During centuries, it was in the middle of two of the great religions of the world: For the Christians, it was Hagia Sophia, Eglise of Holy Wisdom, l' church mother of the orthodoxe faith and the mille-year-old Byzantine Empire. For the Moslems, it became Ayasofya Camii, the mosque of Holy Wisdom and jewel d' Istanbul. But for people of all confessions, it was, according to the terms of the sixth century, l' Procope historian, “a spectacle d' a marvellous beauty, crushing with those which know it by completely incredible hearsay. Because it s' raise with a height to correspond to the sky… stands on the heights and looks at downwards on the remainder of the city…."...