Koca Mi'mâr Sinân Âğâ (Ottoman Turkish: معمار سينان; Modern Turkish: Mimar Sinan, pronounced [miːˈmaːɾ siˈnan]) (c. 1489/1490 -- July 17, 1588) was the chief Ottoman architect (Turkish: "Mimar") and civil engineer for sultans Suleiman the Magnificent, Selim II, and Murad III. He was responsible for the construction of more than three hundred major structures and other more modest projects, such as his Islamic primary schools (sibyan mektebs). His apprentices would later design the Sultan Ahmed Mosque in Istanbul, Stari Most in Mostar and help design the Taj Mahal in the Mughal Empire. The son of a stonemason, he received a technical education and became a military engineer. He rose rapidly through the ranks to become first an officer and finally a Janissary commander, with the honorific title of ağa. He refined his architectural and engineering skills while on campaign with the Janissaries, becoming expert at constructing fortifications of all kinds, as well as military infrastructure projects, such as roads, bridges and aqueducts.At about the age of fifty, he was appointed as chief royal architect, applying the technical skills he had acquired in the army to the "creation of fine religious buildings" and civic structures of all kinds. He remained in post for almost fifty years. His masterpiece is the Selimiye Mosque in Edirne, although his most famous work is the Suleiman Mosque in Istanbul. He headed an extensive governmental department and trained many assistants who, in turn, distinguished themselves, including Sedefkar Mehmed Agha, architect of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque. He is considered the greatest architect of the classical period of Ottoman architecture, and has been compared to Michelangelo, his contemporary in the West. Michelangelo and his plans for St. Peter's Basilica in Rome were well known in Istanbul, since Leonardo da Vinci and he had been invited, in 1502 and 1505 respectively, by the Sublime Porte to submit plans for a bridge spanning the Golden Horn. According to contemporary biographer, Mustafa Sâi Çelebi, Sinan was born in 1489 (c. 1490 according to the Encyclopædia Britannica, 1491 according to the Dictionary of Islamic Architecture and sometime between 1494 and 1499, according to the Turkish professor and architect Reha Günay) with the name Joseph. He was born either an Armenian, Albanian, Greek or a Turkish in a small town called Ağırnas near the city of Kayseri in Anatolia (as stated in an order by Sultan Selim II). One argument that lends credence to his Armenian background is a decree by Selim II dated Ramadan 7 981 (ca. Dec. 30, 1573), which grants Sinan's request to forgive and spare his relatives from the general exile of Kayseri's Armenian community to the island of Cyprus. According to Herbert J. Muller he "seems to have been an Armenian —though it is almost a criminal offense in Turkey today to mention this probability." Lucy Der Manuelian of the Tufts University suggests that "he can be identified as an Armenian through a document in the imperial archives and other evidence." Several scholars have cited Sinan's possible Albanian origin, while according to the British scholar Percy Brown and the Indians Mahajan, the Mughal Emperor Babur was very dissatisfied from the local Indian architecture and planning, thus he invited "certain pupils of the leading Ottoman architect Sinan, the Albanian genius, to carry out his architectural schemes." The scholars who support the thesis of his Greek background have identified his father as a stonemason and carpenter by the name of Christos (Greek "Χρήστος"), a common Greek name. It is certain that both his parents were of the Eastern Orthodox Christian faith, since the Ottoman archives of that epoch recorded only religion information about the population (the concept of ethnicity was irrelevant to the religion-based Ottoman Millet system). Sinan (Joseph) grew up helping his father in his work, and by the time that he was conscripted would have had a good grounding in the practicalities of building work. There are three brief records in the library of the Topkapı Palace, dictated by Sinan to his friend Mustafa Sâi Çelebi. (Anonymous Text; Architectural Masterpieces; Book of Architecture). In these manuscripts, Sinan divulges some details of his youth and military career. His father is mentioned as "Abdülmennan." Military career

• published: 21 Dec 2013
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