A Gothic Church Became a Mosque: Arap Camii (Arab Mosque), Galata, Istanbul, Turkey

This mosque in Istanbul began as a Dominican church in the fourteenth century, and its minaret was once a bell tower. This is the Arap Camii, the Arab Mosque, in Galata.

Key facts
• Galata was then a Genoese colony, and Dominican friars built a church here in brick and stone, in an Italian Gothic style, dedicated to Saint Paul and Saint Dominic (The Byzantine Legacy; Kultur Envanteri)
• After the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453, Sultan Mehmed the Second ordered it converted into a mosque; an endowment deed of 1475 records it as the Galata Mosque, and the bell tower became its minaret (Kultur Envanteri; The Byzantine Legacy)
• After 1492, Muslims from Andalusia settled in the neighbourhood, and the building became known as the Arab Mosque (both sources)
• A later tradition links it to an Arab siege of Constantinople in the early eighth century, but historians find no evidence for that (both sources)
• After the great fire of 1731, Saliha Sultan, the mother of Sultan Mahmud the First, had it restored, and Ottoman windows and portals replaced the Gothic ones (The Byzantine Legacy)
• In 1913 more than a hundred Italian gravestones of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were found beneath the floor (Kultur Envanteri)
• After the earthquake of 1999 falling plaster revealed frescoes, and the restoration of 2007 to 2012 uncovered more, along with mosaics made by Byzantine artists for Catholic patrons, which is very rare (Kultur Envanteri)

Where sources differ: the exact year of the conversion. The details are in the pinned comment.

Sources
The Byzantine Legacy, San Paolo (Arap Camii): https://www.thebyzantinelegacy.com/san-paolo
Kultur Envanteri (Turkey's cultural heritage inventory), Arap Camii: https://kulturenvanteri.com/en/yer/arap-camii/

Visuals are AI-generated illustrations. The mosque, its tower, the marble portal and the prayer hall are drawn from published photographs. The harbour colony, the Gothic church interior, the parchment, the lane, the burned hall, the grave slabs and the frescoes are imagined. The real place differs in detail.

Which mosque should we explore next? Tell us in the comments.

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