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aegean-okra:
The Basilica Cistern, is the largest of several hundred ancient cisterns that lie beneath the city of Istanbul/Constantinople. It was built in the 6th century during the reign of Byzantine Emperor Justinian I. The bases of two columns reuse blocks carved with the visage of Medusa. The origin of the two heads is unknown, though it is thought that the heads were brought to the cistern after being removed from a building of the late Roman period. There is no written evidence that suggests they were used as column pedestals previously. Tradition has it that the blocks are oriented sideways and inverted in order to negate the power of the Gorgons’ gaze, however it is widely thought that one was placed sideways only to be the proper size to support the column. The upside down Medusa was placed that way specifically because she would be the same height right side up.
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oh, i’ve been here, when I went to Istanbul in uhhh 2018? was it 2018? i think so. It’s… simultaneously boring and overwhelming. You can’t see anything from the surface, but like… the cistern was built literally 1400 years ago??!! it is SO OLD, you have to see it. It’s really close to the Hagia Sofia (and was built approximately concurrently) so if you just went there and were blown away (seriously it’s… huge) then you figure you’d better check out this cistern. So you give them money and go down some stairs and you’re… in the dark? and it’s… it’s dark. that’s it.
So you wander a little, and ok this is a big space. There’s a walkway, you’re on this walkway, there are columns. Gradually (maybe you cheat with a camera flash, or you see someone else’s) you realize that there are a shitload of columns. What the fuck.
There’s not really anything to see, you just realize that you’re underground in this literal forest of columns that extend off into the distance and then are sort of blocked off, there are painted canvas wrappings blocking off where they’re doing work so the whole thing doesn’t collapse, and there are paintings of columns on the wrappers, and you’re kind of led around these areas by the walkway. The floor is dark and maybe covered in water, you’re not sure. It’s full of people but it’s still weirdly hushed, and it’s just really really really dark in here. (The photos I took are here, [https://www.flickr.com/photos/dragonlady7/45685183574/in/album-72157698963172630/] and if you just keep clicking the “next” button there are a handful of them, including the Medusa heads, and oh yeah the whole album is Istanbul if you’re interested.)
The walkway takes you to a column that’s all carved fancy, and explains that this column was clearly taken from some bit of earlier construction, salvaged from Roman stuff– a lot of the columns have bits on them that were clearly taken from older construction, apparently the Romans had left a lot of monumental architecture sort of lying around so this made sense. Then there’s a completely uncited legend of what the carvings mean, which is implausible but charming.
So you get to these Medusa heads basically last of all, and they mention them in the summaries of the site so the whole time you’re like “so what’s the deal with these” and to get to them you have to go down some stairs, which is unnerving because there’s water down there, but the walkway stays dry, and then around a corner it’s like oh there they– holy shit those are huge. What the hell were these heads on to begin with that they are so massive???
But maybe the weirdest thing about the Basilica Cistern is that it was lost for hundreds of years.
I know right???!!! It was there the whole time, it’s just the Ottomans didn’t like water from cisterns, they weren’t into the idea, so they stopped using it and then everyone forgot, and in the TWENTIETH CENTURY, people were like “hey downtown you can get fish out of the wells, isn’t that weird” and a random German submariner was like “I must explore this” and TOOK A BOAT DOWN INTO THE CISTERN (because apparently there was… a staircase… that the locals were like “idk! weird cellar staircase! nobody goes down there!”) and that was how the people of Istanbul rediscovered this incredibly massive ancient work of engineering. When they say there’s no written record of the Medusa heads, that’s because there’s almost no record of the entire construction, even though it is incredibly enormous, it’s basically an entire city block of water collection facilities, and holds thousands of tons of water, and would still work today with minimal maintenance, but was entirely forgotten for literal centuries.
It’s really something.
aegean-okra:
The Basilica Cistern, is the largest of several hundred ancient cisterns that lie beneath the city of Istanbul/Constantinople. It was built in the 6th century during the reign of Byzantine Emperor Justinian I. The bases of two columns reuse blocks carved with the visage of Medusa. The origin of the two heads is unknown, though it is thought that the heads were brought to the cistern after being removed from a building of the late Roman period. There is no written evidence that suggests they were used as column pedestals previously. Tradition has it that the blocks are oriented sideways and inverted in order to negate the power of the Gorgons’ gaze, however it is widely thought that one was placed sideways only to be the proper size to support the column. The upside down Medusa was placed that way specifically because she would be the same height right side up.
::
oh, i’ve been here, when I went to Istanbul in uhhh 2018? was it 2018? i think so. It’s… simultaneously boring and overwhelming. You can’t see anything from the surface, but like… the cistern was built literally 1400 years ago??!! it is SO OLD, you have to see it. It’s really close to the Hagia Sofia (and was built approximately concurrently) so if you just went there and were blown away (seriously it’s… huge) then you figure you’d better check out this cistern. So you give them money and go down some stairs and you’re… in the dark? and it’s… it’s dark. that’s it.
So you wander a little, and ok this is a big space. There’s a walkway, you’re on this walkway, there are columns. Gradually (maybe you cheat with a camera flash, or you see someone else’s) you realize that there are a shitload of columns. What the fuck.
There’s not really anything to see, you just realize that you’re underground in this literal forest of columns that extend off into the distance and then are sort of blocked off, there are painted canvas wrappings blocking off where they’re doing work so the whole thing doesn’t collapse, and there are paintings of columns on the wrappers, and you’re kind of led around these areas by the walkway. The floor is dark and maybe covered in water, you’re not sure. It’s full of people but it’s still weirdly hushed, and it’s just really really really dark in here. (The photos I took are here, [https://www.flickr.com/photos/dragonlady7/45685183574/in/album-72157698963172630/] and if you just keep clicking the “next” button there are a handful of them, including the Medusa heads, and oh yeah the whole album is Istanbul if you’re interested.)
The walkway takes you to a column that’s all carved fancy, and explains that this column was clearly taken from some bit of earlier construction, salvaged from Roman stuff– a lot of the columns have bits on them that were clearly taken from older construction, apparently the Romans had left a lot of monumental architecture sort of lying around so this made sense. Then there’s a completely uncited legend of what the carvings mean, which is implausible but charming.
So you get to these Medusa heads basically last of all, and they mention them in the summaries of the site so the whole time you’re like “so what’s the deal with these” and to get to them you have to go down some stairs, which is unnerving because there’s water down there, but the walkway stays dry, and then around a corner it’s like oh there they– holy shit those are huge. What the hell were these heads on to begin with that they are so massive???
But maybe the weirdest thing about the Basilica Cistern is that it was lost for hundreds of years.
I know right???!!! It was there the whole time, it’s just the Ottomans didn’t like water from cisterns, they weren’t into the idea, so they stopped using it and then everyone forgot, and in the TWENTIETH CENTURY, people were like “hey downtown you can get fish out of the wells, isn’t that weird” and a random German submariner was like “I must explore this” and TOOK A BOAT DOWN INTO THE CISTERN (because apparently there was… a staircase… that the locals were like “idk! weird cellar staircase! nobody goes down there!”) and that was how the people of Istanbul rediscovered this incredibly massive ancient work of engineering. When they say there’s no written record of the Medusa heads, that’s because there’s almost no record of the entire construction, even though it is incredibly enormous, it’s basically an entire city block of water collection facilities, and holds thousands of tons of water, and would still work today with minimal maintenance, but was entirely forgotten for literal centuries.
It’s really something.
