Istanbul Backpacker

Selimiye Barracks and the docks of Harem seen from Bosphorus. During the Crimean War (1854-1856), the barracks were converted into a temporary military hospital. On November 4, 1854, Florence Nightingale arrived in Scutari with 38 volunteer nurses. They cared for thousands of wounded soldiers, and drastically reduced the high mortality rate by improving the sanitary living conditions until she returned home in 1857 as a heroine. During the Crimean campaign, Florence Nightingale gained the nickname "The Lady with the Lamp", deriving from a phrase in a report in The Times:

The German Fountain is a gazebo styled fountain in the northern end of ancient Roman-Byzantine hippodrome, Sultanahmet Square, Istanbul, Turkey. It was constructed to commemorate German Emperor Wilhelm's visit to Istanbul in 1898. It was built in Germany, then transported piece by piece and assembled in its current site in 1900. The neo-Byzantine style fountain's octagonal dome has eight marble columns, and dome's interior is covered with golden mosaics.

Photo: Hagia Irene Church seen from Istanbul ferry over the Ruins of Byzantium. Hagia Irene is a former Eastern Orthodox church located in the outer courtyard of Topkapı Palace in Istanbul, Turkey. The building reputedly stands on the site of a pre-Christian temple. It ranks, in fact, as the first church built in Constantinople. Roman emperor Constantine I commissioned the first Hagia Eirene church in the 4th century. In 381 the First Council of Constantinople took place in the church. It served as the church of the Patriarchate before Hagia Sophia was completed in 537.