Kasım Aga Mosque

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Details of the masonry on the northeast side

The Kasım-Ağa Mosque ( Turkish Kasım Ağa Mescidi ; also Kâsım Bey Mescidi ) is a former Byzantine building in Istanbul that was rededicated as a mosque during the time of the Ottoman Empire . It is not yet known what function the structure originally had, but it is possible that it was part of a monastery, the main church of which is today's Odalar Mosque .

location

The mosque is located in the Salmatomruk district of Istanbul's Fatih district , not far from the Charisiustore ( Turkish Edirnekapı ) of the Theodosian Wall between Chora Church and Fethiye Mosque , and around 100 meters southwest of the ruins of the Odalar Mosque. The small mosque stands in a garden between the streets Koza Sokak and Kasim Odalar Sokak and is surrounded by modern buildings.

history

Map of the Byzantine Constantinople. The Kasım-Ağa Mosque is located near the eastern Theodosian Wall about 300 meters southeast of the Charisiustore.

The building was erected on the seventh hill of Constantinople between the Aetius cistern (now a small football stadium) and the Boğdan Sarayı . Nothing is known about the original use of the building in Byzantine times. The possibility is discussed that the structure was part of a monastery whose catholicon was the church later known as the Odalar Mosque. The complex was undoubtedly supplied with water from the nearby Ipek cistern. At the time of the conquest of Constantinople by the Ottomans in 1453, however, the building was already in ruins.

After the conquest of Constantinople, mainly Christians settled in the district. Nonetheless, Kasım Bey bin Abdullah (possibly Sekbanbaşı , i.e. Agha or Supreme Commander of the Janissaries ) built a small mosque on the ruins of the building in 1506. Several shops and properties belonged to the mosque, including the still existing Byzantine cistern Ipek Bodrum (English: silk cellar ), which was so named because silk was produced here in Ottoman times. The small mosque was badly damaged in an earthquake in 1894 and a fire in the Salmatomruk district on July 2, 1919, so that only the outer walls and the minaret remained. The building was abandoned and was primitive housing for the poor ( gecekondu ) in the mid-20th century . It was not until 1975 and 1977 that the building was restored and reopened for prayer.

The mosque is a mescit , i.e. a smaller mosque without a sermon pulpit ( minbar ), which is not intended for Friday prayers , but only for devotions.

architecture

Drawing of the destroyed mosque after 1919

The building was erected on a square floor plan. The Byzantine building was almost square with a single nave, followed by an atrium in the northeast and a smaller room in the east. Due to its small dimensions, the building was hardly a church, but probably part of a monastery. An examination of the brickwork during the restoration phase revealed different construction phases and proved that the foundations and preserved walls were made of stone and brick. The appraisal revealed that the atrium and the wall of the mihrab must have been renewed during the conversion to a mosque in 1506. At the same time, a massive minaret was built on the northeast side.

The walls, which are unusually thick in some places, are striking. According to the Byzantine art historian Neslihan Asutay-Effenberger , the strength of the walls can only be explained by the fact that the building once had several floors. For the art historian, the striking thickness of the walls, the corner reinforcement and the recognizable gate passages are proof that the basement of a tower was once located in the north corner. On the inside of the west wall you can see three arcosol niches , a fourth niche extends beyond the line of the north wall.

literature

  • Semavi Eyice : Istanbul. Petite Guide a travers les Monuments Byzantins et Turcs . Istanbul Matbaası, Istanbul 1955
  • Wolfgang Müller-Wiener : Image lexicon on the topography of Istanbul: Byzantion, Konstantinupolis, Istanbul up to the beginning of the 17th century . Wasmuth, Tübingen 1977, ISBN 978-3803010223
  • Stephan Westphalen: The Odalar Camii in Istanbul. Architecture and painting of a Middle Byzantine church . Wasmuth, Tübingen 1998, ISBN 3-8030-1741-6

Web links

Commons : Kasım Ağa Mosque  - Collection of Pictures, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Müller-Wiener (1977), p. 164
  2. ↑ a b c d e Westphalen (1998), p. 1.
  3. ↑ a b Eyice (1955) p. 72
  4. ^ Ernest Mamboury : The Tourists' Istanbul . Çituri Biraderler Basımevi, Istanbul 1953, p. 309
  5. ↑ a b Neslihan Asutay-Effenberger : The monastery of Ioannes Prodromos τής Пέτρας in Constantinople and its relationship to Odalar and Kasιm Ağa Camii . In: Millennium - Yearbook on culture and history of the first millennium AD Volume 5, pp. 299–326

Coordinates: 41 ° 1 ′ 44.4 ″  N , 28 ° 56 ′ 20.4 ″  E