Along the Golden Horn - Strolling Through Istanbul: The Classic Guide to the City - page 308

The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate has been on this site since about
1601, having moved around for a number of years after leaving the
Pammakaristos in 1586. The present patriarchal church of St. George,
however, dates only from 1720. Like almost all the post-Conquest
churches in the city, it is a small basilica. This form was adopted
partly because of its simplicity, but largely because the Christians
were forbidden to build churches with domes or masonry roofs, so
that the basilica with its timbered roof, a traditional Christian edifice,
was the obvious solution. The earlier church seems to have had the
same form, for an Italian traveller who saw it in 1615 describes it
as “of moderate size, long in form and with several aisles.” Among
the many relics in the church are the remains of St. Omonia, St.
Theophano and St. Euphemia of Chalcedon, whose martyrium we
have seen near the Hippodrome; their coffins are in the south aisle.
On the right side of the central aisle is the Partriarchal Throne, which
is thought to date from the late Byzantine period, although the pious
claim that it is the original throne of St. John Chrysostomos, who
was Patriarch at the beginning of the fifth century. The church also
contains a very lovely portative mosaic of the Blessed Virgin, of the
same type and date as the one at St. Nicholas.
Across the courtyard from the church are the other buildings of
the Patriarchate. With the exception of the library, a pleasing old
building, these are all modern structures erected after the disastrous
fire of 1941 which gutted most of the buildings on this side of the
courtyard. It is hard to believe that this modest establishment was
the centre of the entire Orthodox Church, or that in its great days
the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople dominated the religious
afairs of the entire Eastern Christian world. Today, although the
present Patriarch, Bartholomeos, is still the spiritual leader of
Orthodox Christianity, his actual flock in Turkey consists of only the
few thousand Greeks still resident in Istanbul and the Aegean islands
of Imbros and Tenedos.
THE FENER
After leaving the Patriarchate we continue on along Sadrazam Ali Paşa
Caddesi for a few paces to the next intersection. Just to the right at this