Alâeddin Sinop Mosque: A Seljuk Congregational Mosque in Türkiye
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.8
- Popularity
- Low
- Country
- Turkey
- Primary era
- Medieval
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Modern
- Civilizations
- Candarid, Ottoman, Seljuk
- Site type
- Religious
- Remains
- Mosque
On this page8 sections
History
Alâeddin Sinop Mosque is a medieval Seljuk mosque in Sinop, Türkiye, probably commissioned in the 1220s during the rule of Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad I. Sinop was an important Black Sea port, and the Seljuk sultan Izz al-Din Kaykaus I captured the city in 1214. The mosque belongs to an early Seljuk tradition shaped by Arab mosque planning and the architectural model of the Artuqids, a medieval Anatolian dynasty whose building tradition influenced Seljuk architecture.
Seljuk foundation and rebuilding
The exact date of construction, architect, and patron are uncertain. The building is associated with Atabeg Eseduddin Ayas, a senior guardian, military commander, and administrator in service to a ruler. Ayas had ruled within the Ahlatshah dynasty, a medieval power based around Ahlat in eastern Anatolia, before entering Seljuk service after a palace coup removed him from power. He took part in the Seljuk conquest of Sinop and was later assigned to repair and renew the city walls.
Between 1215 and 1230, Ayas supervised major Seljuk construction projects, employing architects and craftsmen from southeastern Anatolia or Syria. The mosque was probably destroyed, or largely destroyed, in 1261, when forces of the Komnenian rulers of Trabzon attacked buildings outside Sinop’s Inner Fortress. After the Seljuks recovered the city in 1264, the vizier Muinuddin Pervane rebuilt the mosque on its earlier foundations in the late 1260s.
Candarid and Ottoman periods
Sinop later came under the Candarids, also known as the Isfendiyarids, an Anatolian Turkish dynasty that ruled the city and neighboring territories before the Ottoman annexation. In the 1340s, Ibrahim of the Candarids built a tomb in the northeastern corner of the mosque courtyard. In 1376, the Candarid ruler Celaleddin Bayezid ordered a major repair. The mosque entered the Ottoman Empire with the rest of the Candarid lands in the 1460s.
Maintenance continued under Ottoman rule. Repairs to the dome over the mihrab area and to the roof took place in 1709 and 1725. In the nineteenth century, work associated with Sinop governor Tufan Pasha strengthened the building with masonry and renewed the wooden entrance prayer porch, women’s gallery, and minbar, the pulpit used for the Friday sermon. An inscription records that repairs begun in 1848 were completed in 1851.
Earthquake damage and modern restoration
An earthquake in 1853 caused the main dome to collapse and destroyed the original marble minbar made for Isfendiyar Bey. Restoration continued in the 1860s, and the original minbar was transferred to Istanbul. Further repairs followed in 1946 and 1950. The mosque and courtyard received their most recent major restoration in 2008 and 2009. The building remains an active Sunni Muslim mosque and is also called Sinop Ulu Cami, meaning Great Mosque, and the Arab Mosque. It is regarded as the largest Seljuk-period mosque in northern Anatolia.
Remains
Prayer hall and setting
The mosque stands in Sinop’s historic center, on the central part of the Sinop Peninsula, near the Pervane Madrasa and the historic Sinop bathhouse. Its rectangular plan measures approximately 66 metres in length and 22 metres in width. The broad, transverse prayer hall is arranged for long rows of worshippers, following the hypostyle mosque tradition, in which a wide prayer space is organized across the building rather than around a centralized plan.
Five domes cover the building. Three principal domes rise over the mihrab area, with the middle dome slightly higher than the two beside it. Smaller domes stand at the eastern and western ends. This arrangement gives the roof a sequence of central and lateral coverings within the long rectangular plan.
Courtyard and religious features
A broad courtyard surrounds the mosque, measuring approximately 66 by 44 metres. Its walls rise about 12 metres and contain gates on the west, north, and east sides, together with five exits from the courtyard to the exterior. A central ablution fountain, or shadirvan, serves the courtyard. A minaret was added later in the middle of the northern courtyard wall.
Inside the prayer hall, the marble mihrab, a niche indicating the direction of Mecca, carries intricate Seljuk-style decoration. An inscription containing Ayat al-Kursi, a Quranic verse traditionally associated with divine sovereignty and protection, borders the mihrab on three sides.
Minbar and Candarid tomb
The original marble minbar was decorated with vegetal motifs. The seventeenth-century Ottoman traveler and writer Evliya Celebi praised it and compared it with the minbar of Bursa Ulu Cami. After the earthquake damage and later restoration, that original was removed to Istanbul. The mosque now contains a wooden minbar made in the nineteenth century.
The Candarid tomb occupies the northeastern corner of the courtyard. Ibrahim of the Candarids constructed it in the 1340s, adding a dynastic funerary structure to the mosque complex during the period when Sinop was governed by the Candarid dynasty.
