SUE LITTLETON: Poems of Istanbul
THE UNLUCKIEST DAY OF THE WEEK
BYZANTIUM-CONSTANTINOPLE-ISTANBUL
A PLACE TO STAY
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THE UNLUCKIEST DAY OF THE WEEK BYZANTIUM-CONSTANTINOPLE-ISTANBUL A PLACE TO STAY  

THE UNLUCKIEST DAY OF THE WEEK
Should you visit Istanbul, as you pass through the imposing doors of the Hagia Sophia, now neither Christian church nor Moslem mosque, pause, and reflect. Here were spent the final, dreadful hours of the Christian citizens of Constantinople; here they fled for sanctuary for the second and last time before the invaders' scimitars. here the blood once again washed the stone floors and the screams of slaughtered women and children echoed in the vast dome. Would the Ottoman Empire have succeeded in its conquest if the Crusaders had not broken the back of Christian Constantinople two hundred years before? Five and a half centuries later Tuesday is still the unluckiest day of the week in Greece, for it was Tuesday, May 29, 1453, that Sultan Mehmet II knelt, poured a handful of dust over his head, and then, rising to his feet, entered St. Sophia to declare that henceforth this hallowed Christian church was sacred to Allah, to no God but God and Mohammed was His prophet. Thus Santa Sophia became a mosque until the 20th century, thus the Turkish flag depicts a waning moon, to remind all that the moon was in its last quarter when Constantinople fell. Observe those massive, ancient ramparts that lurch brokenly around the borders of the original city – the Theodosian Walls, built in 413 AD, their ruins a tragic testimonial to the catastrophic end of a history no one seems to quite recall.
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THE UNLUCKIEST DAY OF THE WEEK BYZANTIUM-CONSTANTINOPLE-ISTANBUL A PLACE TO STAY  


BYZANTIUM-CONSTANTINOPLE-ISTANBUL
The fascination of the cobbled streets of old Istanbul, the tiled magnificence of Topkapi Palace where lived the spoiled sultans of the Ottoman Empire, the delicate grace of the minarets, the massive domes of the mosques, tempt one to think only on the last five hundred years of this haunting city. And yet, the Ottoman Empire is only one part of the story. Founded as the Greek port Byzantium in 600 B.C., the city was transformed in 330 A.D. into the Christian stronghold of the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great, who named it after himself-- Constantinople – rival to Rome as the seat of the Holy Mother Church. The Byzantine Empire lasted 1,123 years and 18 days, when it fell to its last conqueror, Sultan Mehmet II. During the Fourth and last Crusade, in the year 1203, proud Constantinople, rich in literacy, culture and art, was virtually destroyed by fellow Christians. The Pope could not tolerate Constantinople´s challenge to the authority of Rome. The Franks and the Venetians breached the formidable walls, vandalized, ravished, murdered— the majestic Church of St. Sophia stank with blood and ordure as the Crusaders mocked and looted. The Venetians, however, were connoisseurs of art and beauty. Rather than destroy, they took back with them as many magnificent treasures as they could carry – including those four mighty bronze horses that have towered over the Piazza of St. Mark's in Venice for eight centuries.
SUE LITTLETON: Poems of Istanbul
POETRYREPAIRS 13.02: 014
Poetry endangers the established order  of the soul - Plato

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THE UNLUCKIEST DAY OF THE WEEK BYZANTIUM-CONSTANTINOPLE-ISTANBUL A PLACE TO STAY  


A PLACE TO STAY
Our small, neat hotel is within walking distance of all the places we could possibly want to visit in the two short weeks we have scraped together to visit this strange and beautiful city of Constantinople C now Istanbul C the Blue Mosque, the Hagia Sofia, the Roman Cistern, the Topkapi Museum, the gardens with the round fountain that we see shooting crystal feathers of water into the air late one afternoon . . . the oval Hippodrome, now a paved street, where over a thousand years ago the Romans raced their chariots before a cheering throng of thousands; the two Egyptian obelisks, one looking spanking new (for all its 3,000 years) and one battered beyond belief by Crusaders ripping off its bronze covering for weapons; the museums and museums.
SUE LITTLETON: Poems of Istanbul
POETRYREPAIRS 13.02: 014
SUE LITTLETON: Poems of Istanbul

THE UNLUCKIEST DAY OF THE WEEK
BYZANTIUM. CONSTANTINOPLE. ISTANBUL
A PLACE TO STAY
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