The setting
The south gallery: the mosaic in its own place on the wall, ringed by vaults and windows. Whichever corner of this space you turn to, another work appears.
Hagia Sophia: An Illustrated Story
An account of Hagia Sophia, in the testimony of documents and images
Four thresholds, the book's four chapters. Tap or click one to see it in detail, or scroll down to follow them all in turn.
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Four ways to examine Hagia Sophia
05 · Into the mosaic
01 / 04
- The setting
- Mosaic panels
- Details
- Finer details
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01 · Architecture
No precedent before it, no easy equal after
The present building is the third church on this site, raised between 532 and 537 to the design of Anthemius of Tralles and Isidore of Miletus. For the first time at this scale, a dome was set not on a circular wall but on a square plan, carried by pendentives. A ring of forty windows encircles its base, some 31 metres across; the book looks past the dome to the arches and half-domes that hold it up.
02 · Art
The mosaics are famous; what surrounds them seldom gets a turn
The gold-ground mosaics are the best known face of the building. Around them stand marble panels opened and matched like the pages of a book, capitals cut deep with the drill, bronze door leaves and eight vast calligraphic roundels. Any one of them alone would be enough to make this building famous the world over.
03 · What a single glance cannot take in
The ground you walk is one slice of fifteen centuries
Hagia Sophia is a place of visit and of worship, and the route almost everyone takes is the same. The roof at the foot of the dome, the stone ramps that climb to the upper gallery, the names and marks cut into the parapets across the centuries, among them Norse runes: none of it lies on that route. The book leaves the route.
04 · Historical documents
Archives bring to light what time erased or covered over
Inscriptions, travellers' engravings and written accounts, early photographs: each is a first-hand witness of the century that saw the building. Some of the mosaics uncovered and then covered again during the Fossati restoration of 1847-1849 survive only in the drawings made at the time. The book rests every claim on such documents.
Hagia Sophia’s architecture, works of art and historical sources.
Architecture and detail
It examines the dome, galleries, doors, mosaics and inscriptions in their architectural setting.
Sources and observation
It compares historical documents with observations of the building.
The history of Istanbul
It places Hagia Sophia within Istanbul’s urban and cultural history.
Dome, marble, mosaic and inscription: evidence of different periods in one building.
Inside the book
About the book
Built on documents and images
The Turkish original, Ayasofya: Tarihin En Uzun Şiiri (Timaş Yayınları, 2020; 2nd edition 2022, 240 pages), examines Hagia Sophia through historical documents, drawings and photographs. An English edition is in preparation.
Contributors to the research and images in the book.
Acknowledgements
Get the book
Turkish edition →
Hagia Sophia: An Illustrated Story
An English edition is in preparation. In the meantime, the Turkish edition — Ayasofya: Tarihin En Uzun Şiiri — is available now.