POPULAR TOURIST SITE REOPENS

After a five-year restoration process the Basilica Cistern, a historical site in Istanbul, has been reopened to visitors. It’s a huge underground hall that was once part of a network of more than 100 cisterns, or tanks, that were used for water storage. The Romans began building the chamber and it was completed by the Byzantines and Ottomans who later ruled the area.

Built in 532AD, the cistern has 336 marble columns to help support its underground structure and once supplied the city and its palaces with running water.