Press Release for the Hagia Sophia Cathedral and the Chora Church in Istanbul, Turkey

EOS – Association of Archaeologists in Greece
October 2020

PRESS RELEASE FOR THE HAGIA SOPHIA CATHEDRAL
AND THE CHORA CHURCH IN ISTANBUL, TURKEY

The international academic community was recently unpleasantly surprised and deeply disappointed by the violent change in the use of two of the most important Byzantine monuments. Hagia Sophia and the Chora Church (Turkish: Cariye Camii) in Istanbul were both turn into mosques.

Hagia Sophia, built in the 6th century as the cathedral of Constantinople, is the foremost example of Byzantine Christian architecture in the world. It is the largest and the most luxurious building that was ever built in Byzantium, a unique example of the ability of its architects, which no one was able to imitate ever after. This monument which holds an enormous spiritual and cultural importance for billions of people of various religious beliefs, must preserve its universal character. The concealing of its amazing wall mosaics, the covering of the floor with carpets, and the placement of furniture into the richly decorated narthex(entrance area) of the building for the accumulation of shoes, constitute a violent and inconceivable alteration of the monument.

The Chora Church was built in the 14th century and its numerous mosaics display a rare example of high art and aesthetics that developed in the capital of Byzantium during the final period of its history; in fact, this monument foretold the Renaissance which was then beginning in the West. The unsightly concealing of its decoration to function as a mosque is yet another crime against a World Cultural Heritage monument.

The inclusion of these two monuments in the World Catalog of the Cultural Heritage of UNESCO as parts of the historic areas of Istanbul in 1985 was an act of universal respect for their continuing importance and confirmed that they would become secular monuments/Museums welcoming visitors from all over the world.

A monument is threatened not only when its structure is endangered but also when the non-material culture and principles that are connected to it are endangered. Therefore, any actions that affect the physical access to the monument or the monument’s management constitute breaches of the rules derived from the World Heritage Convention and we must stand up against it.
Constantinople, renamed Istanbul since 1453, continued to be enriched with important Islamic temples (mosques) throughout the years of the Ottoman empire. These include monuments like the Suleymaniye mosque or the Sultan Ahmed mosque, the only mosque with six minarets outside Medina. Therefore, we wonder about the purpose of turning these two uniquely important Byzantine monuments into mosques, since they have functioned as officially recognized Turkish State Museums for almost a hundred years.

We deeply regret these decisions and we address the international archaeological community, regardless of their academic specialization, and ask them to oppose any alteration of these World Heritage Monuments which hold a strong symbolic, historical and universal value for numerous groups of people. These actions, removing as they do access to the monuments, do not belong to the 21st century but remind us of old practices that by now we hoped belonged to history.