Phanar
Phanar, Fanar or Phanari (Greek Φανάρι, Turkish Fener) is a neighborhood midway up the Golden Horn, within the borough of Fatih in Istanbul (Constantinople). The streets in the area are full of historic wooden houses, churches, and synagogues dating from Byzantine and Ottoman times.
After the Fall of Constantinople in 1453, the Phanar district was home to most of the Greeks who remained in the city. The Eastern Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople moved to the area as well, and is still located there. As a result, Phanar is often used as shorthand for the Ecumenical Patriarchate just as Vatican is used for the leadership of the Roman Catholic Church.
The Greek inhabitants of Phanar were called Phanariotes. Wealthy Phanariotes were appointed voivodes of Wallachia and Moldavia by the Ottoman Empire between 1711 and 1821.
The name comes from Greek "Fanari" (φανάρι) meaning lantern.[1] During the city's Byzantine period, there was within the district a columnar monument, topped with a lantern.
See also
- Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, currently Bartholomew I of Constantinople
- Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople
- Church of St George
- Phanar Greek Orthodox College
- Greeks in Turkey
References
External links
A portion of content for this article is credited to Wikipedia. Content under GNU Free Documentation License(GFDL)