Our first stop next morning was the atmospheric and moody Basilica Cistern: a great underground water tank built in the C5thAD by 7,000 hard working slaves. The Cistern can hold 100,000 tons of water, yet it looks more like a high vaulted floor of a grand palace, as it used in its construction stone chunks and colonnades from elaborate ruins filched from all around the empire. Even back then there were ruins of phenomenal size, style and artistic merit waiting to be recycled. Two Gorgon heads of the Medusa swirling with snakes fill in as the base of tall pillars: one upside down, the other turned on her cheek to better suit the construction. Or, so slave workers might better avoid the Gorgon gaze, for if trapped by that gaze they might forever be turned to stone. Or so it was believed.
Water was channelled into the cistern by rainfall, and via a well-planned system of purpose-built viaducts stretching 19 kilometres from north of the city in the Belgrade forest. Immense planning, and that when the city was tiny. It is even harder to conceive how much water is needed for today’s Istanbul population, which is exponentially larger.
Outside, we found a plain stone marker called the Million, all that is left of a much larger monument, a set of huge triumphal arches marking the beginning of the Mesa, the important ancient road that signified that all roads lead to Constantinople. The Million was built in the C4thAD and parts of its triumphal arch have been found recycled in the Basilica Cistern. When the Sultan returned home from his conquests only he could ride through this ceremonial arch, all others had to dismount, while his men set the heads of their vanquished onto pikestaffs in the arch for all to see. Today, a modern marker stands alongside the ancient Million, pointing out routes to all the corners of the globe, with Istanbul at its epicentre.
We stepped out onto the Hippodrome, or At Meydani, the Horse Square, as it is often called today. The Hippodrome was a massive oval spectator arena, much like a vast Spanish bullring set with stone seats, canopies draped for protection, drink seller’s kiosks, and toilets to satisfy the needs of some 60,000 spectators there to watch the two or four horse chariot races, or the gladiatorial events that were run for their benefit, often with the Sultan present in his lofty Royal box accessible only from the Palace. The Hippodrome was the heart of the city for the commoners, and functions as such even today, though the stadium has long been dismantled and most of its stone recycled.
Three ancient obelisks that ran as decor down the centre of the Hippodrome, remain. Their age is so extraordinary to us that we can only gaze in awe. Firstly, the Egyptian obelisk: three and a half thousand years ago this obelisk was set up in front of a temple at Thebes to celebrate the thirty year reign of Pharaoh Thutmos 111. After a great battle it became a status symbol for Constantine in the C4thAD so he had the needle dug out and moved to the coast, near Alexandria, to be transported as booty to Constantinople. But figuring out a way to ship this 30 metre long piece of stone took years of research and headaches, a logistics nightmare. Eventually it arrived in Constantinople, split in two, so was erected shorter by 10 metres than the original.
Secondly, the Serpent column: this, too, was Egyptian plunder and is over two and a half thousand years old. The serpents that snake around the column once held atop a large stone bowl, and their heads lifted from the rim, sometimes spouting water, and at other times, wine. One of the original serpent's heads was recently found, which in itself is amazing.
And thirdly, the Obelisk of Emperor Constantine: thwarted by the inability of his thinkers to speed up the delivery of the Egyptian obelisk, Constantine, impatient, erected a limestone needle in C4thAD to stand in for it. It is even built at the height the Egyptian obelisk would have been had it been erected undamaged. Once the obelisk arrived acrobats strung a high wire between Constantine’s obelisk and the Egyptian obelisk. Constantinople at play.
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