7-tower fortress from 1458, known for its royal dungeon that imprisoned many well-known people. “Fortress of the Seven Towers”) is a fortified historic structure located in the Yedikule neighbourhood of Fatih, in Istanbul.
Built in 1458 on the commission of Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II, the seven-tower complex was created by adding three new towers and fully enclosing a section of the ancient Walls of Constantinople, including the two twin towers that originally constituted the triumphal Golden Gate (Turkish: Altınkapı) built by Roman Emperors Theodosius I and Theodosius II.
The fortress came to be known as the home of a formidable royal dungeon that housed notable figures throughout its history, and the associated intrigue captured the public’s imagination over the centuries in various legends, stories, and the arts.
After the conquest of Constantinople the Sultan gave priority to official construction projects such as Yedikule and his first seraglio, Saray-i Atik. Yedikule, Fortress of Seven Towers, was erected as the official treasury fort of the Empire around the year 1457 (Özgüven 1996: 95–99). Witnesses described the building as one of the palaces of the Sultan. Each tower of the Yedikule functioned as the storage of precious goods, documents, armoury, coins, and golden and silver ingots. Sultan knew well from his ancestors that protection of the fort was one of the high-priority matters of state (Clavijo 1970: 187–188). That the structure was built as a fortress points out the existence of a military outpost in charge of defending the official treasury against hostile attacks. The treasury was later transferred to the inner section of the Topkapı Palace in the sixteenth century and thereafter Seven Towers became the prison of prestigious captives.
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