Less than sublime

Histories of Europe in the years leading up to World War I (a particular interest of mine) often refer to the Ottoman Empire as "the Sublime Porte." I always thought that was a poetic reference to the Bosphorus, as the gate between Europe and Asia, or the entrance to the Black Sea, or something.

But the "porte" is actually just that, a doorway or gate leading to the office of the grand vizier (what the Ottomans called their prime minister):


While it is undeniably a porte, and whatever it might have been in the 1800s, today it is certainly a bit less than sublime.