The Suleymaniye Mosque, raised above the Golden Horn in Istanbul, is the masterwork of the great Ottoman architect Sinan and the building in which the Ottoman tradition found its own voice.
Sinan and the imperial commission
Built between 1550 and 1557 for Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent by Mimar Sinan, chief imperial architect, the mosque answered a problem the Ottomans had worked at for a century: how to build something to rival the vast domed space of the Byzantine Hagia Sophia, which had stood in the city since the sixth century. Sinan's design, a great central dome carried on a clear and balanced structure, is usually read as the point at which Ottoman architecture ceased merely responding to the Byzantines and began speaking for itself; Sinan himself regarded it as among his finest works, ranking it in his own account as the achievement of his maturity.
A social complex, not only a mosque
The Suleymaniye is not a mosque alone but a kulliye, a whole endowed foundation: the prayer hall stands among colleges, a medical school, a hospital, a public kitchen feeding the poor, a caravanserai, baths and shops, all supported by the endowment and all understood as part of the religious act of charity. This integration of worship, learning and welfare in a single endowed complex is characteristic of Ottoman piety and of Islamic charitable foundations more broadly.
Living mosque and tombs
Suleyman and his wife Hurrem Sultan are buried in domed tombs in the garden behind the mosque, and Sinan's own modest tomb stands nearby. The Suleymaniye remains an active mosque and a dominant feature of the Istanbul skyline, part of the historic areas of the city inscribed as a World Heritage site; it continues in daily use for prayer while receiving very large numbers of visitors.