SULTAN AHMED MOSQUE

Description

Essentials about the Sultan Ahmed Mosque in brief

The Sultan Ahmed Mosque is generally considered the largest and most magnificent mosque in Istanbul and is therefore logically one of the city’s main sights. With its beautiful domes and slender minarets stretching towards the sky, the mosque is one of the finest examples of Ottoman architecture. Since the secularization of Hagia Sophia, which is only a short distance away, the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, often referred to as the “Blue Mosque” because of its abundance of blue and white tiles, has been Istanbul’s main mosque.

The history of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque

As its name suggests, the mosque was commissioned by Sultan Ahmed I in 1609 and completed in 1616. The master builder was Mehmet Ağa, a student of the famous Ottoman architect Sinan.

In Europe, the Sultan Ahmed Mosque is often called the “Blue Mosque” because of its abundance of blue and white tiles. They adorn the dome and the upper part of the walls, but are younger than the building itself. More significant in terms of art history are the tiles on the lower part of the walls and the stands. They date from the heyday of the famous Iznik faiences and show traditional plant motifs, with green and blue tones dominating. The painting of the interior was changed to pink.

The minarets of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque

The mosque has six minarets; only the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina, with ten, and the Main Mosque in Mecca, with nine, have more minarets than the Sultan Ahmed Mosque. As the court chronicler wrote, when the contract was awarded, the Sultan had required the architect to gild the minarets. However, since the gold leaf to be spent would have completely exceeded the budget given to him, the architect Mehmet Ağa “interrogated” himself and made the Turkish word “altin” (meaning “gold”) into the number “alti” (meaning “six”).

The prayer room of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque

The prayer room is almost square, 53 meters long and 51 meters wide. The main dome has a diameter of 23.5 meters and is 43 meters high. It is supported by four pointed arches and four shallow spandrels, which again rest on four huge, five-meter-thick columns. 260 windows light up the interior. The stained glass panes are modern replicas of the original 17th century ones.

The buildings at the Sultan Ahmed Mosque

The mosque and courtyard were surrounded by a wall, of which only the northern part still exists. It separates the mosque from the other buildings of the mosque complex. In the adjacent mausoleum, which is open to visitors, rests builder Ahmed I, his wife and three of his sons.

In the upper part of the courtyard entrance on the west side there is a heavy iron chain. Thus, the sultan who entered the courtyard on horseback had to bow his head at this point if he did not want to bump into the chain. A symbolic act so that the sultan could not enter the mosque with his head raised, that is, in the pose of pride.