Suleymaniye Mosque
 At
one's first glance there are two things that are particularly remarkable
in the ancient monuments of the Ottomans: the choice of the site and the
perfect unity of the whole. Whether or not it is in a ra~sed place, the
site always has a view of vast open spaces and however far one may look,
one may see the sky. The structure as a whole is broad and imposing. All
details of the monument, howev- er charged with multiple ornaments it may
be, simultaneously con- tribute to a general effect that is always simple
and always unique.
İf, fmong all the
masterpieces which are imbued with the genius of Master Sinan Master and
of his pupils, there is one that fills more perfectly than the others
these fundamental conditions of Ottoman architecture, it is undoubtedly
the Süleymaniye. Situated at the top of a hill dominating the Kantarcılar
district between the Ministry of Wlar and the Office of the Sheikhulislam,
the Süleymaniye soars majestically towards the sky with nothing to hinder
its ascent. From the vast platform of its enclosure, one captures at a
single glance Europe and Asia, the two seas that bathe Istanbul, and the
smiling Princes Isles. Further still, in the vaporous transparency of the
horizon, the giant Bithynian Olympus takes shape against a pure sky,
standing like an ever present witness to the memory of the cradle of
ancient Ottoman power. Confronted by such a tableau, the spirit can
conceive only noble ideas. Founded in year 964 of the Hegira (1556 of the
Christian era) by Sultan Süleyman the Lawgiver, for whom history has also
decreed the names of "the Great" and "the Magnificent'; the
Süleymaniye is preceded by an interior court or square flanked by four
minarets. By this number, according to tradition, the founder wanted to
indicate that he was the fourth Ottoman sovereign
since the aonquest of Constantinople. In the same
way, the total number of the bal conies of its minarets indicates that he
was the tenth sultan since Osman Ghazi, the glorious root of his line.
The two minarets
located at the two sides of the facade have two balconies each, and the
two other two, which are at the other end of the square on each side öf
the porch, have three balconies each. The total number, for the four
minarets, yields ten balconies, all with corbelling in stalactites. Three
beautiful doors whose open- ings are formed of flattened curues are each
surmounted by an ogee arch and give access through the frontage and the
two other sides of the courtyard. A cloister of twenty four arcades runs
around and is supported by an equal number of columns. The pair closest to
the door in the facade are of porphyry; of the remainder, twelve
columns of pink granite alternate with ten of white marble. All are of the
crystallized order. Their capitals are of white marble, and the edges of
their stalactites heavily gilded.
Domes,
which number twenty four, surmount the gallery of tbe cloister.
Their cupolas are paînted with ornaments and flowers on a ground, and the
largest, located midway along the porch, in front of the entrance to the
nave, is decorated with pendentives in white marble stalactites, with
gilding on the edges of crystalliza- tions. The door of the nave is a
niche decorated with stalactites, also fashioned from gilded white marble
in a design of great puri- ty and aspect of true monumentality. The
proportions are large. Two other smaller niches are located along each
side at half the distance between the entrance to the nave and the
courtyard wall. The windows of the porch have quadrangular bays surmounted
by ogee arches lavishly decorated with glazed tiles that have a royal blue
ground on which beautiful Arabic letters are inter.- laced, tracing out in
pure white sacred verses from the Quran.
A very simple
fountain, in the form of a parallelogram with four vertical faces and
covered by a zinc roof, occupies the center of the square. Its decoration,
sober and gracious, consists of a metal grill painted in emerald green and
an openwork lattice of geometrical rosettes, above which runs a frieze of
white marble carued with broad leaves whose hearts are slightly tinted
aqua- marine. ~ The court is entirely paved with enormous flagstones of
white marble, except for the passage which gives access, through the
porch, inside the mosque. There, in front of.the main door, is placed a
round monolithic flagstone of the richest porphyry with a diameter of
approximately two meters. If we should believe a popular legend associated
with this flagstone, it marks a tragic event and played a bloody role
during the construction of the Süleymaniye courtyard. Sultan Süleyman
had himself chosen and indicated a sample of the most precious porphyry
with which to enrich, the place before the mihrab inside mosque which indi
cates the direction of Mecca towards which the faithful perform their prostrations.
He spelled out the particulars of size and finish to a skilful workman who
knew the destination of the stone. This craftsman, who was a Christian,
thought he would do a pious deed by carving on the flagstone a cross,
perhaps hoping that merely by the sight of this emblem, all the Muslims
would convert spontaneously. He had undoubtedly not re~l'ected, or perhaps
he was unaware, that the Islamic religion absolutely proscribes plâces
reserved for the worship of any image. The flagstone of porphyry became,
by virtue of the fact that a cross had even been carved on it, unsuitable
with the ornamentation of mosque.
Sultan Süleyman,
indignant at seeing all his care thus rendered useless, was provoked, they
say, into a violent rage. He condemned the workman to death, and ordered
that it be carried out then and there, in front of his eyes. T'hey
thus brought into the courtyard a throne, on which the sovereign sat down
to preside over the execu- tion. The sculptor was decapitated in his
presence and to preserue at the same time the memory of this disobedience
and its terrible punishment, they carued deeply into the block of the
marble where the seat of the sultan had sat and where the head of the
victim had fallen, two signs which vaguely represent the outline of a
t.hrone and that of a head; they are still to be seen there today.
As for the porphyry, flagstone, so that it would not be completely wasted,
they turned it over so that the cross was on the bottom and then installed
it in front of the principal entrance to the nave with the result that,
unbeknownst to themselves, all who pass over it are treading on the cross.
It is thus fulfills a function quite contrary to the proselytical
intentions of the executed sculptor. Nothing prevents us from believ- ing
in this legend, which bears all the attributes characteristic of the
truth, for it is known that leniency did not number among the favorite
virtues of Sultan Süleyman the Lawgiver. Moreover, at that time,
tolerance and mercy were practiced no better in the ~est than th.ey were
in the East. Francis I, the restorer of arts and the patron of literature,
also had the philosopher and scholar Etienne Dolet publicly burned alive;
Charles V formally took part in the "acts of faith" of the
Spanish Inquisition.
The Islamic
religion, at least, has never had an institution sim- ilar to the Holy
Office. Be that as it may, afterpassing over the leg- endary porphyry
flagstone, we enter the nave, where we first of all are overcome by our
admiration of the lofty and vast cupola of the dome, painted in a wash of
clear tones of blue, white, and gold. These three colors form the basis of
the entire decorative harmony of the building: its paintings, sculptures,
precious marbles, tiles, etc, both inside and out. Everywhere, the white
and blue domi- nate-the white especially. A few pink granite and porphyry
columns or insets, a few lines the color of blood, freshen the light
without interrupting this harmony; the gildings of the stalactites are
everywhere applied with a solemnity that does not disturb the tranquility.
The colossal vault is supported by four gigantic upright piers. Around the
sides are columns that support the lat- eral galleries and the first
landing, which contains the loges for the ladies and extends in a square
around the nave. Three circu- lar galleries gird the central rotunda.
During the nights of Ramazan and on other holy days, splendid
illuminations engulf the balustrades which circumscribe them, and
highlight all the elegant details of the stars, flowers, foliage, and
scrollwork in flame. The first of these gallerie~..is reached by two
staircases that are located conveniently close tö the entrance. The two
uppergal- leries, the highest of which is at the same level as the great
central cupola, is reached by wooden ladders placed on the roof outside
the dome. In this last gallery, there is a curious acoustical effect:
sounds made anywhere in the interior are concentrated here and even
softly-spoken words uttered in the nave or the aisles may be distinctly
heard here.
Another curiosity
worthy of remark, and which could be pro- posed as an example to
architects, is the following one: tunnels dug in the ground and
faced with solid masonry, lead from the interior of the mosque to external
tanks that are used for the dis- tribution of water to all the
dependencies of the Süleymaniye. The famous architect of this mosque,
Master Sinan, combined this sup- ply so as to take advantage of it in
order to maintain inside the nave a mild and uniform temperature. By means
of wooden trap doors that are located all over the central part of the
floor of the nave, the air contained in these underground tunnels is fed
into the mosque, where, as a result, the temperature is always warm in
winter and cool in summer. All the inscriptions that decorate the Süleymaniye
were executed by the famous calligrapher Hasan Ç'elebi, who is buried
beside his master in Sütlüce by the Sweet T~aters of Europe. Among the
outstanding calligraphic ornamen- tation one should particularly mention
the large rosettes of glazed tiles adorned with white letters on a royal
blue ground and framed by borders of foliage executed in turquoise blue
which decorate the two sides of the mihrab. Like thepulpitplaced to its
left, the mihrab is made of white marble, cazved in stalactites that are
gilded with gold. ?'he marble plates composing the pulpit number
only four.~ the gate and base are formed of single slabs and measure eight
meters, one in its length and the other in its height. 2'hese are also the
measurements of the niche in which the mihrab is set. The imperial loge,
situated at the right, is also of white. It is supported by porphyry
columns with capitals in the crystallized order that are fashioned of
gilded white marble. There are two richly-deco- rated fountains that are
intended for ablutions. The door of this loge is, like all the woodwork of
the building, engulfed in carved geometric rosettes. A kürsü
(pulpit) abutting the pillar closer to the imperial loge is also worthy of
mentioning for the remarkable
excecution of work
of this last kind, in which walnut has been finely cut with
open-work and carved with boldness and delica- cy. At the other end of the
nave, on the pillar on the opposite side, the balcony of the muezzin is
set. Simpler, but almost as beauti- ful as the imperial loge, it is also
of the crystallized order. Behind the muezzin's balcony along the low
sides, is located~the library, separated from the nave by a superb screen
of brass worked in rococo ornamentation. It was repaired during the reign
of Sultan Mahmud I by his grand vizier, Mustafa Pasha. More recently, this
screen was renovated by Ahmed Vefik Efendi. .
Leaving the nave,
one passes in front of external galleries with superimposed orders:
the lower is in the crystallized order and has ogival arcades in which
broad and high arches alternate with low and narrow ones, The upper order
is planar with a row of reg- ular arcades that are narrow and high. On the
side of the mosque which looJzs towards Mecca there are cemeteries planted
with rose bushes in the center of which have been erected several splendid
tombs among which is that of the mosque's benefactor. Among all these
illustrious dead, the architect of Süleymaniye does not appear;
instead, Master Sinan built for himself a modest and charming mausoleum,
located not far from there, at the intersec- tion of two streets, between
the enclosure outside of the mosque and the Office of the Sheikhulislam,
which in his day was the headquarters of the Janissaries.
It is known that
this great artist was a member of that terrify- ing militia which, after
having raised the military might of Turkey to its brightest apogee, then
turned and because of its continued mutinies and the bloody tyranny that
it exercised over the sover eigns themselves and all their subjects, its
abolition became essen- tial for the advancement of the empire. During the
entire course of his long and glorious life Master Sinan never ceased to
receive the pay and pension due to the haseki ~privy household~ corps of
Janissaries. The violent suppression of this turbulent and undisci- plined
body, ordered by Sultan Mahmud II, continued until the very tomb leaving
no trace nor any emblem that might remind posterity of its odious memory:
even the stone turbans that distin- guished the burial places of these
eternally proscribed militiamen were broken. In one honorable exception
the tomb of Master Sinan was respected, and thus, thanks to the very
special indul- gence of the sovereign, one may see still see standing over
the slab of white marble, the grandmaster Ottoman architecture, the typi-
cal turban of the haseki corps. The principal dependencies of the Süleymaniye
are: a special college for the study of the oral tradi- tions of the
Prophet; four higher schools (medreses); a prepara- tory
college for the sciences; a school of medicine; a primary
school; a kitchen and hospice for students; a great public
bath; and a very famous asylum for lunatics.
The historian Peçevi
(v 1, p 424) says that, according to what was appeared in the accounts of
the director of construction, the expenditure for this building amounted
to 896,.383 florins, which was worth 53, 782,900 aspers then, of which SO
were equivalent' to a gurush. The gurush in the time of Sultan Süleyman
is esti- mated by Mr Belin, in the Mecidiye currency to be worth SO pias-
tres and 27 paras.
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