Atik Sinan

Sinan-i Atik, also known as Azadlı Sinan, and Atik Sinan (meaning Sinan the Freedman; His nephew, also an architect, built the Bayezid II Mosque.

Architectural influence Atik Sinan designed and oversaw the construction of “one of the most important historical monuments in Istanbul” – the Fatih Mosque and its Külliye, meaning complex. In addition to being the first large selatin mosque in the city, it was also the first large building in the Ottoman imperial architectural tradition constructed in the recently captured Constantinople. Atik Sinan named the structure for the man who commissioned his work – Mehmed the Conqueror, as the word Conqueror translates to “Fatih” in Turkish. Its location – on the site of the recently destroyed Byzantine Church of the Holy Apostles, and its status as the first major mosque construction in the city rendered it “an effective center for the radiation of Ottoman urbanization.” Architecturally, Atik Sinan drew inspiration from other Turkoman mosques as well as the Hagia Sophia.

The Fatih Mosque's Külliye is also of great architectural significance. Atik Sinan constructed a massive complex spreading from the east and west sides of the mosques. The madrasas Atik Sinan constructed marked an important shift in education in the Ottoman Empire, as they served as a new center for religious and judicial training in the capital as opposed to the more distant training centers in Cairo. The tombs were also significant, as they legitimized Mehmed II's claim to the title of “Kayser-i Rum (Caesar of Rome)” and further “Ottomanized the city.” The Fatih Mosque's Külliye never fully succumbed to the earthquake damage that destroyed the mosque itself, and thus remains largely as Atik Sinan built it - “preserved in its original form.”