Selimiye Mosque, Üsküdar

Selimiye Mosque
Büyük Selimiye Camii
Istanbul Selimiye Mosque Exterior 6589.jpg
Religion
AffiliationIslam
Location
LocationÜsküdar, Istanbul, Turkey
Selimiye Mosque, Üsküdar is located in Istanbul
Selimiye Mosque, Üsküdar
Shown within Istanbul
Geographic coordinates41°00′35″N 29°01′00″E / 41.00966°N 29.01655°E / 41.00966; 29.01655Coordinates: 41°00′35″N 29°01′00″E / 41.00966°N 29.01655°E / 41.00966; 29.01655
Architecture
TypeMosque
StyleOttoman Baroque
Groundbreaking1801
Completed1805
Specifications
Minaret(s)2
Materialscut stone, marble

The Selimiye Mosque (Turkish: (Büyük) Selimiye Camii, lit.'(Great) Mosque of Selim') is a mosque situated in the district of Üsküdar in İstanbul, Turkey, near the Selimiye Barracks. The mosque was commissioned by Ottoman Sultan Selim III (reigned 1789–1807) and built between 1801 and 1805.

Background

View of the Selimiye Barracks from the Bosphorus

The Selimiye complex was built by Selim III between 1801 and 1805. It is located next to the Selimiye Barracks, the largest Ottoman barracks built in this period, which was constructed between 1800 and 1803. This building was burned down by revolting Janissaries in 1812 but it was rebuilt in stone by Mahmud II between 1825 and 1828 and further expanded to its current form by Abdülmecid I between 1842 and 1853. The barracks was a new building type in Ottoman architecture which arose in conjunction with Selim III's reform attempts, the Nizam-I Cedid ("New Order"), which among other things created a new Western-style army. Selim's construction of both the barracks and the mosque complex was likely part of an overall plan and was likely meant, in part, to symbolize the New Order.

Three men served as chief court architects during the mosque's construction: but the main architect may have been Foti Kalfa, a Christian master carpenter. The mosque was part of a külliye (charitable complex) that also included dependencies such as a mektep (primary school), a muvakkithane timekeeper's house ( a fountain, and a hammam (bathhouse). More innovatively, it also included an array of factories, shops, and modern facilities such as a printing house, all arranged to form the nucleus of a new neighbourhood with a regular grid of streets. Today, however, only the mosque has been preserved mostly unchanged since its construction. The minarets of the mosque were rebuilt in 1822.

Architecture

Front view of the mosque and its entrance portico

The mosque is built with high-quality stone in the Ottoman Baroque style that dominated the 18th century. Its design illustrates the degree of influence exerted by the earlier Beylerbeyi Mosque (1777–1778) built by his predecessor, Abdülhamid I, which incorporates a wide multi-story imperial pavilion (a kind of private lounge and reception area for the sultan) that stretches across the front façade of the mosque, in contrast with earlier mosques which were preceded by a courtyard or an arched entrance portico. Like its predecessor, the Selimiye Mosque incorporates an imperial pavilion, but the design was further refined: the two wings of the pavilion are raised on a marble arcade and there is space in the middle, between the two wings, where a staircase and entrance portico leads into the mosque, allowing for a more monumental entrance to be retained. The imperial pavilion itself contains various rooms and halls that functioned like a mini-palace for the sultan and his entourage.

The prayer hall is covered by a single large dome with pendentives at its corners. The side galleries that were usually present inside earlier mosques were in this case moved completely outside the prayer hall, along the building's exterior, leaving the interior more open and unencumbered. A long inscription in gold on a black background runs in a band around most of the hall, similar in style to the inscription inside the earlier Nuruosmaniye Mosque. It contains the Surah al-Fath (surah of "victory"). The rest of the painted decoration inside the mosque today is not original and is painted in an anachronistic classical style. At the back of the prayer hall, opposite the mihrab, is a gallery or balcony that grants access between the mosque and the imperial pavilion. The sultan's loge (hünkâr mahfili), on the right-hand side near the prayer hall's entrance, is fully integrated into the lateral wall of the mosque and stands inside an extension of the imperial pavilion instead of being a balcony or box standing inside the prayer hall. The loge opens to the prayer hall through arched opening that allows for an easy view of the congregation but not of the mihrab.

The building is notable overall for its high-quality stone decoration. The exterior is marked by Baroque stone moldings along its edges and sculpted keystones for its arches, among other details. Inside, the mosque's minbar and mihrab are made of marble richly carved with Baroque motifs. The columns of the mosque's arcades have Ionic capitals. One minor detail that was characteristic of the 18th century are the small ornate birdhouses carved in stone on the exterior of the mosque, situated on the corner turrets.


This page was last updated at 2022-08-08 02:39 UTC. Update now. View original page.

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