Domes in Bosnia

Domes in Bosnia

Amra Hadžimuhamedović 1, Fehim Hadžimuhamedović 2

Abstract ‘Domes in Bosnia” focuses on the architecture of historic domed mosques in Bosnia. The paper’s contribution is aimed towards an understanding of the significance of the domes of Bosnian mosques in the history of Bosnia’s architecture as a whole and reference to the degree of authenticity and identity of Bosnia’s domed mosques. The paper will deal with the domed mosques built in Bosnia from the 15th to the 19th century. The paper will provide an overview of the study of domed mosques in Bosnia to date; their basic typological and stylistic features; the significance of domed mosques in the urban landscape; the social and symbolic significance of domed mosques; the symbolic meaning of domed mosques focusing on the importance of the reflection of the religious and cosmological order in their architecture; and the destruction of the patterns of Bosnia’s historic urban landscapes.

Key words Bosnia, mosque, historic urban landscape, monumental domes, wooden domes, concealed domes

1.

INTRODUCTION

The distinctive nature of Bosnia’s historic urban landscapes, which reflect the continuity and intermingling of sacred traditions – Christianity, Islam and Judaism – over a long period, would at first glance suggest that the role of the dome in shaping these historic urban landscapes is an important one. This paper, however, postulates that the primary significance of the dome in Bosnia is symbolic and ritual, and that it is reflected in an equally striking manner, albeit in different formal media, both in the Bosnian urban landscape and in the interior expression of religious edifices. The traditional and historical factors of the urban landscape and of Bosnian sacred architecture, with particular focus on mosque architecture, form the subject-matter of this paper. Since almost every traditional domed mosque in Bosnia was built in the 16th or 17th century, a time dominated by pre-modern world views, the paper is based on the connection between the symbolic meaning and cosmological paradigms of pre-modern Muslim architecture. In all its forms, human action in Bosnia was imbued with religious principles from the 16th right through to the 19th century. Therefore the architecture from the times of the Ottoman Empire may also be seen as based on the

1

Faculty of Art and Social Sciences, International University of Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, [email protected] 2 Academy of Fine Arts, University of Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, [email protected]

same models of the search for answers to the essential questions of organization and the fashioning of form in space as was mediaeval ‘pre-modern’ architecture in the rest of Europe. In the narrower sense, the premise is that both architectural design and the understanding and use of architecture under the Ottoman Empire were dominated by a metaphysical approach, both imbued with and read in terms of traditional wisdom, and by treating the architectural process and the work of architecture as a tool in the quest for spiritual essence. In light of such a definition of Bosnian architecture during the Ottoman period, it is not enough to study this architecture using one’s knowledge of structural features, style and materials – it is vital also to introduce criteria by which the symbolic expression and religious-cosmological predeterminants of architectural forms, their relationship with nature and the way they link to one another will be analyzed. Samer Akkach notes the universal applicability and presence of this approach in our understanding of Muslim architecture. The Platonic-Aristotelian duality of the sensible and the intelligible, the physical and metaphysical, along with the Ptolemaic geocentric model were uncontested. For over a millennium, from Mujahid b. Jabr’s (d. 722) very basic cosmography to Haqqi’s (d. 1780) most elaborate Ma_rifat-name, a remarkable consistency can be traced in the cosmic form and structure. The Islamic cosmos consisted of the seen and unseen, the divine and human domains, with each having its own inhabitants, landscape, and order. (Akkach, 2005)i

The aim of this paper is to draw attention to some possible ways of reading the duality of the sensible and the intelligible in the choice of the dome as an formative element in Bosnian architecture, its design, and its persistency in the Bosnian expression of the plurality of religious forms.

2.

THE UNIVERSAL AND THE BOSNIAN IDEA OF THE DOME

Why can the most important architectural achievements in the construction of Bosnian domes be linked to the Muslim religious content of Bosnia’s sacred map? The remarkable role of the dome in shaping the distinctive nature of the architecture that most studies of art history dub Muslim or Islamic is a fact that is stated almost axiomatically. Despite the considerable diversity in this sweepingly-named corpus, and all the regionally and historically dictated unique features of Bosnian architecture, it cannot be denied that the dome is the most potent and most readily recognizable formal feature of the Muslim component of Bosnia’s historic urban landscapes. What is certain is that the dome became a feature of the corpus of the Bosnian built heritage as a significant architectural expression only from the late 16th or early 17th century. With the exception of the seminal pre-Slavic single-room, stone-built round house with a corbelled dome, known locally as bunje and of which only a few examples are preserved in the south-west of the country, 3 until the 16th century those few buildings with domes about which reliable information has been preserved were Orthodox Christian churches, built in the eastern regions of Bosnia. 4 The domes of these buildings were no more than 4 m in diameter, were elevated on a tall drum, and resembled a dome surmounting a tower. (Čurčić 2010) In Bosnia’s Catholic architecture, the longitudinal, usually simple basilical type of building was the norm, and as a result the dome did not constitute a significant element in the definition of spatial expression until the 19th century. (Benac et al. 1966) It is not irrelevant to the fundamental thesis of this study, however, to emphasize that rounded ceilings in religious buildings, denoting the infinity of space and symbolizing the heavens, are not uncommon, and that this feature was usually achieved by means of keel, pointed, domical or barrel vaults in a number of buildings dating from before the 16th century. The marked presence of the dome and its important role in the formation of Bosnian urban landscapes are associated with the very early 16th century, when purely Muslim facilities began to appear in 3

Some bunjas may still be found in the village of Lipa, near Livno An Orthodox church was built in the mid 15th century at Sopotnica near Goražde, on Mt. Ozren, followed by others in the mid 16th century at Papraća near Zvornik and Vozuća near Zavidovići which, unlike earlier churches in Bosnia – which were vaulted, with gabled roofs, and were markedly elongated in plan – acquired a feature that was in part a continuation of Byzantine architecture – a small dome on a tall drum. In these buildings, the dome is a purely secondary formal factor, compositionally contributing to the spatial articulation of the building but not accentuating the uniformity of spatial expression, which is what constituted the basic formal concept of most domed mosques. 4

Bosnia’s principal towns and cities, namely the graves of the ‘good’ 5, mosques, hammams (public baths) and madrasas (schools) – all of which have the dome as their most striking feature.

3.

THE DUALITY OF THE SENSIBLE AND THE INTELLIGIBLE IN THE BOSNIAN DOMES’ EXPRESSION

In every general consideration of the appearance and use of the dome in a certain area the author is once again faced with the questions which Baldwin Smith proposes at the beginning of his study, question invariably intended to solve the puzzle of the symbolic power of the dome since its first appearance in the history of architecture, which completely overshadows its utilitarian and structural expedience. (Smith, 1950) As evidence for the use of the dome to denote a sacred space or that of a particularly important house, Smith turns to the etymology of the word ‘dome,’ which derives from the Latin domus, a house. 'In Middle and Late Latin doma meant “house,’ “roof,’ and only at times “cupola” while during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance it was used all over Europe to designate a revered house, a Domus Dei. This persistent association with the idea of an important house, which will be seen going back to the first beginnings of domical architecture, survived in the Italian duomo, the German, Icelandic, and Danish Dom, meaning “cathedral,” and as late as 1656 in the English dome meaning “Town-House,” “Guild-Hall,” “State-House,” and “Meeting-house” in a city. (Smith, 1950)

There is no Bosnian word for dome or cupola. Nowadays the word used exclusively is kupola, deriving in Bosnian and many other Indo-European languages from the Latin cupula (classical Latin cupella from the Greek κύπελλον kupellon), the diminutive of the word cupa. Petar Skok records the use of the word as an erudite architectural term towards the end of the 16th century, and notes the use of kuba or kube in the 17th century; these latter were until recently more common than the word kupola, in Bosnian deriving via Turkish from the Arabic qubba. In the vernacular, the word used for any vaulted space is ćemer or kemer, which is of Persian origin and may denote a brace. (Skok 1971) This excursion into the linguistic attributes of the architectural feature that is the subject of this paper provides further evidence for the fact that in both Bosnia and the surrounding region, sociological reflection on the dome dates only from the 16th century. Given the continuity of religious tradition in Bosnia, and in particular the historically intriguing schismatic Bosnian Church, 6 remains of which continued into the later centuries in the practices of Bosnian Muslims, it is important to note the persistency of belief in the holiness of natural features – caves, crevices and hilltops – as the formal origin in nature of the architectural form of the dome. The curves of cave vaults, rock hollows and mountain tops are the recognizable archetypal models for the interior and exterior form of the dome. In this religious and cosmological paradigm of the structure of space which, regardless of distinctive regional and cultural features, is present as the foundation for establishing spatial order (Akkach 2005), the role of the dome is to encompass, just as has the cosmic Mount Qaf in the spatial order of the mundus imaginalis. Henry Corbin describes Mt. Qaf as the ‘Sphere of Spheres surrounding the totality of the visible cosmos.’ (Corbin, 1978) The cosmic Mount Qaf, which for Muslim cosmology holds a central place in the definition of both the macrocosmos and the microcosmos, is not only expressed symbolically in the domes of Bosnia’s religious buildings from the 15th to the 19th century, but is also transposed to the natural environment – the mountain tops of Bosnia are places of pilgrimage and prayer, symbolizing the ascent to the emerald pole of Mount Qaf. Anthropological research into Bosnia’s sacred landscapes, albeit limited in extent, attests to this. (Mulaomerović, 2004-2005). 7 5

In Bosnia the adjective ‘good’ is used as a noun, and is the equivalent of the customary use of the Arabic word wali – friend of God. Visiting the graves of the ‘good’ and praying beside them is a surviving Bosnian tradition. 6 See: John V.A. Fine (2007). The Bosnian Church: Its Place in State and Society from the Thirteenth to the Fifteenth Century. Saqi Books, The Bosnian Institute, London; Pejo Čošković (2005). Crkva bosanska u XV stoljeću, Institut za istoriju, Sarajevo 7 “Congregational prayer on mountain peaks and hilltops has not gone unnoticed by anthropologists. Such prayers are particularly common among Bosnian Muslims. In 1872, Gavro Vučković noted that the Bosnian Muslims went to the highest, largest hills on Ilin-dan, St Elias’ Day, spending the night there, lighting fires and praying to God. On Aliđun – Ilin-dan, Sarajevo’s Muslims went to Trebević, the mountain above the city.

Fig 1. Mt Visočica, peak known as Džamija [Mosque], alt. 1967 m

Fig. 2: Djevojačka pećina [Maiden’s Cave], Brateljevići, Kladanj

Fig. 3. Representation of the vault of the heavens on a stećak tombstone, Bratunac

Descriptions of the magnitude of this cosmic sphere affixed to a rock with a diameter of 2,000 years and a height of 500 years pose a kind of architectural goal that may be seen as a proportional model in some of Bosnia’s oldest mosques with a saucer dome – a dome which is segmental in section: the Kuršumlija (Hajji Bali-bey) Mosque in Kladanj (1544-1555), the Čekrekčijina Mosque in Sarajevo (1526), the Skenderija Mosque in Sarajevo (1517 – demolished in 1936). 8 (Kreševljaković, 1938)

Fig. 4. The Čekrekčijina Mosque, Sarajevo

Fig. 5. The Kuršumlija Mosque, Kladanj

Fig. 6. The Skenderija Mosque, Sarajevo

Bosnia’s specific historical and cultural circumstances, particularly in the light of its distinctive religious tradition in mediaeval times and up to the beginning of the 16th century, when a metaphysical understanding of the world dictated the physical expressions of its architecture, did not displace the universal organization of architectural space based on the understanding of the cosmological order, the application of universal religious symbols. Signs of the cosmological order are contained in the bodily positions worshippers performing the daily ritual prayers, in the rituals of the pilgrimage and of the burial of the dead, and also in the numerical relationships reflecting the harmony of the cosmos and their repetition and use in architecture – the oneness of God, the duality of the sexes, the four corners of the world, the five pillars of the faith, the seven heavens, the twelve

Before World War II a number of prayers were held on St. George’s Day, beginning in Karići and followed by prayers on mountain tops such as Hum above Mujakovići near Olovo, Mt. Budoželjska, and Mt. Selečka, and ending on Aliđun eve on the hill above Karići. Prayers on the summit of Konjuh are also known, while prayers at sunrise on the summit of Ćaba at Treskavica are part of our family tradition, but sadly have already been lost.’ (Mulaomerović 2004-2005). 8 “Judging from the saucer dome, the builder of this mosque was from the school of the famous Turkish architect Hayruddin, a pupil of Mimar Sinan (1490-1588), the greatest Turkish architect of all times. Skenderija was also built by an architect from the same school, for this too had a saucer dome, while every other mosque was built by Sinan’s pupils.’ (Kreševljaković: 1938, p.20)

months, the eight angels supporting the Throne of God, the seventeen daily repetitions of the daily ritual prayers. (Haider 1988) The proposition concerning the preeminently symbolic role of the dome as a form designating sacrality can be confirmed by analyzing the use of the dome in Bosnia. In this paper we shall restrict ourselves to identifying the type and function of the buildings where the dome is dominant, and to the form of the dome and its use in Bosnian architecture. If we hypothesize that the dome is a built form that designates the sacred and the ritual function of space, it is essential to explain why it is, as already noted, that the dome features in Bosnia’s towns and cities not only in mosques, but also as a mandatory feature over graves, in hammams and in madrasas, and why the ceiling in the principal room of a number of Muslim houses is in the form of a wooden concealed dome or bears a rosette as a projection, as it were, of the dome on a flat ceiling, suggesting the sphericity and all-encompassing nature of the heavens it symbolizes. In both the historic urban landscapes of Bosnia and the country’s religious map, the dome is invariably the physical indicator of a sacred space. Though research to date has dealt with only a small percentage of domes in the architecture of Bosnia’s mosques, in this paper we seek to demonstrate that in both its spatial and its symbolic expression, the dome is associated with the concept of the pre-modern Bosnian mosque. 3.1.

Domes over the burial-places of the good

Though the first notable emphasis on the significance of the dome in Bosnian architecture dates from the early 16th century, the idea of the dome within this cultural phenomenon is inseparable on the one hand from the original forms of human habitation in Bosnia – caves and round-houses, with conical roofs clad with branches and straw – while on the other hand, it is the result of the memory, forming part of the universal Muslim tradition, of the early introduction of the qubba as the defining element of religious, and in particular mortuary, architecture, deriving from the primitive concept of the tenthouse, as a symbolically potent feature erected initially over the burial-places of the good. 9 (Smith, 1950) This concept of erecting a dome over graves as the symbol of the heavens took hold in Bosnia, sometimes reduced to its elementary expression as the pillars carrying the dome. The cubic space beneath the dome, symbolizing the earth and the suspension of movement, is often omitted. It is not uncommon even for the dome over the pillars to be dematerialized, consisting merely of curved strips of iron or omitted entirely, leaving the pillars to suggest that they are carrying the vault of the heavens.

Fig. 7. Turbes at Alifakovac, Sarajevo

3.2.

Fig. 8. The Turbes pod lipom [“under the lime tree’], Travnik

Fig. 9. Semiz Ali-Pasha’s turbe, Prača, Pale

Domes over hammams

Masonry domes are a regular architectural feature of every Bosnian hammam. Even where there are no domed mosques in the urban landscape, the dome of the hammam is a feature denoting the concentration of functions and volumes in the public zone of the town. Though Smith’s research in the mid twentieth century suggested that domes were used for public baths mainly for functional reasons (Smith 1950), in pre-modern Bosnian architecture the dome over a hammam equally denotes a ritual space of sacred symbolic value. Performing the regular ritual cleansing of the body became part of the Muslim sacred tradition as a religious obligation, with the essential content and form of the 9

See note No. 5.

ritual defined in the holy scriptures, the Qur’an (the Revelation), and the hadith (examples from the life of Muhammad, the Messenger of God). The requirement to cleanse the body is set out in several verses in the Qur’an, of which the following is quite explicit: Truly, Allah loves those who turn unto Him in repentance and loves those who purify themselves (by taking a bath and cleaning and washing thoroughly their private parts, bodies, for their prayers etc.) (Al

Baqarah 2:222) Recorded sayings of Muhammad, the Messenger of God, refer to purity or cleanliness as ‘half of faith’, filling that which is between heaven and earth. 10

Figs. 10 and 11. The hammam in Stolac prior to demolition in 1996.

Fig. 12. The Gazi Husrev-bey hammam in Sarajevo

Incomplete statistics suggest that 56 hammams were built in Bosnia and Herzegovina between the 15th and the 19th century, each with several domes. One may conclude from this that of all the masonry domes that have shaped the historic urban landscapes of Bosnia, the most numerous are hammam domes. Hammams have suffered damage and destruction, and none has survived in its original form, while only a few of those still extant are in a state that will allow for an elementary legibility of their original meaning in the historic urban landscape to be achieved by means of limited restoration. 3.3.

Domes over madrasas

The domes over madrasas also symbolically denote a sacred ritual space. The Qur’an clearly states that prayer, purity and study are three fundamental aspects of submission to God.

Fig. 13. The Šišman Ibrahim-Pasha madrasa Počitelj

10

Figs. 14 and 15. The Gazi Husrev-bey madrasa, Sarajevo

More detailed descriptions of the importance of regular cleansing of the body and maintaining bodily purity, as precise instructions on the form of the lesser ritual of abdest, performed five times a day, and the greater ritual of ghusl, performed in various circumstances but at least once a week, are to be found in several hadiths. The hadith given here confirms the importance of bodily cleanliness as an expression of faith. “Narrated Abu Malik al-Ash'ari: The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: Cleanliness is half of faith and, Praise be to Allah, fills the scale, and Glory be to Allah and Praise be to Allah, fill up what is between the heavens and the earth, and prayer is a light, and charity is proof (of one's faith) and endurance is a brightness and the Qur'an is a proof on your behalf or against you.(…).“ (Sahih Muslim, Book 2, Number 0432)

Just as We have sent among you a messenger from yourselves reciting to you Our verses and purifying you and teaching you the Book and wisdom and teaching you that which you did not know. (2:151)

Muhammad, the Messenger of God, said that seeking knowledge is the path to Heaven. 11 Bosnia’s madrasas consist of small rooms for one-to-one instruction and a large lecture room; all these rooms, in which the religious ritual of the quest for knowledge is performed, are domed. More than a hundred madrasas were built in Bosnia from the 16th to the 19th century, but only a few now survive in their original form. (Kasumović 1999) 3.4.

Domes in Bosnian houses

The idea of the ‘domed space’ – manifesting the sacred geometry of the circle over the square – is also expressed in every major room within the constellation of the Bosnian house with a central rosette motif, a solar wheel, a spider’s web on the wooden ceiling. This symbolic role of the ceiling, in reiterating the significance of diversity resolved in the Unicity of the Centre of All Things – the Oneness of God – by centralizing space, indicates the religious meaning of the home, in which the day-to-day activities of family life themselves represent in some sense a religious ritual. The home is also where the five daily prayers are performed, and a place of retreat in order to praise God, and as a result the rooms that are most strongly marked by religious symbolic features are known as the halvat, from the Arabic khalwa, a retreat, a secluded room. Similarly, in every pre-modern Bosnian mosque where there is no domical vault or semi-calotte, it is invariably denoted symbolically as a two-dimensional projection on the ceiling.

Fig. 16. Symbolic representation of a dome on the ceiling of the Đulhanuma house, Stolac

3.5.

Fig. 17. Dome over the main room in the Bišćević ćošak, Mostar

Fig. 18. Dome in the halvat of the Kolaković house, Blagaj (destroyed in 1992)

Monumental domed mosques in Bosnia

Notwithstanding these facts concerning the presence of domes in Bosnian religious spaces other than mosques, this paper, ‘Domes in Bosnia,’ concentrates on the architecture of historic domed mosques in Bosnia, and is part of a broader study on the meaning of the dome in Bosnian architecture and the formation of Bosnia’s historic urban landscapes. Studies of Bosnian Muslim religious architecture published to date have defined the basic typology of Bosnia’s mosques using two criteria: (1) the form of the roof – domed or hipped; and (2) the type of minaret – stone or wooden. Though the typological series based on these criteria suggest the use of more precise determinants, and the introduction of additional criteria and typological series, they remain the starting-point for a study of mosque architecture in Bosnia. In 1933 the Supreme Islamic Council published the first, and thus far the only relevant, inventory of mosques built in Bosnia from the early 16th to the end of the 19th century, identifying 1,120 mosques in all, 644 of which were in good condition, 351 semi-ruinous, and 125 in ruins. These figures reflect the state of affairs at the time the inventory was published, after a number of mosques had been destroyed by fire, uprisings and military campaigns against Bosnia’s towns and cities during the Ottoman period, by decision of the Austro-Hungarian authorities, or during World 11

Muhammad, God's Messenger, said: “Whoever follows a path in the pursuit of knowledge, Allah (SWT) will make a path to Paradise easy for him.’ (Narrated by al-Bukhaari, Kitaab al-‘Ilm, 10)

War I and the inter-war period, and included a number of newly-built mosques. Thus they cannot be regarded as an accurate or reliable basis for studying mosque-building while Bosnia was under Ottoman rule. (Hadžimuhamedović 1996; Hadžimuhamedović 1997). In this paper, therefore, all statistical data concerning the number of mosques of a certain type relating to the typological classification of domes mosques and to other domed buildings will be given by way of indication only, as the need to identify certain architectural and urbanistic patterns or paradigms, not as a scientifically determinable number. All the studies and statistical documents treat only monumental mosques with masonry domes, whether hemispherical or saucer as domed mosques. All Bosnian mosques of this type, with the exception of the Bey’s Mosque in Sarajevo and the Ferhadija Mosque in Banja Luka, are buildings with a central cubic or cuboid prayer hall covered by a single dome. The Bey’s Mosque and the Ferhadija Mosque are complex in plan, with additional side rooms and a space in front of the mihrab, covered in the case of the Bey’s Mosque by semi-domes and in Ferhadija by barrel vaults and semidomes. In both cases, unity of space is achieved both in the interior and in its exterior expression. Mehmed Mujezinović compiled his inventory of domed mosques in Bosnia as a supplement to and correction of the inventory published in 1938 by Hamdija Kreševljaković in his ‘Džamija i vakufnama Muslihudina Čekrekčije.’ His findings were that 35 domed mosques were built in nineteen towns in Bosnia during the Ottoman period, 28 of them in the 16th and 17th century. He identified the Balaguša Mosque in Livno, dating from 1514, as the oldest domed mosque, and the Ali-Pasha Rizvanbegović Mosque in Buna, dating from 1840-1850, as the most recent (Mujezinović 1998 p. 95).

Fig. 19. Interior of the Aladža Mosque in Foča

Fig. 20. Interior of the Ferhadija Mosque, Banja Luka

Fig. 21. Interior of the Karađoz-bey Mosque, Mostar

Fig. 22. Interior of the Ferhadija Mosque, Sarajevo

This typological definition and accompanying statistics were then taken up by Madžida Bećirbegović (Bećirbegović 1990) and Sabira Husedžinović (Husedžinović 2005), adding to the number the Azizija Mosque in Brezovo Polje, work on which began in 1863, the architecture of which reveals strong modernist influences, thus bringing to 37 the total number of pre-modern domed mosques known to date. Though it does not fall within the basic criterion, to this list could also be added the 16th-century Varoš Mosque in Travnik, which was burned down in 1903 and to which a dome was added when it was being rebuilt in 1906, though the original building had no dome. 12 (1) Balagijina (Balaguša) Mosque in Livno, built in 1514; (2) Mustafa Skenderpašić (Skenderija) Mosque in Sarajevo, built in 1517 (mosque demolished in 1935, minaret in 1960); (3) Sultan-Sulejman (Imperial) Mosque in Blagaj, built in 1519 (domed until 1892, the dome being replaced by a pyramidal roof when the mosque was renovated); (4) Čekrekči Muslihudin Mosque in Sarajevo, built in 1526; (5) Havadža Durak (Baščaršija) Mosque in Sarajevo, built in 1528; (6) Sinan-čauš (Džumanuša) Mosque in Livno, built in 1529; (7) Gazi Husrev-bey Mosque in Sarajevo, built in 1531; (8) Hasan-aga (Jeni) Mosque in Travnik, built in 1549; (9) Hasan Nezir (Aladža) Mosque in Foča, built in 1550; (10) Kuršumlija Mosque in Kladanj, built in the first half of the 16th century; (11) Buzadži hajji Hasan (Logavina) Mosque in Sarajevo, built in 1555; (12) Karađoz-bey Mosque in Mostar, built in 1557; (13) Hadim Ali-pasha Mosque in Sarajevo, built in 1561; (14) Ferhad-bey (Ferhadija) Mosque in Sarajevo, built in 1562; (15) Hajji Alija Mosque in Počitelj, built in 1562; (16) Nesuhaga Vučjaković in Mostar, built in 1564; (17) Careva Mosque in Sarajevo, built in 1565; (18) Selimija Mosque in Knežina, built in 1566.-1567; (19) Lala-pasha (Beglučka or Beglek) Mosque in Livno, built in 1567; (20) Sinan-bey Boljanić Mosque in Čajniče, built in 1570; (21) Mehmed-čauš Mosque in Konjic, built in 1579; (22) 12

Research into Bosnian domes so far makes reference only to masonry domes. All of them were made of stone except for the Azizija Mosque in Brezovo Polje, which was built of brick. (Hadžimuhamedović 2009). Most scholars of Bosnian Muslim architecture to date have focused on monumental domed mosques and public edifices (Knoll 1929; Bejtić 1853; Zdravković 1964; Andrejević 1972; Redžić 1983; Andrejević 1984; Pašić 1994; Husedžinović 2005), though all would agree with Andrej Andrejević’s when he remarks that ‘among the types of mosques identified in our country, there is not one that would be unknown in the mosque architecture of Turkey or among the Ottoman monuments of other Balkan countries.’ (Andrejević 1984, p. 69) Despite this assertion of the universal typological presence of domed mosques in the Ottoman Empire, since they were usually built as imperial mosques or endowed by the leading figures in the Empire, Bosnia’s mosques have several distinctive features which differentiate them from those of other regions in the Empire. These characteristics reflect Bosnian heritage and indigenous building methods as well as the involvement of local and Dubrovnik craftsmen, following instructions as they built but bringing to their work their own experience and understanding of space. (Kiel 1979)

Fig. 23. Aladža Mosque, Foča

Fig. 24. Sinan-pasha Mosque, Čajniče

Fig. 25. Bey’s Mosque, Sarajevo

The codification of construction and the transfer of experience from one part of the world to another was present in the Muslim architectural tradition from the very outset. The introduction of paper to the Muslim world is traditionally dated to 751, when the technique of paper-making was passed onto the Arabs by Chinese prisoners, and by the 14th century paper was readily available and widely used. Among other benefits, this made it possible to produce and distribute drawings and plans. This invention largely contributed to the globalization of architectural styles and the impressive uniformity of architectural expression throughout the Ottoman Empire. (Bloom 1993) The typological uniformity and clear architectural codification of Bosnia’s monumental domed mosques reduced the scope for individuality to the size and depth of the dome, the ratio between the

Hajji Ahmed Dukatar (Glavica) Mosque in Livno, built in 1588; (23) Ferhad-pasha (Ferhadija) Mosque in Banja Luka, built in 1579; (24) Ahmed-pasha (Čaršija) Mosque in Gračanica, built in 1593; (25) Deftedar (Arnaudija) Mosque in Banja Luka, built in 1594; (26) Kizlar-aga Mosque in Mrkonjić-Grad, built in 1595; (27) Lala-pasha Mosque in Tomislav-Grad (Duvno), built in the latter half of the 16th century; (28) Jusuf-pasha (Kuršumlija) Mosque in Maglaj, built in the latter half of the 16th century; (29) Koski Mehmed-pasha Mosque in Mostar, built in 1612; (30) Mehmed-pašsha Kukavica Mosque in Foča, built in 1751; (31) Esma Sultanija Mosque in Jajce, built in 1753; (32) Husejin-kapetan Gradaščević (Husejnija) Mosque in Gradačac, built in 1824; (33) Azizija Mosque in Brezovo Polje, built in 1862; (34) Derviš-pasha (Poturmahalska) Mosque in Travnik, built c. 1863; (35) Ali-pasha Rizvanbegović Mosque in Buna, built in 1848.-1849; (36) Varoš Mosque in Travnik, 16th century (burned down in the great fire of 3 September 1903, rebuilt in 1906 with a dome, though the original mosque had no dome); (37) Ali-bey Mosque in Žepče (date unknown).

centre and plan of the dome, the treatment of details, the finish of stone or wooden furniture, and the use of calligraphy, wall painting, and stone or wood carvings as decoration and detail. Despite this, Bosnia’s indigenous building methods made a significant contribution to the overall body of the Muslim built heritage. Madžida Bećirbegović’s study of mosques with wooden minarets was the first major contribution to the study of Bosnia’s Muslim vernacular religious architecture, which is also the conveyor of specific Bosnian features in typological classification. (Bećirbegović 1990) Machiel Kiel’s paper on Bosnian mosques with square minarets is a further contribution to our understanding of the authenticity of Bosnian Muslim religious architecture and its intimate connection with the deep tradition of religious architecture in Bosnia. (Kiel 2010) No comprehensive study of concealed and wooden domes in Bosnia has yet been produced, and indeed they have not even been recorded, except incidentally in works where they were not the subject of research. As a result, there has been no opportunity of identifying this group of buildings as the possible bearers of the predominant Bosnian code. Since the destruction of the 1992-1995 war against Bosnia and Herzegovina, in some cases such incidental mention is the only evidence of a concealed dome in the architecture of a destroyed mosque. Despite their paucity of description, passages from the works of Madžida Bećirbegović, Mehmed Mujezinović and Ekrem Hakki Ayverdy are precious pieces in the puzzle that we hope to assemble in future research. This paper, in which we seek to identify the meaning of wooden and concealed domes and, on the basis of the fact that a dome is implicitly or explicitly present in every Bosnian mosque, to adumbrate the potent symbolic meaning of this architectural feature in Muslim religious art in Bosnia, is an introduction to such research. 3.6.

Mosques with concealed domes

Not one study published to date on mosques with wooden domes and those with concealed domes classifies them as domed mosques, nor has the purely symbolic and ritual meaning of the dome present in the concealed dome been the subject of research thus far. Every classification treats mosques with concealed domes within the typological series of buildings with hipped roofs, the modest outward appearance of which has not attracted the attention of scholars. Many buildings with concealed domes, the majority of which were wooden, have thus remained undocumented. Since most concealed domes were built of wood, which is vulnerable to fire, whether accidental or arson, this lack of documentation has left a great many buildings unresearched and unrecognized. This investigation has provided an opportunity to compile and analyze the fragmentary documentation on concealed domes, most of which were wooden. This documentation suggests that the number of known concealed domes is close to the number of domes that were recognizable in the historic urban landscape. The regional distribution of concealed wooden domes does not reflect the availability of stone or timber as a building material. To the contrary, many mosques with concealed wooden domes were built in areas where stone was the most readily available material. The presumption that mosques with concealed domes were more widely distributed in Bosnia than monumental mosques may be explained in a variety of ways. Here, such pragmatic reasons as price, feasibility and availability of materials will be disregarded, since they can be no more than assumptions.

Fig. 26. Aladža Mosque, Foča

Fig. 27. Šarena Mosque, Travnik

Fig. 28. Bey’s Mosque, Sarajevo

Fig. 29. Careva Mosque, Sarajevo

The concealed dome in the mosques of Bosnia is a feature that could have been prompted by the same factors as the decoration and use of colour in the architecture of the country’s mosques. Colour and sculptural decoration are always used extremely sparingly or not at all on the exterior of the mosque, whereas the interior is richly decorated with stone mouldings and wood carvings and the use of polychrome on stone, wood and plaster. (Knoll, 1929). The preeminently introvert nature of Bosnia’s mosques – the architectural plainness of their exterior and the exuberance and symbolic charge of their interior – indicate the ritual meaning of the dome and decoration. The openness to inner depths through the architecture of Bosnia’s mosques revives the memory of the splendour of places of retreat, where the worshipper responds to God’s call. In a space that is focused on an inner centre, everything is an expression of the readiness of matter, in the utter detachment of the group of worshippers from the void that is not filled by praising God, to serve the manifestation of the inner Self. On the other hand, at the time these pre-modern mosques were being built, Bosnia was a traditional plural society. The concept of the mosque of which the expression of its religious and cosmological organization and symbolic discourse speaks only to those who enter it with the intention of remembering God perfectly reflects the foundations on which such a plural society may be organized and survive – the absence of both segregation and intrusiveness. Such mosques are sufficiently present in the historic urban landscape to respond to the demands of accessibility and visibility on the religious map, while, in the celebration of Beauty, their interior compels the attention of those who aspire to the Beautiful. A survey of extant mosques in Bosnia and a comparative analysis of historical documents has identified the following mosques as having wooden domes: (1) the Šarića Mosque in Mostar; (2) the Sevri hajji Hasan Mosque in Mahala in Mostar; (3) the Tabačica Mosque in Mostar; (4) the Ćejvan ćehaja Mosque in Mostar, (5) the Cernička Mosque in Mostar; (6) the Turali bey Mosque in Tuzla (1572); (7) the Jalska Mosque in Tuzla; (8) the Atik Behram bey Mosque in Tuzla; (9) the Ferhadija Mosque in Tešanj; (10) the Handanija Mosque in Prusac; (11) the Mosque on the spring in Čajniče; (12) the Gazanferija Mosque in Banja Luka; (13) the Ali bey Kapetanović Mosque in Vitina; (14) the Sulejmanija Mosque in Bijeljina; (15) the Savska Mosque in Brčko; (16) the mosque in Bosanska Kostajnica; (17) the Central Mosque in Bosanski Novi; (18) the Hamza-bey Mosque in Sanski Most; (19) the Čaršija Mosque in Konjic; (20) the Sultan Fatih Mosque in Vlasenica; (21) the Perkuša Mosque in Livno ( 22) the Careva Mosque in Foča (1481-1512); and (23) the Čaršija or Havadža Durak Mosque in Sarajevo. Some of these mosques no longer have this feature, and others have been demolished or destroyed to the ground. The available archive material and meagre descriptions suggest that only two of these mosques with wooden domes did not have a concealed dome. Descriptions in old documents suggest that the Careva Mosque in Foča and the Čaršija Mosque in Sarajevo originally had wooden domes clad on the outside with lead and that their sphericity was expressed in the outward form of the mosque. Upon his visit to Foča in 1664, Evliya Çelebi described the Careva Mosque, built in 14811512: The Mosque of Sultan Bajezit the Great in the old čaršija stands out from all the other mosques. It is an old place of worship, built of durable materials in the classical style. It has a wooden dome clad with lead, and one minaret (Čelebija) ii

In its documented architectural form, the Careva Mosque in Foča had a pitched roof and a flat ceiling. The earlier dome probably came to grief in some unknown manner. The Havadža Durak (Baščaršija) Mosque originally had a wooden dome, which was destroyed by fire in 1697, and replaced with a still extant dome when the building was restored. The absence of documentation on the original wooden domes of these two mosques makes it impossible to conduct any further analysis of their possible connection with architectural models such as the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem (690-691) and other similar examples of early Muslim architecture and their models in the earlier architecture of Syria and Palestine, but it should be noted that there were many ways in which the forms of early Muslim architecture could be transmitted without impediment, so that the influence of the oldest and most notable mosques cannot be excluded. The structure, span and form of wooden domes in Bosnia ranges from small domes over the very centre of the mosque (the Hamza-bey Mosque in Sanski Most) to a domical vault covering the prayer hall, with a flat ceiling at the corners (the mosques in Mostar,

the Handanija Mosque in Prusac and others) or a hemispherical dome with some kind of wooden pendentives at the corners covering the entire mosque interior (the Ferhadija Mosque in Tešanj).

Fig. 30. Turali-bey Mosque, Tuzla

Fig. 31. Roznamedžija Mosque, Mostar

Fig. 32. Čaršija Mosque, Tešanj

Fig. 33. Gazanferija, Banja Luka

To these may be added three mosques that we know to have concealed masonry domes – the Dizdar’s Mosque in Jajce, the Okić Mosque, also in Jajce, and the mosque in Podgora in Breza. The domes of all three are small in diameter, over a small prayer hall, but meet the principles of establishing architectural order corresponding with the principles of the micro- and macrocosmos. In the 1990s, the dome of the mosque in Podgora, which was originally concealed, was discovered and left exposed. The conservator’s rationale for this decision was the paucity of research into the typological features of domed mosques and the lack of knowledge concerning the presence of mosques with concealed domes in Bosnia. Concealed domes are a feature that is by no means an original Bosnia contribution to the history of architecture, but as an architectural form, they satisfied the rules by which Muslim religious spaces are conceived, reaching full expression in interiority, and were thus entirely appropriate. Concealed domes are known from Roman times, when hemispherical structures were encased in an outer structure that took the exterior loads and thus reduced the load on the dome. Domes enclosed by pyramidal roofs are also known in Armenia as a form of traditional expression. (Smith 1950). The number of concealed domes in pre-modern mosques was probably much greater, but since no value was accorded to them, many have no doubt been lost and replaced by new forms. Again, since most were wooden, to fire and deliberate destruction may be added the frequent need for replacement as the timbers rotted. During this course of this research, some users of Bosnian mosques have reported that, to make it easier to heat the prayer hall, wooden domes were closed off by a flat ceiling in the latter half of the 20th century, when religious communities were under pressure and short of funds.

4.

THE MEANING OF MONUMENTAL DOMED MOSQUES IN BOSNIA’S HISTORIC URBAN LANDSCAPES

Bosnia’s monumental domed mosques are usually in low-lying areas, at the heart of the public town space – one might say, at the point where all the lines of force of Bosnia’s towns and cities meet. This is the place that symbolically denotes the lowest point of the town. In the Bosnian urban pattern, the mosque is usually in the valley, and the church on the hilltop, giving Bosnia’s urban landscapes their sacred expression. Placing the central mosque in the valley ensured that everything else faced towards it. A domed mosque in this position symbolized a worshipper bent in prostration during the ritual prayer, which is the highest position in metaphysical terms – in which the worshipper is closest to God. 13 Bosnia’s domed mosques are the heart and nodal point of the structure of the city, the place with the most potent formal and functional significance. In outward appearance, Bosnia’s domed mosques are reduced to an approximately cubic prayer hall, octagonal drum and hemispherical dome. The cube symbolizes the earth, the dome the heavens or the Throne of God, which is circular in section, and the octagonal drum refers to the eight angels holding up the Throne (Guénon 1995, 184-187). This formal coherence, this warping and compression of space, is expressed in the urban landscape in its relationship with the perpendicular minaret, which further concentrates the space of the city. In the 13

Prostrate and draw near [to God] (Al-‘Alaq 96:19)

space of forms, the minaret, dome and cube of the mosque reflect the symbolism of the Creation of the world in the same way as it is symbolized in the movements of the worshipper during the daily prayers – standing, bowing and prostration. Prostration and the dome symbolize exaltation – they are the position and form of absolute harmony. The circle of the dome, which contains the numerical value of the days of the year and the number of veins in the human body, and which is the form of a balance, completes or complements the form of the passive square and the active octagon, thus establishing spatial harmony. (Bakhtiar 1976) In Bosnia, monumental mosques are symbolically and voluminously the most potent architectural factors of the historic urban landscape – they are the constants which sustain the urban landscape and ensure equilibrium between its permanent factors and the changes that pulsate through the city. The Bosnian sacredscape, formed by the introvert nature of Bosnia’s mosques, their position at the bottom of the valley and their relationship with the form and position of other religious spaces in the historic urban landscape, constitutes the contents and features the destruction or alteration of which entails the irreversible destruction of those urban landscapes. Following the ravages of the recent war, in which more than a thousand Bosnian mosques were left in ruins, and the bewilderments of the postwar period, which have wiped from memory the traditional patterns of the Bosnian urban landscape, every effort to accord value to the forms and locations of Bosnia’s domed mosques and their integration into the management of maintaining enduring values and the advancement of those that are changing in the city is a contribution to preserving cultural memory.

CONCLUSION Our research indicates that the dome was a standard and mandatory form in the composition of religious spaces, and in particular of mosques, in Bosnia. Since only 37 of the 1,120 or so mosques had masonry domes, and given that we have so far been able to identify 24 with concealed domes, when determining the role of the mosque in Bosnian Muslim religious architecture the customary strictly geometric significance of the dome as ‘covering a space with a circular plan’ has been reduced by a symbolic criterion. Geometry is understood above all as invariably reaching beyond its spatial expression in architecture, as the geometry of the sacred, with the dome always seen as circular, symbolizing the heavens shaped above the square form that symbolizes the earth. By introducing this relationship, based on minimizing the physical determinants of the architectural element and placing the emphasis on the immaterial or cognitive as the components that predominate over the observational, we find that the symbolic and ritual meaning of the dome in mosques with flat ceilings is achieved by a projection of the dome on the ceiling by making wooden ceilings with a spider’s-bed, rosette, solar ray or similar motif. The expression of the dome in the interior is an important generative element in the organization of the mosque. Consequently, ‘every Bosnian mosque has a dome,’ be it interior or, perhaps, exterior, three-dimensional (3D) or 2D. It follows that the interior of the mosque always has a dome, even though it may be lacking in outward form. This code may then be transferred to monumental mosques with visible exterior domes to indicate the essential nature of the inwardness of every dome which is expressed, in terms of its symbolic expression and association with religious ritual, in the use of painted decoration, calligraphy and colour in the mosque interior, and in the total absence of any non-structural element on the exterior of Bosnia’s mosque domes. As a result, this primary essential role of the dome, which is to cover the interior of the mosque, does not mean that the inner face of the dome shapes the entire exterior. In other words, the dome that is expressed outwardly is the elementary connotation of a religious space – including the mosque – while the interior dome ensures the sacred durability of those spaces. Research also confirms that the emergence and use of domes in Bosnia coincides with the universal principles and manner of introducing and making use of this architectural element. The Bosnian dome and its symbolic meaning cannot be separated from the universal context of domical ideologies, and constitute the final fusion of different domical traditions and mutual exchanges of construction techniques and ways of building domes. (Smith 1950) Despite clear indications that the introvert nature of Bosnian Muslim architecture is one of the fundamental expressions of its pre-modern roots in religious and cosmological principles and its symbolic charge, and equally clear indications that there were far fewer monumental domed mosques

in Bosnia than would correspond to the meaning of the dome in the formation of sacred space, there can be no doubt as to the role of Bosnia’s monumental mosques in determining the enduring values of the historic Bosnian urban landscape. The consequence of the destruction of domed mosques during the war against Bosnia and Herzegovina, and of the sacred patterns on which Bosnia’s urban landscapes were organized by on-going construction, is ravaged urban landscapes, which can be restored only by re-establishing the key principles by which they were shaped.

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