Dedicated by Emperor Justinian in 537 AD, the Haghia Sophia was topped by the largest dome ever constructed -- a record it held for a thousand years until the construction of St. Peter's in Rome.

Built as a Christian Church, in 1453 following the Ottoman Turk's invasion of Constantinople it was converted into a Muslim Mosque.

In the 1920s, President Ataturk took it out of religious service and turned it into a museum -- deftly settling the controversy over whether it should be restored as a Christian Church or remain a Mosque.