Description of the attraction
The sultans of the Ottoman Empire have always cared about decorating their domains with original buildings and paid great attention to creating magnificent mosques throughout the Caliphate. Traveling through the territory of their state, they ordered the construction of this or that building on the occasion of their visit. Most often these were mosques, madrasahs or tekki (premises for clergy). In addition, the sultans encouraged their wealthy subjects to invest in the construction of religious and charitable institutions. Thanks to such a scale of construction, a special position was even introduced in the empire - the chief architect of the sultan. Thus, it is believed that the Bayezid II mosque was built by the architect Hayretdin. But, given the absence of any historical documents confirming this, some historians believe that the creator of this magnificent kulliye was Yakup Shah bin Sultan Shah.
The construction of the kullie and the Mosque of Sultan Bayezid II began in the spring of 1484, when the ruler stopped in Edirne before a military campaign in Moldova. By his order, the complex was erected on the right bank of the Tundzha River and included a guest house, a free dining room for the poor, a hospital, a madrasah, a hamam, a mill, and a bridge across the river. The area of the kyllie is over 22 thousand square meters. Most of all, this building looks like a "Muslim monastery", but the complex was also intended for the treatment of the mentally ill, the creation of medicines, and the training of doctors.
From an architectural point of view, the most interesting building of the complex is a mosque with two minarets. Their height is 38 meters, and their diameter is approximately equal to three meters. The mosque is decorated with one large dome (diameter 20.55 m) resting on a twenty-sided drum with an area of about 500 sq. meters. In addition, the dome rests on four massive pillars with stalactite tops. The total number of domes on all buildings in the kyllie exceeds a hundred. The pool for ablutions is taken outside the premises - into the courtyard, along the perimeter of which there is a bypass gallery covered with small domes. It should be noted that the architects of those times tried not to remove the trees from the construction sites, so several cypresses were left in the courtyard of the Bayazid II mosque, which adorn the entire ensemble.
The mosque has an unusual layout. At the entrance to its premises, two wings open to the right and left, forming a kind of vestibule with vaulted arcades. The long gallery of the mosque resembles a medieval monastery refectory. The cuillier domes are covered with lead slabs, and a golden crescent is erected on the spire. Despite the fact that the mosque is one of the funeral ones, the turbe (from Turkish - "tomb") is located behind the mosque.
The hospital located on the territory of Bayezid II kulie was in great demand and served patients for almost four centuries, right up to the Russian-Turkish war. Both general practitioners and narrowly focused specialists worked here: ophthalmologists, surgeons and pharmacists. The hospital also had a special ward for the mentally ill - tymarkhan (which means "psychiatric hospital"). In the treatment of these sufferers, methods unusual for those times were used: they used national music, the melodious murmur of water, aromatherapy. In 1984, the hospital buildings were transferred to Trakia University and, after renovation, began to be used for the educational process. The Museum of Health was opened in Tymarkhan in 1997. Its interesting exposition allows you to present the level of development of medicine in the Ottoman Empire.
