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86 87OTTOMAN ARCHITECTURE_Alain Vimercati

HISTORY OF OTTOMAN ARCHITECTURE THE KLLIYES OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE

ISTANBULSLEYMANIYE KLLIYE,1550-1556

EDIRNEBEYAZIT II KLLIYE,1484-1488

BURSAYILDIRIM BEYAZIT KLLIYE,1391-1403

CAPITALS OF THE EMPIRE

After the conquest of the Christian cities Bursa, Edirne and Con-stantinoplethe Turkish sultans transformed each of them to maketheir capital. Each one marked a stage in the development of theyoung Ottoman Empire. This gave the possibility to discover andlearn from other cultures, like the Byzantines, but always in a way

of reinterpretation, according to the characteristic of the Ottomansown architecture and culture.

Although they are not too distant from each other, the three cities arevery different. Bursa is situated at the foot of the Olymp of Mysie,Edirne on a flat land irrigated by three rivers, Istanbul on the sea.Water used to be a determining factor for the planning of their cities,for it was celebrated by the Koran.

PUBLIC SPACES

The Turks way of life and especially their concept of life in societyhas also an influence on urbanism. Square are quite rare and are bigopen spaces where markets take place. The bazaar,in covered roadswith barrel vault is the Turkish citys shopping centre. Therefore onecannot find big public spaces for the community as they existed inthe Greek, Roman or Byzantine empire. Cafsin the open air, gen-erally near the mosque, or in green areas, are preferred as socialspaces but always in a informal way.

The klliyeis the most important part of the Ottoman cities, butits function doesnt correspond to this idea of public space. It is thereligious and social place, where in most cases there is a mosque, amadrasa, a hosptital, a refectory, a tomb, a library, and more.

The mosque and the klliye formes a well ordered complex apartfrom the urban structure of the residential areas.

AN ARCHITECTURE OF PROFILE

According to the Byzantine conception following the Roman tradi-tions, the cities were designed according to a plan in horizontal andarranged with arterial roads and squares. In contrast, that of Turkisharchitecture design begins with the profile of landscape to empha-size the vertical aspect, with the development of the most importantand representative buildings such as the mosques. It is with Sinanthat this concept will be further developed to the point that due to itsdominant position the mosque determines the profile of the wholecity.

The Turkish citys structure was determined by two factors: the no-madic origin of this people, and then by their conversion to Islam.Since its beginning Islam has always refused to give an exaggeratedimportance to the real world and to accumulating of wealth favoredby the city. The splendour and the monumentals dimensions werereserved for only the sacred buildings, especially the mosques.

It is probable that at the time of building the complex thecity extended all about it and that the layout of the com-plex was influenced by the lanes and adjacent houses.The asymmetrical urban form, with the buildings form-ing an irregular U-shape around the central axis of themosque, is determined by the conformation of the land.The buildings are situated on a flat landscape, this waythe silhouette of the mosque appears clearly visible. Itis like a campus, including, in a side, a big madrasa, aninfirmary and a psychiatric hospital, the whole formingthe school medicine.This result from the hierarchy and distinction betweenthe sacred building and the utilitarian buildings.

The complex was built by the architect Sinan (1491-1588), the most important architect of the ottoman em-pire. The layout is on a hill, which complicated Sinanstask but this enabled him to draw an advantage and to

confer this characteristic silhouette of the city. The sym-metric disposition of the other buildings in comparisonwith the main axle of the mosque confers a strong hi-erarchy to the complex. A beginning of hierarchizationbetween the sacred building and the ones surroundingit already existed in Edirne in the klliye Beyazit II, butSinan accentuated it more: the more he excelled him-self with the construction of mosques the less he caredabout faades of other buildings. In spite of this thecomplex is characterized by a very high precision regard-ing the general layout of the buildings.

The first complete klliye is the one of Bursa, the firstcapital of the Ottoman Empire. It included the mosque,the madrasa, the sultans turb, a nursery, a refecto-ry of the natives, public baths and a caravanserai. Thebuildings are situated on terraced land, on the outskirtof the city. There are no axes nor parallels that connectthe different buildings, there is no hierarchy as to thespaces that connect the whole complex, there is nopre-arranged system for the layout of the constructions,the disposition is only due to the conformation of theland. Being higher and larger than all the other build-ings the mosque dominates the whole complex. Thisis rather due to its silhouette than to its effective mass.

Ottoman ArchitectureH P S E R C S

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88 89OTTOMAN ARCHITECTURE Alain Vimercati

THE MADRASA THE HAMAMTHE MOSQUE

The Madrasa of Soliman Mosque, Istanbul

Yi ld iri m Be ya zi t k l li ye , m ad ra sa , 139 8- 140 3, Ed ir ne , P la n Ye ni -K ap li ca , 16 th ce ntu ry, Bu rs a, El ev at io n a nd pl anSACRED TURKISH ARCHITECTURE AND THE RELATION TO A

CHRISTIAN TRADITION

FROM THE HAGIA SOPHIA TO A LATE OTTOMAN CHURCH

FROM AN EARLY OTTOMAN MOSQUE TO THE SOLIMAN

MOSQUE

THE MOSQUE IN THE OTTOMAN TRADITION

Yeni-Kaplica, 16th century, Bursa

Yeni-Kaplica, 16th century, BursaAhmet Pasha Cami Madrasa, Istanbul Ali Pasha Hamam, 1573, TokatYildirim Beyazit klliye, Edirne

Themadrasais a school of theology, the plan of which had beeninherited from the Persian-seljukid madrasas, and evolves byreducing proportions and simplifying the forms. One can finda subordination to the dimensions and treatment of materialscomparable to those of a mosque.The typical plan of an Ottoman madrasa includes a porticoedcourtyard, flanked by vault- or dome-covered cells that were in-tended for use by students. A vaulted hall opens onto the court-yard, walled on three sides, with the fourth entirely open, situ-ated on the main axis.

The custom of public bathing is a very old ottoman tradition,strictly linked to the prescriptions concerning body hygiene aspresented in the Koran with regard to the cult. It also served asan alternating meeting place for both males and females. Thegeneral disposition of the hamamincludes an anteroom, a firstbath room with moderate temperature and then a steam bath,. Even at the climax of the Ottoman Empire the public bathsmaintained chiefly a practical and modest aspect, especially inthe external faade.

Seen from the outside, the first mosques (cami) of Brousse, Ed-irne and Istanbul are compact cube shaped constructions. Thisvolume changes progressively into a body of crystal-clearappearance. This is characterised by the minarets and the su-perimposed and jointed domes and semi domes that give thesilhouette that most clearly expresses the sacred Turkish archi-tecture. The external appearance always reflects the internal

structure. With few formal variations this one is composed withfour piers included in a central plan with square basement, con-nected with four big arches, serving as lateral bracing crownedwith a monumental buttress. Another characteristic preservedis the big entrance gate and the orientation of the mosque fromthe rear wall (kibla) in direction South/West, i.e. towards Mecca.

Sleymaniye Cami, 1550-1556, Istanbul

The first Ottoman mosques were composed of a succession ofspaces, formed by massive walls supporting the dome (domedprayer hall). The big change of conception occurs with the con-quest of Constantinople (1453) and the discovery of the church ofHagia Sophia as a reference. In time however Ottoman architectswould free themselves of this reference, as exemplified by theimportant Ottoman architect Sinan and his successors. The direc-tional space inherited by Saint-Sophia of the early Ottoman erawill evolve in plan to become sets of perfectly balanced spacesbased on rotating symmetries.

Sleymaniye Cami, 1550-1556, Istanbul

A B C

Yechil CamiMosque in Bursa(1421 AD)

Soliman Mosquein Istanbul bySinan (1556 AD)

A B

A

B

Selimiye-Cami Mosque, 1575, Edirne

Hagia Sophia(537 AD)

Selim Mosque inEdirne by Sinan(1571 AD)

Sultan AhmedMosque in Istan-bul (1609 AD)

A

B

C

Selimiye-Cami Mosque, 1575, Edirne

Ottoman ArchitectureB T

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Rstem Pasha Han, Istanbul

Rstem Pacha Han, Istanbul House, Ankara, 18th. century, Elevation and plan

Thehan (also called caravanserai) represents the only type ofhostel in the Ottoman Empire. Usually the han would be situatedin the center of the city, so their form had to adapt to the irregularconstructions in the urban urroundings. This kind of building hadno more than two storeys.

Their function was simple and purely utilitarian: individual roomsfor the travellers arranged around a hall with galleries for the dis-tribution. Another function was as trading place and market, dueto the high numbers of persons who were passing through forshort laps of time.

Compared to the mosques the Turkish residential houses andthe palace have a simple and modest aspect. Two factors deter-mine the living plan: firstly the climate and the landscape, andsecondly the Islamic religion which imposes a strict separationbetween the spaces of the men and those of women. For thisreason the rooms do not communicate but are articulated in L orU-shape around a hall-courtyard. This courtyard sapce for accessand living is a very important element of the house, becauseit is the commonly shared space and the place for access tothe fresh air. The number of floors rarely exceeds two, and thebuilding material generally used is wood.

Soliman Mosque, IstanbulYeni Cami, Adana

Faience

Set within the simple elevations of themajority of traditional houses the onlyfacade element to present its owner sappropriate social status to the outsideworld is the door. All symbolic attributescan therefore be found miniaturized inthis facade element, whether in iron,wooden sculpture or in stone.At the monumental scale there are theiwan, the mosques monumental gates,that are also richly ornate with the classi-cal elements of Ottoman decoration.

Faience tiles were used by the Ot-tomans to cover the internal spacesin order to visually dissolve the wallsmateriality and to eliminate any sign ofweight. The surface as a result appearshard, impenetrable and compact, but atthe same time radiant without glittering.In contrast to mosaics they reveal withprecision and clarity the outline of thetiled forms. In this way the walls looklike a glassy, clear continuous surface.

The stalactitesor muquarnas are deco-rative elements in stucco, inherited fromprimitive Turkish art. They were used toconnect the piers directly to the archsabove, to mask the geometric transitionbetween the walls and the domes to thecapitols of the columns. This motive isalso found around the piers to empha-size the junction with the external wallswhere the lateral archs are inserted.Their function is emphasize the internalspaces unity and structural rigor, in orderto conceal the tectonic transition.

Yechil Cami, Bursa

Hataunye Cami, To

Faience

90 91OTTOMAN ARCHITECTURE Alain Vimercati

THE HAN (CARAVANSERAI) HOUSES DOORSREVETEMENTSTALACTITES

Koza Han, Bursa Interior of a house, KonyaRstem Pasha Han, Istanbul Soliman Mosque, Istanbul

A E

Ottoman ArchitectureB T