This is the Murat I mosque.

Also called: ‘Hüdavendigâr Camii’ (Mosque of the Monarch), reflecting the imperial longings of Murat I (1362-1389). He built this mosque in 1363, at the request of his mother Nilüfer Hatun. The typical use of alternating layers of brick and stone, although decorative, was a measure of economy practised by Byzantine builders, long before Ottomans adopted it too. It had to be rebuilt (around 1420) after its destruction during the 1413 Karamanoğlu attack against Bursa (during the civil war between the sons of Sultan Bayezid I). In 1855 an earthquake brought down the dome; in 1906 a coprehensive restoration of the mosque took place.

In fact, the impressive facade hides three different entities: a mosque (with an ‘inversed T’ ground plan), a ‘zaviye’ (dervish lodge) on the same floor and a medrese (theological college) on the first floor. There are Seljuk exampes of two-storey colleges but the erection of an orthodox college above a retreat of heterodox dervishes is extraordinary.

Correspondent: J.M.Criel, Antwerpen.
Sources: ‘Islamic Architecture: Ottoman Turkey’ (Godfrey Goodwin) – London 1977
& ‘Türkye Tarihi Yerler Kılavuzu’ – M.Orhan Bayrak, Inkılâp Kitabevi, Istanbul, 1994.