Ayasofya Filming Locations

The Ayasofia (Hagia Sophia) of today, accepted as one of the greatest monuments of the history of architecture, was built approximately 1500 years ago by two architects from Western Anatolia, Isidoros of Miletos (Soke) and Anthmios of Tralles (Aydin). Approximately ten thousand laborers under the supervision of a hundred master craftsmen constructed the present building, commissioned by the Emperor Justinian and completed on December 27, 537. Ayasofia was regarded with great affection and solicitude by the Byzantine emperors who succeeded Justinian. It became a mosque after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453. This sacred building in Istanbul was also held in great esteem by the Ottoman Sultans. In the 16th century, during the reign of Selim II, Sinan, Architect-in-Chief to the Sultan constructed gigantic buttresses that prevented Ayasofia from collapsing. In the garden of Ayasofia is the biggest of the Ottoman royal tombs, containing the bodies of a number of Sultans and princes.