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Inner courtyard of the Yeni Cami (=New Mosque). It's friday afternoon and many people are just leaving the mosque after praying. Others are preparing themselves for praying. An important preparation is to wash yourself according to certain rules. To be able to do that, each mosque has a place to do so. Bigger mosques, like the Yeni Cami, with an inner courtyard have a special fountain called "sadirvan".
Istanbul (historically Byzantium and later Constantinople; see the other names of Istanbul) is the largest city of Turkey and the third largest city in the world. The city covers 27 districts of the Istanbul province.It is located on the Bosphorus Strait and encompasses the natural harbor known as the Golden Horn, in the northwest of the country. It extends both on the European (Thrace) and on the Asian (Anatolia) side of the Bosphorus, and is thereby the only metropolis in the world which is situated on two continents. In its long history, Istanbul served as the capital city of the Roman Empire (330–395), the East Roman (Byzantine) Empire (395–1204 and 1261–1453), the Latin Empire (1204–1261), and the Ottoman Empire (1453–1922). The city was chosen as joint European Capital of Culture for 2010. The historic areas of Istanbul were added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1985.
