Mimar Sinan (; , ; – 17 July 1588) also known as Koca Mi'mâr Sinân Âğâ, ("Sinan Agha the Grand Architect" or "Grand Sinan") was the chief Ottoman architect, engineer and mathematician for sultans Suleiman the Magnificent, Selim II and Murad III. He was responsible for the construction of more than 300 major structures, including the Selimiye Mosque in Edirne, the Kanuni Sultan Suleiman Bridge in Büyükçekmece, and the Mehmed Paša Sokolović Bridge in Višegrad, as well as other more modest projects such as madrasas, külliyes, and bridges. His apprentices would later design the Sultan Ahmed Mosque in Istanbul and the Stari Most bridge in Mostar.
The son of a stonemason, he received a technical education and became a military engineer. He rose rapidly through the ranks to become first an officer and finally a Janissary commander, with the honorific title of Sinan.Goodwin (2001), p. 87 He refined his architectural and engineering skills while on campaign with the Janissaries, becoming expert at constructing fortifications of all kinds, as well as military infrastructure projects, such as roads, bridges and aqueducts.Kinross (1977), pp 214–215 At about the age of fifty, he was appointed as chief royal architect, applying the technical skills he had acquired in the army to the "creation of fine religious buildings" and civic structures of all kinds. He remained in this post for almost fifty years.
His masterpiece is the Selimiye Mosque in Edirne, although his most famous work is the Suleiman Mosque in Istanbul. He headed an extensive governmental department and trained many assistants who, in turn, distinguished themselves; these include Sedefkar Mehmed Agha, architect of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque and Mimar Hayruddin, architect of the Stari Most. He is considered the greatest architect of the classical period of Ottoman architecture and has been compared to Michelangelo, his contemporary in the West.De Osa, Veronica.Saoud (2007), p. 7 Michelangelo and his plans for St. Peter's Basilica in Rome were well known in Istanbul, since Leonardo da Vinci and he had been invited, in 1502 and 1505 respectively, by the Sublime Porte to submit plans for a bridge spanning the Golden Horn.Vasari (1963), Book IV, p. 122 Mimar Sinan's works are among the most influential buildings in history.
Early years and background
Mimar Sinan was born with the name Joseph in a small town called Ağırnas near the city of Kayseri in Anatolia (as stated in an order by Sultan Selim II). His birth is variously placed either between 1489 and 1491 or between 1494 and 1499. His origin is disputed, which is usually stated to be ArmenianZaryan, Sinan, Armenian Soviet Encyclopedia, p. 385.Kouymjian, Dickran. "Armenia from the Fall of the Cilician Kingdom (1375) to the Forced Emigration under Shah Abbas (1604)" in The Armenian People From Ancient to Modern Times, Volume II: Foreign Dominion to Statehood: The Fifteenth Century to the Twentieth Century. Richard G. Hovannisian (ed.). New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997, p. 13. .Alboyajian (1937), vol. 2, pp. 1533-34."Sinan, an Armenian architect": Chisholm, Hugh. The Encyclopaedia Britannica; A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, Literature and General Information. 1910, page 426. or Cappadocian Greek.Talbot, Hamlin Architecture Through the Ages. University of Michigan, p. 208. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, Sinan had Armenian or Greek origin. One argument that lends credence to his Rum (Orthodox Christian) background is a decree by Selim II dated Ramadan 7 981 (ca. December 30, 1573), which granted Sinan's request to forgive and spare his relatives from the general exile of Kayseri's Rum (Orthodox Christian) community to the island of Cyprus; this decree was published in the June 1930-May 1931 edition of the Istanbul Turkish journal Türk Tarihi Encümeni Mecmuası. Godfrey Goodwin stated that "after the Ottoman conquest of Cyprus in 1571, when Selim II decided to repopulate the island by transferring Rum (Orthodox Christian) families from the Karaman Eyalet, Sinan intervened on behalf of his family and obtained two orders from the Sultan in council exempting them from deportation." Relatives of Mimar Sinan from Ağırnas and a few other villages were also included on the list. One of his relatives traveled to Istanbul and explained the situation to Sinan. Sinan wrote a petition to the sultan in the form of a letter, requesting that his relatives be removed from the list. Selim II granted this request; in this letter, the names of his relatives are given as Üleysi, Kudanşah, and Sarıoğlu Düvenci. Furthermore, in the work titled "Tarih-i Edirne" by Örfî Mehmed Ağa, Mimar Sinan himself states that his grandfather's name was "Toğan/Doğan"; all of these names are of Turkish origin, which makes it likely that he came from a Turkified Greek or Christian Turkish family.Akgündüz Ahmed & Öztürk Said, (2011), Ottoman History, Misperfections and Truths, IUR Press (Islamitische Universiteit Rotterdam), Pg.196, See online. Quoted from the book: "some Jewish writers claimed that the actual name of Sinan the Architect was Yusuf Sinan and was, accordingly, Jewish... According to yet another view, Sinan came from a Christian Turkish family, whose father's name was Abdulmennan and his grandfather's Doğan Yusuf."MERIÇ, Rıfkı Melûl, Mimar Sinan, Hayatı, Eseri-I, Mimar Sinan’ın Hayatına Eserlerine Dair Metinler, Türk Tarih Kurumu, Ankara, 1965RIFAT, Ahmet: Lüğât-ı Tarihiyye ve Coğrafiyye, C. VI, İstanbul 1299/1883.23 No.lu Mühimme Defteri, s. 240. Krş ve bkz. Göyünç, “a.g.m.”, s. 38; Ayrıca bkz. Ahmet Refik, Türk Tarih Encümeni Mecmuası, C. 1, S. 5, Haziran 1930 - Mayıs 1931, s. 10; Aynı yazarın, Hazine-i Evrak Vesikalarına Göre Türk Müslümanları adlı kitabı.Bkz. Jennigs, s. 34’den naklen, N. Göyünç’ün “Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nda Ermeniler” isimli çalışması, İstanbul 1983.
Sinan's place of birth, Ağırnas, was a Rum (Orthodox Christian) village with no Armenian inhabitants, which some scholars argue would give more credence to the theory of him being of Greek or Christian Turkish origin. Additionally, before the Greeks evacuated the village, a Cappadocian Greek family from the village named Taşçıoğlu (Greek: Ταστσιόγλου) had claimed Sinan as a member of their own family. Turkish scholars have meanwhile argued that Sinan's family was Christian Turkish. In 1935, a council commissioned by the Turkish Historical Society went so far as to open up Sinan's tomb and measure his skull so as demonstrate his Turkish "racial" heritage.Bettany Hughes, Istanbul: A Tale of Three Cities (New York: Da Capo Press, 2017), p. 437.
Less popular theories among scholars are that Sinan was Albanian, or even Jewish, A local tradition in the village of Shiroka Lăka holds that Sinan was of Bulgarian origin and his family came from that village.
Sinan grew up helping his father in his work, and by the time that he was conscripted would have had a good grounding in the practicalities of building work.Encyclopædia Britannica: Sinan (Ottoman architect) There are three brief records (Anonymous Text; Architectural Masterpieces; Book of Architecture) in the library of Topkapı Palace, dictated by Sinan to his friend and biographer Mustafa Sâi Çelebi. In these manuscripts, Sinan divulges some details of his youth and military career. His father is referred to as "Abdülmennan" (literally "Servant of the Generous and Merciful One"), a title which was commonly used in the Ottoman period to define the non-Muslim father of a Muslim convert.
Military career In 1512, Sinan was conscripted into Ottoman service under the devshirme system.Kinross, pp 214–215. He was sent to Constantinople to be trained as an officer of the Janissary Corps and converted to Islam. He was too old to be admitted to the imperial Enderun School in the Topkapı Palace but was sent instead to an auxiliary school. Some records claim that he might have served the Grand Vizier Pargalı İbrahim Pasha as a novice of the Ibrahim Pasha School. Possibly, he was given the Islamic name Sinan there. He initially learned carpentry and mathematics but through his intellectual qualities and ambitions, he soon assisted the leading architects and got his training as an architect.
During the next six years, he also trained to be a Janissary officer (acemioğlan). He possibly joined Selim I in his last military campaign, Rhodes according to some sources, but when the Sultan died, this project ended. Two years later he witnessed the conquest of Belgrade. Under the new sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, he was present, as a member of the Household Cavalry, at the Battle of Mohács. He was promoted to captain of the Royal Guard and then given command of the Infantry Cadet Corps. He was later stationed in Austria, where he commanded the 62nd Orta of the Rifle Corps. He became a master of archery, while at the same time, as an architect, learning the weak points of structures when gunning them down. In 1535 he participated in the Baghdad campaign as a commanding officer of the Royal Guard. In 1537 he went on expeditions to Corfu and Apulia and Moldavia.Sinan (in Dictionary of Islamic Architecture)
During these campaigns he proved himself an able architect and engineer. When the Ottoman army captured Cairo, Sinan was promoted to chief architect and was given the privilege of tearing down any buildings in the captured city that were not according to the city plan. During the campaign in the East, he assisted in the building of defences and bridges, such as a bridge across the Danube. He converted churches into mosques. During the Persian campaign in 1535 he built ships for the army and the artillery to cross Lake Van. For this he was given the title Haseki'i, Sergeant-at-Arms in the body guard of the Sultan, a rank equivalent to that of the Janissary Ağa.
When Chelebi Lütfi Pasha became Grand Vizier in 1539, he appointed Sinan, who had previously served under his command, to the office of Architect of the Abode of Felicity. This was the start of a remarkable career. The job entailed the supervision infrastructure construction and the flow of supplies within the Ottoman Empire. He was also responsible for the design and construction of public works, such as roads, waterworks and bridges. Through the years he transformed his office into that of Architect of the Empire, an elaborate government department, with greater powers than his supervising minister. He became the head of a whole Corps of architects, training a team of assistants, deputies and pupils.
Work
His training as an army engineer gave Sinan an empirical approach to architecture rather than a theoretical one--similar to Europe-based architects of roughly the same period such as Brunelleschi and Michelangelo.
Various sources state that Sinan was the architect of at least 374 structures which included 92 mosques; 52 small mosques (mescit); 55 schools of theology (medrese); 7 schools for Koran reciters (darülkurra); 20 mausoleums (türbe); 17 public kitchens (imaret); 3 hospitals (darüşşifa); 6 aqueducts; 10 bridges; 20 caravanserais; 36 palaces and mansions; 8 vaults; and 48 baths.A list of the buildings designed by Mimar Sinan Sinan held the position of chief architect of the palace, which meant being the overseer of all construction work of the Ottoman Empire, for nearly 50 years, working with a large team of assistants consisting of architects and master builders.
The development and maturing stages of Sinan's career can be illustrated by three major works. The first two of these are in Istanbul: the Şehzade Mosque, which he calls a work of his apprenticeship period and the Süleymaniye Mosque, which is the work of his qualification stage. The Selimiye Mosque in Edirne is the product of his master stage.