Geography of Istanbul
The location of İstanbul
could be placed in a circle lying roughly at the intersection of the 41 st
parallel and the 29th meridian.A number of the world's
important cities also lie on or near the same parallel-cities such as
Peking Salonika, Naples Madrid and New York. İstanbul is the place where
the continents of Europe and Asia meet too, for it was founded at the
point where the Black Sea is linked to the Mediterranean and the islands
by the Sea of Marmara. Istanbul is where roads link East and West, where
the sea brings North and South together. This geographical feature of the
city is further stressed by the presence of the Golden Horn, which
throughout history has served as a natural harbour for ships of all kinds.
İstanbul was able
to develop as three separate cities.The first of these is the historic
part within the old city walls
which is triangular
in shape; this part of the city has a very ancient history, has seen many
different stages of development, and could rightly be described as its
nucleus. Galata, which lies on the north bank of the Golden Horn,
developed as a city in its own right, and is the nucleus of the many
districts that have grown up around it during the past hundred years
or so. Üsküdar was founded on the Asian side of the Bosphorus and, until
the arrival of the Turks, was an unimportant settlement; it resembles a
purely Turkish provincial township which has blossomed just outside of İstanbul
like a second city. During the time of the Ottoman Empire, the three parts
of the city were referred to as Bilâd-ı selâse. It has been established
that there were no settlements of any importance on either side of the
Bosphorus during the Early and Middle ages. If the few coastal villages
which lay close to the city could be regarded as exceptions, then examples
of habitation dating from the Byzantine period consist of a few isolated
monasteries lying on the coast or on the hillsides overlooking the
Bosphorus. After the advance of the OttomanTurks it is probable that they
were abandoned. Both shores of the Bosphorus experienced their main
development during theTurkish period, when villages sprang up at intervals
along both sides, and a large number of waterside residences adorned the
coastline between them. It was in the l9th century that a number of
palaces were built along the Bosphorus, and this added even further to its
importance. It is a great pity that in our day and age a blind
eye has been turned to the construction of a number of ugly
buildings that have spoiled the landscape of this waterway; many of
the waterside residences of old have been demolished and a number of
facilities such as coalyards and oil storage tanks, factories and
workshops, which are not in keeping with their surroundings, have been
built along the shores of this natural channel, which must surely be one
of the loveliest places in the world, and have done a great deal to
detract from the beauty of this “promenade”. If we add to this damage,
all done in the recent past, the shanty towns that have also sprung up
with incredible rapidity in recent years, then there is no doubt that the
shores of the Bosphorus have lost much of their loveliness. The law that
was brought out in 1985 to save the Bosphorus deserves to be criticised as
far as its terms and its enforcement are concerned.
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