Neorion Harbour

The Neorion Harbour (Greek: Λιμὴν τοῦ Νεωρίου or Λιμὴν τῶν Νεωρίων) was a harbour in the city of Constantinople, active from the foundation of the city in the 4th century until the late Ottoman period. It was the first port to be built in Constantinople after its re-foundation by Constantine the Great, and the second in the area after the Prosphorion, which was the port of ancient Byzantium.

The harbour lay on the southern shore of the Golden Horn, east of today's Galata Bridge, in the sixth region of Constantinople. In the Ottoman Istanbul this area corresponded to the Bahçekapı ("Gate of the garden") neighborhood, located between the customs warehouses and the Abdülhamit Medrese: today the site belongs to the Mahalle of Bahcekapi in Eminönü, which is part of the Fatih district (the walled city) of Istanbul. The inlet where the basin once lay is now silted up, and is presently occupied by the ferry terminals to the Bosphorus, Kadiköy and Üsküdar.

The Neorion was the first harbour to be erected in Constantinople after its foundation, and the second in the area after the Prosphorion harbour, which existed already under the city's previous incarnation as Byzantium, and lay in the next inlet to the east, right under the northwest slope of the first hill of the city, in the quarter named "ta Eugeniou" (Greek: τὰ Εὑγενίου). Being placed on the southern shore of the Golden Horn, the Neorion was not subjected to the heavy storms provoked by the Lodos, the south-west wind blowing from the Marmara Sea; in addition, harbour silting was not such a big problem as for the harbours on the city's southern shore. In fact, entrance of sail ships into the Golden Horn was possible with all winds; the only wind which could create some problems and a light silting being the North wind. The harbour had the double function of commercial port and shipyard, and hosted also a factory producing oars (Greek: κοπάρια). Since the main activity of the harbour was trade, the area was surrounded by many storehouses. This fact is underlined by the many fires which ravaged the port quarter: in 433 all the storehouses burned; in 465 a fire started here engulfed eight regions of the city; and in 559 the warehouses burned again. According to a late tradition, St. Andrew the Apostle settled here and made the quarter the centre of his preaching when he landed in Byzantium. In 697 Emperor Leontios (r. 695-98) had the harbour cleaned from the mud, since the area was suspected to be a plague breeding ground.

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Wikipedia