The Sveti Sedmochislenitsi Church and formerly The Black Mosque is a Bulgarian Orthodox church in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria. It was created in 1547 as an Ottoman mosque later converted into orthodox Church, and was inaugurated on 27 July 1903. The church is named after Cyril and Methodius and their five disciples, known in the Orthodox Church collectively as the Sedmochislenitsi.
The Black Mosque was commissioned by Sofu Mehmed Pasha, former governor-general of Rumelia, to Mimar Sinan. It was constructed at the place of a former nunnery of the Rila Monastery and an Early Christian temple from the 4th-5th century, the ruins of which were excavated in 1901. An even older construction, a pagan temple of Asclepius from Roman Serdica, was also discovered in the mosque's foundations.
The mosque received its more popular name, the Black Mosque, after the dark granite from which its minaret was made. The minaret collapsed during an earthquake in the 19th century and the mosque was abandoned by the Ottomans after the Liberation of Bulgaria in 1878 to become used as a military warehouse and prison.
The architect who suggested the conversion of the once Ottoman mosque into a Christian church was the Russian Alexander Pomerantsev, responsible for the Upper Trade Rows on Red Square, among other buildings. The Bulgarian architects Yordan Milanov and Petko Momchilov designed the dome, the narthex and the bell tower in a traditional Bulgarian style, inspired by the movement of Romanticism. Only the central hall and the dome of the former mosque were preserved, with four oval bays, a narthex and an altar section being added.
The construction works took a year, between 27 May 1901 and 6 May 1902, but the complete inner decoration did not finish until 1996. Young artists painted the icons and among the first donors were Tsar Ferdinand and Ivan Evstratiev Geshov.
References:The ancient Argos Theater was built in 320 BC. and is located in Argos, Greece against Larissa Hill. Nearby from this site is Agora, Roman Odeon, and the Baths of Argos. The theater is one of the largest architectural developments in Greece and was renovated in ca 120 AD.
The Hellenistic theater at Argos is cut into the hillside of the Larisa, with 90 steps up a steep incline, forming a narrow rectilinear cavea. Among the largest theaters in Greece, it held about 20,000 spectators and is divided by two landings into three horizontal sections. Staircases further divide the cavea into four cunei, corresponding to the tribes of Argos A high wall was erected to prevent unauthorized access into the theatron and may have helped the acoustics, but it is said the sound quality is still very good today.
Around 120 CE, both theaters were renovated in the Roman style.