Turbe of Sultan Murat III скачать в хорошем качестве

Turbe of Sultan Murat III

Where ever we travel, we always like to visit at least one or two cemeteries in a country out of curiosity, to see how people are honored & remembered after they die. They're also very peaceful places in general, & good places to reflect on both life & death. In Turkey, during the Ottoman period, the bodies of the ruling sultan & his family members were interned & placed in "turbe's" (pronounced tur-bee). The turbe's were small, free standing structures generally built in the cemetery behind a mosque. They usually were hexagonal or octagonal in shape and were relatively plain on the outside. On the inside however, they were elaborately decorated with beautiful ceilings & tiles. The bodies of the family members were placed in burial boxes and covered with expensive clothes. The males of the family, the sultan and sehzades (princes) were identified by a turban on their boxes. The wife & the female members have nothing. People come to visit these turbe's, and just like in a mosque, they must remove their shoes & women must cover their heads. People also pray while in the turbe's, but in Islam, there are no prayers for the dead. They are just praying in general to Allah (but kind of hoping he notices we're they're praying from so their prayers may carry more weight). I couldn't help but think when seeing the burial boxes that it kind of resembled a campground with all sorts of tents of different sizes. In Istanbul there are turbe's all over the city in mosque cemeteries. But in one particular suburb called Eyup, there is a cluster of about 30 or so of these turbe's all in one location. Eyup therefore is a major pilgrimage site for Muslims- said to be the largest pilgrimage site outside of Mecca. There is also a huge hillside cemetery there too,where many of the famous & wealthy are buried in order to be close to the sultan's. You actually take an aerial tramway (similar to what you see at a ski resort) to get from the base of Eyup, up the hillside, while passing over all of the graves below. It makes for a short, interesting trip. Once at the top of the cemetery, you're able to walk around & explore it. Most people instead though just choose to sit at one of the lovely cafe's located at the top, and view the cemetery from a distance, while also having a great view back up the Golden Horn waterway towards downtown Istanbul. .