Sultan Mehmed II Never Bought Hagia Sophia
The Claim
Ottoman leader Sultan Mehmed II the Conqueror actually bought Hagia Sophia with his own money.
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Emerging story
A heavily circulating claim has been doing rounds that Sultan Muhammad II (Muhammad al-Fatih) had bought the Hagia Sophia building from the Patriarch when he conquered Constantinople in 1453 and then converted it into a mosque. Claims were circulating across the MENA region.
This claim originated after a Turkish court officially annulled a 1934 government decree to turn Hagia Sophia into a museum, stating that it was unlawful, thus opening the door to turning Hagia Sophia into a mosque again. This news has aroused many concerns and caused huge controversy.
It is also widely spread in multiple languages by well-known people, Islamic figures, journalists and accounts with a large follower and audience base.
Misbar’s Analysis
As the story goes back more than 500 years, Misbar's team conducted an investigation that included a review of the most prominent history books that spoke about the Conquest of Constantinople, and fount it to be false.
After reviewing books such as The Fall of Constantinople 1453 by Steven Runciman and The Siege and the Fall of Constantinople in 1453: Historiography, Topography, and Military Studies by Marios Philippides and Walter K. Hanak, we found no evidence to prove that Sultan Mehmed II had ever bought the church. Not even in Ottoman history sources, they all state that it was conquered, seized and then converted into a mosque.
Mark Cartwright of Ancient History Encyclopedia writes: "In the afternoon, Mehmed entered the city himself, called an end to the pillaging and declared that the Hagia Sophia church be immediately converted into a mosque. It was a powerful statement that the city’s role as a bastion of Christianity for twelve centuries was now over. Mehmed then rounded up the most important survivors from the city’s nobility and executed them."
