1 00:00:06,000 --> 00:00:10,400 These are the gardens of the Topkapi Palace of Istanbul, 2 00:00:10,400 --> 00:00:16,160 the imperial residence of the sultans of the Ottoman Empire. 3 00:00:16,160 --> 00:00:19,880 Just as Henry VIII was dazzling England, 4 00:00:19,880 --> 00:00:23,760 two boys might have been seen walking here amongst the pavilions 5 00:00:23,760 --> 00:00:25,480 and the courtyards. 6 00:00:27,120 --> 00:00:30,840 The two boys were Prince Suleiman, the son and heir 7 00:00:30,840 --> 00:00:35,920 of the reigning Sultan, and Ibrahim, his favourite companion, 8 00:00:35,920 --> 00:00:38,400 his slave, a Christian boy 9 00:00:38,400 --> 00:00:41,120 bought in the slave markets of Europe converted 10 00:00:41,120 --> 00:00:45,360 to Islam and brought here to be trained in the palace school. 11 00:00:48,640 --> 00:00:51,520 Ibrahim had been given to Suleiman, 12 00:00:51,520 --> 00:00:55,800 and they became best friends, inseparable allies. It was 13 00:00:55,800 --> 00:00:59,880 a friendship that would ultimately end in betrayal and murder. 14 00:01:02,000 --> 00:01:05,480 Ibrahim was the bumptious and confident one. 15 00:01:05,480 --> 00:01:10,320 His master more enigmatic and reticent. 16 00:01:10,320 --> 00:01:14,480 These two boys would one day rule a global empire 17 00:01:14,480 --> 00:01:17,480 from this, their imperial capital, 18 00:01:17,480 --> 00:01:21,640 but whatever the name of this city, and it had variously been Byzantium, 19 00:01:21,640 --> 00:01:25,400 Constantinople and now Istanbul, 20 00:01:25,400 --> 00:01:30,440 this place was always the essence of its power. 21 00:01:30,440 --> 00:01:34,440 Once, it had been the site of the palace of the Roman Caesars, 22 00:01:34,440 --> 00:01:38,560 and now, it was the seat of the Ottoman emperors 23 00:01:38,560 --> 00:01:42,280 and from here, they ruled the greatest empire on Earth. 24 00:01:46,960 --> 00:01:48,640 I come here as historian 25 00:01:48,640 --> 00:01:53,160 and traveller, to tell the story of how this city rose to become 26 00:01:53,160 --> 00:01:58,160 the cosmopolitan world capital of a vast empire that stretched 27 00:01:58,160 --> 00:02:04,880 from Iraq to the Balkans, and also a sacred epicentre of Islam. 28 00:02:04,880 --> 00:02:10,320 It's always been a city built and made to rule the world. 29 00:02:12,160 --> 00:02:16,240 I'm fascinated by its secrets, the world under its streets, 30 00:02:16,240 --> 00:02:21,280 the hidden councils of power, the dark recesses of the imperial 31 00:02:21,280 --> 00:02:26,160 palaces, the intrigues behind the grilles of the Harem. 32 00:02:26,160 --> 00:02:29,960 In this last film, we will travel from the fearsome 33 00:02:29,960 --> 00:02:32,880 brilliance of Sultan Selim the Grim 34 00:02:32,880 --> 00:02:38,120 and the rule of the female Sultanas, all the way up to the 35 00:02:38,120 --> 00:02:42,600 First World War and finally, the rise of a new Turkey under 36 00:02:42,600 --> 00:02:49,120 the command of a visionary secular leader, the extraordinary Ataturk. 37 00:03:06,600 --> 00:03:09,720 When the Ottoman conquerors poured through the walls of this 38 00:03:09,720 --> 00:03:15,160 city in 1453, the first thing they did was convert the ancient 39 00:03:15,160 --> 00:03:20,600 church of St Sophia into a mosque. Constantinople, 40 00:03:20,600 --> 00:03:26,080 in ancient times Byzantium, was then rebuilt and repopulated 41 00:03:26,080 --> 00:03:30,280 and they called it Istanbul. 42 00:03:30,280 --> 00:03:34,120 The Ottomans had a vision of the city as world capital, 43 00:03:34,120 --> 00:03:37,680 with all other faiths, Christians and Jews tolerated, 44 00:03:37,680 --> 00:03:41,440 providing they recognised the supremacy of Islam 45 00:03:41,440 --> 00:03:43,440 and the Ottoman Sultan. 46 00:03:44,760 --> 00:03:47,000 Strangely, the Ottomans had conquered 47 00:03:47,000 --> 00:03:51,880 south-eastern Europe before they conquered Asia. At the start 48 00:03:51,880 --> 00:03:57,560 of the 16th century, the Ottoman sultans ruled most of the Balkans. 49 00:03:57,560 --> 00:04:00,520 Alongside their own Turkish horsemen, 50 00:04:00,520 --> 00:04:03,600 their armies and their administrators, the viziers, 51 00:04:03,600 --> 00:04:07,560 were mainly made up of Christian converts, forcibly taken 52 00:04:07,560 --> 00:04:12,880 as a tax from families in today's Serbia, Greece, and Bosnia. 53 00:04:14,800 --> 00:04:17,400 It was very much a European empire. 54 00:04:19,120 --> 00:04:22,080 But all that was to change because of just one man. 55 00:04:27,560 --> 00:04:31,680 This is the tomb of Selim the Grim. 56 00:04:31,680 --> 00:04:36,800 He was probably the greatest warrior emperor of the Ottoman dynasty. 57 00:04:36,800 --> 00:04:40,640 As those boys walked in the Topkapi gardens, the Prince's 58 00:04:40,640 --> 00:04:44,640 father was conquering a new empire. 59 00:04:44,640 --> 00:04:50,200 Selim was a terrifying and ferocious warrior Sultan. He was also 60 00:04:50,200 --> 00:04:54,840 talented, highly educated, an accomplished poet, trained 61 00:04:54,840 --> 00:04:59,880 and raised in the vicious snake pit of the Ottoman court. 62 00:04:59,880 --> 00:05:03,160 Selim didn't spend much time in Istanbul, he was always at war. 63 00:05:03,160 --> 00:05:05,520 He spent most of his eight-and-a-half-year reign 64 00:05:05,520 --> 00:05:10,920 in the saddle. First he defeated the Shiite Shahs of Iran 65 00:05:10,920 --> 00:05:14,880 and then he destroyed the entire Mamluk Empire, 66 00:05:14,880 --> 00:05:18,840 conquering all of the Middle East, including the holy cities of Mecca, 67 00:05:18,840 --> 00:05:21,440 Medina and Jerusalem and henceforward, 68 00:05:21,440 --> 00:05:25,320 he proudly called himself Guardian of the Holy Places. 69 00:05:28,680 --> 00:05:32,840 But there was more. Selim was now the proud possessor 70 00:05:32,840 --> 00:05:35,680 of the most important holy relics of Islam, 71 00:05:35,680 --> 00:05:39,440 the swords of the Prophet Mohammed. 72 00:05:41,520 --> 00:05:47,120 And these cases, containing his mantle and his sacred banner. 73 00:05:47,120 --> 00:05:51,320 These were the treasures he brought back to the Topkapi Palace. 74 00:05:52,960 --> 00:05:54,800 The palace of the Ottoman emperors 75 00:05:54,800 --> 00:06:00,000 was situated on a high peninsula guarding the Bosphorus, 76 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:05,560 the narrow straits dividing Europe from Asia. This city commanded 77 00:06:05,560 --> 00:06:10,640 the strategic crossroads between east and west, the Mediterranean 78 00:06:10,640 --> 00:06:15,280 and Black Seas, and now it was the capital of the Muslim world. 79 00:06:17,320 --> 00:06:21,800 When Selim the Grim died, it was here that his son Prince Suleiman 80 00:06:21,800 --> 00:06:26,680 came to take the reins of power. Topkapi was like no other 81 00:06:26,680 --> 00:06:31,960 palace on Earth. Its many pavilions are arranged more like the 82 00:06:31,960 --> 00:06:38,040 campaign tents of a monarch on the march. It was a place of intrigue 83 00:06:38,040 --> 00:06:40,760 and shadows, where business was conducted 84 00:06:40,760 --> 00:06:44,480 in almost complete silence. 85 00:06:44,480 --> 00:06:48,600 I was just looking at a portrait of Suleiman the Magnificent. 86 00:06:48,600 --> 00:06:53,120 Looking at the face of this exceptional man. 87 00:06:53,120 --> 00:06:57,200 He was very thin-faced. He was just 25 years old, 88 00:06:57,200 --> 00:07:02,280 haughty, majestic, enigmatic. 89 00:07:02,280 --> 00:07:02,600 Always totally mysterious. 90 00:07:02,760 --> 00:07:04,480 Always totally mysterious. 91 00:07:04,480 --> 00:07:07,960 He was capable of running wars, 92 00:07:07,960 --> 00:07:11,560 of commanding complex architectural projects, 93 00:07:11,560 --> 00:07:15,200 of thinking about ideology of religion, 94 00:07:15,200 --> 00:07:19,320 but he also was deeply paranoid and suspicious. 95 00:07:19,320 --> 00:07:23,200 This was a man of great friendship and loyalty, 96 00:07:23,200 --> 00:07:27,320 but he was also capable of the darkest vengeance 97 00:07:27,320 --> 00:07:29,440 on family and friends. 98 00:07:32,680 --> 00:07:35,720 This is the Divan, the Cabinet chamber of the empire. 99 00:07:35,720 --> 00:07:40,520 Suleiman soon made his friend Ibrahim his Grand Vizier 100 00:07:40,520 --> 00:07:42,280 or Prime Minister. 101 00:07:42,280 --> 00:07:44,440 But while Ibrahim sat with his ministers, 102 00:07:44,440 --> 00:07:49,200 Suleiman listened to their plans unseen from behind a grille he'd had 103 00:07:49,200 --> 00:07:53,400 installed halfway up the wall. 104 00:07:53,400 --> 00:07:57,480 The sultans often executed their grand viziers 105 00:07:57,480 --> 00:08:00,560 and even Ibrahim had begged his master 106 00:08:00,560 --> 00:08:02,480 not to raise him too high. 107 00:08:05,920 --> 00:08:10,000 Suleiman didn't see himself just as a Sultan. 108 00:08:10,000 --> 00:08:13,480 He was Caesar and Khan, Lord of the Horizon, 109 00:08:13,480 --> 00:08:16,480 Emperor of the Two Seas, 110 00:08:16,480 --> 00:08:20,480 but now he had the holy cities and the holy relics, 111 00:08:20,480 --> 00:08:24,280 he added another title - that of Caliph. 112 00:08:24,280 --> 00:08:28,560 The Successor and Viceroy of Mohammed on Earth. 113 00:08:28,560 --> 00:08:33,840 Suleiman now set about building a city worthy of that title. 114 00:08:35,440 --> 00:08:39,320 Up here, on the rooftops, among all these famous minarets, 115 00:08:39,320 --> 00:08:43,680 and these great domes, I'm at the centre of one of the holiest cities 116 00:08:43,680 --> 00:08:48,640 in the world, and I'm about to hear any minute the call to prayer, 117 00:08:48,640 --> 00:08:51,320 from the muezzins in these minarets. 118 00:08:55,640 --> 00:08:58,280 CALL TO PRAYER It's starting over there. 119 00:09:04,760 --> 00:09:07,360 CALL TO PRAYER CONTINUES 120 00:09:07,360 --> 00:09:09,560 The sound of a holy city. 121 00:09:14,880 --> 00:09:17,960 Suleiman the Magnificent built many mosques 122 00:09:17,960 --> 00:09:20,920 here in the capital, but there's one that's bigger 123 00:09:20,920 --> 00:09:25,640 and more stately than all the rest, one that even rivals 124 00:09:25,640 --> 00:09:29,200 the church turned-mosque of Hagia Sophia. 125 00:09:29,200 --> 00:09:33,280 And it bears his name, the Suleimaniye. 126 00:09:33,280 --> 00:09:38,240 This is the masterpiece of Suleiman the Magnificent's architect, Sinan. 127 00:09:38,240 --> 00:09:43,080 Together, theirs was probably the most successful partnership 128 00:09:43,080 --> 00:09:47,680 of monarch and architect in all of history. He was the 129 00:09:47,680 --> 00:09:51,120 Christopher Wren of Istanbul and much, much more. 130 00:09:51,120 --> 00:09:53,960 They changed the skyline of the city 131 00:09:53,960 --> 00:09:57,920 more than anyone since Justinian had built Hagia Sophia. 132 00:10:00,080 --> 00:10:01,560 The foundations alone 133 00:10:01,560 --> 00:10:04,760 of this great mosque took three whole years to build. 134 00:10:06,200 --> 00:10:11,720 Inside, no expense was spared. Sinan even fitted its vast dome 135 00:10:11,720 --> 00:10:16,800 with special resonators to help improve the acoustics. 136 00:10:16,800 --> 00:10:20,160 THEY CHANT AND PRAY 137 00:10:20,160 --> 00:10:25,960 I'm with art historian Nina Ergin to explore what Suleiman had in mind. 138 00:10:25,960 --> 00:10:27,840 Suleiman had a very long reign, 139 00:10:27,840 --> 00:10:33,280 46 years, and he was a very successful military leader as well, 140 00:10:33,280 --> 00:10:36,520 and with the money from his conquests, 141 00:10:36,520 --> 00:10:40,040 he was able to build a mosque of this size. 142 00:10:40,040 --> 00:10:42,200 Suleiman the Magnificent, 143 00:10:42,200 --> 00:10:45,600 he picked for himself the Padishah of Islam, the Emperor of Islam, 144 00:10:45,600 --> 00:10:49,760 so really, the Caliph, the ruler of the entire Islamic world. 145 00:10:49,760 --> 00:10:54,600 Part of his mission was to bring the law of the Ottoman countries more in 146 00:10:54,600 --> 00:10:59,120 line with the Sharia and put more emphasis on the Orthodox practice 147 00:10:59,120 --> 00:11:02,880 of religion, and this is very much emphasised in this building. 148 00:11:02,880 --> 00:11:05,480 For example, the inscriptions that you can see 149 00:11:05,480 --> 00:11:09,000 all over the mosque, they are almost exclusively drawn 150 00:11:09,000 --> 00:11:12,360 from the Koran and they are almost exclusively verses 151 00:11:12,360 --> 00:11:16,200 that emphasise how you should pray, how often you should go to pray, 152 00:11:16,200 --> 00:11:18,720 the timing of the prayer and so on. 153 00:11:21,840 --> 00:11:26,280 But it's outside, at his mausoleum, that I discover how Suleiman really 154 00:11:26,280 --> 00:11:31,160 saw himself. He was emulating the greatest king of the Bible. 155 00:11:32,840 --> 00:11:35,600 Suleiman, the name itself actually means Solomon, 156 00:11:35,600 --> 00:11:38,640 and he styled himself as the Solomon of his age. 157 00:11:38,640 --> 00:11:41,600 So for example, he had a very special connection to 158 00:11:41,600 --> 00:11:45,960 Jerusalem, where the temple built by Solomon is also located and 159 00:11:45,960 --> 00:11:48,840 on top of that is the Dome of the Rock. Suleiman the Magnificent 160 00:11:48,840 --> 00:11:52,880 actually renovated the Dome of the Rock and following that, he 161 00:11:52,880 --> 00:11:58,760 built his own mausoleum to reflect the shape of the Dome of the Rock. 162 00:12:00,680 --> 00:12:06,000 Suleiman, law-giver and conqueror, was answerable to no man. 163 00:12:06,000 --> 00:12:08,680 And yet, within the cold haughtiness, 164 00:12:08,680 --> 00:12:10,960 there was a surprising warmth, 165 00:12:10,960 --> 00:12:17,200 and it came from the most secret part of the Imperial Palace. 166 00:12:17,200 --> 00:12:21,560 This gate led to the harem, 167 00:12:21,560 --> 00:12:25,240 and a special purpose of the harem was only indirectly concerned 168 00:12:25,240 --> 00:12:29,480 with sex. It was really all about power and the imperial 169 00:12:29,480 --> 00:12:35,960 bloodline, and forget the cliche of black-eyed B-list belly dancers, 170 00:12:35,960 --> 00:12:39,600 these rooms behind me contained the most beautiful 171 00:12:39,600 --> 00:12:45,080 women in the world. This was a breeding machine for the sultans. 172 00:12:45,080 --> 00:12:50,080 The idea was that no wife or her family would ever become powerful. 173 00:12:50,080 --> 00:12:53,440 They were just there to provide multiple heirs 174 00:12:53,440 --> 00:12:56,480 for the Ottoman Empire. That was all. 175 00:12:56,480 --> 00:12:58,680 At least, that was how it was MEANT to work. 176 00:13:02,760 --> 00:13:07,960 These girls, the concubines of the harem, were Christians, 177 00:13:07,960 --> 00:13:12,720 often captured by pirates, bought by slave traders for the markets 178 00:13:12,720 --> 00:13:17,360 of the city. Slavic blondes and redheads 179 00:13:17,360 --> 00:13:19,480 were particularly prized. 180 00:13:19,480 --> 00:13:23,400 They were converted to Islam and educated in the Sultan's harem. 181 00:13:25,360 --> 00:13:29,560 One Russian girl attracted Suleiman's special attention. 182 00:13:35,680 --> 00:13:38,520 Ottoman emperors didn't traditionally marry 183 00:13:38,520 --> 00:13:42,880 their concubines, but Suleiman obviously absolutely loved Roxelana. 184 00:13:42,880 --> 00:13:47,720 He renamed her Hurrem Sultan, the joy the delight of the Sultan. 185 00:13:47,720 --> 00:13:51,320 They had children together, they had sons and daughters 186 00:13:51,320 --> 00:13:55,040 and she became increasingly part of his life 187 00:13:55,040 --> 00:13:58,040 and of the politics of the Ottoman court. 188 00:13:58,040 --> 00:14:02,000 Their love letters, which they exchanged and also the poems 189 00:14:02,000 --> 00:14:06,640 they wrote to each other, are some of the most romantic exchanges 190 00:14:06,640 --> 00:14:10,200 in all of Turkish literature and I think in world literature. 191 00:14:12,520 --> 00:14:15,760 He called her, "The queen of my heart's realm. 192 00:14:15,760 --> 00:14:18,120 "Oh, my black-haired love 193 00:14:18,120 --> 00:14:20,640 "with bow-like eyebrows, 194 00:14:20,640 --> 00:14:24,440 "with languorous, perfidious eyes. 195 00:14:24,440 --> 00:14:27,040 "If I die, you are my killer. 196 00:14:27,040 --> 00:14:29,360 "Merciless infidel woman." 197 00:14:29,360 --> 00:14:31,560 Her letters are passionate too... 198 00:14:31,800 --> 00:14:32,160 Her letters are passionate too... 199 00:14:32,160 --> 00:14:36,600 "If the seas become ink and the trees become pens 200 00:14:36,600 --> 00:14:39,680 "when could they write of our parting?" 201 00:14:39,680 --> 00:14:45,400 And sometimes she writes of... "The pity and lonely separation from the 202 00:14:45,400 --> 00:14:47,760 "Lord of the Worlds." 203 00:14:49,080 --> 00:14:53,240 But behind the sweet words was a grimmer reality. 204 00:14:53,240 --> 00:14:57,360 Roxelana was not the only woman to bear the Sultan's children and 205 00:14:57,360 --> 00:15:00,160 she was up against a brutal convention 206 00:15:00,160 --> 00:15:04,440 set up by Suleiman's great-grandfather. 207 00:15:04,440 --> 00:15:08,240 The breeding machine of the harem worked far too well. 208 00:15:08,240 --> 00:15:12,480 Now, there were so many heirs and they all wanted power, 209 00:15:12,480 --> 00:15:16,880 but Suleiman's great-grandfather Sultan Mehmed II had 210 00:15:16,880 --> 00:15:20,520 instituted a ruthless solution to this problem. 211 00:15:21,920 --> 00:15:23,920 They would kill all their brothers, 212 00:15:23,920 --> 00:15:25,640 and some of their sons even, 213 00:15:25,640 --> 00:15:29,480 on their accession. And this is how they did it. 214 00:15:29,480 --> 00:15:32,680 With the bowstring. The Turks believed it was forbidden 215 00:15:32,680 --> 00:15:35,320 to shed royal blood, so they had to find a way 216 00:15:35,320 --> 00:15:38,120 to kill their brothers without shedding any. 217 00:15:38,120 --> 00:15:39,760 And this is how they did it... 218 00:15:39,760 --> 00:15:41,600 They sent deaf-mutes, 219 00:15:41,600 --> 00:15:44,680 their special bodyguards, to strangle them like this. 220 00:15:47,800 --> 00:15:51,960 Roxelana would have to fight for her own children's survival 221 00:15:51,960 --> 00:15:56,440 in a merciless contest. She would have to wield power herself. 222 00:15:56,440 --> 00:15:57,760 But how? 223 00:15:57,760 --> 00:16:02,360 The only way was to gain the Sultan's exclusive ear. 224 00:16:02,360 --> 00:16:04,520 To do that, she would have to get rid 225 00:16:04,520 --> 00:16:08,120 of his great friend and minister Ibrahim. 226 00:16:15,360 --> 00:16:19,040 This is the palace of Ibrahim Pasha, built for him 227 00:16:19,040 --> 00:16:22,640 by Suleiman the Magnificent himself. By this time, 228 00:16:22,640 --> 00:16:26,280 Ibrahim was the richest and most powerful man in the empire 229 00:16:26,280 --> 00:16:27,760 after the Sultan himself. 230 00:16:29,960 --> 00:16:32,680 When Suleiman was away at the war, Roxelana wrote him 231 00:16:32,680 --> 00:16:36,800 letters warning him of plotting and intrigue by Ibrahim. 232 00:16:38,560 --> 00:16:41,800 When Suleiman got back, he invited his old friend over to the 233 00:16:41,800 --> 00:16:47,320 Topkapi Palace to spend an evening together like they always used to. 234 00:16:47,320 --> 00:16:50,920 Ibrahim went over there for dinner. It was to be their last 235 00:16:50,920 --> 00:16:55,080 evening together. It was to be Ibrahim's last evening, full stop. 236 00:16:57,680 --> 00:17:01,440 In the morning, his strangled and bloodied body was found 237 00:17:01,440 --> 00:17:03,120 outside the palace gates. 238 00:17:07,520 --> 00:17:12,200 With Ibrahim gone, Roxelana was able to take total control. 239 00:17:12,200 --> 00:17:15,240 She married her and Suleiman's daughter to 240 00:17:15,240 --> 00:17:19,720 a Grand Vizier of her choice, Rustem, and together they plotted 241 00:17:19,720 --> 00:17:22,600 against Suleiman's eldest son, Mustafa. 242 00:17:26,320 --> 00:17:29,640 This is Rustem's Mosque, also built by Sinan. 243 00:17:32,800 --> 00:17:36,360 It's one of the most beautiful in Istanbul with the most 244 00:17:36,360 --> 00:17:42,560 stunning Iznik tile work, but behind the beauty is the story of how 245 00:17:42,560 --> 00:17:47,520 Roxelana put her own son in line for the throne. 246 00:17:47,520 --> 00:17:52,800 She played on Suleiman's suspicions of his elder son, which were perhaps 247 00:17:52,800 --> 00:17:57,800 justified. Either way, Suleiman invited his son Mustafa to his tent 248 00:17:57,800 --> 00:18:02,960 where he was strangled in front of him. Roxelana had won. 249 00:18:05,840 --> 00:18:09,760 She's buried in a glorious tomb next to her master 250 00:18:09,760 --> 00:18:12,200 at the Suleimaniye Mosque. 251 00:18:12,200 --> 00:18:16,520 It was her son Selim II who succeeded his father. 252 00:18:16,520 --> 00:18:19,640 He was fat, he was indolent and he was cheerful and he was 253 00:18:19,640 --> 00:18:23,680 so fond of wine that westerners called him Selim the Drunk. 254 00:18:26,920 --> 00:18:33,200 The Ottoman conquests hadn't been just on land. Their admirals, 255 00:18:33,200 --> 00:18:37,640 like the famous Barbarossa, had ensured that this city dominated 256 00:18:37,640 --> 00:18:42,960 the entire Mediterranean, and by Suleiman's time, 257 00:18:42,960 --> 00:18:47,640 Istanbul had entered a golden age as trading entrepot. 258 00:18:48,880 --> 00:18:50,680 There were spices and perfumes 259 00:18:50,680 --> 00:18:55,360 from Egypt, meat from Anatolia and the Balkans, butter and salt from 260 00:18:55,360 --> 00:18:59,040 the Crimea. Silks from the Far East. 261 00:18:59,040 --> 00:19:02,480 Fish from the Black Sea. Istanbul was 262 00:19:02,480 --> 00:19:06,920 an orderly and peaceful place, due as one visitor noted, 263 00:19:06,920 --> 00:19:11,400 to the salutary vigour of frequent acts of execution. 264 00:19:14,200 --> 00:19:18,640 But one minority of traders had a special reason to feel grateful. 265 00:19:21,040 --> 00:19:24,800 I've come to the old Jewish quarter of Haskoy. 266 00:19:26,280 --> 00:19:30,520 These days, there's only a few Jews left in Istanbul, 267 00:19:30,520 --> 00:19:33,160 but they once were a powerful community. 268 00:19:34,480 --> 00:19:37,480 THEY SPEAK LADINO Hola! 269 00:19:37,480 --> 00:19:40,200 Straightaway, you hear something. 270 00:19:40,200 --> 00:19:44,440 A language that gives you a clue about how they got here. 271 00:19:44,440 --> 00:19:47,120 THEY SPEAK LADINO 272 00:19:47,120 --> 00:19:48,560 Gracias. 273 00:19:48,560 --> 00:19:52,080 I didn't realise they were still speaking this special Jewish 274 00:19:52,080 --> 00:19:56,000 dialect of Spanish. It's amazing to find out that they still are. 275 00:19:56,000 --> 00:19:59,000 MAN SPEAKS LADINO 276 00:19:59,000 --> 00:20:00,280 Gracias. 277 00:20:03,840 --> 00:20:07,280 Wow, what a lovely synagogue, 278 00:20:07,280 --> 00:20:09,960 and I'm very happy to be here. 279 00:20:09,960 --> 00:20:16,960 This synagogue, founded in 1525, is one of the oldest in Istanbul. 280 00:20:16,960 --> 00:20:21,360 A beautiful place, as you can see, and it tells a story here. 281 00:20:21,360 --> 00:20:26,120 In 1492, the repressive and intolerant Christian rulers 282 00:20:26,120 --> 00:20:30,240 of Spain, and then followed by the whole of western Europe, 283 00:20:30,240 --> 00:20:35,920 expelled their Jews and the Ottoman emperors gave them refuge, invited 284 00:20:35,920 --> 00:20:39,680 them to settle and they did so in large numbers. They made 285 00:20:39,680 --> 00:20:45,080 themselves so at home here that they spoke a special language, Ladino, a 286 00:20:45,080 --> 00:20:50,080 mixture of Spanish and Hebrew, with a little bit of Turkish thrown in. 287 00:20:50,080 --> 00:20:54,840 And even today, the Jews who look after this Synagogue, 288 00:20:54,840 --> 00:20:58,080 speak that special Ottoman Jewish language. 289 00:21:01,320 --> 00:21:04,640 But I'm really here to tell the story of one remarkable man. 290 00:21:06,360 --> 00:21:10,520 Joseph Nasi came here with his aunt, a regal retinue 291 00:21:10,520 --> 00:21:15,320 and an international banking fortune that he leant to his new sovereign. 292 00:21:17,280 --> 00:21:22,400 Joseph Nasi became companion, advisor and best friend 293 00:21:22,400 --> 00:21:27,080 almost of the heir to the throne, Prince Selim, and when 294 00:21:27,080 --> 00:21:32,000 he succeeded as Selim II, he became his chief consularie 295 00:21:32,000 --> 00:21:35,880 almost and he prospered enormously. 296 00:21:35,880 --> 00:21:39,600 Joseph was enriched by monopolies granted to him, 297 00:21:39,600 --> 00:21:43,640 especially in wine, which he enjoyed drinking with the Sultan. 298 00:21:43,640 --> 00:21:45,200 He was so powerful, 299 00:21:45,200 --> 00:21:48,880 that Europeans who called the Sultan "The Great Turk", 300 00:21:48,880 --> 00:21:51,680 dubbed Joseph "The Great Jew". 301 00:21:51,680 --> 00:21:54,360 He built a palace overlooking the Bosphorus 302 00:21:54,360 --> 00:21:56,120 where he lived like a king, 303 00:21:56,120 --> 00:22:00,440 patronising artists and protecting his fellow Jews. 304 00:22:02,280 --> 00:22:06,640 This is really the most important part of any synagogue. It's the ark 305 00:22:06,640 --> 00:22:13,880 and it's where the scrolls of the law, the Tora are kept and 306 00:22:13,880 --> 00:22:16,680 it's always a very exciting moment and a rather lovely moment for a 307 00:22:16,680 --> 00:22:19,600 Jewish person to look at these, so I'm going to open it. 308 00:22:19,600 --> 00:22:23,200 I've got the golden key here. So let's see. 309 00:22:25,320 --> 00:22:27,040 Open the doors... 310 00:22:29,920 --> 00:22:31,440 ..and... 311 00:22:32,680 --> 00:22:36,600 ..draw aside the curtain and there they are. 312 00:22:36,600 --> 00:22:38,400 Very beautiful, aren't they? 313 00:22:41,200 --> 00:22:45,720 Selim made Joseph the Duke of Naxos, an island in the Aegean, 314 00:22:45,720 --> 00:22:48,960 where ironically, this Jewish prince found himself 315 00:22:48,960 --> 00:22:51,240 ruling over Christians. 316 00:22:51,240 --> 00:22:53,960 It just tells you something about this extraordinary 317 00:22:53,960 --> 00:22:58,080 time in Ottoman history and the history of Istanbul, when this 318 00:22:58,080 --> 00:23:03,400 great Jewish figure could actually be best friends and confidant with 319 00:23:03,400 --> 00:23:09,520 the Caliph of Islam and the Islamic Emperor of the greatest Muslim 320 00:23:09,520 --> 00:23:11,600 empire in the world. 321 00:23:14,440 --> 00:23:17,720 It wasn't just the Jews that prospered. The Christian 322 00:23:17,720 --> 00:23:23,000 Greeks that had been here since before the Ottoman conquest thrived. 323 00:23:23,000 --> 00:23:26,880 The Sultan appointed Greek princes to rule his Christian 324 00:23:26,880 --> 00:23:28,880 provinces in today's Romania. 325 00:23:31,800 --> 00:23:33,680 But the Armenians were the Christians 326 00:23:33,680 --> 00:23:35,800 who really blossomed in Istanbul. 327 00:23:35,800 --> 00:23:39,040 They too had their own quarter of the city. 328 00:23:39,040 --> 00:23:42,120 All of them swore loyalty to the Emperor. 329 00:23:42,120 --> 00:23:44,680 They were the Sultan's Christian subjects. 330 00:23:46,280 --> 00:23:48,520 Any threats that came to the city 331 00:23:48,520 --> 00:23:51,800 came not from them, but from the instability of 332 00:23:51,800 --> 00:23:57,440 its Ottoman rulers. As their empire got bigger, the sultans spent less 333 00:23:57,440 --> 00:24:00,600 time in the saddle and more time enjoying 334 00:24:00,600 --> 00:24:02,520 the pleasures of the palace. 335 00:24:03,880 --> 00:24:08,880 Selim II died after falling over drunk in the harem. If his vice 336 00:24:08,880 --> 00:24:11,800 was alcohol, that of his successor was lust. 337 00:24:12,800 --> 00:24:16,840 Murad III fathered 102 children, 338 00:24:16,840 --> 00:24:19,960 which required a massive culling of princes 339 00:24:19,960 --> 00:24:25,040 when his son Mehmed III succeeded him in 1597. 340 00:24:25,040 --> 00:24:27,040 The day after his accession, 341 00:24:27,040 --> 00:24:30,920 the policy of fratricide reached its brutal 342 00:24:30,920 --> 00:24:33,640 and heart-rending climax. 343 00:24:33,640 --> 00:24:37,560 This place bears witness to the tragedy 344 00:24:37,560 --> 00:24:43,360 of that day where 19 brothers were killed, some as young as five. 345 00:24:47,840 --> 00:24:52,080 Their tombs are here alongside their father's at Hagia Sophia. 346 00:24:55,800 --> 00:24:58,280 One of the little ones asked if he could 347 00:24:58,280 --> 00:25:02,440 finish his roasted chestnuts before he was strangled. 348 00:25:02,440 --> 00:25:06,920 Even the hardened courtiers of the Topkapi wept 349 00:25:06,920 --> 00:25:08,800 as they saw the procession 350 00:25:08,800 --> 00:25:15,960 of 19 tiny coffins wend its way from the palace to rest right here. 351 00:25:20,520 --> 00:25:25,000 This was fratricide gone mad, and even public opinion was outraged, 352 00:25:25,000 --> 00:25:27,320 so the brothers of future sultans 353 00:25:27,320 --> 00:25:30,520 were kept in luxurious rooms in Topkapi, 354 00:25:30,520 --> 00:25:33,400 known ironically as the cage, 355 00:25:33,400 --> 00:25:36,960 where they spent the rest of their lives in isolated splendour. 356 00:25:41,960 --> 00:25:47,760 In 1616, a new showpiece of Ottoman power arose in the city, 357 00:25:47,760 --> 00:25:52,000 a landmark that still defines the skyline of Istanbul. 358 00:25:54,240 --> 00:25:58,200 The Blue Mosque had an unprecedented six minarets, 359 00:25:58,200 --> 00:25:59,800 but its building tells us much about the state 360 00:25:59,960 --> 00:26:02,320 but its building tells us much about the state 361 00:26:02,320 --> 00:26:07,280 of the empire outside and the positions of the sultans here. 362 00:26:14,600 --> 00:26:18,360 There's something a little gaudy, perhaps a little kitsch, 363 00:26:18,360 --> 00:26:23,440 certainly very Baroque about this place. It's got these vast, 364 00:26:23,440 --> 00:26:27,960 elephant-leg columns and above, a cascade of multiple domes. 365 00:26:27,960 --> 00:26:31,520 It wasn't built like the other mosques on the trophies 366 00:26:31,520 --> 00:26:33,440 of victory over the Christians. 367 00:26:33,440 --> 00:26:37,040 This one is really a statement of vanity of the Sultan 368 00:26:37,040 --> 00:26:40,720 Ahmed I, but I like it. I like it a lot. 369 00:26:43,960 --> 00:26:47,760 Ahmed I was a pious Sultan, but he didn't live long enough 370 00:26:47,760 --> 00:26:50,520 to enjoy the delights of his foundation. 371 00:26:50,520 --> 00:26:55,600 He died aged 27, having half bankrupted the empire to build it. 372 00:26:57,280 --> 00:26:59,680 Sultan Ahmed built the Blue Mosque, 373 00:26:59,680 --> 00:27:02,920 but the most interesting thing about him is the intelligent 374 00:27:02,920 --> 00:27:08,520 and beautiful Greek woman who became the love of his life - Kosem. 375 00:27:08,520 --> 00:27:12,840 She and Ahmed are both buried over there. She became the most 376 00:27:12,840 --> 00:27:15,080 powerful woman in all of Istanbul's history. She was the wife 377 00:27:15,280 --> 00:27:17,640 powerful woman in all of Istanbul's history. She was the wife 378 00:27:17,640 --> 00:27:21,560 and mother, the ruler and the killer of sultans. 379 00:27:24,520 --> 00:27:28,680 Ahmed's immediate successors weren't Kosem's sons, 380 00:27:28,680 --> 00:27:33,280 but she watched and waited as Ahmed's brother Mustafa went insane 381 00:27:33,280 --> 00:27:36,640 and was dethroned by the palace eunuchs. 382 00:27:36,640 --> 00:27:42,040 His son Osman suffered an even worse fate when he dared to cross 383 00:27:42,040 --> 00:27:44,880 his elite troops, the Janissaries. 384 00:27:47,920 --> 00:27:50,960 The Janissaries had been mainly Slavic boys, 385 00:27:50,960 --> 00:27:54,520 given to the Sultan as a tax on his Christian subjects. 386 00:27:54,520 --> 00:27:57,720 They were converted to Islam, and trained into the best 387 00:27:57,720 --> 00:27:59,880 troops in Europe. 388 00:27:59,880 --> 00:28:05,680 But now, they had become a bloated Praetorian Guard, hereditary 389 00:28:05,680 --> 00:28:09,920 and over-mighty with the power to dominate the sultans themselves. 390 00:28:12,240 --> 00:28:17,680 The boy Sultan Osman was imprisoned in the Castle of the Seven Towers. 391 00:28:17,680 --> 00:28:20,680 When they came to kill him, he resisted violently 392 00:28:20,680 --> 00:28:25,040 until he was stopped by Pahlavan the Oil Wrestler, who killed him 393 00:28:25,040 --> 00:28:27,360 by constriction of his testicles. 394 00:28:29,960 --> 00:28:31,160 Imagine the agony. 395 00:28:34,640 --> 00:28:39,040 Whether Kosem was directly involved or not, we don't know. 396 00:28:39,040 --> 00:28:42,520 But it was now that Kosem helped raise her own young son 397 00:28:42,520 --> 00:28:44,240 to the throne. 398 00:28:46,080 --> 00:28:49,840 Murad IV was an Ottoman cross between Julius Caesar 399 00:28:49,840 --> 00:28:54,000 and Caligula, one of the most victorious sultans, but also 400 00:28:54,000 --> 00:28:58,280 the most blood-spattered. He was an enormous giant of a man who could 401 00:28:58,280 --> 00:29:01,760 lift up two of his courtiers in each arm above his head. 402 00:29:01,760 --> 00:29:05,520 He led victorious campaigns that retook Armenia 403 00:29:05,520 --> 00:29:09,080 and Baghdad, and when he returned to Topkapi, 404 00:29:09,080 --> 00:29:13,720 he did so in a Roman-style triumph wearing a lion skin. 405 00:29:16,480 --> 00:29:18,240 He celebrated his victories 406 00:29:18,240 --> 00:29:23,240 by building the majestic Baghdad Pavilion at Topkapi Palace, 407 00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:27,400 but this victorious and meteoric showman had a dark side. 408 00:29:29,320 --> 00:29:34,240 Obsessed with re-imposing political authority and religious conformity, 409 00:29:34,240 --> 00:29:39,080 he presided over the executions of as many as 20,000 people. 410 00:29:39,080 --> 00:29:43,240 Now, he would leave the palace at night and prowl the streets. 411 00:29:44,920 --> 00:29:48,040 He was both a sadist and increasingly an alcoholic. 412 00:29:48,040 --> 00:29:52,280 When he heard some women partying down by the river, he had them 413 00:29:52,280 --> 00:29:54,400 all drowned in the water. 414 00:29:56,120 --> 00:29:59,000 When his singer at court sang a Persian song, 415 00:29:59,000 --> 00:30:01,320 he chopped off his head. 416 00:30:01,320 --> 00:30:04,680 At night, incognito and drinking heavily, 417 00:30:04,680 --> 00:30:07,840 he would patrol the town with a group of friends wearing 418 00:30:07,840 --> 00:30:09,360 a huge broadsword. 419 00:30:10,840 --> 00:30:13,840 He would burst into cafes and private houses 420 00:30:13,840 --> 00:30:16,560 and shops and any rules that were broken, 421 00:30:16,560 --> 00:30:18,840 he would draw his sword and personally chop 422 00:30:18,840 --> 00:30:23,800 the heads off anyone who crossed him. He was becoming a monster. 423 00:30:25,400 --> 00:30:30,400 While Murad killed, Kosem would patrol the same streets tending 424 00:30:30,400 --> 00:30:33,440 to the orphaned and the dispossessed. 425 00:30:33,440 --> 00:30:36,160 The terror only ended in 1640 426 00:30:36,160 --> 00:30:39,640 when Murad IV died at the age of 29, 427 00:30:39,640 --> 00:30:42,840 the last of the conquering sultans. 428 00:30:44,640 --> 00:30:50,600 Kosem would rule in place of her last son, Ibrahim, who was insane. 429 00:30:50,600 --> 00:30:52,360 But, mercifully for the city, 430 00:30:52,360 --> 00:30:57,320 he was confined to an existence within the palace walls. 431 00:30:57,320 --> 00:31:01,360 Ibrahim the Mad built this little pavilion to take his breakfast, 432 00:31:01,360 --> 00:31:05,640 but actually his mind was very rarely on food. 433 00:31:05,640 --> 00:31:07,840 He was a demented, fetishistic, 434 00:31:07,840 --> 00:31:13,840 erotomaniac priapist, who was obsessed with three fetishes, 435 00:31:13,840 --> 00:31:21,080 amber scent, furs and gigantic women. He scoured the entire empire 436 00:31:21,080 --> 00:31:24,280 for larger and larger women. Such a woman was found, 437 00:31:24,280 --> 00:31:28,680 and this Armenian courtesan was brought to Istanbul 438 00:31:28,680 --> 00:31:33,760 where he named her Sugar Cube and made her his absolute favourite. 439 00:31:33,760 --> 00:31:37,200 But he was becoming more and more demented. 440 00:31:37,200 --> 00:31:40,440 He would find women walking here in the gardens at Topkapi 441 00:31:40,440 --> 00:31:43,560 and ravish them in front of all his courtiers. 442 00:31:43,560 --> 00:31:46,960 Soon, this was too much even for the eunuchs of the harem 443 00:31:46,960 --> 00:31:51,120 and his courtiers and they, along with the mufti, the religious leader 444 00:31:51,120 --> 00:31:56,080 of Istanbul, decided that Ibrahim the Mad had to go. 445 00:31:56,080 --> 00:31:58,360 His mother agreed. 446 00:31:58,360 --> 00:32:01,480 While Ibrahim was being led away for strangulation, 447 00:32:01,480 --> 00:32:05,760 Kosem was already presenting her seven-year-old grandson to 448 00:32:05,760 --> 00:32:10,640 the viziers. Here he is, she said. See what you can do with him. 449 00:32:10,640 --> 00:32:15,480 Kosem was the real ruler, giving orders to ministers from behind the 450 00:32:15,480 --> 00:32:17,840 gilded grille in the Divan. 451 00:32:28,840 --> 00:32:31,920 Like the sultans before her, Kosem also built 452 00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:34,360 charitable works on a grand scale. 453 00:32:35,880 --> 00:32:38,000 Right in the heart of the city, 454 00:32:38,000 --> 00:32:42,040 there's a huge galleried courtyard, complete with its own mosque. 455 00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:45,920 One of the delights about researching 456 00:32:45,920 --> 00:32:48,240 the history of a place like Istanbul 457 00:32:48,240 --> 00:32:50,760 is finding this sort of neglected jewel. 458 00:32:51,960 --> 00:32:54,840 This was once a caravanserai to receive goods 459 00:32:54,840 --> 00:32:59,000 and camel trains from the east, from the silk route, from Persia, 460 00:32:59,000 --> 00:33:03,240 and you can imagine it in the 17th century thriving, bustling with 461 00:33:03,240 --> 00:33:08,760 camels and horses. There were hotels here and stables and workshops, 462 00:33:08,760 --> 00:33:12,960 markets. This huge place is all the work of one woman - 463 00:33:12,960 --> 00:33:16,760 the Queen Mother, the Valide Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. 464 00:33:20,400 --> 00:33:25,800 But inevitably, Kosem's turn came too in yet another palace coup. 465 00:33:26,960 --> 00:33:30,480 Kosem was the Mrs Thatcher of the Ottoman Empire, which she 466 00:33:30,480 --> 00:33:34,720 dominated for 50 years, but when the intrigues of the harem 467 00:33:34,720 --> 00:33:38,200 turned against her, they found her hiding in a cupboard. 468 00:33:38,200 --> 00:33:42,400 She fought so hard that the blood poured out of her ears and eyes. 469 00:33:42,400 --> 00:33:45,200 And it was said she was strangled with her own hair. 470 00:33:48,360 --> 00:33:51,720 Over the next two centuries, the fortunes of the city began to 471 00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:56,640 stagnate just as the empire outside fell into torpor. 472 00:33:58,520 --> 00:34:01,680 But a recent discovery beneath this building 473 00:34:01,680 --> 00:34:05,400 challenges our presumption that the Ottomans were obsolete. 474 00:34:05,400 --> 00:34:08,400 I've come to see an extraordinary structure underneath 475 00:34:08,400 --> 00:34:11,840 the 18th-century Nuruosmaniye Mosque. 476 00:34:14,520 --> 00:34:19,360 These pools are part of an elaborate system to limit the damage 477 00:34:19,360 --> 00:34:24,280 from earthquakes, because the mosque above was built on soft ground. 478 00:34:24,280 --> 00:34:30,280 In the rainy season, the pools would overflow and the floodwater would 479 00:34:30,280 --> 00:34:34,120 disappear down a steep channel into the Bosphorus. 480 00:34:34,120 --> 00:34:38,400 That way, these fantastic vaulted foundations 481 00:34:38,400 --> 00:34:41,840 were kept dry, so that when earthquakes struck, 482 00:34:41,840 --> 00:34:45,200 as they frequently do here, the mosque would stay up. 483 00:34:46,800 --> 00:34:48,560 So even in the 18th century, 484 00:34:48,560 --> 00:34:51,000 the middle of the 18th century, in the time 485 00:34:51,000 --> 00:34:55,320 when the Ottoman Empire was actually in eclipse and its power was 486 00:34:55,320 --> 00:34:59,040 in serious decline, it's interesting that they were still capable 487 00:34:59,040 --> 00:35:05,320 of this very, very sophisticated and multipurpose piece of engineering. 488 00:35:08,000 --> 00:35:11,200 But away from the capital, the foundations of this great 489 00:35:11,200 --> 00:35:16,480 empire were now beginning to fracture. The problem was 490 00:35:16,480 --> 00:35:19,640 with the Sultan's Christian subjects. 491 00:35:19,640 --> 00:35:22,720 This is the Phanar District of Old Istanbul, 492 00:35:22,720 --> 00:35:24,760 the Greek Orthodox neighbourhood. 493 00:35:31,880 --> 00:35:34,600 And it's a vanished world now. You can see 494 00:35:34,600 --> 00:35:39,840 the mansions ruined of old Phanariot Greek merchant families. 495 00:35:39,840 --> 00:35:42,680 They were the fixers, the middlemen, they were wealthy 496 00:35:42,680 --> 00:35:46,720 and their princes were potentates of Ottoman society, 497 00:35:46,720 --> 00:35:48,720 descended from Byzantine emperors. But in 1821, something 498 00:35:48,960 --> 00:35:51,440 descended from Byzantine emperors. But in 1821, something 499 00:35:51,440 --> 00:35:57,840 happened that broke for ever 400 years of tolerance and co-existence. 500 00:35:57,840 --> 00:36:01,720 The Greeks of mainland Greece rebelled against the Sultan. 501 00:36:06,960 --> 00:36:12,720 The consequences for the Greek population of Istanbul were dire. 502 00:36:12,720 --> 00:36:16,920 Their patriarch, Gregory V, the head of the Orthodox Church, 503 00:36:16,920 --> 00:36:19,440 somehow became implicated in the rebellion. 504 00:36:20,880 --> 00:36:23,960 The Sultan decided to make an example of him. 505 00:36:26,600 --> 00:36:30,840 On Easter Sunday 1821, the holiest day of the Greek Orthodox calendar, 506 00:36:30,840 --> 00:36:34,600 the Sultanic guards burst into this church. 507 00:36:34,600 --> 00:36:37,960 They rushed down the centre, grabbed the patriarch in front of his 508 00:36:37,960 --> 00:36:42,600 packed congregation, dragged him out and hanged him from a gibbet right 509 00:36:42,600 --> 00:36:46,640 on the gate of his own church. It took him hours to die. 510 00:36:49,120 --> 00:36:52,720 Elsewhere in the city, three archbishops were hanged 511 00:36:52,720 --> 00:36:55,120 and any Greeks found on the streets were 512 00:36:55,120 --> 00:36:56,560 killed on the spot. Peace was soon restored in the capital, but the 513 00:36:56,840 --> 00:36:59,920 killed on the spot. Peace was soon restored in the capital, but the 514 00:36:59,920 --> 00:37:04,960 centuries-old tradition of tolerance in the city had been broken. 515 00:37:09,400 --> 00:37:12,880 The Sultan who'd given the order was this man. 516 00:37:12,880 --> 00:37:14,000 Mahmud II. 517 00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:19,600 He believed that if he was to maintain power abroad, 518 00:37:19,600 --> 00:37:23,400 he would first have to assert himself in his capital. 519 00:37:23,400 --> 00:37:27,920 And that meant getting rid of his bodyguard, the Janissaries. 520 00:37:27,920 --> 00:37:31,480 They were out of control and becoming a plague on Istanbul. 521 00:37:36,120 --> 00:37:39,680 The Janissaries had once been the Sultan's crack troops, 522 00:37:39,680 --> 00:37:45,120 but now they were incompetent, corrupt and technically obsolete. 523 00:37:45,120 --> 00:37:48,440 They were much more interested in trading in their little shops 524 00:37:48,440 --> 00:37:51,080 and making and unmaking sultans. 525 00:37:51,080 --> 00:37:54,920 And intriguingly, in a city of wooden buildings, 526 00:37:54,920 --> 00:37:56,960 they were the fire brigade. 527 00:37:58,240 --> 00:38:02,240 When fire broke out, as it frequently did in Istanbul, 528 00:38:02,240 --> 00:38:05,040 the Janissaries would pull down the houses 529 00:38:05,040 --> 00:38:10,520 in the path of the fire to stop it spreading. But more often than not, 530 00:38:10,520 --> 00:38:16,680 the contents would be looted by them and the owners left destitute. 531 00:38:16,680 --> 00:38:19,480 The Janissaries were hated by everyone. 532 00:38:19,480 --> 00:38:22,760 They were a law unto themselves. 533 00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:25,600 Mahmud too had good reason 534 00:38:25,600 --> 00:38:29,280 to hate his own troops. The Janissaries had deposed 535 00:38:29,280 --> 00:38:34,280 and murdered his own cousin Selim III in 1808 and he'd 536 00:38:34,280 --> 00:38:38,800 only escaped by running across the rooftops of the Topkapi Palace. 537 00:38:40,640 --> 00:38:42,560 Now as Sultan, 538 00:38:42,560 --> 00:38:45,680 Mahmud was determined to destroy the Janissaries 539 00:38:45,680 --> 00:38:50,520 and to do that, he would deploy one of the holiest relics in all Islam. 540 00:38:54,440 --> 00:38:58,560 On the 11th June 1826, the Sultan began to drill 541 00:38:58,560 --> 00:39:01,760 some of his soldiers in European fashion... 542 00:39:04,480 --> 00:39:07,000 ..wearing modern uniforms, 543 00:39:07,000 --> 00:39:10,080 knowing the Janissaries would resent this 544 00:39:10,080 --> 00:39:13,000 new challenge to their age-old power. 545 00:39:13,000 --> 00:39:16,600 The Janissaries took the bait, they rebelled 546 00:39:16,600 --> 00:39:19,240 and ran amok in the streets, hoping 547 00:39:19,240 --> 00:39:22,440 to bully the Sultan as they always had before. But this time, 548 00:39:22,440 --> 00:39:23,920 the Sultan was ready. 549 00:39:25,120 --> 00:39:27,720 He fetched the Holy Banner of the Prophet 550 00:39:27,720 --> 00:39:32,600 from its box in the Topkapi Treasury and gave it to his Grand Vizier 551 00:39:32,600 --> 00:39:37,440 to take to the Blue Mosque, saying either the Janissaries will 552 00:39:37,440 --> 00:39:42,640 all be murdered or cats will walk over the ruins of Constantinople. 553 00:39:44,840 --> 00:39:47,160 The Holy Banner of the Prophet Mohammed 554 00:39:47,160 --> 00:39:49,000 was unfurled from this pulpit 555 00:39:49,000 --> 00:39:52,880 and the message went out to all true Muslims in the city, 556 00:39:52,880 --> 00:39:55,360 come here and support your Caliph. 557 00:39:56,720 --> 00:39:59,280 But would the people come? 558 00:39:59,280 --> 00:40:02,840 And would the Sultan's other soldiers stay loyal? 559 00:40:02,840 --> 00:40:04,440 But come they did. 560 00:40:09,640 --> 00:40:12,840 Thousands of people converged on this mosque, bearing swords 561 00:40:12,840 --> 00:40:18,200 and pitchforks and guns, to support their Sultan against the hated 562 00:40:18,200 --> 00:40:22,280 Janissaries. This became military headquarters for this holy 563 00:40:22,280 --> 00:40:27,480 enterprise and at last, the Blue Mosque covered itself in holy glory. 564 00:40:30,320 --> 00:40:34,000 Outnumbered by the people of the city, the Janissaries retreated 565 00:40:34,000 --> 00:40:36,360 to their barracks. 566 00:40:36,360 --> 00:40:38,840 It was a fatal mistake, 567 00:40:38,840 --> 00:40:41,720 because the Grand Vizier had the loyalty 568 00:40:41,720 --> 00:40:45,480 of the Sultan's artillery regiment. 569 00:40:45,480 --> 00:40:49,440 He brought up cannon and started to bombard the place. 570 00:40:50,840 --> 00:40:54,640 It caught fire and, in a sort of sweet infernal irony, 571 00:40:54,640 --> 00:40:58,000 the Janissaries, the firefighters of Istanbul, 572 00:40:58,000 --> 00:41:00,640 were consumed in their thousands 573 00:41:00,640 --> 00:41:03,800 in this vast and terrible conflagration. 574 00:41:09,720 --> 00:41:11,640 The Janissaries who escaped were butchered by the people of Istanbul. 575 00:41:11,880 --> 00:41:14,600 The Janissaries who escaped were butchered by the people of Istanbul. 576 00:41:14,600 --> 00:41:18,080 When they hid in the bathhouses of the city, they were dragged out 577 00:41:18,080 --> 00:41:21,480 for a month afterwards and torn to pieces, 578 00:41:21,480 --> 00:41:23,960 their bodies left for the dogs. 579 00:41:29,160 --> 00:41:34,320 There ended, after hundreds of years, the power of the Janissaries. 580 00:41:38,120 --> 00:41:42,400 The massacre was styled the Auspicious Event. 581 00:41:42,400 --> 00:41:44,840 Now, the sultans could turn their backs 582 00:41:44,840 --> 00:41:47,840 on the past and start to modernise. 583 00:41:47,840 --> 00:41:50,160 And it was clear what their model would be. 584 00:41:57,720 --> 00:41:59,840 Their inspiration 585 00:41:59,840 --> 00:42:02,520 would be the imperial dynasties of the West. 586 00:42:03,760 --> 00:42:06,080 France, Austria, Britain. 587 00:42:07,400 --> 00:42:10,920 And here it is, the new face of Empire. 588 00:42:13,600 --> 00:42:17,080 This is the brand-new Dolmebache Palace, 589 00:42:17,080 --> 00:42:19,840 built in the mid-19th century. 590 00:42:19,840 --> 00:42:24,400 It's grand, it's gaudy, it's kitsch and it's bling. 591 00:42:24,400 --> 00:42:27,520 It's built to impress and it's really declaring 592 00:42:27,520 --> 00:42:31,080 that the Ottoman sultans are modern 593 00:42:31,080 --> 00:42:37,240 European monarchs in the grand age of Victorian empires. 594 00:42:38,920 --> 00:42:41,480 Everything in here is the very best 595 00:42:41,480 --> 00:42:44,600 that Europe can offer. The chandeliers are 596 00:42:44,600 --> 00:42:48,640 from Britain, the gilded furniture is French. 597 00:42:48,640 --> 00:42:51,000 The ceramics are Italian. 598 00:42:51,000 --> 00:42:54,360 The Sultan who built this is really saying, 599 00:42:54,360 --> 00:43:00,720 "I am still the master of a thriving international empire." 600 00:43:00,720 --> 00:43:05,120 That's what it looks like, but in fact, the reality is very different. 601 00:43:06,640 --> 00:43:10,200 The bear skins on the floor are from Russia, 602 00:43:10,200 --> 00:43:13,880 and they tell us the other side of the story. 603 00:43:13,880 --> 00:43:17,200 This is the Sultan's reception room, and this is where, in his 604 00:43:17,200 --> 00:43:21,520 customary magnificence, he received the ambassadors of the great powers. 605 00:43:21,520 --> 00:43:24,000 But only two of these ambassadors really mattered - 606 00:43:24,000 --> 00:43:26,240 the Russians and the British. 607 00:43:26,240 --> 00:43:29,200 And it was they who were encouraging him to reform his army 608 00:43:29,200 --> 00:43:33,160 and to give his minorities the sort of rights they received in the West. 609 00:43:33,160 --> 00:43:36,440 But actually, something very different was going on here, 610 00:43:36,440 --> 00:43:39,160 both the Russians and the British took turns to bully 611 00:43:39,160 --> 00:43:42,400 the Sultan into doing what they wanted him to do. 612 00:43:42,400 --> 00:43:45,240 Tsar Nickolas I called the Ottoman Empire 613 00:43:45,240 --> 00:43:47,160 "The sick man of Europe". 614 00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:52,040 And actually, both powers were really only interested in carving up 615 00:43:52,040 --> 00:43:54,640 the empire when it finally died. 616 00:43:57,960 --> 00:44:00,800 But it was the Russians who had the greatest 617 00:44:00,800 --> 00:44:02,600 and most ancient ambitions. 618 00:44:06,560 --> 00:44:08,880 Russia had wanted the city 619 00:44:08,880 --> 00:44:12,240 ever since 1780, when Catherine the Great had 620 00:44:12,240 --> 00:44:17,120 initiated her Greek Project, the partition of the Ottoman Empire 621 00:44:17,120 --> 00:44:21,520 with the intention of creating a new Christian Byzantium. 622 00:44:21,520 --> 00:44:26,880 She called Istanbul "Tsargrad", City of the Caesars, 623 00:44:26,880 --> 00:44:31,520 and she even named her grandson Constantine, designated future 624 00:44:31,520 --> 00:44:35,720 emperor of a new Byzantine Empire. 625 00:44:35,720 --> 00:44:37,760 Looking out here, you can really 626 00:44:37,760 --> 00:44:43,080 see why this little bit of water mattered so much to the Russians. 627 00:44:43,080 --> 00:44:47,480 Look at these cargo ships queuing up to get through the straits 628 00:44:47,480 --> 00:44:50,920 to export their grain from Odessa, on the north 629 00:44:50,920 --> 00:44:53,600 coast of the Black Sea, to the Mediterranean. 630 00:44:53,600 --> 00:44:57,680 And that's why the Russian Tsars wanted to conquer Istanbul. 631 00:45:00,640 --> 00:45:03,240 In April 1877, Russia declared war 632 00:45:03,240 --> 00:45:05,960 and invaded the empire's Balkan provinces. 633 00:45:07,600 --> 00:45:11,600 Seven months later, they'd fought their way to the very 634 00:45:11,600 --> 00:45:13,520 gates of Istanbul. 635 00:45:16,080 --> 00:45:21,240 But on the 13th February 1878, six battleships anchored 636 00:45:21,240 --> 00:45:25,080 right off the coast here to take on the Russians. 637 00:45:26,720 --> 00:45:29,200 And this big gun tells the story of what happened next. 638 00:45:29,480 --> 00:45:30,200 And this big gun tells the story of what happened next. 639 00:45:32,280 --> 00:45:35,080 Those battleships were British battleships, 640 00:45:35,080 --> 00:45:37,440 and they were there with one purpose - 641 00:45:37,440 --> 00:45:41,840 to stop the advancing victorious Russians and to save Istanbul. 642 00:45:41,840 --> 00:45:45,160 And they succeeded. The Russians stopped in their tracks. 643 00:45:49,240 --> 00:45:51,480 Look at this nameplate here. 644 00:45:51,480 --> 00:45:56,920 It says "Vickers-Armstrong, Newcastle, 1869." 645 00:45:56,920 --> 00:46:01,080 This was a gun given by the British to the Ottomans to help 646 00:46:01,080 --> 00:46:02,680 defend Istanbul. 647 00:46:04,280 --> 00:46:07,280 The guiding principle of British foreign policy throughout 648 00:46:07,280 --> 00:46:12,040 the 19th Century was to keep the Russians out of Istanbul 649 00:46:12,040 --> 00:46:16,080 and to maintain the Ottoman Empire until they decided otherwise. 650 00:46:18,440 --> 00:46:20,520 While the Russians and the British schemed, 651 00:46:20,520 --> 00:46:25,800 the new Sultan was enlisting help from other quarters. 652 00:46:25,800 --> 00:46:30,280 Help that would ultimately prove disastrous for the city. 653 00:46:30,280 --> 00:46:33,160 This is the Yildiz Palace. It's not really 654 00:46:33,160 --> 00:46:35,120 a palace at all, it's actually a complex of different pavilions. 655 00:46:35,360 --> 00:46:36,960 a palace at all, it's actually a complex of different pavilions. 656 00:46:36,960 --> 00:46:40,400 And it's as weird, as eccentric, as eclectic 657 00:46:40,400 --> 00:46:43,960 and as sinister as the Sultan who built it, 658 00:46:43,960 --> 00:46:46,040 Abdul Hamid II. 659 00:46:46,040 --> 00:46:50,040 For 30 years, he ruled the Ottoman Empire from here. 660 00:46:51,800 --> 00:46:56,480 As I'm sitting on the steps of his favourite house in his secret park, 661 00:46:56,480 --> 00:47:00,280 I've just been looking at the face of Sultan Abdul Hamid II. 662 00:47:00,280 --> 00:47:04,320 He has to be one of the strangest leaders of modern times. 663 00:47:04,320 --> 00:47:08,120 A bizarre mixture of the archaic and the modern. 664 00:47:08,120 --> 00:47:13,520 Over there, he had his harem with 900 girls in it, his odalisques. 665 00:47:13,520 --> 00:47:17,560 In this house, he would go to the top floor and watch 666 00:47:17,560 --> 00:47:24,040 the Bosphorus through a telescope to monitor the comings and goings, 667 00:47:24,040 --> 00:47:26,120 and he was absolutely paranoid. 668 00:47:26,120 --> 00:47:29,680 He looked every day under his bed to see if there was an assassin. 669 00:47:29,680 --> 00:47:33,640 He was happiest sitting here in his park, on his island, 670 00:47:33,640 --> 00:47:35,280 watching his private zoo. 671 00:47:37,080 --> 00:47:41,360 And yet, despite all these eccentricities, he was a ruthless 672 00:47:41,360 --> 00:47:46,960 politician with a singular idea of how to save the Ottoman Empire. 673 00:47:46,960 --> 00:47:50,160 As it lost more and more Balkan provinces, 674 00:47:50,160 --> 00:47:53,720 Abdul Hamid promoted himself as an Islamicist leader, 675 00:47:53,720 --> 00:47:58,240 as the Caliph of international Islam, by which he hoped to 676 00:47:58,240 --> 00:48:01,600 provide the glue to keep the empire together. 677 00:48:03,720 --> 00:48:08,320 He also was a fanatical moderniser. He built railways, 678 00:48:08,320 --> 00:48:11,640 and telegraphs and a modern army, 679 00:48:11,640 --> 00:48:13,240 and to do this, he had one backer and partner. 680 00:48:13,440 --> 00:48:15,480 and to do this, he had one backer and partner. 681 00:48:15,480 --> 00:48:19,160 Kaiser Wilhelm II, of Germany, who visited him 682 00:48:19,160 --> 00:48:25,520 here at Yildiz twice and, as you can see, he built German buildings. 683 00:48:25,520 --> 00:48:28,480 The Kaiser would have felt right at home here. 684 00:48:30,680 --> 00:48:33,840 But Abdul Hamid, ageing and isolated, 685 00:48:33,840 --> 00:48:39,160 was overthrown in 1909 by the Young Turks, idealistic army officers 686 00:48:39,160 --> 00:48:42,600 who set up a parliamentary government. 687 00:48:42,600 --> 00:48:47,360 But in 1913, power was seized by one of them, 688 00:48:47,360 --> 00:48:49,600 Enver Pasha, a reckless 689 00:48:49,600 --> 00:48:54,080 and flamboyant young general, who believed only harsh nationalism 690 00:48:54,080 --> 00:48:57,040 and victorious war could save the empire. 691 00:48:59,360 --> 00:49:02,680 On the 9th November 1914, backed by Germany, 692 00:49:02,680 --> 00:49:07,320 Enver declared war against Britain, France and Russia. 693 00:49:08,720 --> 00:49:13,120 His murderous repression and deportation of minorities 694 00:49:13,120 --> 00:49:16,640 destroyed the old cosmopolitanism of the capital, 695 00:49:16,640 --> 00:49:19,240 and his defeats brought catastrophe. 696 00:49:21,120 --> 00:49:24,040 Sean McMeekin studies the pivotal role 697 00:49:24,040 --> 00:49:27,520 played by Istanbul in the First World War. 698 00:49:27,520 --> 00:49:29,840 Well, it put it right at the heart of the conflict. 699 00:49:29,840 --> 00:49:33,680 It was the great prize, if not the greatest prize to be won in the war. 700 00:49:33,680 --> 00:49:36,680 In a certain sense, it gave the war a purpose, it gave it a point. 701 00:49:36,680 --> 00:49:37,880 Not least for Russia, 702 00:49:37,880 --> 00:49:40,800 the Tsar with his sovereign claim here on the city. 703 00:49:40,800 --> 00:49:43,000 Suddenly, the war had a point for the Russians, 704 00:49:43,000 --> 00:49:45,640 and it had an objective now for Russia's allies, 705 00:49:45,640 --> 00:49:47,560 Britain and France, wanting to open up the 706 00:49:47,560 --> 00:49:51,120 city so that they could help supply Russia by way of the Black Sea. 707 00:49:51,120 --> 00:49:54,640 So, the city really became the great prize that was fought over, 708 00:49:54,640 --> 00:49:57,720 with this claim actually negotiated between the powers 709 00:49:57,720 --> 00:49:59,680 during the Gallipoli campaign. 710 00:49:59,680 --> 00:50:04,360 In fact, the city was literally to be divided in three between these 711 00:50:04,360 --> 00:50:07,280 allies, with the Russians getting most of the ancient 712 00:50:07,280 --> 00:50:09,320 city of Byzantium. 713 00:50:09,320 --> 00:50:12,800 How did Enver and the Ottomans do in World War One in fact? 714 00:50:12,800 --> 00:50:14,600 Well, not that badly. 715 00:50:14,600 --> 00:50:17,680 In some ways, the Ottomans actually surprised Europe 716 00:50:17,680 --> 00:50:21,320 with their performance in the war. In the end though, it wasn't enough. 717 00:50:21,320 --> 00:50:24,360 It's a largely forgotten episode in the West that the powers 718 00:50:24,360 --> 00:50:28,600 occupied the capital of the Ottoman Empire for four years from 1918 719 00:50:28,600 --> 00:50:31,320 to 1922, although it's not forgotten here. 720 00:50:35,440 --> 00:50:37,960 In 1918, Britain and France, 721 00:50:37,960 --> 00:50:41,720 the victorious allies, occupied Istanbul. 722 00:50:41,720 --> 00:50:45,440 The great capital that had resisted all comers for 400 years 723 00:50:45,440 --> 00:50:48,000 had finally fallen, 724 00:50:48,000 --> 00:50:51,360 and a resentful population awaited its fate. 725 00:50:55,440 --> 00:50:59,560 While plans for partition were being drawn up, it was here, at the 726 00:50:59,560 --> 00:51:05,200 Pera Palace Hotel, that the British officers and diplomats stayed. 727 00:51:05,200 --> 00:51:08,840 They flirted in the bar with gorgeous Russian countesses 728 00:51:08,840 --> 00:51:12,800 turned courtesans, refugees from the Bolshevik revolution. 729 00:51:14,440 --> 00:51:17,520 Russia was now out of the running, 730 00:51:17,520 --> 00:51:21,320 and it was the British Prime Minister who had the big idea. 731 00:51:22,920 --> 00:51:25,400 But it was an idea from an old world. 732 00:51:28,160 --> 00:51:31,120 In the excitement of victory, the British Prime Minister 733 00:51:31,120 --> 00:51:35,800 Lloyd George was dazzled by dreams of classical empires. 734 00:51:35,800 --> 00:51:38,920 He encouraged the Greeks to go to war, 735 00:51:38,920 --> 00:51:45,200 to restore the Byzantine Empire, and recreate a Christian Constantinople. 736 00:51:45,200 --> 00:51:49,360 The Greeks began to dream of Orthodox services at the great 737 00:51:49,360 --> 00:51:50,800 church of St Sophia. 738 00:51:53,160 --> 00:51:59,720 But one man would change all that. In November 1918, 739 00:51:59,720 --> 00:52:05,000 an elegant and much-decorated Turkish General arrived here 740 00:52:05,000 --> 00:52:10,160 in the Pera Palace Hotel and booked into a suite on the second floor. 741 00:52:10,160 --> 00:52:13,320 One night, some British officers invited him 742 00:52:13,320 --> 00:52:15,720 for a drink at their table. 743 00:52:15,720 --> 00:52:19,440 He famously replied, "We are the hosts here, 744 00:52:19,440 --> 00:52:24,440 "you are the guests, you take drinks at my table." 745 00:52:24,440 --> 00:52:28,600 The occupation was unacceptable to most Turks, 746 00:52:28,600 --> 00:52:31,400 and his voice was the voice of history. 747 00:52:31,400 --> 00:52:34,560 His name was Mustafa Kemal Pasha, 748 00:52:34,560 --> 00:52:37,920 but he's known to posterity as Ataturk. 749 00:52:43,160 --> 00:52:45,640 This is where Ataturk stayed. He was altogether 750 00:52:45,640 --> 00:52:47,680 an exceptional character. 751 00:52:47,680 --> 00:52:50,400 He was one of the few Ottoman generals who'd actually 752 00:52:50,400 --> 00:52:52,160 defeated the British. 753 00:52:52,160 --> 00:52:57,640 He'd expelled the Anglo-French expedition at Gallipoli in 1915. 754 00:52:57,640 --> 00:53:00,320 He had the looks of a matinee idol, 755 00:53:00,320 --> 00:53:03,840 he was a man of veracious sensual appetites. 756 00:53:03,840 --> 00:53:08,120 He loved drinking, he loved womanising, but above all, 757 00:53:08,120 --> 00:53:13,920 he had a vision for himself as leader and for Turkey as a nation. 758 00:53:16,040 --> 00:53:21,720 When the Greek armies invaded Turkey at Lloyd George's instigation, 759 00:53:21,720 --> 00:53:27,920 Ataturk left Istanbul to lead the resistance from mainland Anatolia. 760 00:53:27,920 --> 00:53:31,920 He planned to mobilise what was left of the Ottoman army. 761 00:53:31,920 --> 00:53:36,120 The next time he'd return to Istanbul, it would be as conqueror. 762 00:53:38,440 --> 00:53:43,080 Ataturk made his base in Ankara to the east, and in a ferocious 763 00:53:43,080 --> 00:53:46,920 campaign, pushed the Greeks all the way back to the Aegean. 764 00:53:48,680 --> 00:53:53,760 The British plans collapsed and by September 1922, 765 00:53:53,760 --> 00:53:57,040 Ataturk's forces encircled the city. 766 00:53:57,040 --> 00:54:01,440 The British, now war-weary, wisely did not engage. 767 00:54:01,440 --> 00:54:06,680 In a year-long stalemate, the Turks took over the city from the inside, 768 00:54:06,680 --> 00:54:09,320 and in Britain, Lloyd George resigned. 769 00:54:10,680 --> 00:54:13,480 On 6th October 1923, 770 00:54:13,480 --> 00:54:19,320 the first infantry division of the new Turkish Army entered Istanbul. 771 00:54:25,200 --> 00:54:27,800 And the Turkish Republic was born. 772 00:54:29,600 --> 00:54:34,040 The victorious Ataturk had great plans for his country. 773 00:54:34,040 --> 00:54:38,160 He abolished the Sultanate, but the Ottomans remained as Caliphs, 774 00:54:38,160 --> 00:54:40,480 commanders of the faithful. 775 00:54:42,080 --> 00:54:43,360 But not for long. 776 00:54:44,600 --> 00:54:49,440 400 years after Selim the Grim had brought back the holy relics 777 00:54:49,440 --> 00:54:53,840 to Istanbul, the caliphate's days were numbered. 778 00:54:53,840 --> 00:54:56,760 On the 3rd March 1924, 779 00:54:56,760 --> 00:55:01,440 the Assembly in Ankara formerly abolished the caliphate. 780 00:55:01,440 --> 00:55:07,160 The next morning, at dawn, troops surrounded the Dolmabache Palace, 781 00:55:07,160 --> 00:55:11,680 and the Caliph, a small group of servants and family, gathered 782 00:55:11,680 --> 00:55:14,720 together their things and left the palace. 783 00:55:16,160 --> 00:55:21,080 In the evening, the last Caliph boarded the Orient Express 784 00:55:21,080 --> 00:55:22,640 into exile. 785 00:55:24,280 --> 00:55:28,600 It was the end of 500 years of the Ottoman Dynasty's connection 786 00:55:28,600 --> 00:55:30,520 with Istanbul. 787 00:55:40,080 --> 00:55:43,960 Ataturk suppressed the city's religious establishments. 788 00:55:43,960 --> 00:55:45,680 Some became museums. 789 00:55:45,680 --> 00:55:50,680 Many shrines, religious schools and dervish lodges were closed. 790 00:55:50,680 --> 00:55:54,760 "No civilised nation could follow in the path of sheikhs, 791 00:55:54,760 --> 00:55:58,240 "dervishes and fortune-tellers," he said. 792 00:55:58,240 --> 00:56:00,480 Religion was a private matter. 793 00:56:02,760 --> 00:56:04,160 But it wasn't just that. 794 00:56:04,160 --> 00:56:09,640 He shunned the capital itself. This is Ataturk's yacht. 795 00:56:09,640 --> 00:56:14,360 It's moored here in Istanbul, a city he turned his back on, 796 00:56:14,360 --> 00:56:17,200 despising its perfidious history. 797 00:56:18,320 --> 00:56:22,000 He said, "Perhaps the Black Sea will flood the Bosphorus, 798 00:56:22,000 --> 00:56:25,360 "the Republic will make a man of Byzantium, 799 00:56:25,360 --> 00:56:28,600 "which by becoming habituated to filth, 800 00:56:28,600 --> 00:56:33,160 "lies and immorality, has lost its immeasurable value." 801 00:56:35,000 --> 00:56:38,920 He moved the capital away from Istanbul and 802 00:56:38,920 --> 00:56:42,640 the Turkish Republic is still governed from Ankara. 803 00:56:45,320 --> 00:56:48,760 90 years on, Ataturk's secular vision remains the only 804 00:56:49,000 --> 00:56:50,120 90 years on, Ataturk's secular vision remains the only 805 00:56:50,120 --> 00:56:57,120 way for many Turks and Istanbul is now Europe's biggest megacity, of 806 00:56:57,120 --> 00:57:02,200 15 million, comfortable in its role as Turkey's modern, 807 00:57:02,200 --> 00:57:04,120 cultural, economic capital. 808 00:57:05,440 --> 00:57:11,320 But today's Turkish democracy is following a mildly Islamic path, 809 00:57:11,320 --> 00:57:15,680 accompanied by a revival of Ottoman prestige and ambition. 810 00:57:18,160 --> 00:57:20,280 There are head scarves in the streets 811 00:57:20,280 --> 00:57:24,360 and pilgrims pray at the tombs of conquering sultans. 812 00:57:24,360 --> 00:57:29,160 Cosmopolitan Istanbul now seems divided as the pendulum 813 00:57:29,160 --> 00:57:32,640 swings towards stricter Muslim piety. 814 00:57:36,640 --> 00:57:39,800 I'm ending my story in one of the most wondrous 815 00:57:39,800 --> 00:57:44,800 buildings on Earth, Hagia Sophia. 816 00:57:44,800 --> 00:57:49,240 It's still the monument, the symbol, the centre of this 817 00:57:49,240 --> 00:57:54,560 crossroads between East and West, Islam and Christianity. 818 00:57:56,640 --> 00:58:01,320 For one and a half millennia, it has presided over Caesars 819 00:58:01,320 --> 00:58:06,200 and sultans, magnificence, massacre and mayhem. 820 00:58:06,200 --> 00:58:09,840 The tides of history, power and faith. 821 00:58:16,160 --> 00:58:21,240 More than any other, this building defines the sacred 822 00:58:21,240 --> 00:58:25,800 and imperial city with the three magical names. 823 00:58:25,800 --> 00:58:31,560 For 900 years, it was a church. For 500 years, it was a mosque. 824 00:58:31,560 --> 00:58:36,800 For the past 80, it's been a neutral, secular museum. 825 00:58:36,800 --> 00:58:40,000 And now, there's a campaign for it to be a mosque again. 826 00:58:41,200 --> 00:58:45,520 As ever, reflecting the drama of its times, 827 00:58:45,520 --> 00:58:49,480 this world city remains ever-changing.