Outside the Cisterna Basilica in Istanbul
I seems that this section of the great city of Istanbul is filled with important landmarks. After all, Istanbul is actually part of the UNESCO World Heritage site list, under the name Historic Areas of Istanbul. Anyone who took up world history surely would have come to know about Istanbul and it’s older name – Constantinople. But not too many would actually know about the name previous to that – Byzantium. While I heard about the Byzantine empire, I wasn’t aware of the name Byzantium. This was the original name of the place until this area was conquered by Constantine the Great. Byzantium was eventually renamed to Constaninople in honor of Emperor Constantine.
Structure Housing the Cisterna Basilica
You can probably guess that Istanbul has a lot of historical structures not unlike Greece which I think has the biggest mind share as far as tourists go but Türkiye can more than give Greece a run for its money. I have a few places to visit here in this part of Istanbul. Apparently, there is a major monument here from the time of the Romans called the Cisterna Basilica. As the name implies, it is water cistern. The basilica part refers to the size of the cisterna. I only happened to see this on Google Maps and figured that it is probably something very important. It goes beyond the Grand Bazaar and there was little shade here. I was glad that I brought my umbrella because the afternoon sun was intense. I eventually came to a glass covered structure which is supposedly the cisterna basilica. Maybe it isn’t that impressive if it is just something covered in glass.
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