Rodosçuk

Rodosçuk lies on the northern shore of the Sea of Marmara, where the fertile plains of Thrace meet the water. Earlier known as Rhaidestos and Rodosto, the town became a port for grain shipped towards Constantinople. Its markets and religious buildings grew with the prosperity of a coastal town connected to the capital and the surrounding countryside.

In the sixteenth century Grand Vizier Rüstem Pasha endowed a complex here, including a mosque, school, baths, market and caravanserai. The mosque, dated 1553 by its inscription, was designed by the imperial architect Sinan. In the eighteenth century Rodosçuk sheltered the exiled Hungarian prince Ferenc Rákóczi and his companions. His secretary Kelemen Mikes described a town inhabited by Turks, Greeks, Armenians and Jews, recording the daily life of the exile community on the Marmara shore.