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We have just arrived back in Australia from a three week tour of Turkey and one of our first happy tasks is to write a recommendation for Mr Mevlut Uysal of Pomegranate Tours. Our tour was superbly organised, nothing went wrong and everything that was supposed to happen did as planned. As we progres...
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Turkey Travel Destinations - Hagia Sophia
Hagia Sophia
The Church was dedicated to the Logos, the second person of the Holy Trinity its dedication feast taking place on 25 December, the anniversary of the Birth of the incarnation of the Logos in Christ. Although it is sometimes referred to as Sancta Sophia (as though it were named after Saint Sophia), "Shrine of the Holy Wisdom of God"
The face the Hexapterygon (six-winged angel) on the north east pendentive (upper left), discovered but covered again by Gaspare Fossati during its restoration, is visible again.
Although this design stabilizes the dome and the surrounding walls and arches, the actual construction of the walls of Hagia Sophia weakened the overall structure. The bricklayers used more mortar than brick, weakening the walls. The structure would have been more stable if the builders at least let the mortar cure before they began the next layer; however, they did not do this. When the dome was erected, its weight caused the walls to lean outward because of the wet mortar underneath. When Isidore the Younger rebuilt the fallen cupola, he had to first build up the interior of the walls to make them vertical again. Additionally, the architect raised the height of the rebuilt dome by approximately six metres so that the lateral forces would not be as strong and its weight would flow more easily down into the walls. Moreover, he shaped the new cupola like a scalloped shell or the inside of an umbrella, with ribs that extend from the its top down to the base. These ribs allow the weight of the dome to flow between the windows, down the pendentives, and ultimately to the foundation.
Hagia Sophia is famous for the mystical quality of light that reflects everywhere in the interior of the nave, giving the dome the appearance of hovering above this. This effect was reached inserting forty windows around the base of the original structure. Moreover, the insertion of the windows in the dome structure lowers its weight.
The unique character of the design of Hagia Sophia shows how this structure is one of the most advanced and ambitious monuments of late antiquity.
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