Naval Museum

Landlubbers and salty seadogs alike will enjoy a visit to this museum of Turkish naval history, which is located on the Bosphorus shore close to the Beşiktaş ferry terminal. Though the Ottoman Empire is most remembered for its conquests on land, its maritime power was equally impressive. During the reign of Süleyman the Magnificent (r 1520–66), the eastern Mediterranean was virtually an Ottoman recreational lake. The sultan’s navies cut a swathe in the Indian Ocean as well. Sea power was instrumental in the conquests of the Aegean coasts and islands, Egypt and North Africa. Discipline, logistics and good ship design contributed to Ottoman victories. Exhibits focus on two great Turkish sailors: the 16th-century cartographer Piri Reis; and the admiral of Süleyman the Magnificent’s fleet, Barbaros Heyrettin Paşa (1483–1546), better known as Barbarossa. The admiral’s tomb, designed by Sinan, is in the square opposite the museum. Highlights include a coloured 1461 map on antelope skin, and a portion of the great chain that the Byzantines stretched across the mouth of the Golden Horn to keep out the sultan’s ships during the battle for Constantinople in 1453. The museum’s indoor and outdoor spaces were being renovated when this book went to print, but the main exhibits were still open to the public.