Tekfur Sarayı, Theodosian Walls & Chora Balat Istanbul Guide

✓ Last reviewed: May 2026 — Verified and updated by our licensed Turkey travel experts. Prices, opening hours and visa rules reflect the latest 2026 guidance. Istanbul 360 — a 360° look at Istanbul filmed on our private city tour. Quick Answer: The Tekfur Sarayı (Palace of the Porphyrogenitus), the Theodosian Land Walls , and the Chora Church (Kariye Camii) form the late-Byzantine crown of upper Balat / Edirnekapı in Istanbul, Turkey . You can see all three on foot in roughly 3 hours, but the back-street approach from Balat is genuinely confusing — for safety and context we recommend visiting them with our guided 4-hour Balat & Fener walking tour . Why visit Tekfur Sarayı, the Theodosian Walls and Chora together? These three monuments tell a single story — the final two centuries of Byzantine Constantinople , from the Palaiologan Renaissance to the city's fall in 1453. They sit within a 700-metre arc on the upper ridge of the historic peninsula, just above the Balat and Fener neighbourhoods. Standing on the rampart of Tekfur Palace , you can literally see the painted dome of Chora and the broken silhouette of the Theodosian Land Walls running south toward the Sea of Marmara. For visitors who already love our Balat & Fener half-day itinerary , this upper loop is the natural "advanced" extension — but it is not a casual self-guided stroll, which is why we treat it as part of the guided 4-hour route rather than the 2-hour self-guided walk . What is Tekfur Sarayı (Palace of the Porphyrogenitus)? Tekfur Sarayı — literally "the Palace of the Sovereign" in Ottoman Turkish — is the only substantially intact Byzantine palace still standing in Istanbul, Turkey. Built in the late 13th to early 14th century as an annex of the much larger Blachernae Palace complex , it served as an imperial residence during the Palaiologan dynasty (1261-1453), the last ruling house of Byzantium. Its three-storey façade of alternating red brick and white marble is a textbook example of late-Byzan