On the track of legendary Mimar Sinan in İstanbul

Ironically, while the man's work may be well known, Sinan himself remains, like his near contemporary, the great British playwright William Shakespeare (1564-1616), a shadowy figure about whom very little is certain.

Sinan appears to have been born to a Greek Christian family living in the small village of Ağırnas, near Kayseri in Central Anatolia, at around 1490. In 1512 he was taken through the devşirme system, a form of taxation in human form levied on the non-Muslim populations of the Ottoman Empire, and brought to İstanbul, where he converted to Islam and was given an education in the huge school for civil servants in the Topkapı Palace.

In his 30s, he served as an engineer for the janissaries in several of the military campaigns waged by Süleyman the Magnificent, so he was already about 48 when he became the head of the imperial architects; he didn't complete work on his first great mosque, the Haseki Hürrem Sultan Camii in Cerrahpaşa, until he was almost 50. Fortunately, Sinan went on to have a very long life, working until well into his 90s. During that time, he was responsible for around 320 assorted buildings, 120 of them in İstanbul alone.

Although the great Selimiye Camii in Edirne is regarded as Sinan's finest work, in İstanbul that accolade would have to go to the Süleymaniye Camii, the mosque that he built for his patron Süleyman the Magnificent between 1550 and 1557. The Süleymaniye stands astride what was the third of the seven hills of Byzantium, its minarets and domes dominating the view from the right-hand side of the Galata Bridge. Like all the great imperial mosque complexes, the Süleymaniye was much more than a simple place of worship. Instead it was a world within a world, complete with a set of schools (medreses) that went on to form the basis for İstanbul University, a hospital, a soup kitchen for the poor, a caravanserai (inn), a hamam (Turkish bath) and a medical college. Nor was everything so pointedly worthy -- here too could be found a wrestling ground and a whole street of cafes, including some of rather dubious reputation.

But, of course, the centerpiece of all this activity was always the mosque, a place of extraordinary beauty that is currently undergoing extensive restoration. Not surprisingly, Sultan Süleyman was laid to rest in the graveyard immediately beside his prize, with his wife Haseki Hürrem Sultan, better known as Roxelana, in a separate tomb beside him. Even Sinan wanted to be buried here. His tomb can be found on the outskirts of the complex. Predictably he had designed it for himself.

The Süleymaniye may be the biggest and best known of Sinan's gifts to the city, but two more of his wonderful mosques are also within easy walking distance of Sultanahmet, the heart of tourist İstanbul. The closest is the Sokollu Mehmet Paşa Camii, built on the steep slope running down behind the Hippodrome to Kadırga in 1572 for Esmahan Sultan, the wife of one of Selim II's grand viziers. The complex is entered via a huge arched entrance at the foot of the slope, which has a dershane (lecture theater) built immediately above it to serve the school housed behind the portico surrounding the courtyard. This being the golden age of the Ottomans, the mosque was not just elegant externally but also beautiful internally, its walls decorated with tiles made in İznik, a small town near Bursa that had cornered the 16th century market in fine ceramics.

It's not much further to walk to find the Rüstem Paşa Camii, near the Spice Market, which was built in 1561 for a man who was not only son-in-law to Sultan Süleyman but also served three terms as grand vizier, a post rather like that of a modern prime minister. The Rüstem Paşa mosque is far easier to overlook even though its dome and single minaret are clearly visible from the Galata Bridge. This is because it was built on a raised platform inside the tight network of streets that make up the Tahtakale bazaar; at ground-level, therefore, you're looking for a small doorway leading up some stairs rather than for the grand entrance into a mosque courtyard. Once you've found the mosque, however, you will discover that not just its interior but its exterior as well has been sheathed in gorgeous İznik tiles. For many people, this is the most appealing of all of İstanbul's smaller mosques.

For those with the time and inclination to venture further afield, there are other wonderful Sinan mosques to be found in Eyüp, Fatih, Tophane, Üsküdar, Edirnekapı and Cerrahpaşa. In Eyüp, the Zal Mahmut Paşa Camii is a stupendous building, constructed on a slope like the Sokollu Mehmet Paşa Camii, but in this case equipped with porticoed courtyards on two separate levels. It was probably built in the 1570s for the man who had murdered Süleyman's son Mustafa in 1553.

In Fatih, within walking distance of the Süleymaniye Camii, stands the superb Şehzadebaşı Camii, its glorious courtyard with varying red and white geometric patterns over each of its windows surely one of the most beautiful sights in İstanbul. Here in the exact center of the Ottoman city, Sinan designed a complex in a large garden to house the remains of Süleyman's eldest son Mehmet, who died of smallpox in 1543. His tomb became the center of a cluster of others; they're beautifully decorated, but sadly not currently open to the public.

The mosques of Kılıç Ali Paşa in Tophane and of Mihrimah Sultan in Edirnekapı are currently undergoing restoration. In Cerrahpaşa, the superb complex that Sinan built for Süleyman's wife Haseki Hürrem Sultan (Roxelana) in 1539 is the earliest of his works in the city and deserves to be much better known. Unfortunately, however, it's in a part of town that has slipped below the tourism radar. Ill-judged plans to create a hotel out of the hospital attached to the mosque have long since been abandoned, and the complex now stands forgotten, severed from the mosque that was its heart by a busy road. Tile panels taken from the lunettes above the windows of the medrese and now housed in the Çinili Köşk section of the Archeology Museum hint at how lovely the building must have been in its heyday.

If you hop on the ferry to Üsküdar, you'll find another magnificent work of Sinan standing just across the road from the terminal. The İskele Camii (Harbor Mosque) was built in 1547-8 for Mihrimah Sultan, the wife of Rüstem Paşa and the woman who was also the driving force behind the Sinan mosque in Edirnekapı. Once upon a time it would have stood right on the waterfront so that the sultan could have stepped straight from his caïque onto its steps. Today it's still an impressive sight and the view from its şadırvan (ablutions fountain) is said to be one of the finest in the city.

Finally, you should trek uphill in Üsküdar to find the Nurbanu Sultan Valide-i Atik Camii, built for Selim II's powerful wife Nurbanu Sultan in 1570 and regarded by some as second only in beauty to the Süleymaniye. The graceful mosque here is part of an extensive complex, although one that is rather less cohesively designed than that of the Süleymaniye. Almost unbelievably, some parts of it have been used as a prison; other parts are currently off-limits for no very apparent reason. Like the Haseki Hürrem Sultan complex, the Valide-i Atik is long overdue for renewal and rediscovery. 

Selimiye Camii