Eyüp Mosque, the Ottomans’ ‘coronation’ mosque

Never shy about the spectacle, the Ottoman Empire’s leaders were all presented with the sword of Osman, an act to show the legitimacy of rule Eyüp is a small village on the south, southwestern side of the Golden Horn outside the walls of Constantinople or the “Old City,” as it is sometimes known. Little information about its beginnings has survived until today and the first it was referenced is when Emperor Justinian built a church in the 6th century to two saints, Cosmas and Damian, who had been martyred by Roman Emperor Diocletian (r. 284-305). The two saints were physicians who didn’t accept payment and were credited with grafting a black man’s leg onto a white man’s body. Although the church was destroyed somewhat later, a monastery was built there, consecrated to the same two saints. The place was considered sacred and people traveled there to be healed.

According to one Turkish source that doesn’t cite any original source, Byzantine emperors went there for their coronations. This seems at odds with the generally accepted knowledge that they were crowned in the St. Sophia Cathedral. The historian Robert Mantran wrote it was at this monastery to Saints Cosmas and Damian that the Byzantine emperor, his nobles and his generals used to don their swords and depart for war. The same Turkish source suggests that this is why the Ottoman who had become sultan would be girded with a sword in Eyüp following the conquest of Constantinople in 1453.

Eyüp al-Ansari’s final resting place

Shortly after the Prophet Muhammad’s death in 632, the Arabs began to expand throughout the Middle East, North Africa and into Anatolia. One of their most treasured dreams was to...