Museum sights in Trabzon
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Aya Sofya Museum
One of Trabzon's star attractions, the Aya Sofya Museum, originally Hagia Sophia (Church of the Divine Wisdom), is 4km west of the centre on a terrace that once held a pagan temple. Built in the late Byzantine period, between 1238 and 1263, the church was clearly influenced by Georgian and Seljuk design, although the marvellous wall paintings and mosaic floors follow the prevailing Constantinople style.
It was converted to a mosque after the conquest in 1461, and later used as an ammunition storage depot and hospital by the Russians, before being fully restored in the 1960s.
Enter through the western entrance into the vaulted narthex to view the best-preserved, vividly col…
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Trabzon Museum
Just south of Uzun Sokak, this Italian-designed mansion was originally built for a Russian merchant in 1912 and inhabited briefly by Atatürk. The fantastic interiors and original furnishings put most Ottoman re-creations to shame, with a series of impressive high-ceilinged rooms displaying ethnographic and Islamic artefacts, mostly labelled in English. The basement archaeological section also has significant pieces, including a flattened bronze statue of Hermes from local excavations at Tabakhane and Byzantine finds from near Sumela.
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