Istanbul Fatih district, which was named after Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror (Turkish: "Fatih Sultan Mehmed"), corresponds to what was, until the Ottoman conquest in 1453, the whole of the city of Constantinople (today is the capital district and called the "historic peninsula" of Istanbul) on the southern shore of the Golden Horn, across the medieval Genoese citadel of Galata on the northern shore. The Genoese fortifications in Galata were largely demolished in the 19th century, leaving only the Galata Tower, to make way for the northward expansion of the city. Galata (Karaköy) is today a quarter within the Beyoğlu (Pera) district,
Galata Bridge and principal religious and secular institutions of the empire, and the districts of Galata, Beyoğlu, Şişli and Harbiye, where a large proportion of the inhabitants were non-Muslims and where foreign merchants and diplomats lived and worked. As Peyami Safa wrote in his novel, "Fatih-Harbiye", a person who went from Fatih to Harbiye via the bridge set foot in a different civilization and a different culture. Apart from its place in fiction, the romantic appearance of the Galata Bridge made it the subject of many paintings and engravings. Galata Bridge The Galata Bridge (, ) is a bridge that spans the