istanbul shopping guide
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istanbul shopping guide
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For Turkey For Cappadocia and its fantastic landscapes visit cappadociaguide For Turkish Carpets and kilims For Bodrum ancient Halicarnassus For maps, portcards and books of Turkey Looking for real estate, an architect and contruction firm in Turkey Looking for real estate, an architect and contruction firm in Turkey E Mail
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YERABATAN CISTERN This immense cistern with 336 ancient columns was built by Justinian the Great in the 6th century. Having capacity of 8000 cubic meters, it was part of the one of the amazing water supply system in the ancient Contantinople. It originally supplied water to great palace of Byzantine Emperors and buildings of the first hill. The cistern which has been used up the end of the Byzantine Empire, disappeared from the sight in the early Turkish times. After the fall of Contantinople, Turks built houses over the old cistern and opened wells to reach to water. The cistern was miraculously discovered by Gylus in the 15th century and reused by the Turks. Named as "The underground cistern" by the Turkish people, the cistern became one of the major attractions in Contantinople. During the recent cleaning done in 1980's, two Medusa heads which were originally part of ancient pagan temples were discovered towards the northern end of the cistern. Reused as construction material, these two carvings depicting medusa surprised the scholars and public on the day of their discovery. Medusa whose hair is consist of serpents has been always symbol of Evil and Malice for the Christian and Muslim communities. This could be one of the reasons why Medusa heads were used upside down or laid on her side. Christian people wanted to humiliate the medusa figure. The Million Column Located on the Sultanahmet Square, Million stone was the beginning point of all the miles stones put on the major roads running between Contantinople, Yugoslavia and Rome. Romans who measured roads precisely and put mile stones used some cities as the beginning point of their measurement system.
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