The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and
Instruction, by Various

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Title: The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction
Vol. 10, Issue 285, December 1, 1827

Author: Various

Release Date: March 1, 2004 [EBook #11388]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MIRROR OF LITERATURE, NO. 285 ***

Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Keith M. Eckrich, David King, and the
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THE MIRROR OF LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.

Vol. 10, No. 285.] SATURDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1827. [Price 2d

CASTLE OF THE SEVEN TOWERS

[Illustration: Castle of the Seven Towers at Constantinople.]

1. Triumphal Arch of Constantine.
2. First Tower of the Pentagon.
3. First Marble Tower.
4. Second Marble Tower.
5. Angle of the Pentagon with the fallen Tower.
6. Double Tower.
7. Dedecagonal tower.
8. Square Tower of entrance to the Prison.
9. Round Tower falling to decay.
10. House of the Aga, &c.
11. Garden of the Aga's House.
12. Cemetery of the Martyrs.

The celebrity of the _Seven Towers_ in European countries, though
strongly savouring of romance, is no joke--it being the _prison_ where
the Turks confine the ministers and ambassadors of the powers with whom
they are at war. At the present moment this engraving will doubtless be
acceptable to our readers; especially to such of our City friends as
have recently been induced to speculate on the heads of ambassadors of
the allied powers; and a few days since it might have served as a scale
for their _wagering_ the "price of blood."

With the early account of this castle we shall be brief. It is cited in
the history of the lower empire from the sixth century of the Christian
era, as a point which served for the defence of Constantinople. The
embrasures of some of its towers, as well as of the towers that flank
the ramparts of the town from the southern angle of the castle to the
sea, blackened as is supposed by the Greek fire, announce that it was
the principal bulwark of the city on the side of the Propontis, in the
latter times of the empire. In 1453, Mahomet II., after an obstina