The Brilliant Blue Mosque in Turkey

The Blue Mosque, also known as the Sultan Ahmet Mosque, just might be the most famous place in all of Istanbul, and it is definitely amongst its finest postcard images. It towers above the old city, and sits overlooking the Sea of Marmara and the Bosphorous Straight.

The man behind the mosque is Sultan Ahmet I, who had started construction on it in 1609.. Its design was created by Mehmet Aga, and it took 7 years to finish construction. It consists of a number of domes, surrounded by six minarets. There is a huge central dome, that stretches a while 33 meters, or 100 feet, and has a lot of smaller domes all around it All of the domes rest on top of 4 giant pillars which are each four and a half meters thick (fifteen feet). These foundational pillars are referred to as the "elephant's foot" pillars.

The inside of the mosque is stunning, because the insides of all the domes and arches are covered in gorgeous Arabic calligraphy. On top of that, the walls inside are covered with over twenty thousand blue Iznik tiles. Most travellers are confused about why a white mosque would be called the "Blue Mosque", but the name actually comes from those interior tiles. The interior is also enclosed by 260 stained glass windows, and when sunlight shines through the colored light upon the blue tiles is a beautiful sight. These windows, however, are replacement windows, since the originals were destroyed in an earthquake.

Sultan Ahmet's grand project was very controversial in its day. Until that point, the only mosque on Earth with 6 minarets had been one in Mecca, and by matching the grandeur of that mosque the sultan had stepped on some toes. He brilliantly solved the problem by having an extra minaret added to the mosque in Mecca, allowing it to retain its image of supremacy. This calmed religious fervor.