Academics all over the world pen letter against turning Hagia Sophia into a mosque
Dozens of academics from all over the world have penned a letter against turning Hagia Sophia into a mosque, urging Turkish authorities to protect it. "Our concern is that the current conflict, until now only a 'war of words,' could result in similarly careless treatment of Hagia Sophia in Istanbul: that historical and archaeological evidence could be damaged, and works of art concealed," they said.
Duvar English
Dozens of academics from all over the world have penned a letter against turning Hagia Sophia into a mosque, urging the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) to preserve its status.
"Hagia Sophia is too beautiful a monument and too precious a historical document to serve as a pawn in regional politics," they said in an open letter.
"Successive Byzantine, Ottoman, and Turkish governments have protected it against the ravages of time and thus maintained its significance not only for themselves, but also for those to come in the future — including all of us. It is a matter of vital concern to us as scholars of Byzantine and Ottoman art and culture that the current Turkish government continue this tradition of responsible stewardship," they added.
A Turkish court on July 2 heard a case about converting Istanbul’s sixth century Hagia Sophia back into a mosque and will announce its verdict within 15 days, a lawyer said, on an issue which has drawn international expressions of concern.
Hagia Sophia was the foremost church in Christendom for 900 years and then one of Islam’s greatest mosques for 500 years after the Ottoman conquest of Istanbul.
The government decision to turn the mosque into a museum was made in 1934 in the early years of the Turkish Republic founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. The court case disputes the legality of that conversion.
"In our opinion, the central question is not, 'Should Hagia Sophia be a museum or a mosque?' The central question is rather, 'How can we best care for Hagia Sophia?' In other words, we draw a distinction between function and stewardship," the academics said.
"We are concerned that the ongoing dispute over function hinders the development of a management strategy commensurate to the scale of the challenges: preservation of the historical fabric and continued visibility of the works of art of all periods, Byzantine and Ottoman; responsible management of mass tourism; and protection against the threat of earthquake," they said.
Giving a brief summary of the history of Hagia Sophia, the academics pointed to the damage done to the Hagia Sophia in the Black Sea province of Trabzon when it underwent restoration.
"In recent years, the Directorate General has assumed control of other Byzantine monuments and reopened them to Muslim worship. One prominent example is another Hagia Sophia, this one in Trabzon on the Black Sea, whose proper administration has been contested since 2013. An effort to re-open the building to Muslim prayer included construction of an elaborate set of screens to obscure the Byzantine frescoes. Less publicized, but of more lasting harm, was the campaign of restoration carried out by the Directorate General on Hagia Sophia in Vize (Thrace) in 2006, which resulted in substantial damage to the historical fabric of the building," they said.
"Our concern is that the current conflict, until now only a 'war of words,' could result in similarly careless treatment of Hagia Sophia in Istanbul: that historical and archaeological evidence could be damaged, and works of art concealed," they added.