Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
section was destroyed when the avenue was widened. In general
it follows the usual plan: a great domed camekân leads to a small
three-domed soğukluk, which opens into the hararet. This latter has
a rather charming arrangement, seen also at Cağaloğlu and elsewhere;
inscribed in a square chamber is a circle of columns supporting an
arcade on which rests the dome. In the corners are the little washing-
cells, each with its dome and an attractive door; the pavements have
geometric designs.
THE COLUMN OF CONSTANTINE
Just across the side street from the hamam we come to one of the
most venerable monuments in the city, the Column of Constantine.
Ths is known locally as Çemberlitaş, or the Hooped Column, hence
the name of the surrounding neighbourhood; in English it was in
times past called the Burnt Column because of the marks of a fire that
raged around it in the eighteenth century. This column marks the
centre of what was once the Forum of Constantine the Great and was
erected by him to celebrate the dedication of the city as capital of the
Roman Empire on 11 May in the year 330. Constantine's forum with
columned porticoes had the unusual shape of an oval. It has been
compared to Bernini's superb portico at St. Peter's, though models
nearer in time and place are not wanting: for example, the charming
elliptical agora at Gerasa (Jerash) in Jordan built 200 years earlier,
probably by Hadrian. Around it stood the usual public buildings: a
Senate (there was still another Senate House of the Augustaeum), a
Praetorium, and several temples and churches. And of course it was
adorned with statues both Christian and pagan. The relics of all this
grandeur are now buried some three metres beneath the present level
of the road, and all that remains visible is the column, itself, much
mutilated.
The column now consists of a very ungainly masonry base about ten
metres high surmounted by a shaft of six porphyry drums, the joints
between them hooped with iron bands; at the summit are ten courses
of masonry topped by a marble block; the total height is 34.8 metres.
Originally the column had a square pedestal standing on five steps;
on the pedestal was a porphyry plinth and column base and seven
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