A statue depicting an Ottoman prince taking a selfie is officially under police protection in Turkey after vandals damaged its camera and cracked its saber in two.
Authorities in Amasya, a historical town in northern Turkey, were seen wrapping yellow crime scene tape around the statue of Prince Sehzade Mustafa on Monday, which had become both a hit for tourists -- appearing often on Instagram and Twitter since it was installed May 9 -- and a lightning rod for locals who found it disrespectful.
"I find the construction of the statue a meaningless attempt to make fun of a historically important figure," said Yusuf Erdemli, a local resident, to Today's Zaman. "However, the person who broke the cell phone should be found and punished by police.”
"Everybody knows that cell phones did not exist during that time period," said another. "It is disrespectful to our ancestors to portray a prince in that way. Whoever broke that part of the statue should have just removed it completely."
Özçekim yapan şehzade heykelinin telefonu kırıldı. Kim yaptı özelden söylesin :)) pic.twitter.com/ujlAEDyXpU— Hüseyin Nihâl Atsız™ (@uluturkcuatsiz) May 10, 2015
The town's deputy mayor, Osman Akbaş, disagreed, telling Today's Zaman it was meant to be an homage to the city's "reputation for being the city of princes."
See selfies with the selfie-taking prince
selfie'ci şehzadenin kırık telefonuyla selfie... A photo posted by M&C&E (@merverdim1) on May 11, 2015 at 12:44am PDT
Televizyonlara konu olan meshur heykel :) #meshur#selfie#heykel# #Amasya#asker#Ben# A photo posted by HÜSEYîN (@huseyin1842) on May 11, 2015 at 6:37am PDT
İlle selfie çektirek diye tutturdu ben de kıramadım :)) A photo posted by Hasan VARLIK (@hasan.varlik) on May 10, 2015 at 12:29pm PDT
#سيلفي_ويه_الضلع A photo posted by @ahmedshowke on May 9, 2015 at 2:02pm PDT