Guide

The clock tower of Kastamonu stands on Sarayustu hill behind the government house and is one of the symbols of the city. It was built in 1885 by the governor Abdurrahman Pasha.

There is a story attached to it, still told locally and given by the Ministry as a legend rather than as record: that the bell of a clock at Sarayburnu in İstanbul struck at the wrong moment and caused one of the sultan's pregnant concubines to miscarry, and that the clock tower was exiled to Kastamonu for it. Whatever the truth of that, the hill is where people come for the view over the city, and there are places to sit and drink tea in the tower's shadow.