Because when we are in holidays we do not only eat and drink but also we need to know better the local people, history and habits, so today we had been to:
a. Turkish and Islamic Arts Museum (Turk ve Islam Eserleri Muzesi) Turkish and Islamic Art Museum is the first museum in our country to include Turkish - Islamic art works together. It opened its doors for the first time in 1914 in the imaret building of Suleymaniye Mosque Social Complex, one of the most important structures of Mimar Sinan (Sinan the Architect) by the name of "Evkaf-ı Islamiye Museum" (Islamic Foundations Museum). It was moved to Ibrahim Pasha Palace to the west of Blue Mosque Square, in 1983. Apart from the Sultan palaces, the museum building is one of the earliest surviving palace buildings to the present day, dates back to the late 15th century.
b. Little Hagia Sophia Mosque (Küçük Ayasofya Camii) This building used to be a former Greek Eastern Orthodox church dedicated to Saints Sergius and Bacchus in Constantinople, built between 532 and 536, and converted into a mosque during the Ottoman Empire. This Byzantine building with a central dome plan was erected in the sixth century by Justinian; despite its Turkish name, it likely was not a model for Hagia Sophia ("Holy Wisdom"), with which its construction was contemporary, but it is nonetheless one of the most important early Byzantine buildings in Istanbul. It was recognized at the time by Procopius as an adornment to the entire city, and a modern historian of the East Roman Empire has written that the church "by the originality of its architecture and the sumptuousness of its carved decoration, ranks in Constantinople second only to St Sophia itself". It is a very nice and cozy mosque no matter what is your religion.
c. Sokollu Mehmed Pasha Mosque (Sokollu Mehmet Paşa Camii) The mosque was designed by Ottoman imperial architect Mimar Sinan for the grand vizier Sokollu Mehmed Pasha and his wife İsmihan Sultan, a daughter of Selim II and one of the granddaughters of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent. According to the foundation inscription in Turkish above the north entrance to the courtyard, the building was completed in AH 979 (1571/72 CE).
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