Nurbanu Sultan

The bedroom is enclosed by delicately-carved panels, its walls layered with exquisite tiles from Iznik that reflect the muted morning light like a turquoise dream. Floral motifs on the panels and on the gilded sideboards begin to shine brightly in the sunlight that now beams down from a skylight on the arched ceiling. Süleyman's legendary paramour Nurbanu flutters her eyelids as she slowly stirs on her goose-down bed. The Venetian blonde with the lily-white face and the willowy figure hesitates to wake up completely lest she lose her extraordinary dream.

She had been debating where she should commission the mosque to be built. And this night an answer of sorts has been revealed to her. A white-bearded wise man came in her sleep with a strange instruction: "Let the wind lift your veil from the pier at Besiktas, and build your temple wherever it lands." She repeats the words until she has memorized them.

Her chest is heaving with excitement, her face lit-up with a smile of pure bliss. The year is 1570. The emerald-eyed Nurbanu Sultana obeys the oracle in her dream and hurls her veil into the wind at Besiktas. After an extended flight it settles down at the top of Toptasi hill.

She bids Sinan, the architect of all the ages, to adorn that hill with elegant domes and slender minarets.