0:00:07 > 0:00:11These are the gardens of the Topkapi Palace of Istanbul,
0:00:11 > 0:00:17the imperial residence of the sultans of the Ottoman Empire.
0:00:17 > 0:00:20Just as Henry VIII was dazzling England,
0:00:20 > 0:00:24two boys might have been seen walking here amongst the pavilions
0:00:24 > 0:00:26and the courtyards.
0:00:28 > 0:00:31The two boys were Prince Suleiman, the son and heir
0:00:31 > 0:00:37of the reigning Sultan, and Ibrahim, his favourite companion,
0:00:37 > 0:00:39his slave, a Christian boy
0:00:39 > 0:00:42bought in the slave markets of Europe converted
0:00:42 > 0:00:46to Islam and brought here to be trained in the palace school.
0:00:49 > 0:00:52Ibrahim had been given to Suleiman,
0:00:52 > 0:00:56and they became best friends, inseparable allies. It was
0:00:56 > 0:01:01a friendship that would ultimately end in betrayal and murder.
0:01:03 > 0:01:06Ibrahim was the bumptious and confident one.
0:01:06 > 0:01:11His master more enigmatic and reticent.
0:01:11 > 0:01:15These two boys would one day rule a global empire
0:01:15 > 0:01:18from this, their imperial capital,
0:01:18 > 0:01:22but whatever the name of this city, and it had variously been Byzantium,
0:01:22 > 0:01:26Constantinople and now Istanbul,
0:01:26 > 0:01:31this place was always the essence of its power.
0:01:31 > 0:01:35Once, it had been the site of the palace of the Roman Caesars,
0:01:35 > 0:01:39and now, it was the seat of the Ottoman emperors
0:01:39 > 0:01:43and from here, they ruled the greatest empire on Earth.
0:01:48 > 0:01:49I come here as historian
0:01:49 > 0:01:54and traveller, to tell the story of how this city rose to become
0:01:54 > 0:01:59the cosmopolitan world capital of a vast empire that stretched
0:01:59 > 0:02:05from Iraq to the Balkans, and also a sacred epicentre of Islam.
0:02:05 > 0:02:11It's always been a city built and made to rule the world.
0:02:13 > 0:02:17I'm fascinated by its secrets, the world under its streets,
0:02:17 > 0:02:22the hidden councils of power, the dark recesses of the imperial
0:02:22 > 0:02:27palaces, the intrigues behind the grilles of the Harem.
0:02:27 > 0:02:31In this last film, we will travel from the fearsome
0:02:31 > 0:02:33brilliance of Sultan Selim the Grim
0:02:33 > 0:02:39and the rule of the female Sultanas, all the way up to the
0:02:39 > 0:02:43First World War and finally, the rise of a new Turkey under
0:02:43 > 0:02:50the command of a visionary secular leader, the extraordinary Ataturk.
0:03:07 > 0:03:10When the Ottoman conquerors poured through the walls of this
0:03:10 > 0:03:16city in 1453, the first thing they did was convert the ancient
0:03:16 > 0:03:21church of St Sophia into a mosque. Constantinople,
0:03:21 > 0:03:27in ancient times Byzantium, was then rebuilt and repopulated
0:03:27 > 0:03:31and they called it Istanbul.
0:03:31 > 0:03:35The Ottomans had a vision of the city as world capital,
0:03:35 > 0:03:38with all other faiths, Christians and Jews tolerated,
0:03:38 > 0:03:42providing they recognised the supremacy of Islam
0:03:42 > 0:03:44and the Ottoman Sultan.
0:03:45 > 0:03:48Strangely, the Ottomans had conquered
0:03:48 > 0:03:52south-eastern Europe before they conquered Asia. At the start
0:03:52 > 0:03:58of the 16th century, the Ottoman sultans ruled most of the Balkans.
0:03:58 > 0:04:01Alongside their own Turkish horsemen,
0:04:01 > 0:04:04their armies and their administrators, the viziers,
0:04:04 > 0:04:08were mainly made up of Christian converts, forcibly taken
0:04:08 > 0:04:14as a tax from families in today's Serbia, Greece, and Bosnia.
0:04:15 > 0:04:18It was very much a European empire.
0:04:20 > 0:04:23But all that was to change because of just one man.
0:04:28 > 0:04:32This is the tomb of Selim the Grim.
0:04:32 > 0:04:37He was probably the greatest warrior emperor of the Ottoman dynasty.
0:04:37 > 0:04:41As those boys walked in the Topkapi gardens, the Prince's
0:04:41 > 0:04:45father was conquering a new empire.
0:04:45 > 0:04:51Selim was a terrifying and ferocious warrior Sultan. He was also
0:04:51 > 0:04:55talented, highly educated, an accomplished poet, trained
0:04:55 > 0:05:00and raised in the vicious snake pit of the Ottoman court.
0:05:00 > 0:05:04Selim didn't spend much time in Istanbul, he was always at war.
0:05:04 > 0:05:06He spent most of his eight-and-a-half-year reign
0:05:06 > 0:05:11in the saddle. First he defeated the Shiite Shahs of Iran
0:05:11 > 0:05:15and then he destroyed the entire Mamluk Empire,
0:05:15 > 0:05:19conquering all of the Middle East, including the holy cities of Mecca,
0:05:19 > 0:05:22Medina and Jerusalem and henceforward,
0:05:22 > 0:05:26he proudly called himself Guardian of the Holy Places.
0:05:29 > 0:05:33But there was more. Selim was now the proud possessor
0:05:33 > 0:05:36of the most important holy relics of Islam,
0:05:36 > 0:05:40the swords of the Prophet Mohammed.
0:05:42 > 0:05:48And these cases, containing his mantle and his sacred banner.
0:05:48 > 0:05:52These were the treasures he brought back to the Topkapi Palace.
0:05:54 > 0:05:55The palace of the Ottoman emperors
0:05:55 > 0:06:00was situated on a high peninsula guarding the Bosphorus,
0:06:00 > 0:06:06the narrow straits dividing Europe from Asia. This city commanded
0:06:06 > 0:06:11the strategic crossroads between east and west, the Mediterranean
0:06:11 > 0:06:16and Black Seas, and now it was the capital of the Muslim world.
0:06:18 > 0:06:22When Selim the Grim died, it was here that his son Prince Suleiman
0:06:22 > 0:06:27came to take the reins of power. Topkapi was like no other
0:06:27 > 0:06:32palace on Earth. Its many pavilions are arranged more like the
0:06:32 > 0:06:39campaign tents of a monarch on the march. It was a place of intrigue
0:06:39 > 0:06:41and shadows, where business was conducted
0:06:41 > 0:06:45in almost complete silence.
0:06:45 > 0:06:49I was just looking at a portrait of Suleiman the Magnificent.
0:06:49 > 0:06:54Looking at the face of this exceptional man.
0:06:54 > 0:06:58He was very thin-faced. He was just 25 years old,
0:06:58 > 0:07:03haughty, majestic, enigmatic.
0:07:03 > 0:07:05Always totally mysterious.
0:07:05 > 0:07:09He was capable of running wars,
0:07:09 > 0:07:12of commanding complex architectural projects,
0:07:12 > 0:07:16of thinking about ideology of religion,
0:07:16 > 0:07:20but he also was deeply paranoid and suspicious.
0:07:20 > 0:07:24This was a man of great friendship and loyalty,
0:07:24 > 0:07:28but he was also capable of the darkest vengeance
0:07:28 > 0:07:30on family and friends.
0:07:33 > 0:07:36This is the Divan, the Cabinet chamber of the empire.
0:07:36 > 0:07:41Suleiman soon made his friend Ibrahim his Grand Vizier
0:07:41 > 0:07:43or Prime Minister.
0:07:43 > 0:07:45But while Ibrahim sat with his ministers,
0:07:45 > 0:07:50Suleiman listened to their plans unseen from behind a grille he'd had
0:07:50 > 0:07:54installed halfway up the wall.
0:07:54 > 0:07:58The sultans often executed their grand viziers
0:07:58 > 0:08:01and even Ibrahim had begged his master
0:08:01 > 0:08:03not to raise him too high.
0:08:06 > 0:08:10Suleiman didn't see himself just as a Sultan.
0:08:10 > 0:08:14He was Caesar and Khan, Lord of the Horizon,
0:08:14 > 0:08:17Emperor of the Two Seas,
0:08:17 > 0:08:21but now he had the holy cities and the holy relics,
0:08:21 > 0:08:25he added another title - that of Caliph.
0:08:25 > 0:08:29The Successor and Viceroy of Mohammed on Earth.
0:08:29 > 0:08:34Suleiman now set about building a city worthy of that title.
0:08:36 > 0:08:40Up here, on the rooftops, among all these famous minarets,
0:08:40 > 0:08:44and these great domes, I'm at the centre of one of the holiest cities
0:08:44 > 0:08:49in the world, and I'm about to hear any minute the call to prayer,
0:08:49 > 0:08:52from the muezzins in these minarets.
0:08:56 > 0:08:59- CALL TO PRAYER - It's starting over there.
0:09:05 > 0:09:08CALL TO PRAYER CONTINUES
0:09:08 > 0:09:10The sound of a holy city.
0:09:15 > 0:09:18Suleiman the Magnificent built many mosques
0:09:18 > 0:09:21here in the capital, but there's one that's bigger
0:09:21 > 0:09:26and more stately than all the rest, one that even rivals
0:09:26 > 0:09:30the church turned-mosque of Hagia Sophia.
0:09:30 > 0:09:34And it bears his name, the Suleimaniye.
0:09:34 > 0:09:39This is the masterpiece of Suleiman the Magnificent's architect, Sinan.
0:09:39 > 0:09:44Together, theirs was probably the most successful partnership
0:09:44 > 0:09:48of monarch and architect in all of history. He was the
0:09:48 > 0:09:52Christopher Wren of Istanbul and much, much more.
0:09:52 > 0:09:54They changed the skyline of the city
0:09:54 > 0:09:59more than anyone since Justinian had built Hagia Sophia.
0:10:01 > 0:10:02The foundations alone
0:10:02 > 0:10:05of this great mosque took three whole years to build.
0:10:07 > 0:10:12Inside, no expense was spared. Sinan even fitted its vast dome
0:10:12 > 0:10:17with special resonators to help improve the acoustics.
0:10:17 > 0:10:21THEY CHANT AND PRAY
0:10:21 > 0:10:27I'm with art historian Nina Ergin to explore what Suleiman had in mind.
0:10:27 > 0:10:28Suleiman had a very long reign,
0:10:28 > 0:10:3446 years, and he was a very successful military leader as well,
0:10:34 > 0:10:37and with the money from his conquests,
0:10:37 > 0:10:41he was able to build a mosque of this size.
0:10:41 > 0:10:43Suleiman the Magnificent,
0:10:43 > 0:10:46he picked for himself the Padishah of Islam, the Emperor of Islam,
0:10:46 > 0:10:50so really, the Caliph, the ruler of the entire Islamic world.
0:10:50 > 0:10:55Part of his mission was to bring the law of the Ottoman countries more in
0:10:55 > 0:11:00line with the Sharia and put more emphasis on the Orthodox practice
0:11:00 > 0:11:03of religion, and this is very much emphasised in this building.
0:11:03 > 0:11:06For example, the inscriptions that you can see
0:11:06 > 0:11:10all over the mosque, they are almost exclusively drawn
0:11:10 > 0:11:13from the Koran and they are almost exclusively verses
0:11:13 > 0:11:17that emphasise how you should pray, how often you should go to pray,
0:11:17 > 0:11:19the timing of the prayer and so on.
0:11:22 > 0:11:27But it's outside, at his mausoleum, that I discover how Suleiman really
0:11:27 > 0:11:32saw himself. He was emulating the greatest king of the Bible.
0:11:33 > 0:11:36Suleiman, the name itself actually means Solomon,
0:11:36 > 0:11:39and he styled himself as the Solomon of his age.
0:11:39 > 0:11:42So for example, he had a very special connection to
0:11:42 > 0:11:46Jerusalem, where the temple built by Solomon is also located and
0:11:46 > 0:11:49on top of that is the Dome of the Rock. Suleiman the Magnificent
0:11:49 > 0:11:53actually renovated the Dome of the Rock and following that, he
0:11:53 > 0:11:59built his own mausoleum to reflect the shape of the Dome of the Rock.
0:12:01 > 0:12:07Suleiman, law-giver and conqueror, was answerable to no man.
0:12:07 > 0:12:09And yet, within the cold haughtiness,
0:12:09 > 0:12:12there was a surprising warmth,
0:12:12 > 0:12:18and it came from the most secret part of the Imperial Palace.
0:12:18 > 0:12:22This gate led to the harem,
0:12:22 > 0:12:26and a special purpose of the harem was only indirectly concerned
0:12:26 > 0:12:30with sex. It was really all about power and the imperial
0:12:30 > 0:12:36bloodline, and forget the cliche of black-eyed B-list belly dancers,
0:12:36 > 0:12:40these rooms behind me contained the most beautiful
0:12:40 > 0:12:46women in the world. This was a breeding machine for the sultans.
0:12:46 > 0:12:51The idea was that no wife or her family would ever become powerful.
0:12:51 > 0:12:54They were just there to provide multiple heirs
0:12:54 > 0:12:57for the Ottoman Empire. That was all.
0:12:57 > 0:12:59At least, that was how it was MEANT to work.
0:13:03 > 0:13:08These girls, the concubines of the harem, were Christians,
0:13:08 > 0:13:13often captured by pirates, bought by slave traders for the markets
0:13:13 > 0:13:18of the city. Slavic blondes and redheads
0:13:18 > 0:13:20were particularly prized.
0:13:20 > 0:13:24They were converted to Islam and educated in the Sultan's harem.
0:13:26 > 0:13:30One Russian girl attracted Suleiman's special attention.
0:13:36 > 0:13:39Ottoman emperors didn't traditionally marry
0:13:39 > 0:13:43their concubines, but Suleiman obviously absolutely loved Roxelana.
0:13:43 > 0:13:48He renamed her Hurrem Sultan, the joy the delight of the Sultan.
0:13:48 > 0:13:52They had children together, they had sons and daughters
0:13:52 > 0:13:56and she became increasingly part of his life
0:13:56 > 0:13:59and of the politics of the Ottoman court.
0:13:59 > 0:14:03Their love letters, which they exchanged and also the poems
0:14:03 > 0:14:07they wrote to each other, are some of the most romantic exchanges
0:14:07 > 0:14:11in all of Turkish literature and I think in world literature.
0:14:13 > 0:14:16He called her, "The queen of my heart's realm.
0:14:16 > 0:14:19"Oh, my black-haired love
0:14:19 > 0:14:21"with bow-like eyebrows,
0:14:21 > 0:14:25"with languorous, perfidious eyes.
0:14:25 > 0:14:28"If I die, you are my killer.
0:14:28 > 0:14:30"Merciless infidel woman."
0:14:30 > 0:14:33Her letters are passionate too...
0:14:33 > 0:14:37"If the seas become ink and the trees become pens
0:14:37 > 0:14:40"when could they write of our parting?"
0:14:40 > 0:14:46- And sometimes she writes of...- "The pity and lonely separation from the
0:14:46 > 0:14:48"Lord of the Worlds."
0:14:50 > 0:14:54But behind the sweet words was a grimmer reality.
0:14:54 > 0:14:58Roxelana was not the only woman to bear the Sultan's children and
0:14:58 > 0:15:01she was up against a brutal convention
0:15:01 > 0:15:05set up by Suleiman's great-grandfather.
0:15:05 > 0:15:09The breeding machine of the harem worked far too well.
0:15:09 > 0:15:13Now, there were so many heirs and they all wanted power,
0:15:13 > 0:15:17but Suleiman's great-grandfather Sultan Mehmed II had
0:15:17 > 0:15:21instituted a ruthless solution to this problem.
0:15:22 > 0:15:25They would kill all their brothers,
0:15:25 > 0:15:26and some of their sons even,
0:15:26 > 0:15:30on their accession. And this is how they did it.
0:15:30 > 0:15:33With the bowstring. The Turks believed it was forbidden
0:15:33 > 0:15:36to shed royal blood, so they had to find a way
0:15:36 > 0:15:39to kill their brothers without shedding any.
0:15:39 > 0:15:40And this is how they did it...
0:15:40 > 0:15:42They sent deaf-mutes,
0:15:42 > 0:15:45their special bodyguards, to strangle them like this.
0:15:48 > 0:15:53Roxelana would have to fight for her own children's survival
0:15:53 > 0:15:57in a merciless contest. She would have to wield power herself.
0:15:57 > 0:15:58But how?
0:15:58 > 0:16:03The only way was to gain the Sultan's exclusive ear.
0:16:03 > 0:16:05To do that, she would have to get rid
0:16:05 > 0:16:09of his great friend and minister Ibrahim.
0:16:16 > 0:16:20This is the palace of Ibrahim Pasha, built for him
0:16:20 > 0:16:23by Suleiman the Magnificent himself. By this time,
0:16:23 > 0:16:27Ibrahim was the richest and most powerful man in the empire
0:16:27 > 0:16:28after the Sultan himself.
0:16:30 > 0:16:33When Suleiman was away at the war, Roxelana wrote him
0:16:33 > 0:16:37letters warning him of plotting and intrigue by Ibrahim.
0:16:39 > 0:16:42When Suleiman got back, he invited his old friend over to the
0:16:42 > 0:16:48Topkapi Palace to spend an evening together like they always used to.
0:16:48 > 0:16:51Ibrahim went over there for dinner. It was to be their last
0:16:51 > 0:16:56evening together. It was to be Ibrahim's last evening, full stop.
0:16:58 > 0:17:02In the morning, his strangled and bloodied body was found
0:17:02 > 0:17:04outside the palace gates.
0:17:08 > 0:17:13With Ibrahim gone, Roxelana was able to take total control.
0:17:13 > 0:17:16She married her and Suleiman's daughter to
0:17:16 > 0:17:20a Grand Vizier of her choice, Rustem, and together they plotted
0:17:20 > 0:17:23against Suleiman's eldest son, Mustafa.
0:17:27 > 0:17:30This is Rustem's Mosque, also built by Sinan.
0:17:33 > 0:17:37It's one of the most beautiful in Istanbul with the most
0:17:37 > 0:17:43stunning Iznik tile work, but behind the beauty is the story of how
0:17:43 > 0:17:48Roxelana put her own son in line for the throne.
0:17:48 > 0:17:53She played on Suleiman's suspicions of his elder son, which were perhaps
0:17:53 > 0:17:58justified. Either way, Suleiman invited his son Mustafa to his tent
0:17:58 > 0:18:04where he was strangled in front of him. Roxelana had won.
0:18:06 > 0:18:10She's buried in a glorious tomb next to her master
0:18:10 > 0:18:13at the Suleimaniye Mosque.
0:18:13 > 0:18:17It was her son Selim II who succeeded his father.
0:18:17 > 0:18:20He was fat, he was indolent and he was cheerful and he was
0:18:20 > 0:18:24so fond of wine that westerners called him Selim the Drunk.
0:18:27 > 0:18:34The Ottoman conquests hadn't been just on land. Their admirals,
0:18:34 > 0:18:38like the famous Barbarossa, had ensured that this city dominated
0:18:38 > 0:18:43the entire Mediterranean, and by Suleiman's time,
0:18:43 > 0:18:48Istanbul had entered a golden age as trading entrepot.
0:18:49 > 0:18:51There were spices and perfumes
0:18:51 > 0:18:56from Egypt, meat from Anatolia and the Balkans, butter and salt from
0:18:56 > 0:19:00the Crimea. Silks from the Far East.
0:19:00 > 0:19:03Fish from the Black Sea. Istanbul was
0:19:03 > 0:19:07an orderly and peaceful place, due as one visitor noted,
0:19:07 > 0:19:12to the salutary vigour of frequent acts of execution.
0:19:15 > 0:19:19But one minority of traders had a special reason to feel grateful.
0:19:22 > 0:19:25I've come to the old Jewish quarter of Haskoy.
0:19:27 > 0:19:31These days, there's only a few Jews left in Istanbul,
0:19:31 > 0:19:34but they once were a powerful community.
0:19:35 > 0:19:38- THEY SPEAK LADINO - Hola!
0:19:38 > 0:19:41Straightaway, you hear something.
0:19:41 > 0:19:45A language that gives you a clue about how they got here.
0:19:45 > 0:19:48THEY SPEAK LADINO
0:19:48 > 0:19:49Gracias.
0:19:49 > 0:19:53I didn't realise they were still speaking this special Jewish
0:19:53 > 0:19:57dialect of Spanish. It's amazing to find out that they still are.
0:19:57 > 0:20:00MAN SPEAKS LADINO
0:20:00 > 0:20:01Gracias.
0:20:04 > 0:20:08Wow, what a lovely synagogue,
0:20:08 > 0:20:10and I'm very happy to be here.
0:20:10 > 0:20:17This synagogue, founded in 1525, is one of the oldest in Istanbul.
0:20:17 > 0:20:22A beautiful place, as you can see, and it tells a story here.
0:20:22 > 0:20:27In 1492, the repressive and intolerant Christian rulers
0:20:27 > 0:20:31of Spain, and then followed by the whole of western Europe,
0:20:31 > 0:20:36expelled their Jews and the Ottoman emperors gave them refuge, invited
0:20:36 > 0:20:40them to settle and they did so in large numbers. They made
0:20:40 > 0:20:46themselves so at home here that they spoke a special language, Ladino, a
0:20:46 > 0:20:51mixture of Spanish and Hebrew, with a little bit of Turkish thrown in.
0:20:51 > 0:20:55And even today, the Jews who look after this Synagogue,
0:20:55 > 0:20:59speak that special Ottoman Jewish language.
0:21:02 > 0:21:05But I'm really here to tell the story of one remarkable man.
0:21:07 > 0:21:11Joseph Nasi came here with his aunt, a regal retinue
0:21:11 > 0:21:16and an international banking fortune that he leant to his new sovereign.
0:21:18 > 0:21:23Joseph Nasi became companion, advisor and best friend
0:21:23 > 0:21:28almost of the heir to the throne, Prince Selim, and when
0:21:28 > 0:21:33he succeeded as Selim II, he became his chief consularie
0:21:33 > 0:21:36almost and he prospered enormously.
0:21:36 > 0:21:40Joseph was enriched by monopolies granted to him,
0:21:40 > 0:21:44especially in wine, which he enjoyed drinking with the Sultan.
0:21:44 > 0:21:46He was so powerful,
0:21:46 > 0:21:49that Europeans who called the Sultan "The Great Turk",
0:21:49 > 0:21:52dubbed Joseph "The Great Jew".
0:21:52 > 0:21:55He built a palace overlooking the Bosphorus
0:21:55 > 0:21:57where he lived like a king,
0:21:57 > 0:22:01patronising artists and protecting his fellow Jews.
0:22:03 > 0:22:07This is really the most important part of any synagogue. It's the ark
0:22:07 > 0:22:14and it's where the scrolls of the law, the Tora are kept and
0:22:14 > 0:22:17it's always a very exciting moment and a rather lovely moment for a
0:22:17 > 0:22:20Jewish person to look at these, so I'm going to open it.
0:22:20 > 0:22:24I've got the golden key here. So let's see.
0:22:26 > 0:22:28Open the doors...
0:22:31 > 0:22:32..and...
0:22:33 > 0:22:37..draw aside the curtain and there they are.
0:22:37 > 0:22:39Very beautiful, aren't they?
0:22:42 > 0:22:46Selim made Joseph the Duke of Naxos, an island in the Aegean,
0:22:46 > 0:22:50where ironically, this Jewish prince found himself
0:22:50 > 0:22:52ruling over Christians.
0:22:52 > 0:22:54It just tells you something about this extraordinary
0:22:54 > 0:22:59time in Ottoman history and the history of Istanbul, when this
0:22:59 > 0:23:04great Jewish figure could actually be best friends and confidant with
0:23:04 > 0:23:10the Caliph of Islam and the Islamic Emperor of the greatest Muslim
0:23:10 > 0:23:12empire in the world.
0:23:15 > 0:23:18It wasn't just the Jews that prospered. The Christian
0:23:18 > 0:23:24Greeks that had been here since before the Ottoman conquest thrived.
0:23:24 > 0:23:27The Sultan appointed Greek princes to rule his Christian
0:23:27 > 0:23:30provinces in today's Romania.
0:23:32 > 0:23:34But the Armenians were the Christians
0:23:34 > 0:23:36who really blossomed in Istanbul.
0:23:36 > 0:23:40They too had their own quarter of the city.
0:23:40 > 0:23:43All of them swore loyalty to the Emperor.
0:23:43 > 0:23:45They were the Sultan's Christian subjects.
0:23:47 > 0:23:49Any threats that came to the city
0:23:49 > 0:23:52came not from them, but from the instability of
0:23:52 > 0:23:58its Ottoman rulers. As their empire got bigger, the sultans spent less
0:23:58 > 0:24:01time in the saddle and more time enjoying
0:24:01 > 0:24:03the pleasures of the palace.
0:24:04 > 0:24:09Selim II died after falling over drunk in the harem. If his vice
0:24:09 > 0:24:12was alcohol, that of his successor was lust.
0:24:13 > 0:24:17Murad III fathered 102 children,
0:24:17 > 0:24:21which required a massive culling of princes
0:24:21 > 0:24:26when his son Mehmed III succeeded him in 1597.
0:24:26 > 0:24:28The day after his accession,
0:24:28 > 0:24:31the policy of fratricide reached its brutal
0:24:31 > 0:24:34and heart-rending climax.
0:24:34 > 0:24:38This place bears witness to the tragedy
0:24:38 > 0:24:44of that day where 19 brothers were killed, some as young as five.
0:24:48 > 0:24:53Their tombs are here alongside their father's at Hagia Sophia.
0:24:56 > 0:24:59One of the little ones asked if he could
0:24:59 > 0:25:03finish his roasted chestnuts before he was strangled.
0:25:03 > 0:25:07Even the hardened courtiers of the Topkapi wept
0:25:07 > 0:25:09as they saw the procession
0:25:09 > 0:25:17of 19 tiny coffins wend its way from the palace to rest right here.
0:25:21 > 0:25:26This was fratricide gone mad, and even public opinion was outraged,
0:25:26 > 0:25:28so the brothers of future sultans
0:25:28 > 0:25:31were kept in luxurious rooms in Topkapi,
0:25:31 > 0:25:34known ironically as the cage,
0:25:34 > 0:25:38where they spent the rest of their lives in isolated splendour.
0:25:42 > 0:25:48In 1616, a new showpiece of Ottoman power arose in the city,
0:25:48 > 0:25:53a landmark that still defines the skyline of Istanbul.
0:25:55 > 0:25:59The Blue Mosque had an unprecedented six minarets,
0:25:59 > 0:26:03but its building tells us much about the state
0:26:03 > 0:26:08of the empire outside and the positions of the sultans here.
0:26:15 > 0:26:19There's something a little gaudy, perhaps a little kitsch,
0:26:19 > 0:26:24certainly very Baroque about this place. It's got these vast,
0:26:24 > 0:26:29elephant-leg columns and above, a cascade of multiple domes.
0:26:29 > 0:26:32It wasn't built like the other mosques on the trophies
0:26:32 > 0:26:34of victory over the Christians.
0:26:34 > 0:26:38This one is really a statement of vanity of the Sultan
0:26:38 > 0:26:41Ahmed I, but I like it. I like it a lot.
0:26:44 > 0:26:48Ahmed I was a pious Sultan, but he didn't live long enough
0:26:48 > 0:26:51to enjoy the delights of his foundation.
0:26:51 > 0:26:56He died aged 27, having half bankrupted the empire to build it.
0:26:58 > 0:27:00Sultan Ahmed built the Blue Mosque,
0:27:00 > 0:27:03but the most interesting thing about him is the intelligent
0:27:03 > 0:27:09and beautiful Greek woman who became the love of his life - Kosem.
0:27:09 > 0:27:13She and Ahmed are both buried over there. She became the most
0:27:13 > 0:27:18powerful woman in all of Istanbul's history. She was the wife
0:27:18 > 0:27:22and mother, the ruler and the killer of sultans.
0:27:25 > 0:27:29Ahmed's immediate successors weren't Kosem's sons,
0:27:29 > 0:27:34but she watched and waited as Ahmed's brother Mustafa went insane
0:27:34 > 0:27:37and was dethroned by the palace eunuchs.
0:27:37 > 0:27:43His son Osman suffered an even worse fate when he dared to cross
0:27:43 > 0:27:46his elite troops, the Janissaries.
0:27:48 > 0:27:51The Janissaries had been mainly Slavic boys,
0:27:51 > 0:27:55given to the Sultan as a tax on his Christian subjects.
0:27:55 > 0:27:58They were converted to Islam, and trained into the best
0:27:58 > 0:28:00troops in Europe.
0:28:00 > 0:28:06But now, they had become a bloated Praetorian Guard, hereditary
0:28:06 > 0:28:11and over-mighty with the power to dominate the sultans themselves.
0:28:13 > 0:28:18The boy Sultan Osman was imprisoned in the Castle of the Seven Towers.
0:28:18 > 0:28:21When they came to kill him, he resisted violently
0:28:21 > 0:28:26until he was stopped by Pahlavan the Oil Wrestler, who killed him
0:28:26 > 0:28:28by constriction of his testicles.
0:28:31 > 0:28:32Imagine the agony.
0:28:35 > 0:28:40Whether Kosem was directly involved or not, we don't know.
0:28:40 > 0:28:43But it was now that Kosem helped raise her own young son
0:28:43 > 0:28:45to the throne.
0:28:47 > 0:28:50Murad IV was an Ottoman cross between Julius Caesar
0:28:50 > 0:28:55and Caligula, one of the most victorious sultans, but also
0:28:55 > 0:28:59the most blood-spattered. He was an enormous giant of a man who could
0:28:59 > 0:29:02lift up two of his courtiers in each arm above his head.
0:29:02 > 0:29:06He led victorious campaigns that retook Armenia
0:29:06 > 0:29:10and Baghdad, and when he returned to Topkapi,
0:29:10 > 0:29:14he did so in a Roman-style triumph wearing a lion skin.
0:29:17 > 0:29:19He celebrated his victories
0:29:19 > 0:29:24by building the majestic Baghdad Pavilion at Topkapi Palace,
0:29:24 > 0:29:28but this victorious and meteoric showman had a dark side.
0:29:30 > 0:29:35Obsessed with re-imposing political authority and religious conformity,
0:29:35 > 0:29:40he presided over the executions of as many as 20,000 people.
0:29:40 > 0:29:44Now, he would leave the palace at night and prowl the streets.
0:29:45 > 0:29:49He was both a sadist and increasingly an alcoholic.
0:29:49 > 0:29:53When he heard some women partying down by the river, he had them
0:29:53 > 0:29:55all drowned in the water.
0:29:57 > 0:30:00When his singer at court sang a Persian song,
0:30:00 > 0:30:02he chopped off his head.
0:30:02 > 0:30:05At night, incognito and drinking heavily,
0:30:05 > 0:30:08he would patrol the town with a group of friends wearing
0:30:08 > 0:30:10a huge broadsword.
0:30:11 > 0:30:14He would burst into cafes and private houses
0:30:14 > 0:30:17and shops and any rules that were broken,
0:30:17 > 0:30:19he would draw his sword and personally chop
0:30:19 > 0:30:24the heads off anyone who crossed him. He was becoming a monster.
0:30:26 > 0:30:31While Murad killed, Kosem would patrol the same streets tending
0:30:31 > 0:30:34to the orphaned and the dispossessed.
0:30:34 > 0:30:37The terror only ended in 1640
0:30:37 > 0:30:40when Murad IV died at the age of 29,
0:30:40 > 0:30:43the last of the conquering sultans.
0:30:45 > 0:30:51Kosem would rule in place of her last son, Ibrahim, who was insane.
0:30:51 > 0:30:53But, mercifully for the city,
0:30:53 > 0:30:58he was confined to an existence within the palace walls.
0:30:58 > 0:31:02Ibrahim the Mad built this little pavilion to take his breakfast,
0:31:02 > 0:31:06but actually his mind was very rarely on food.
0:31:06 > 0:31:08He was a demented, fetishistic,
0:31:08 > 0:31:14erotomaniac priapist, who was obsessed with three fetishes,
0:31:14 > 0:31:22amber scent, furs and gigantic women. He scoured the entire empire
0:31:22 > 0:31:25for larger and larger women. Such a woman was found,
0:31:25 > 0:31:29and this Armenian courtesan was brought to Istanbul
0:31:29 > 0:31:34where he named her Sugar Cube and made her his absolute favourite.
0:31:34 > 0:31:38But he was becoming more and more demented.
0:31:38 > 0:31:41He would find women walking here in the gardens at Topkapi
0:31:41 > 0:31:44and ravish them in front of all his courtiers.
0:31:44 > 0:31:47Soon, this was too much even for the eunuchs of the harem
0:31:47 > 0:31:52and his courtiers and they, along with the mufti, the religious leader
0:31:52 > 0:31:57of Istanbul, decided that Ibrahim the Mad had to go.
0:31:57 > 0:31:59His mother agreed.
0:31:59 > 0:32:02While Ibrahim was being led away for strangulation,
0:32:02 > 0:32:06Kosem was already presenting her seven-year-old grandson to
0:32:06 > 0:32:11the viziers. Here he is, she said. See what you can do with him.
0:32:11 > 0:32:16Kosem was the real ruler, giving orders to ministers from behind the
0:32:16 > 0:32:18gilded grille in the Divan.
0:32:29 > 0:32:32Like the sultans before her, Kosem also built
0:32:32 > 0:32:35charitable works on a grand scale.
0:32:36 > 0:32:39Right in the heart of the city,
0:32:39 > 0:32:43there's a huge galleried courtyard, complete with its own mosque.
0:32:45 > 0:32:47One of the delights about researching
0:32:47 > 0:32:49the history of a place like Istanbul
0:32:49 > 0:32:51is finding this sort of neglected jewel.
0:32:53 > 0:32:55This was once a caravanserai to receive goods
0:32:55 > 0:33:00and camel trains from the east, from the silk route, from Persia,
0:33:00 > 0:33:04and you can imagine it in the 17th century thriving, bustling with
0:33:04 > 0:33:09camels and horses. There were hotels here and stables and workshops,
0:33:09 > 0:33:13markets. This huge place is all the work of one woman -
0:33:13 > 0:33:17the Queen Mother, the Valide Sultan of the Ottoman Empire.
0:33:21 > 0:33:26But inevitably, Kosem's turn came too in yet another palace coup.
0:33:27 > 0:33:31Kosem was the Mrs Thatcher of the Ottoman Empire, which she
0:33:31 > 0:33:35dominated for 50 years, but when the intrigues of the harem
0:33:35 > 0:33:39turned against her, they found her hiding in a cupboard.
0:33:39 > 0:33:43She fought so hard that the blood poured out of her ears and eyes.
0:33:43 > 0:33:46And it was said she was strangled with her own hair.
0:33:49 > 0:33:52Over the next two centuries, the fortunes of the city began to
0:33:52 > 0:33:57stagnate just as the empire outside fell into torpor.
0:33:59 > 0:34:02But a recent discovery beneath this building
0:34:02 > 0:34:06challenges our presumption that the Ottomans were obsolete.
0:34:06 > 0:34:09I've come to see an extraordinary structure underneath
0:34:09 > 0:34:12the 18th-century Nuruosmaniye Mosque.
0:34:15 > 0:34:20These pools are part of an elaborate system to limit the damage
0:34:20 > 0:34:25from earthquakes, because the mosque above was built on soft ground.
0:34:25 > 0:34:31In the rainy season, the pools would overflow and the floodwater would
0:34:31 > 0:34:35disappear down a steep channel into the Bosphorus.
0:34:35 > 0:34:39That way, these fantastic vaulted foundations
0:34:39 > 0:34:42were kept dry, so that when earthquakes struck,
0:34:42 > 0:34:46as they frequently do here, the mosque would stay up.
0:34:47 > 0:34:49So even in the 18th century,
0:34:49 > 0:34:52the middle of the 18th century, in the time
0:34:52 > 0:34:56when the Ottoman Empire was actually in eclipse and its power was
0:34:56 > 0:35:00in serious decline, it's interesting that they were still capable
0:35:00 > 0:35:06of this very, very sophisticated and multipurpose piece of engineering.
0:35:09 > 0:35:12But away from the capital, the foundations of this great
0:35:12 > 0:35:17empire were now beginning to fracture. The problem was
0:35:17 > 0:35:20with the Sultan's Christian subjects.
0:35:20 > 0:35:23This is the Phanar District of Old Istanbul,
0:35:23 > 0:35:25the Greek Orthodox neighbourhood.
0:35:32 > 0:35:35And it's a vanished world now. You can see
0:35:35 > 0:35:40the mansions ruined of old Phanariot Greek merchant families.
0:35:40 > 0:35:43They were the fixers, the middlemen, they were wealthy
0:35:43 > 0:35:47and their princes were potentates of Ottoman society,
0:35:47 > 0:35:52descended from Byzantine emperors. But in 1821, something
0:35:52 > 0:35:58happened that broke for ever 400 years of tolerance and co-existence.
0:35:58 > 0:36:02The Greeks of mainland Greece rebelled against the Sultan.
0:36:07 > 0:36:13The consequences for the Greek population of Istanbul were dire.
0:36:13 > 0:36:17Their patriarch, Gregory V, the head of the Orthodox Church,
0:36:17 > 0:36:20somehow became implicated in the rebellion.
0:36:21 > 0:36:25The Sultan decided to make an example of him.
0:36:27 > 0:36:31On Easter Sunday 1821, the holiest day of the Greek Orthodox calendar,
0:36:31 > 0:36:35the Sultanic guards burst into this church.
0:36:35 > 0:36:38They rushed down the centre, grabbed the patriarch in front of his
0:36:38 > 0:36:43packed congregation, dragged him out and hanged him from a gibbet right
0:36:43 > 0:36:47on the gate of his own church. It took him hours to die.
0:36:50 > 0:36:53Elsewhere in the city, three archbishops were hanged
0:36:53 > 0:36:56and any Greeks found on the streets were
0:36:56 > 0:37:00killed on the spot. Peace was soon restored in the capital, but the
0:37:00 > 0:37:06centuries-old tradition of tolerance in the city had been broken.
0:37:10 > 0:37:13The Sultan who'd given the order was this man.
0:37:13 > 0:37:15Mahmud II.
0:37:16 > 0:37:20He believed that if he was to maintain power abroad,
0:37:20 > 0:37:24he would first have to assert himself in his capital.
0:37:24 > 0:37:28And that meant getting rid of his bodyguard, the Janissaries.
0:37:28 > 0:37:32They were out of control and becoming a plague on Istanbul.
0:37:37 > 0:37:40The Janissaries had once been the Sultan's crack troops,
0:37:40 > 0:37:46but now they were incompetent, corrupt and technically obsolete.
0:37:46 > 0:37:49They were much more interested in trading in their little shops
0:37:49 > 0:37:52and making and unmaking sultans.
0:37:52 > 0:37:56And intriguingly, in a city of wooden buildings,
0:37:56 > 0:37:58they were the fire brigade.
0:37:59 > 0:38:03When fire broke out, as it frequently did in Istanbul,
0:38:03 > 0:38:06the Janissaries would pull down the houses
0:38:06 > 0:38:11in the path of the fire to stop it spreading. But more often than not,
0:38:11 > 0:38:17the contents would be looted by them and the owners left destitute.
0:38:17 > 0:38:20The Janissaries were hated by everyone.
0:38:20 > 0:38:23They were a law unto themselves.
0:38:23 > 0:38:26Mahmud too had good reason
0:38:26 > 0:38:30to hate his own troops. The Janissaries had deposed
0:38:30 > 0:38:35and murdered his own cousin Selim III in 1808 and he'd
0:38:35 > 0:38:39only escaped by running across the rooftops of the Topkapi Palace.
0:38:41 > 0:38:43Now as Sultan,
0:38:43 > 0:38:46Mahmud was determined to destroy the Janissaries
0:38:46 > 0:38:51and to do that, he would deploy one of the holiest relics in all Islam.
0:38:55 > 0:38:59On the 11th June 1826, the Sultan began to drill
0:38:59 > 0:39:02some of his soldiers in European fashion...
0:39:05 > 0:39:08..wearing modern uniforms,
0:39:08 > 0:39:11knowing the Janissaries would resent this
0:39:11 > 0:39:14new challenge to their age-old power.
0:39:14 > 0:39:17The Janissaries took the bait, they rebelled
0:39:17 > 0:39:20and ran amok in the streets, hoping
0:39:20 > 0:39:23to bully the Sultan as they always had before. But this time,
0:39:23 > 0:39:25the Sultan was ready.
0:39:26 > 0:39:28He fetched the Holy Banner of the Prophet
0:39:28 > 0:39:33from its box in the Topkapi Treasury and gave it to his Grand Vizier
0:39:33 > 0:39:38to take to the Blue Mosque, saying either the Janissaries will
0:39:38 > 0:39:43all be murdered or cats will walk over the ruins of Constantinople.
0:39:45 > 0:39:48The Holy Banner of the Prophet Mohammed
0:39:48 > 0:39:50was unfurled from this pulpit
0:39:50 > 0:39:53and the message went out to all true Muslims in the city,
0:39:53 > 0:39:56come here and support your Caliph.
0:39:57 > 0:40:00But would the people come?
0:40:00 > 0:40:03And would the Sultan's other soldiers stay loyal?
0:40:03 > 0:40:05But come they did.
0:40:10 > 0:40:13Thousands of people converged on this mosque, bearing swords
0:40:13 > 0:40:19and pitchforks and guns, to support their Sultan against the hated
0:40:19 > 0:40:23Janissaries. This became military headquarters for this holy
0:40:23 > 0:40:28enterprise and at last, the Blue Mosque covered itself in holy glory.
0:40:31 > 0:40:35Outnumbered by the people of the city, the Janissaries retreated
0:40:35 > 0:40:37to their barracks.
0:40:37 > 0:40:39It was a fatal mistake,
0:40:39 > 0:40:42because the Grand Vizier had the loyalty
0:40:42 > 0:40:46of the Sultan's artillery regiment.
0:40:46 > 0:40:50He brought up cannon and started to bombard the place.
0:40:51 > 0:40:55It caught fire and, in a sort of sweet infernal irony,
0:40:55 > 0:40:59the Janissaries, the firefighters of Istanbul,
0:40:59 > 0:41:01were consumed in their thousands
0:41:01 > 0:41:04in this vast and terrible conflagration.
0:41:10 > 0:41:15The Janissaries who escaped were butchered by the people of Istanbul.
0:41:15 > 0:41:19When they hid in the bathhouses of the city, they were dragged out
0:41:19 > 0:41:22for a month afterwards and torn to pieces,
0:41:22 > 0:41:25their bodies left for the dogs.
0:41:30 > 0:41:35There ended, after hundreds of years, the power of the Janissaries.
0:41:39 > 0:41:43The massacre was styled the Auspicious Event.
0:41:43 > 0:41:45Now, the sultans could turn their backs
0:41:45 > 0:41:48on the past and start to modernise.
0:41:48 > 0:41:51And it was clear what their model would be.
0:41:58 > 0:42:00Their inspiration
0:42:00 > 0:42:03would be the imperial dynasties of the West.
0:42:04 > 0:42:07France, Austria, Britain.
0:42:08 > 0:42:12And here it is, the new face of Empire.
0:42:14 > 0:42:18This is the brand-new Dolmebache Palace,
0:42:18 > 0:42:20built in the mid-19th century.
0:42:20 > 0:42:25It's grand, it's gaudy, it's kitsch and it's bling.
0:42:25 > 0:42:28It's built to impress and it's really declaring
0:42:28 > 0:42:32that the Ottoman sultans are modern
0:42:32 > 0:42:38European monarchs in the grand age of Victorian empires.
0:42:39 > 0:42:42Everything in here is the very best
0:42:42 > 0:42:45that Europe can offer. The chandeliers are
0:42:45 > 0:42:49from Britain, the gilded furniture is French.
0:42:49 > 0:42:52The ceramics are Italian.
0:42:52 > 0:42:55The Sultan who built this is really saying,
0:42:55 > 0:43:01"I am still the master of a thriving international empire."
0:43:01 > 0:43:06That's what it looks like, but in fact, the reality is very different.
0:43:07 > 0:43:11The bear skins on the floor are from Russia,
0:43:11 > 0:43:14and they tell us the other side of the story.
0:43:14 > 0:43:18This is the Sultan's reception room, and this is where, in his
0:43:18 > 0:43:22customary magnificence, he received the ambassadors of the great powers.
0:43:22 > 0:43:25But only two of these ambassadors really mattered -
0:43:25 > 0:43:27the Russians and the British.
0:43:27 > 0:43:30And it was they who were encouraging him to reform his army
0:43:30 > 0:43:34and to give his minorities the sort of rights they received in the West.
0:43:34 > 0:43:37But actually, something very different was going on here,
0:43:37 > 0:43:40both the Russians and the British took turns to bully
0:43:40 > 0:43:43the Sultan into doing what they wanted him to do.
0:43:43 > 0:43:46Tsar Nickolas I called the Ottoman Empire
0:43:46 > 0:43:48"The sick man of Europe".
0:43:48 > 0:43:53And actually, both powers were really only interested in carving up
0:43:53 > 0:43:55the empire when it finally died.
0:43:59 > 0:44:01But it was the Russians who had the greatest
0:44:01 > 0:44:03and most ancient ambitions.
0:44:07 > 0:44:09Russia had wanted the city
0:44:09 > 0:44:13ever since 1780, when Catherine the Great had
0:44:13 > 0:44:18initiated her Greek Project, the partition of the Ottoman Empire
0:44:18 > 0:44:22with the intention of creating a new Christian Byzantium.
0:44:22 > 0:44:27She called Istanbul "Tsargrad", City of the Caesars,
0:44:27 > 0:44:32and she even named her grandson Constantine, designated future
0:44:32 > 0:44:36emperor of a new Byzantine Empire.
0:44:36 > 0:44:38Looking out here, you can really
0:44:38 > 0:44:44see why this little bit of water mattered so much to the Russians.
0:44:44 > 0:44:48Look at these cargo ships queuing up to get through the straits
0:44:48 > 0:44:52to export their grain from Odessa, on the north
0:44:52 > 0:44:54coast of the Black Sea, to the Mediterranean.
0:44:54 > 0:44:58And that's why the Russian Tsars wanted to conquer Istanbul.
0:45:01 > 0:45:04In April 1877, Russia declared war
0:45:04 > 0:45:07and invaded the empire's Balkan provinces.
0:45:08 > 0:45:12Seven months later, they'd fought their way to the very
0:45:12 > 0:45:14gates of Istanbul.
0:45:17 > 0:45:22But on the 13th February 1878, six battleships anchored
0:45:22 > 0:45:26right off the coast here to take on the Russians.
0:45:27 > 0:45:31And this big gun tells the story of what happened next.
0:45:33 > 0:45:36Those battleships were British battleships,
0:45:36 > 0:45:38and they were there with one purpose -
0:45:38 > 0:45:42to stop the advancing victorious Russians and to save Istanbul.
0:45:42 > 0:45:46And they succeeded. The Russians stopped in their tracks.
0:45:50 > 0:45:52Look at this nameplate here.
0:45:52 > 0:45:57It says "Vickers-Armstrong, Newcastle, 1869."
0:45:57 > 0:46:02This was a gun given by the British to the Ottomans to help
0:46:02 > 0:46:03defend Istanbul.
0:46:05 > 0:46:08The guiding principle of British foreign policy throughout
0:46:08 > 0:46:13the 19th Century was to keep the Russians out of Istanbul
0:46:13 > 0:46:17and to maintain the Ottoman Empire until they decided otherwise.
0:46:19 > 0:46:21While the Russians and the British schemed,
0:46:21 > 0:46:26the new Sultan was enlisting help from other quarters.
0:46:26 > 0:46:31Help that would ultimately prove disastrous for the city.
0:46:31 > 0:46:34This is the Yildiz Palace. It's not really
0:46:34 > 0:46:38a palace at all, it's actually a complex of different pavilions.
0:46:38 > 0:46:41And it's as weird, as eccentric, as eclectic
0:46:41 > 0:46:45and as sinister as the Sultan who built it,
0:46:45 > 0:46:47Abdul Hamid II.
0:46:47 > 0:46:51For 30 years, he ruled the Ottoman Empire from here.
0:46:52 > 0:46:57As I'm sitting on the steps of his favourite house in his secret park,
0:46:57 > 0:47:01I've just been looking at the face of Sultan Abdul Hamid II.
0:47:01 > 0:47:05He has to be one of the strangest leaders of modern times.
0:47:05 > 0:47:09A bizarre mixture of the archaic and the modern.
0:47:09 > 0:47:14Over there, he had his harem with 900 girls in it, his odalisques.
0:47:14 > 0:47:18In this house, he would go to the top floor and watch
0:47:18 > 0:47:25the Bosphorus through a telescope to monitor the comings and goings,
0:47:25 > 0:47:27and he was absolutely paranoid.
0:47:27 > 0:47:30He looked every day under his bed to see if there was an assassin.
0:47:30 > 0:47:34He was happiest sitting here in his park, on his island,
0:47:34 > 0:47:36watching his private zoo.
0:47:38 > 0:47:42And yet, despite all these eccentricities, he was a ruthless
0:47:42 > 0:47:47politician with a singular idea of how to save the Ottoman Empire.
0:47:47 > 0:47:51As it lost more and more Balkan provinces,
0:47:51 > 0:47:54Abdul Hamid promoted himself as an Islamicist leader,
0:47:54 > 0:47:59as the Caliph of international Islam, by which he hoped to
0:47:59 > 0:48:02provide the glue to keep the empire together.
0:48:04 > 0:48:09He also was a fanatical moderniser. He built railways,
0:48:09 > 0:48:12and telegraphs and a modern army,
0:48:12 > 0:48:16and to do this, he had one backer and partner.
0:48:16 > 0:48:20Kaiser Wilhelm II, of Germany, who visited him
0:48:20 > 0:48:26here at Yildiz twice and, as you can see, he built German buildings.
0:48:26 > 0:48:29The Kaiser would have felt right at home here.
0:48:31 > 0:48:34But Abdul Hamid, ageing and isolated,
0:48:34 > 0:48:40was overthrown in 1909 by the Young Turks, idealistic army officers
0:48:40 > 0:48:43who set up a parliamentary government.
0:48:43 > 0:48:48But in 1913, power was seized by one of them,
0:48:48 > 0:48:50Enver Pasha, a reckless
0:48:50 > 0:48:55and flamboyant young general, who believed only harsh nationalism
0:48:55 > 0:48:58and victorious war could save the empire.
0:49:00 > 0:49:03On the 9th November 1914, backed by Germany,
0:49:03 > 0:49:08Enver declared war against Britain, France and Russia.
0:49:09 > 0:49:14His murderous repression and deportation of minorities
0:49:14 > 0:49:17destroyed the old cosmopolitanism of the capital,
0:49:17 > 0:49:20and his defeats brought catastrophe.
0:49:22 > 0:49:25Sean McMeekin studies the pivotal role
0:49:25 > 0:49:28played by Istanbul in the First World War.
0:49:28 > 0:49:30Well, it put it right at the heart of the conflict.
0:49:30 > 0:49:34It was the great prize, if not the greatest prize to be won in the war.
0:49:34 > 0:49:37In a certain sense, it gave the war a purpose, it gave it a point.
0:49:37 > 0:49:38Not least for Russia,
0:49:38 > 0:49:41the Tsar with his sovereign claim here on the city.
0:49:41 > 0:49:44Suddenly, the war had a point for the Russians,
0:49:44 > 0:49:46and it had an objective now for Russia's allies,
0:49:46 > 0:49:48Britain and France, wanting to open up the
0:49:48 > 0:49:52city so that they could help supply Russia by way of the Black Sea.
0:49:52 > 0:49:55So, the city really became the great prize that was fought over,
0:49:55 > 0:49:58with this claim actually negotiated between the powers
0:49:58 > 0:50:00during the Gallipoli campaign.
0:50:00 > 0:50:05In fact, the city was literally to be divided in three between these
0:50:05 > 0:50:08allies, with the Russians getting most of the ancient
0:50:08 > 0:50:10city of Byzantium.
0:50:10 > 0:50:13How did Enver and the Ottomans do in World War One in fact?
0:50:13 > 0:50:15Well, not that badly.
0:50:15 > 0:50:18In some ways, the Ottomans actually surprised Europe
0:50:18 > 0:50:22with their performance in the war. In the end though, it wasn't enough.
0:50:22 > 0:50:25It's a largely forgotten episode in the West that the powers
0:50:25 > 0:50:29occupied the capital of the Ottoman Empire for four years from 1918
0:50:29 > 0:50:32to 1922, although it's not forgotten here.
0:50:36 > 0:50:38In 1918, Britain and France,
0:50:38 > 0:50:42the victorious allies, occupied Istanbul.
0:50:42 > 0:50:46The great capital that had resisted all comers for 400 years
0:50:46 > 0:50:49had finally fallen,
0:50:49 > 0:50:52and a resentful population awaited its fate.
0:50:56 > 0:51:00While plans for partition were being drawn up, it was here, at the
0:51:00 > 0:51:06Pera Palace Hotel, that the British officers and diplomats stayed.
0:51:06 > 0:51:09They flirted in the bar with gorgeous Russian countesses
0:51:09 > 0:51:13turned courtesans, refugees from the Bolshevik revolution.
0:51:15 > 0:51:18Russia was now out of the running,
0:51:18 > 0:51:22and it was the British Prime Minister who had the big idea.
0:51:23 > 0:51:26But it was an idea from an old world.
0:51:29 > 0:51:32In the excitement of victory, the British Prime Minister
0:51:32 > 0:51:36Lloyd George was dazzled by dreams of classical empires.
0:51:36 > 0:51:39He encouraged the Greeks to go to war,
0:51:39 > 0:51:46to restore the Byzantine Empire, and recreate a Christian Constantinople.
0:51:46 > 0:51:50The Greeks began to dream of Orthodox services at the great
0:51:50 > 0:51:51church of St Sophia.
0:51:54 > 0:52:00But one man would change all that. In November 1918,
0:52:00 > 0:52:06an elegant and much-decorated Turkish General arrived here
0:52:06 > 0:52:11in the Pera Palace Hotel and booked into a suite on the second floor.
0:52:11 > 0:52:14One night, some British officers invited him
0:52:14 > 0:52:16for a drink at their table.
0:52:16 > 0:52:20He famously replied, "We are the hosts here,
0:52:20 > 0:52:25"you are the guests, you take drinks at my table."
0:52:25 > 0:52:29The occupation was unacceptable to most Turks,
0:52:29 > 0:52:32and his voice was the voice of history.
0:52:32 > 0:52:35His name was Mustafa Kemal Pasha,
0:52:35 > 0:52:39but he's known to posterity as Ataturk.
0:52:44 > 0:52:46This is where Ataturk stayed. He was altogether
0:52:46 > 0:52:48an exceptional character.
0:52:48 > 0:52:51He was one of the few Ottoman generals who'd actually
0:52:51 > 0:52:53defeated the British.
0:52:53 > 0:52:58He'd expelled the Anglo-French expedition at Gallipoli in 1915.
0:52:58 > 0:53:01He had the looks of a matinee idol,
0:53:01 > 0:53:04he was a man of veracious sensual appetites.
0:53:04 > 0:53:09He loved drinking, he loved womanising, but above all,
0:53:09 > 0:53:15he had a vision for himself as leader and for Turkey as a nation.
0:53:17 > 0:53:22When the Greek armies invaded Turkey at Lloyd George's instigation,
0:53:22 > 0:53:28Ataturk left Istanbul to lead the resistance from mainland Anatolia.
0:53:28 > 0:53:32He planned to mobilise what was left of the Ottoman army.
0:53:32 > 0:53:37The next time he'd return to Istanbul, it would be as conqueror.
0:53:39 > 0:53:44Ataturk made his base in Ankara to the east, and in a ferocious
0:53:44 > 0:53:48campaign, pushed the Greeks all the way back to the Aegean.
0:53:49 > 0:53:54The British plans collapsed and by September 1922,
0:53:54 > 0:53:58Ataturk's forces encircled the city.
0:53:58 > 0:54:02The British, now war-weary, wisely did not engage.
0:54:02 > 0:54:07In a year-long stalemate, the Turks took over the city from the inside,
0:54:07 > 0:54:10and in Britain, Lloyd George resigned.
0:54:11 > 0:54:14On 6th October 1923,
0:54:14 > 0:54:20the first infantry division of the new Turkish Army entered Istanbul.
0:54:26 > 0:54:28And the Turkish Republic was born.
0:54:30 > 0:54:35The victorious Ataturk had great plans for his country.
0:54:35 > 0:54:39He abolished the Sultanate, but the Ottomans remained as Caliphs,
0:54:39 > 0:54:41commanders of the faithful.
0:54:43 > 0:54:44But not for long.
0:54:45 > 0:54:50400 years after Selim the Grim had brought back the holy relics
0:54:50 > 0:54:54to Istanbul, the caliphate's days were numbered.
0:54:54 > 0:54:57On the 3rd March 1924,
0:54:57 > 0:55:02the Assembly in Ankara formerly abolished the caliphate.
0:55:02 > 0:55:08The next morning, at dawn, troops surrounded the Dolmabache Palace,
0:55:08 > 0:55:12and the Caliph, a small group of servants and family, gathered
0:55:12 > 0:55:15together their things and left the palace.
0:55:17 > 0:55:22In the evening, the last Caliph boarded the Orient Express
0:55:22 > 0:55:23into exile.
0:55:25 > 0:55:29It was the end of 500 years of the Ottoman Dynasty's connection
0:55:29 > 0:55:31with Istanbul.
0:55:41 > 0:55:45Ataturk suppressed the city's religious establishments.
0:55:45 > 0:55:46Some became museums.
0:55:46 > 0:55:51Many shrines, religious schools and dervish lodges were closed.
0:55:51 > 0:55:55"No civilised nation could follow in the path of sheikhs,
0:55:55 > 0:55:59"dervishes and fortune-tellers," he said.
0:55:59 > 0:56:01Religion was a private matter.
0:56:03 > 0:56:05But it wasn't just that.
0:56:05 > 0:56:10He shunned the capital itself. This is Ataturk's yacht.
0:56:10 > 0:56:15It's moored here in Istanbul, a city he turned his back on,
0:56:15 > 0:56:18despising its perfidious history.
0:56:19 > 0:56:23He said, "Perhaps the Black Sea will flood the Bosphorus,
0:56:23 > 0:56:26"the Republic will make a man of Byzantium,
0:56:26 > 0:56:29"which by becoming habituated to filth,
0:56:29 > 0:56:34"lies and immorality, has lost its immeasurable value."
0:56:36 > 0:56:39He moved the capital away from Istanbul and
0:56:39 > 0:56:43the Turkish Republic is still governed from Ankara.
0:56:46 > 0:56:5190 years on, Ataturk's secular vision remains the only
0:56:51 > 0:56:58way for many Turks and Istanbul is now Europe's biggest megacity, of
0:56:58 > 0:57:0315 million, comfortable in its role as Turkey's modern,
0:57:03 > 0:57:05cultural, economic capital.
0:57:06 > 0:57:12But today's Turkish democracy is following a mildly Islamic path,
0:57:12 > 0:57:16accompanied by a revival of Ottoman prestige and ambition.
0:57:19 > 0:57:21There are head scarves in the streets
0:57:21 > 0:57:25and pilgrims pray at the tombs of conquering sultans.
0:57:25 > 0:57:30Cosmopolitan Istanbul now seems divided as the pendulum
0:57:30 > 0:57:33swings towards stricter Muslim piety.
0:57:37 > 0:57:40I'm ending my story in one of the most wondrous
0:57:40 > 0:57:45buildings on Earth, Hagia Sophia.
0:57:45 > 0:57:50It's still the monument, the symbol, the centre of this
0:57:50 > 0:57:55crossroads between East and West, Islam and Christianity.
0:57:57 > 0:58:02For one and a half millennia, it has presided over Caesars
0:58:02 > 0:58:07and sultans, magnificence, massacre and mayhem.
0:58:07 > 0:58:11The tides of history, power and faith.
0:58:17 > 0:58:22More than any other, this building defines the sacred
0:58:22 > 0:58:26and imperial city with the three magical names.
0:58:26 > 0:58:32For 900 years, it was a church. For 500 years, it was a mosque.
0:58:32 > 0:58:37For the past 80, it's been a neutral, secular museum.
0:58:37 > 0:58:41And now, there's a campaign for it to be a mosque again.
0:58:42 > 0:58:46As ever, reflecting the drama of its times,
0:58:46 > 0:58:50this world city remains ever-changing.