Brief History

The Maiden's Tower is located in Üsküdar town of Istanbul, 150-200 meters off the coast of Salacak. The land, which used to be a part of the Asian coasts, was separated from the coast in time and the island on which the Maiden's Tower was located was formed. For the first time, the rock on which the Maiden's Tower is located, was mentioned in BC 410. On this date, the Athenian commander Alcibiades had a tower built on this small island in order to control the ships entering and leaving the Bosphorus and to collect taxes. During the Ottoman period, the tower was used as a place of exile and isolation, and as a shooting ground for various religious and diplomatic ceremonies. Some Sultans use this place as a viewing place or a resting area.

Just before the establishment of the Republic of Turkey, the tower began to be used as a lighthouse. The ground was solidified in the 1940s. It served as a military radar station in the early 1980s. Today, it is operated by a private company as a viewing venue and restaurant.

The tower is 54.5 meters, about 30 people high. The Maiden's Tower consists of a square-shaped tower made of cut stone and a building block attached to the three facades of the tower.

The stepped roof of the building block is covered with tiles. At the front of this structure is the entrance door, which is on two round columns and protected by a gable roof. When you move your left and right hands to either side of the entrance door, you will touch three vertical rectangular windows each. If you continue to touch upwards from the windows, you will reach the roof part. There are three skylights on the right and left sides of the roof.

The second part of the building block is slightly higher than the entrance. When you scan the roof of the entrance section forward parallel to the entrance door, there is a wall of the tower on the left at the end of the roof, and the roof of the second section of the building block at the end of the wall. The roof of this section is also covered with tiles. At the intersection of the surfaces of this gable roof, there are three skylights. On the right wall of this part of the building, there are four rectangular windows high above the ground, close to the roof. The last part of the building consists of a terrace and its walls, almost at the level of the roof, protecting the tower and the structure.

The base of the tower is square in shape. Some of its walls are reinforced with diagonal steel supports connected at the corners. Above this section is a hexagonal terrace, which is placed on supports in the form of inverted triangular prisms on all four sides. The structure in the middle of the terrace is a hexagonal structure with six columns at the corners in harmony with the terrace. It has a vertical rectangular window on each face. As you continue upward through the windows, you'll come across a sliced dome. In the upper part of the dome, there are four roof windows and a hexagonal upper terrace above these windows. There is a flagpole in the middle of the terrace.