Golden Horn (Turkey)
| Haliç | ||
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 View of the Golden Horn with the Galata Bridge in the background |
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| Waters | Bosporus | |
| Land mass | Istanbul ( Turkey ) | |
| Geographical location | 41 ° 2 ′ N , 28 ° 58 ′ E | |
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| Coastline | 16 km | |
The Golden Horn ( Turkish Haliç ; Greek Χρυσοκέρας Chrysokeras ) is an approx. 7 km long arm of the sea on the Bosporus in Istanbul .
description
The Golden Horn is located on the western, European side of the Bosporus shortly before its exit into the Marmara Sea . The inlet is actually the joint confluence of the Alibeyköy and Kağithane rivers into the Bosphorus. Seen upstream from here, the Golden Horn runs first in a westerly, then in a northwestern and finally in a northerly direction until the two rivers meet. At its exit it is about 750 m wide and 40 m deep.
On the peninsula between the Golden Horn, the Bosporus and the Sea of Marmara, the historical core of the city lies in the district of Eminönü , where Greek colonists around 660 BC. Chr. Byzantium founded, and the subsequent western district Fatih . They are united in today's district of Fatih , which roughly corresponds to the area of the old town enclosed by the Theodosian Wall . Eyup joins on beyond the wall .
On the north side is the Karaköy district at the entrance to the Golden Horn. It roughly corresponds to the historical Galata or Pera . Today it is part of the Beyoğlu borough , which extends over the entire north side.
While the area in the north of the Golden Horn was hardly inhabited until the second half of the 19th century, today the Golden Horn is located in the middle of the built-up area of the center of Istanbul with well over 14 million inhabitants. Its banks are lined with numerous green areas and parks.
The Golden Horn is crossed by four bridges (up from the Bosphorus):
Since the new construction of the Galata Bridge in 1992 allowed ships that were at least not too tall to pass unhindered, the ferry docks on most of the Bosporus lines have been relocated to places west of the Galata Bridge. A ferry also operates within the Golden Horn, where numerous private ships can also be found.
Its centuries-old function as the most important port of Constantinople was lost with the increasing size of the ships. Since the construction of the Galata Bridge at the latest, there has been little port activity in the Golden Horn within the bridge.
Surname
The name, which is common in most European languages, is attributed to its shape, curved like a horn, and the splendor and wealth of Byzantine and Ottoman Constantinople , but also to its golden sheen in the evening sun. Its Turkish name Haliç simply means mouth . The Greek name is derived from the nymph Keroessa , the mother of the city founder Byzas .
history
For the history of Istanbul , the Haliç is of the greatest importance.
Antiquity
Due to their location on the Bosporus, Byzantion and the Golden Horn were affected by almost all wars that took place in the following centuries in Greco-Asia Minor.
340/339 BC BC Philip II of Macedonia besieged Byzantium. He built a first bridge over the Golden Horn for his troops, probably in the northern, narrow and shallower part.
Byzantine Empire
During the Byzantine Empire , the Golden Horn was the main port of the capital, Constantinople . Walls along the coastline protected the city from sea attacks. In addition, the entrance to the Golden Horn could be blocked against enemy ships with a strong iron chain. She was pulled from the sea wall to the chain house on the north side of the bay.
On the peninsula south of the Horn stood the Imperial Palace, the Hippodrome (the horse racing track) and many other government buildings, all of which were decorated with lavish splendor. Emperor Leo I is said to have built a 12-arch bridge over the port in 469, which the Bulgarians burned in 812. Justinian I is said to have replaced an existing wooden bridge with a stone bridge in 528.
The wall on the Golden Horn was reinforced several times in the 7th and 8th centuries in view of the Arab sieges. The first practical test came in 626 when the Persians and Avars attacked , and after ten days the imperial fleet succeeded in repelling the Slavic auxiliary troops that had penetrated the Golden Horn on dugouts. In the north of the Golden Horn, where the Avars broke through, Emperor Herakleios had the walls closed and the hilly area expanded like a fort. This is where the Blachernenviertel was created . In total, the walls were about 20 km long.
Anastasios II (713–715) strengthened the land and sea walls. All residents who could not prove a three-year supply of grain had to leave the city. For the first time the iron chain was mentioned, with which one tried to seal off the Golden Horn. The chain that served as a barrier was overcome three times. In the 10th century the Kievan Rus had their ships towed overland, put back in the water near Galata and thus got into the Horn. The Byzantine Empire received the attackers with Greek fire and defeated them.
To ensure the supply of goods, ports on the coast to the Golden Horn and the Marmara Sea were expanded or rebuilt. In 1082 the Venetians were given their own quarters on the south side of the Golden Horn, in 1111 the Pisans, and finally in 1155 the Genoese.
On April 13, 1204, during the Fourth Crusade , Venetian ships were able to break the chain with a kind of battering ram and penetrate the city. Three eighths of the capital fell to Venice, which meant that everything between Mittelstrasse (Mese) and the Golden Horn fell to Venice. Emperor Balduin took over the Great Imperial Palace, his brother Heinrich moved into the Blachernen Palace . After Baldwin was captured by Bulgarians in 1205, his brother and successor stayed at the Golden Horn. With the regaining of the capital in 1261, the Venetians lost their economic and political base in the city.
Instead, the Genoese, allied with Byzantium, received the Galata quarter (today Beyoğlu) on the northern side of the Golden Horn as their own settlement area. Despite the imperial ban, they fortified the city in 1307. In 1348 - again against the imperial will - they erected the Galata Tower , a large defensive tower on the top of the hill, which has been preserved to this day under major changes. Venice was only able to regain its quarters after decades, but the city lost considerable economic importance in the course of the 14th century.
Ottoman Empire
In 1453 Sultan Mehmed II succeeded in conquering the city with the tactics of the Kievan Rus. After the conquest , mainly Greeks, Jews , Italians and other non-Muslims settled along the Horn. The Topkapı Palace became the seat of the court, so that the political focus broke away from the Blachernenquartier on the Golden Horn. Therefore, the imperial palaces and the large Italian quarters began to decline over the decades, but many Greeks moved to the Fener quarter, southeast of the Blachernen quarter . They called the quarter Phanar, and after this the Phanariotes are named, which meant a group of wealthy and influential noble families who lived in the Ottoman Empire in the 17th and 18th centuries. Century formed the upper class of the district.
Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519), who was looking for a well-paid position, wrote to Sultan Bayezid II in 1502 that he had heard of his wish to build a bridge over the Golden Horn. He knew how to build such a stone arch bridge and was at the sultan's disposal. The letter, which had been on the way for several months, went unanswered. In Leonardo's extensive notebooks and sketchbooks there is actually a sketch of a 350 m long bridge over the Haliç with a span of 233 m and a roadway forked up to 24 m.
A severe earthquake followed by a tsunami destroyed more than a thousand houses on September 10, 1509. Four to five thousand people died and around 10,000 were injured. The walls of Galata were damaged, as was the tower over the city. The walls around the shipyards collapsed. The strength of the quake was estimated to be close to 8.0, the height of the waves at more than 6 m.
Nevertheless, the capital of the Ottoman Empire recovered rapidly, especially under Suleyman I (1520–1566). The exchange of goods took place in the markets, especially at the Great Covered Bazaar and the Golden Horn, a trading structure that the Ottomans had taken over from the Byzantines. In Galata there was also a very lively market between Karaköy and Kasımpaşa. It was largely preserved after 1453 and the population did not migrate. Therefore, it was the preferred place of residence of the Europeans who came later, who found familiar milieus, languages and cultures here. In addition, there were magazines and shops there, but also the Ottoman military facilities on the Golden Horn, which are still there today. The ships were built in the Tersane , the large shipyard in Kasımpaşa , and weapons were made in Tophane, which gave the district its name.
However, not only the traders' quarters clustered on the Golden Horn. The nationalist movements of the 19th century also found their expression in building history.
At the latest when the inhabitants of Skopje and Samokow expelled the Greek priests in the 1820s and the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople requested the ordination of local candidates, the process of detachment began, even if the Constantinople Patriarch first sent Greeks again. A reform decree issued by Sultan Abdülmecid I under pressure from the Western European powers in 1839 initially did not change anything, but in Vidin in 1840 the court gave in to pressure from the local population and sent the deacon Dionys to Istanbul, but he died before the episcopal ordination .
The Bulgarian colony living in Istanbul was able to achieve initial success in the establishment of its own church. In 1848, Stefan Bogoridi , a senior Ottoman politician of Bulgarian descent, wrote a petition asking for permission to build a Bulgarian church in Istanbul where the liturgy would be held in Bulgarian and by Bulgarian priests. In 1849, Sultan Abdülmecid I allowed him to build the Bulgarian Chapel Sweti Stefan on the Golden Horn in a Ferman . There Bishop Ilarion Makariopolski demonstratively omitted the liturgically prescribed naming of the patriarch during the Easter service on April 15, 1860. In the ecclesiastical canons this was equated with the non-recognition of the patriarch. In 1870, a Ferman from Sultan Abdülaziz ensured that the Bulgarian Exarchate was set up with its seat in Constantinople. Even after Bulgaria's independence in 1878, Constantinople remained the center of the Bulgarian Church. The altar of the church points towards the Golden Horn.
From the 17th century there was a significant influx of Armenians from all areas of the empire. In the middle of the 19th century there were already more than 220,000 Armenians living in Constantinople, who helped shape the image of the city with their own culture.
In 1812 a severe wave of plague hit the city, killing around 150,000 people, followed by another epidemic in 1836, killing 80,000 people. Nevertheless, the city continued to grow and in 1913 had more than one million inhabitants.
In 1836 Sultan Mahmud II opened a wooden floating bridge between the northwestern part of Galata and the opposite Un-Kapu on the site of today's Ataturk Bridge. The toll-free bridge saved the residents the expensive ferry fees and was therefore popularly known as Hayratiye Köprüsü ( Charity Bridge). Later it was generally referred to as the Old Bridge ( Cisr-i Atik ) to distinguish it from the New Bridge ( Cisr-i Cedid ), also a wooden floating bridge . This was built at the instigation of Valide Sultan Bezm-î Âlem , the mother of Sultan Abdülmecid I , in 1845 on the site of today's Galata Bridge.
Turkey
Istanbul with the Bosphorus and Dardanelles Straits was occupied by the Allies after the First World War; Greece planned to recapture the city, but suffered a severe defeat that resulted in the expulsion of all Greeks from Turkey, with the exception of Istanbul. In 1923, the Tatavla or Tataulon district, which was heavily influenced by Greeks, was renamed Kurtuluş (Liberation), and Istanbul lost its status as the capital of Turkey to Ankara . In September 1955 the Istanbul pogrom took place , as a result of which the Greeks practically disappeared from Istanbul. The population rose from its low of 680,000 in 1927 to 1.3 million in 1955 - despite evictions. The influx, especially from the Asian regions, skyrocketed after 1980, and by 1985 the population doubled to around 5.5 million.
Until the 1980s, the Golden Horn was an industrial garbage dump. Since the purge, it has become one of the tourist attractions in Istanbul. The Miniaturk amusement park is at the end of the Horn . Another attraction is the Aynalıkavak Palace . Today the Golden Horn is inhabited on both sides and there are parks with promenades along the banks. The Istanbul Chamber of Commerce has its seat there. Since the old pontoon bridge at the Galata Bridge was replaced by a pillar bridge with a free opening of 80 m in 1992, the water can circulate almost unhindered, which has significantly improved the water quality in the Golden Horn.
In 1998 the Haliç University was established with the faculties of art, medicine, business administration, engineering, nursing and sports schools, a department for fisheries and aquaculture and an institute for health sciences.
Web links
Remarks
- ↑ Map of Constantinople from approx. 1860 (Attention: file size 45.85 MB)
- ↑ Eugen Oberhummer : Byzantion 1 . In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume III, 1, Stuttgart 1897, Col. 1116-1158. Until the siege by Philip of Macedonia.
- ↑ Pierer's Universal Lexicon of the Past and Present or Latest Encyclopedic Dictionary . In: Pierer's Universal Lexicon of the Past and Present or Latest Encyclopedic Dictionary . 4th edition. 4th volume China - German Crown . Publishing book by HA Pierer, Altenburg 1858, p. 382 ( full text in Google Book Search).
- ↑ Alexander Van Millingen: Byzantine Constantinople: The Walls of the City and Adjoining Historical Sites . Cambridge University Press, 2010, ISBN 978-1-108-01456-4 , pp. 174 ( limited preview in Google Book Search - first edition: John Murray, London 1899).
- ↑ Peter Schreiner: Constantinople. History and Archeology , Munich 2007, p. 28.
- ↑ Leonardo's dimensions given without units are: 40 width, 70 height, 600 length, 400 of them above the sea and 200 on land. Babinger converted these measurements using the assumed Florentine cubit of 0.5836 m.
- ^ Franz Babinger: Four construction proposals from Lionardo da Vinci to Sultan Bajezid the Second (1502/1503) . With a contribution by Ludwig H. Heydenreich. In: News from the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen; I. Philological-historical class . tape 1952 , no. 1 . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1952, OCLC 459308342 , p. 1-20 .
- ↑ Leonardo's letter was discovered in the Topkapi archives in 1951.
- ↑ Bulent Atalay: Leonardo's Bridge: Part 2. "A Bridge for the Sultan." Blog from January 22, 2013 in National Geographic
- ^ GA Papadopoulos, T. Murty, S. Venkatesh, R. Blong: Natural Hazards. State-of-the-art at the End of the Second Millennium , Springer, 2000, p. 187.
- ^ Constantin Jireček: History of the Bulgarians
- ↑ Jürgen Osterhammel: The transformation of the world. A history of the 19th century , Munich: Beck 2009, p. 369.
- ↑ Wilfried Heller , Dirk Gerdes: Urban redevelopment in Istanbul: For the relocation of wholesalers, trades and industry from the "Golden Horn" since 1980 . In: Journal of Economic Geography . H. 1, 1991, p. 24-36 .