from the head of the irregular wall towards the leafy abyss, a large inscription gleaming white upon the wall which faces us, the record of the conquest of Mohammed II.
But the point at which you pause is at the head of the fortification, beneath the soaring escarpment of the square tower. It is the same site upon which the peoples from the remote recesses of Asia have stood with the lust of conquest in their eyes. On the opposite bank of the eastern ravine the drum-shaped dome of St. Eugenius rises from among a cluster of red-roofed villas. It was there that the Seljuk sultan issued his threats and insults, while the Greek emperor fasted and prayed. From within the limits of that same sanctuary were heard the shouts of the revellers, mingling with the voices of their concubines. And a white minaret proclaims the event of the long and unequal struggle between the full-blooded followers of the Prophet and the emaciated children of the Cross.
The tower itself has evidently been built at a later period than the wall from which it rises in a continuous face. The colour of the stone is slightly paler, and an inscription, now much decayed, attests it to be the work of the Emperor John the Fourth, the last but one of the Comnenian dynasty. The ground widens like a fan from the foot of this tower, and the ravines, which have almost met, diverge and become great valleys, stretching into the bosom of the hills. Within that ampler space, a few hundred yards south of the fortress, one may still recognise the enclosure of the hippodrome and the great gateway on its northern side. The wall still rises in places to a height of from six to ten feet, but all the interior structures have disappeared. A field of tobacco grows upon the site. Adjoining the gateway, and facing the palace, one is impressed by the shape and appearance of a projecting tongue of land with a flat top. The theatre may once have stood upon this spot.
The ancient churches of Trebizond, some converted into mosques and others into public baths, are among the most interesting relics which the town contains. Retracing our steps to the middle fortress and to the road which joins the two ravines, we have almost reached the bridge over the westerly depression before attaining the old cathedral, sacred to the golden-headed Virgin, of which the southern wall borders our road on the north (No. 18). How bare and bleak it looks, shorn of its southern and western porches, and covered with a thick coating of whitewash! A little court, paved with flagstones, adjoins it on the east, over which you pass to an entrance at the north-east corner which has destroyed the side apse on that side. If you scrutinise the outer wall of the principal apse, you may still distinguish beneath the whitewash a design of figures in mosaic, one of which perhaps represents the seated Virgin. Time has worn down the few sculptured mouldings of which any trace remains. There is little to attract the eye in this mangled group of gables, surmounted by the drum of a duodecagonal dome. On the northern side rises the minaret, adjoining the principal entrance which has made use of the old porch on the north. Four marble pillars with Ionic capitals, probably the spoil of some pagan temple, support the roof of this spacious porch. We are about to enter, when we are called aside to observe an old fountain in the court on the east. It contains a marble slab with a Greek inscription, which is illegible; and the water issues from a much-worn bronze spout, representing the head of a serpent or dragon, which is said to have belonged to a bronze model of such a monster, killed by the spear of Alexius the First. Near the fountain is a tomb, still maintained in good order, in which repose the remains of a shepherd youth to whom the townspeople attribute the capture of the fortress by the Ottoman Turks. The story runs that Mohammed the Second, foiled by the strength of the citadel, had recourse to a final expedient of which the result should determine the alternatives of further effort or abandonment of the siege. A number of shots were to be fired from a cannon at the chain which supported the drawbridge. Should it be severed, it would be a signal for a renewal of operations; in the contrary case the siege was to be raised. The experiment failed; the sultan broke up his camp and removed the bulk of his army, leaving, however, the loaded cannon still in site. A young shepherd, happening to pass by, was prompted by the hardihood of his years to try his skill at the difficult mark. He discharged the gun, and the drawbridge fell. This child of a short-lived future sped to the camp of Mohammed, who was making his way up the valley of the Pyxitis towards Baiburt. But his story was derided, and the sultan, in a fit of anger, caused him to be killed. The rage of the despot was turned to grief when the confirmation reached him of this miraculous exploit. His return was followed by the fall of the city; and he endeavoured to atone for his rash action by loading his victim with posthumous rewards. Over the coffin one may still see the ball suspended which decided the fate of Trebizond. And the martyr is known by a name which repeats the sultan’s sorrowful exclamation: “Khosh Oghlan,” or “Well done! Oghlan.”
The interior of the mosque produces an effect of extraordinary massiveness, with its bulky piers supporting the dome, with the walls which join these piers to the walls of the church and screen off the aisles from the open space beneath the dome. Except for the two inner columns of the porch, not a single pillar is to be seen. The aisles are narrow, and their ceilings low; they are surmounted by a gallery, from which you look through low, arched apertures into the nave. The Turks have placed a wooden stage in the northern arm of the church, between the two walls which screen off the aisle. This erection faces their altar, and is reserved for their women; you reach it by a staircase placed inside the building, in front of the north-east entrance. A doorway leads from this wooden structure into the old gallery over the aisle, through which you pass to the women’s gallery in the original design, which fills the space above the ceilings of the narthex and exo-narthex on the western side of the mosque. Two lofty vaulted openings display the interior to this gallery; while the wall between narthex and exo-narthex is pierced by three arches in a similar style. The door on the west in the storey below, which in Christian times gave access through these outer spaces into the body of the church, is no longer used, now that the religious focus of the building has been changed from the apse to the southern arm between the aisles. The exo-narthex has a width of 18 feet, and the narthex of 9 feet 7 inches. The piers upon which repose the vaulted ceilings of these courts are of such thickness that the entire space, measured from the inner side of the outer wall to the outer side of the wall of the nave, amounts to 37 feet 5 inches. The interior measurements of the church proper are a length of 93 feet 6 inches from the commencement of the nave to the head of the apse, and a breadth of only 50 feet 5 inches. It is well lit from windows in the apse and along the walls; but the twelve windows in the dome are small. Beautiful marble plaques of various colours, and designs in mosaic, may still be admired in the apse; but there is an almost total lack of ornament elsewhere. As to the date of the building, it is ascribed by Texier to the Grand-Comneni; with much less knowledge I hesitate to offer the opinion that the design belongs to an earlier period.
From this mosque of the middle fortress, Orta Hisar Jamisi, the ancient cathedral, it is but a few steps to the bridge over the western ravine. Like its fellow on the east of the enclosure, it consists of a lofty stone embankment, with a single narrow arch through which the stream flows. The prospect on either side is of great beauty, while the deep shadows of the vegetation, rising from the floor of the ravine, rest the eye and refresh the sense. Towards the south, beyond an irregular line of ivy-grown parapets, and towers of varying features and size, the stately works of palace and citadel rise against the sky; while in the direction of the sea, where the depression flattens and is lost in a maze of houses, the tiers of red-tiled roofs are pierced by a double series of battlements and embowered forts. The wall of the middle fortress is seen extending for some distance along the uneven edge of its rocky support; but it is overpowered in the landscape by the outer line of walls, which, starting from the opposite side of the ravine, are drawn in a long perspective to the shore.
Our goal is now the famous church of Hagia Sophia; it is situated upon the coast on the west of the city, at a distance of over a mile from the walls (No. 25). The bridge leads over into the western suburb, and for a short space you follow the outer wall of the lower fortress, stretching westwards at right angles to the ravine. On the right hand this solid masonry and a massive rectangular tower; on the left, a little further on, the cypresses of the Turkish burying-field, the leaning white headstones with their gilt Arabic inscriptions better disposed and tended than is usually the case. We have passed the street which turns upwards to the mosque Khatunieh (No. 20), the spacious and still well-ordered mosque and medresseh which keeps alive the memory of the mother of Selim the First. Like the middle and lower fortress, this western suburb is inhabited for the most part by Mohammedans—what a contrast to the bustling town on the east of the city where the Christian quarters lie! There, busy streets, lined with the broad-paned windows of offices and shops; here, the silent graveyard and widely scattered dwellings which seem to shrink from contact with life. A brighter aspect belongs to the meidan or open place, to which we pass and which we cross (Kavak Meidan, or plane tree square)—an extensive stretch of green turf, resembling an English common, where in old times the jerid or spear exercise was performed. Several tombs (kumbets) are to be seen on this grassy lawn, but I do not know to whom they have been raised. A little later we have left the last settlements behind us, and are winding outwards towards the sea-shore.
Fig. 3. Trebizond: Hagia Sophia.
The church of Hagia Sophia, or the Divine Wisdom, now converted into a mosque, has been described as one of the most interesting monuments of Byzantine architecture, sculpture, and painting that time has spared.[2] This appreciation can only be partially tested by the traveller of the present day, because the frescos which once covered the interior of the building have been daubed over with successive coats of whitewash. It is possible that when the time comes for restoring the building to Christian worship, or at least, as we may hope, for preserving it as a relic to instruct an enlightened age, the scales may fall away and disclose in some of their ancient brightness the solemn faces and gorgeous robes of the Grand-Comneni as they looked down upon the congregation of monks and pilgrims six centuries ago. In the meanwhile we may consult those descriptions of the paintings which have come down to us in the accounts of modern travellers more fortunate than ourselves, for at some periods a portion of the plaster has fallen and revealed the rich work below. Of the sculpture and architectural merits we are able to judge on the spot, for, although the Turks have introduced some alterations in the structure, they are too clumsy to mislead.