Early Works of the Architect Sinan

Abstract

Sinan İbni Abdülmennan, after nineteen years of distinguished service as a Janissary in the Ottoman Army of Süleyman the Magnificent, went on to a long career as architect, during which the large number of his works won for him the name of a builder and artist of genius whose name is writ large in the history of world architecture. Being a Janissary, Sinan was taken in his childhood or youth as a levy into the military corps. The registers of children taken in these levies were by the Aga of the Janissaries but they have not survived, having either been burned or perhaps destroyed along with everything else pertaining to the Janissaries, during the Vak'a-i Hayriye, the abolition of the Corps in the time of Mahmud II. For this reason, neither the date of Sinan's birth, nor his christian name, nor those of his parents are known. Although we have no certain knowledge of the architect Sinan's childhood, there are some clues. In the Tezkiret ül-Ebniye ("Book of Imperial Buildings") and the Tezkiret ül-Bünyan ("Book of Buildings") written down by his close friend the poet Nakkaş Mustafa Sa'i at Sinan's dictation, in the Tablet ül-Mı'marin ("Masterpieces of Architecture") compiled by Asari on the basis of SaTs works, and in Sinan's own deeds of bequest, we encounter certain facts which shed light on the matter.