Ulu Cami'i Grand Mosque in Bursa, Turkey
personal collection
The sky is blue and the sun shine bright when I arrived at Bursa, the second city in our trip schedule. After looking for gifts in Munira, our trip heading to Ulu Cami'i Mosque.
Turkey, besides being a thousand poets country, Turkey is country with thousand mosque. There's many beautiful mosque in Turkey, one of them is Ulu Cami'i Mosque or Grand Mosque.
The entire outer wall of the Great Mosque is made of stone. This mosque is flanked by two towers, namely the twin towers. Interestingly both of towers were not built in the same times, it built at different times. The west tower was built at the same time as the mosque, while the east tower was built in the 15th century by Sultan Mehmet I.
This mosque named Ulul Cami'i because Ulul in Turkish means 'high', while cami'i means Jami, which is unifier. Also because tall towers are built on highlands.
personal collection
personal collection
Ulu Cami'i Mosque was one of important building in Bursa city center. Have another name, Grand Mosque was the the world 5th important mosque in Islam after Mekkah, Madinah, Yerusalem, and the last after Damaskus. UNESCO was designated it as one of the world heritage in 2014. In order that, this mosques is very popular and unique cause had 20th dome that shelter it.
This mosque was built with 20 domes because the Sultan who during the crusade in 1386 vowed to build a mosque with 20 domes if he won that war.
As our tour guide said, in 1396 - 1399, Sultan Bayezid I ordered one of the architects named Ali Neccar to design and build a mosque. At that time Sultan Bayezid I was the fourth ruler of the Ottoman empire. Ali Neccar used Seljuk architecture as the architecture of the Ulul Cami'i mosque. At that time the Ulul Cami'i mosque became a landmark in the Ottoman empire and since 1399, it has been open to the public.
Let's take a look inside of Ulul Cami'i Mosque.
Ulul Cami'i Mosque has 20 Domes which are arranged in four of five rows and supported by 12 columns. As you can see in the pictures above, almost all the walls are found with arabic writing or calligraphy. The calligraphy is said to amount to 192 calligraphy written by 41 different artists and of course have different meanings.
Amongs all calligraphy, there's one special calligraphy. It was the calligraphy of arabic '4 wauw' in the wall.
4 arabic wauw in the wall have deep meaning. It's means in arabic 'wauw' have means number 6. So 4 'wauw' means 6.666. Amount of 6.666 is the number of verses in the holy Koran (Al-Qur'an). Habib (our tourguide) said that when you pray in front of that calligraphy, your wish, what you want would be come true.
I tried to described my wish there, wish me luck
There's Beautiful Fountain Inside The Mosque
That fountain inside the mosque has special history in the construction of the mosque. At that time, before built the mosque, that was a settlement of community. The Sultan asked them to moved from that area cause he wanna build a mosque as his vow. But there's an old lady don't want to move from that area even thought Sultan and theologians asked her continued to leave that place. When Sultan started the mosque, the old lady keep settle down. Then one day, A theologians come to her and said that he just dreamt about old lady punished caused don't wanna left that place. After that, the old lady finally gave her place cause she don't want to be punished by Allah (God).
Then for respect that old lady, Sultan asked the architect to built a fountain in her place. That fountain was used as place for ablution before prayer. What a nice history. The fountain is so beautiful.
Prayer Place
Even thought we were in the mosque, not all area for prayer. The Ulul Cami'i mosque also for tourist it's means there's area isn't for pass through. There's a special place to prayer and it was in the pictures above and below. There's no people can't pass through that place.
Unfortunately when we arrived, it's not prayer time yet cause I can't prayer there. Moreover, there's a lot of schedule, so we can't stay along there.
Ulul Cami'i mosque is one of Turkey historical building which I'm so lucky to able to visit there. There's my favorite view inside. It was a place that an old man read the holy Al-Qur'an. He looks so calm and solemn.
I wish someday I could re-visited The Grand Mosque in Turkey cause visited Turkey once isn't enough. How amazing and how blessed I am, could visited one of the world heritage.
Thanks for reading my blog and please looking forward my another story in Turkey.
All photos are taken by Samsung Galaxy A22
noted: there's a story about my orange scarf or hijab that I wore. Actually it was not actual hijab, it was Mukena (prayer hijab). Mukena has two part. Part one is for the top, for covering head to knees and there's a part for covering the hip to toe. At that time, I forgot to bring my scarf on my bag, whereas I brought it so many for using as scarf. I forgot to bring it on my bag, but I bring my mukena. Cause for enter the mosque, you have to covering your head. Cause impossible to open my suitcase and I just bring Mukena, I used the low part as my hijab.
Vivie Hardika
I have so many imagination in my head. Something that I can't achieve as human and as a girl. So writing very challenging. Since in Junior High School, I written whatever I want to write. Without skill, I just write what I want to read. Now I have 12th published novels and all of that are romance.
Yeah, I proudly say that I am an passionate author!