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The Maiden's Tower (Kız Kulesi) is a tower on a small islet at the southern entrance of the Bosphorus strait, 200 m from the coast of Üsküdar in Istanbul, Turkey.
After the naval victory at Cyzicus, in 408 BC the Athenian general Alcibiades probably built a custom station for ships coming from the Black Sea on a small rock called Arcla. In 1110 Byzantine Emperor Alexius Comnenus built a wooden tower protected by a stone wall. From the tower an iron chain stretched across to another tower erected on the European shore in the Mangana quarter of Constantinople. The islet was then connected to the Asiatic shore through a defence wall whose underwater remains are still visible. During the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453, the tower held a Byzantine garrison commanded by the Venetian Gabriele Trevisano. Subsequently, the structure was used as a watchtower by the Ottomans during the reign of sultan Mehmed the Conqueror.
The tower was destroyed during the earthquake of 1509, rebuilt, and then burned down in 1721. Reconstruction was ordered by the grand vizier Damad Ibrahim Pasha and the new building was used as a lighthouse; the surrounding walls were repaired in 1731 and 1734. Then in 1763 the tower was reconstructed in more durable stone. From 1829 it was used as a quarantine station before being restored again by Sultan Mahmud II in 1832. In 1945 it was the turn of the harbour authority to patch it up.
Today the interior was converted into a café and restaurant, with views of the former Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman capital at Sarayburnu. Private boats ply back and forth between the tower and the shore throughout the day.
References:Rosenborg Palace was built in the period 1606-34 as Christian IV’s summerhouse just outside the ramparts of Copenhagen. Christian IV was very fond of the palace and often stayed at the castle when he resided in Copenhagen, and it was here that he died in 1648. After his death, the palace passed to his son King Frederik III, who together with his queen, Sophie Amalie, carried out several types of modernisation.
The last king who used the place as a residence was Frederik IV, and around 1720, Rosenborg was abandoned in favor of Frederiksborg Palace.Through the 1700s, considerable art treasures were collected at Rosenborg Castle, among other things items from the estates of deceased royalty and from Christiansborg after the fire there in 1794.
Soon the idea of a museum arose, and that was realised in 1833, which is The Royal Danish Collection’s official year of establishment.