Muradiye Mosque, Bursa

The Muradiye külliye of Bursa was built by Murat II in 1424–6, the last imperial mosque complex erected in the city; besides the mosque it included a medrese, an imaret, the founder's türbe and many later-added tombs ¹.

The mosque is of the cross-axial eyvan type: central hall and main eyvan under nearly equal domes of 10.5 metres — the hall's slightly higher — the main eyvan raised six steps, flanked by a pair of dervish zaviyes ². The Muradiye medrese is per Freely the most beautiful Islamic theological school in Bursa, its square courtyard lined with cells and its little dershane famed for brilliant tile decoration; it now serves as a dispensary ³. In the garden between mosque and medrese stands Murat II's türbe among a dozen other tombs including that of his son Alaettin, dead at thirteen; Murat willed to be buried directly in the earth open to the rain — 'may the rain, sign of the benediction of god, fall on me' — so his earth-filled catafalque lies under the dome's open oculus, the last Ottoman sultan buried in Bursa ³.

• Source read: Freely, A History of Ottoman Architecture (2011), pp. 64–65 (The Muradiye, Bursa).
• Record created in this batch; distinct from the Edirne Muradiye.