Mosques, mosques, mosques, mosquitos......

Over the last couple of days there have been many, many mosques. Our local scholar for this portion is actually a grad student at the University of Chicago, but also a local (Istanbul) boy made good. He knows a great deal about architecture, design, post modernism, nationalism (he does not approve of the latter two, it would appear!!) and mosques.

I will not bore you with descriptions of each one, but will make some general observations. First off, the mosques we are seeing, are magnificent works of architecture and engineering. They are massive, impressive, Impossible, and complex. A mosque in this sense is not just a building or even a place of worship. Instead, it is a community. Most of these mosques had, in addition to the worship area such things as elementary schools, madrasas (places to train religious leaders, hospitals, hospices, soup kitchens for the poor, and much more. Some of them even had medical schools.

The ones we saw today were the mosques of Suleiman the Magnificent, of the early to mid 16th century. He was contemporary with Charles V, Holy Roman Emporer and Henry VIII of England, and Pope Clement VII and Martin Luther and Francis I of France and Barbarossa the Pirate (incidentally, he hired the latter and his brother to run the Ottoman navies). His aim was to become the next Solomon (that's what his name is equivalent to. His self image was to be ruler of the known world; to be known for creating a world ruled by justice, and so on. Among his greatest legacies are the mosques and public areas he had built. In some ways the most famous is the Blue Mosque.. not know that way here..... it's an accidental name. Weather and other depradations had made a blue wash on the tiles and westerners thought it was how it was supposed to be. The name stuck for the west, even if it was debunked! The Blue Mosque is one of the most famous among tourists as well. We went in tonight just after 5 o'clock prayer and there were swarms of tourists, many of them badly behaved. Though women were required to wear head coverings, many did not have them. The mosque officials provided them, but the rule was pretty widely broken by a large group of sunburned blonde tourists who I think may have been from somewhere in Northern Europe. However, the most magnificent part was the windows, so I'm attaching one of those pictures. The Blue Mosque is one of the newer mosques of Suleiman, built by a student of his best architect, Sinan, and our guide tells us there is nothing new in it. Sniffff.

But we did see a couple of gems. The Hasiki Sultan Cami is small but moving. It was built for Suleiman's wife, known at times as Hasiki and sometimes as Roxelana. (which simply means the Russian woman, since she was booty of war who became his wife.. he wrote her soppy love sonnets throughout their life and she exercised much power, even being legitimately married to him.... she didn't have many admirers in certain circles. Her mosque is small, but beautifully desingned. It is also surrounded by kitchen, madrasa, elementary school, and a soup kitchen. A school for young boys to learn Koran is still operational and we got to watch for a few minutes as the little boys recited their lessons. I think the imam was glad when we left. we certainly disrupted the school day. THings are ever the same, however... I'm attaching a picture of a parent-teacher conference.....


My favorite was the Cerzade Mosque (there should be a little tail on the bottom of the C and the pronunciation is Share-zah-dee. This was commissioned by a heartbroken Suleiman on the untimely early death of his favorite son. He commissioned Sinan to design it and see to its construction. Sinan started life in slvery, becme an officer of the janissaries. His military role was to be a military engineer, figuring out defensive structures and such He was 49 when Suleiman put him in charge of this mosque and he had lots of detractors who tried to get him fired. However, Suleiman trusted him with it and he created a beautiful struture. Our expert said he was influenced by the Italian architect Bramonte, ad by some of the sketches of Leonardo Da Vinci as well as some elements of St. Peter's in Rome. It is lovely --- finished in only 4 years (there's that slavery element again) and is exceptional in symmetry and moving in its concept.

Then on to the great Sulimaniye, which many think is Sinan's master work. Simple commission from his boss: Make it better than the ancient temple of Solomon. And maybe he did. It has amazing mathematical elements in the arches; it supports huge domes far above the floor. It is a perfect cube with the dome a perfect hemisphere. Gorgeous mosaic work, ornamentation, use of marble and granite.

On a lighter note, there were the omnipresent kedis... kitties in and around every mosque. They are gentle cats, eager to be patted and talked to. Though we did have to rescue one tiny kitten who got caught in a bit of fence. He wasn't all that grateful, either!