A visit to the Aya Sofya today, built as the largest church/Mosque in the world and designed so that the main dome has no supporting pillars.

Rings of lights are suspended at low level under the dome so that they can be reached to refill the oil lamps.

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

The whole building was finished in five years !

8000 Egypten slaves worked 24 hrs a day to complete the building in this time. They didn’t have time to make the supporting pillars for the archways so they sourced them all over the world and transported them to Turkey for the build. The whole ground floor is marble in huge slabs that fit together into one complete piece so that the patterns match at the joins.

 

 

The  Aya Sofya was originally built as a Christian church and later converted to a Mosque.

 

It was discovered that the church virtually faced East to Mecca so rather than destroy the building it was, instead, converted.

 

You can see here that the alter is slightly off centre as this faces true East.

 

The church is now a museum and they are uncovering many mosaics and paintings from the Christian era that had been covered up at the time of conversion to a mosque.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are decorated arches and domes everywhere you look, a fantastic architectural aceivement.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The photos below give you some idea of the scale of the building. Mark is stood by one of the many huge wooden entrance doors.

The marble at the doorway has two dips worn away each side from the wheels of the carts and carriages entering the building.

Behind me you can see the huge pieces of different marble used in the construction process.

 

 

 

From the outside the building is not so ornate but it is beautiful and it was a delight to see more roses in bloom.