Chamberlitash is a square located on the site of the ancient Emperor Constantine's Forum. Of all the buildings of this complex partially only the Column of Constantine has survived. This column was for a long time the main symbol of the Byzantine Empire. It was erected by decree of the Emperor Constantine on 11 May 330 to commemorate his conquest of the city of Byzantium on 18 September 324. It took place on 8 November 324 during the celebrations and on the occasion of the proclamation of Constantinople as the new capital of the Roman Empire. From the very from the beginning, it was a pedestal for the statue of the emperor. This column was the centrepiece of the grandiose square, which also contained colonnade, statues of Christian saints and pagan gods.
It currently goes by the name "Chamberlitash" (which translates as. "Rock with hoops"). The only drawing of this column that has survived and survives, dates from 1574 and is preserved in the library of the College of Holy Trinity College in the English city of Cambridge. The structure can be reached by walking from Sultanahmet Square towards the Great Istanbul Bazaar and Beyazet Square along Divan Yolu Street.
It was erected in the centre of the Forum of Constantine, which was at the same time built on the city's second hill, just beyond the defence walls of old Byzantium. This forum was then an oval-shaped square, surrounded by a by an imposing marble colonnade, with two monumental gates that led out to the west and east of the city. It was adorned with many beautiful antique statues, the location of which is now impossible to determine.
The column is in the form of a truncated regular four-stage pyramid and is erected on a five-metre base made of porphyry. On it was the column's chair, which was square in shape and decorated with bas-relief. The trunk, which had a height of twenty-five metres, consisted of seven drums, the diameter of which was about three metres. The drums were covered metal hoops with gilded closed wreaths of bronze. All drums were also porphyry, except for the eighth - it was made of marble. The majestic structure was crowned by a marble capitol. On the abacus of the capitol a golden imperial statue in the form of the god Apollo, with a nail from the Cross of the Cross of the Son of God fused into it. For this reason the inhabitants of the city of Constantinople originally began to call this architectural monument "the Column of the Nail." The height of the monument was about 38 metres.
During the earthquake of 600 - 601, which occurred at the end of the period of reign of Emperor Mauritius, the statue of Constantine the Great collapsed, with quite badly damaged the column itself. It was fully restored during the reign of Emperor Heraclius (610 - 641), and in 1081 - 1118, under Emperor Alexius I, the statue fell to the ground again when lightning struck it and crushed several passers-by. The monument was restored only during the reign of Emperor Manuel I (1143 - 1180), but soon another collapse of the statue occurred and it was replaced by a cross. After this event, the monument received a new commonplace name - "The Column with the Cross". Later, after 1204, the structure was quite badly damaged by the Crusaders. Its foundations was weakened by an adit that was dug to find the relics, and the the bas-relief was removed and taken to Western Europe. In the present day, a part of it, which the Turks Turks call "Tetrarchi", has been embedded in the wall of St Mark's Cathedral in Venice.
Already in the second half of the 20th century, during archaeological excavations, in Constantinople, a missing element of the bas-relief was found, which is now preserved in the Istanbul Archaeological Museum. After the fall of Constantinople, which took place in the first days of June 1453, the Turks threw the cross off this column.
In 1779, a massive fire that occurred in the vicinity of the square, destroyed most of the buildings, and the column was left with black stains from the fire. The column was nicknamed "The Burnt Column" after this event. By Sultan Abdülhamid I ordered the Chamberlitash to be rebuilt and a new masonry base was made on it. The iron hoops were replaced with new ones. This made it possible to keep the column upright in the following centuries. The first base of the column was about 3 metres below the present level. This means that the column that's on display for tourists today, is, in fact, only a fraction of the original structure.
Haluk Egemen Sarıkaya, a Turkish parapsychologist, wrote the following in one of his writings about this column as follows: "Like any sacred structure, Çemberlitaş, is probably connected to the underground system of the neighbourhood". Confirmation of these words was found in the 1930s during archaeological excavations in the vicinity of the Column of Constantine, during which labyrinth-shaped vestibules were discovered. This is where the belief arose that Cemberlitash is a kind of gate that provides access to the underground galleries of Istanbul.
