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Sinan, History's Most Prolific Architect: How a Master Builder Transformed Islam
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11825 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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8 / 1987 |
1,962 Words |
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Aptullah Kuran
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The great Turkish architect Sinan ibn Abdulmennan will be commemorated in Turkey and elsewhere next year on the occasion of the four-hundredth anniversary of his death. Sinan was chief court architect under three sultans: Suleyman the Magnificent (1520-1566), Selim II (1566-1574), and Murad III (1574-1595). He was appointed to this post in 1538 and held it until his death in 1588. During those fifty years, he was responsible for hundreds of buildings commissioned by the imperial family and important viziers. Sinan built from the shores of the Adriatic to the Persian Gulf and from the Crimea to the Hejaz. But more significant than the impressive number of buildings he designed is their remarkable quality.
Sinan brought Ottoman classical architecture to its logical conclusion. Under his dynamic direction and through his astonishing output, Ottoman architecture was transformed into a universal style as forceful and as refined as that of the contemporary Renaissance.
Sinan's Early Life
Little is known about Sinan's early life other than his origins in Cappadocia and conscription by the sultan's forces in Agirnas, a village near the city of Kayseri. Since he was recruited for the elite Janissary Corps, it can be assumed that he met the Corps' demanding requirements. But because records of the Janissaries have not survived, we do not know either his Christian name (all Janissaries were Christian-born) or date of birth. Judging by references in contemporary manuscripts containing biographical material about Sinan, we can surmise that he was recruited in 1512, soon after Selim I's accession.
The boys recruited into the Janissary Corps were first hired out to Turkish farms to learn the tenets of Islam, the Turkish language, and Ottoman customs. Later, after passing an examination, they became cadets and began their military training. As vacancies occurred in Janissary units and were reported to the Palace, they were filled by appointments from the cadet companies by decree of the sultan. Recruits serving in the provinces were brought to Constantinople and Edirne to fill the vacancies among the cadets.
Sinan completed his provincial service and term of cadetship in nine years, taking his place among the ranks of the Janissaries in 1521. He fought in Suleyman the Magnificent's Belgrade campaign during the summer months of that year. Then he participated successively in the imperial campaigns of Rhodes (1522), Mohacs (1526), Vienna (1529), Iraq and Persia (1534-1535), Corfu and Apulia (1537), and Moldavia (1538).
The military campaigns in which Sinan took part assured his rise in the Janissary Corps. After Mohacs he was appointed company commander. A few years later he was promoted to chief catapult officer. After his return from Baghdad in 1535, he was made a Hasseki - the best-paid and most prestigious officers of the Janissaries, who served as imperial guards. They wore a distinctive uniform and received a fief for life. Sinan's fief was at Vize in Eastern Thrace.
More important than Sinan's rise in the Janissary Corps was the opportunity Suleyman the Magnificent's campaigns gave him to visit scores of historic cities in Asia and Europe. No doubt he examined the architectural monuments along the campaign routes and stored away
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