Suleymaniye Mosque

• Key facts


  Architect: Mimar Sinan (1490-1588)

  Patron: Sultan Süleyman I (ruled from 1520-66)

  Date of construction: 1548-1559

  Function: Mosque - a Muslim place of worship, urban complex, monument to Imperial grandeur

  Nationality: Ottoman

  Location: Istanbul (previously Constantinople), Turkey

  Materials: marble, granite and porphyry
• Central plan


  situated so the building is directed towards Mecca
• Square interior
• Dome (qubba in Arabic)


  • Represents the vault of heaven, carried on piers and buttresses
  • flanked by two semi-domes with buttresses in the walls, half inside the building and half outside
• Grand fenestrated tympanum arches...


  ...dominate the façades divided into three sections by buttresses
• Pendentives...


  ...supports which lift the dome above the piers on the interior
• Huge courtyard on west side with peristyle arcade
• Columns have lozenge and muqarnas capitals
• Four minarets (towers – for the muezzin who calls the faithful to prayer, and as a visual symbol) – shows it has been endowed by a Sultan (otherwise would have only one or two). The north-south axis is accentuated by varying size of each matching pair. , contribute to the pyramidal composition of the mosque.
• Ten galleries (serifes) shows that Süleyman was the 10th Ottoman sultan
• The interior is legible from the exterior, with unbounded space and multiple layers of 249 windows
• Mihrab:


  a niche in the wall which symbolises the place where the prophet Muhammad stood when he addressed the faithful in the mosque at Medina
• Minbar: pulpit or elevated platform from which the Imam leads the service


  pulpit or elevated platform from which the Imam leads the service
• Muqarnas:


  ornamental vaulting like a hood, evoking a gate
• Qibla:


  tri-partite wall in which the mihrab is set, decorated with floral patterns in tiles, and stained glass to symbolise paradise. These include peonies and chrysanthemums from east Asia and tulips from central Asia.
• Iznik tiles: 


  richly coloured tiles for architectural decoration were part of the Ottoman ‘dynastic signature’. Similar designs are found on a wide range of objects.
• Calligraphy in a unified style focuses on themes of worship and divine forgiveness; Koranic roundels
• Raised on a podium the mosque complex is sculpted in three dimensions upon layered terraces and seems to grow organically from a hill dominating the cityscape, with its lateral facades given unusual dominance.
• The triple pointed arches separating the central square from the side galleries are carried on two red granite columns giving an

  elongated volumetric appearance to the building.
• The rectangular courtyard to the N.W. has a central marble fountain and three-storey gatehouse – an unprecedented feature.
• Patronage context (political)


  Known to his people as Suleyman the Lawgiver, he instituted major legislative changes relating to society, education, taxation and criminal law. He harmonized the relationship between the two forms of Ottoman law: sultanic (Kanun) and religious (Sharia).
• Patronage context (cultural)


  Every sultan, when young, learned a craft and Süleyman was a goldsmith. He also became a great patron of culture, overseeing the "Golden" age of the Ottoman Empire in its artistic, literary and architectural development. Süleyman is also famous for his writings as a poet (in both Turkish and Persian).
• Artist - Mimar Sinan


  “The most celebrated architect of the pre-modern Islamic lands is bolstered by his affinity between his centrally planned domed mosques and Italian Renaissance churches: an affinity based in the shared Roman-Byzantine heritage of the eastern Mediterranean basin.” (Gülru Necipoğlu)