The construction of Yedikule Fortress, which is famous for its dungeon and exceeds centuries with its legends, dates back to 413. The fortress, which was built by the Eastern Roman Emperor Theodosius II, who valued architecture, is located on the coastal road stretching from Sarayburnu to Bakırköy. After the construction fortress was completed in 439, a triumphal arch was built to be used to enter the city upon returning from the wars. During the Theodosius III Period, when the sea walls were built against the attacks from Marmara, this triumphal arch was turned into a gate and became the Golden Gate.
After the conquest, Fatih Sultan Mehmed Han had the walls repaired and had three additional towers built here, and the fortress had 7 towers in total. After the construction of the towers was completed in 1457, Yedikule, which gave its name to the district, has become today’s inner castle.
The towers surrounding the pentagonal frame of the building are the Young Osman Tower, the Armory Tower, the Ahmet III Tower (Pastorama Tower), the Treasury Tower (Milli Tower), the Dungeon Tower (Inscriptions Tower), the Cannon Tower, and the Flag Tower.
Haber uçtu devlete de
Beş yıl yattım hapiste
Yedi düvel zindanından
Beterdir Yedikule
(The news flew to the goverment, I was in prison for five years; Yedikule is worse than all the other ones)
The fact that the Yedikule Dungeons, the subject of the songs, took their place in the legends and became so famous, is based on the rumors that foreign political criminals and important Ottoman statesmen who were sacrificed by the palace were imprisoned and tortured in the towers that were used as dungeons for centuries. These rumors increase so much that even the fact that Yedikule Dungeons are cursed causes to wander from city to city and various legends to emerge.
The most important person who was imprisoned here and brutally murdered by the janissaries is Sultan Osman II, nicknamed Young Osman.
“Yesterday morning I was the sultan of the world, now have nothing to left;
be merciful and derive a lesson from my condition; the world is not even for you.”
Osman the Young
Apart from Osman the Young, other important names imprisoned in Yedikule Dungeons are Çandarlı Halil Pasha and his sons (nine days after the Conquest), Trabzon Greek Emperor David Kommenos and his sons, the last Abbasid Caliph Mutevekkil IV and Crimean Khan Mehmet Giray.
Among the legends of the Yedikule Dungeons that have survived, the most common is the pagan curse. According to legend, there was a pagan among the captives imprisoned in dungeons. In European states, pagan, who was thought to be a high-ranking missionary or a spy, were tortured. While dying, the pagan, who could not stand the torture, uttered prayer-like words intricately, using a language similar to ancient Latin, and his corpse quickly decayed. Later, these events were heard by the guards and some people thought that the pagan was cursing.
The dying pagan wished that the souls of the people who were tortured there would be imprisoned in the prisons and walls until the day the Messiah would come to the world; and that the souls would be released to account on the day of the Messiah’s coming.
For this reason, it is rumored that sometimes screams and even words spoken in a language similar to Latin were heard in Yedikule Dungeons.
In another legend, the remarkable elements are the Bloody Well located in the Inscriptions Tower (Dungeon Tower), one of the dungeon towers. According to the rumour; some of the prisoners were executed in the Bloody Well, and there was a tunnel opening to the Marmara Sea at the bottom of the well, and the heads of the prisoners were left through this tunnel and thrown into the Marmara Sea.
The fortress in charge of welcoming the victorious soldiers of the Eastern Romans, the dungeon of the Ottoman Empire, which is the subject of legends, and Yedikule, which has the status of a museum of the Republican Period, returns as the legend of the city. Let’s go through this legend and open the misty page of history.
