Hadim Ibrahim Pasha Mosque, Istanbul

Hadım Ibrahim Pasha Camii stands on Istanbul's Seventh Hill just inside the Silivri Gate of the ancient Theodosian Walls; Sinan built it in 1551 for Hadım Ibrahim Pasha, the second of Süleyman the Magnificent's two grand vezirs of that name. Badly damaged by the earthquakes of 1648 and 1754, its collapsed minaret was rebuilt in baroque style ¹.

A fine porch of five domed bays on six marble columns leads to a portal crowned by an elaborate stalactited baldachino; in form the mosque is an octagon inscribed in a rectangle, its dome carried on shell-shaped pendentives at the angles. The marble mimber and müezzin mahfili are of admirable workmanship, as are the ivory-inlaid door panels ². Above the mihrab are inscribed tiles that Freely judges a later addition — latest-period Iznik or possibly the eighteenth-century Tekfur Saray potteries. In the garden is the founder's open türbe, a marble sarcophagus; the külliye also included a mektep and a hamam, both now gone ³.

• Source read: Freely, A History of Ottoman Architecture (2011), pp. 295–296 (Hadım Ibrahim Pasha Camii).