Bajrakli Mosque, Belgrade

The Bajrakli Mosque (Бајракли џамија; named in Turkish as Bayraklı, bayrak is Turkish for "flag" and Bayraklı means "with flag") is a mosque in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. It is located in Gospodar Jevremova Street in the neighbourhood of Dorćol. It was built around 1575, and is the only mosque in the city out of the 273 that had existed during the time of the Ottoman Empire's rule of Serbia.

During the occupation of Serbia by the Austrians (between 1717 and 1739), it was converted into a Roman Catholic church; but after the Ottomans retook Belgrade, it was returned to its original function.

It was damaged after being set on fire on the eighteenth of March 2004, during that year's unrest in Kosovo, in violent protest to the burning of Serbian churches in Kosovo, but it was later repaired.

History
Out of the  former  more  than  200 mosques  and  many  small  Islamic places  of  worship,  the  so  called  mesdzid,  the  Bajrakli  Mosque  in 11,  Gospodar  Jevremova  Street  is the  only  remaining and  active  example  of  Islamic  religious  architecture  in  Belgrade. It is situated on a slope towards the Danube River, near the junction with Kralja Petra Street. It once dominated in the atmosphere of mostly ground floor houses in the  busy  commercial  and  craft town district of Belgrade, the so-called Zerek.

Descriptions of Belgrade of the 17th century were preserved by Ottoman travel writer Evliya Çelebi in which he vividly described the appearance  of  the  town  in  the  period  of  Turkish  rule,  with various  buildings  of  Islamic  architecture. In the  second  half  of the 19th century, the Bajrakli Mosque was described by historians and travel writers Konstantin Jireček, Giuseppe Barbanti Brodano, as  well  as  by  archaeologist  and  ethnologist Felix Kanitz. It is  assumed  that  today's  Bajrakli  Mosque was  built  on  the  place  of  an  older  mesdzid,  probably in the second half of the 17th century, as the endowment of the Turkish ruler Sultan Suleiman II (1687—1691). It was originally named after former renewers, Čohadži-Hajji Alija's and later Hussein Ćehaja's mosque, while the current name was given in the late 18th or in the early 19th century. In it, as in the main mosque, there was the muwaqqit, the man who  calculated  the  exact  time  of  AH  according  to  the  Islamic  calendar  (which  began  in  622, i.e.  in  the  year  of  Hijra,  the  year  during  which  the emigration of the Prophet Muhammad from Mecca  to  Medina) occurred  to  determine  sacred  days, regulated clock mechanism and put the flag on the minaret,  to  signal  the  simultaneous  beginning  of the prayer to other Islamic places of worship in the town of Belgrade. Between 1717 and 1739, during the Austrian rule, it served as a cathedral Catholic church, but  its  original  function  was  renewed  in 1741  when  the  Ottomans  returned  to  Belgrade. The mosque  was  renewed  in  the  19th  century  by the rulers of the Obrenovic dynasty, Prince Mihailo and King Aleksandar Obrenović.

In 1868,  the  Minister  of  Education  and  Church Affairs  was  ordered  by  Prince  Mihailo  Obrenovic to choose one of the existing mosques and enable it  for  the  performance  of  Muslim  religious  rites. Besides the  mosque, the courtyard  building  next  to  it was also repaired. The Minister  of  Education and Church Affairs sent a document to the State Council of the Principality of Serbia, dated May 10, 1868, with the following content: "In order for Mohammedans, who are on their business in Belgrade, not to be without religious consolation, His Excellency ordered the one of the local mosques to be repaired for their place of  worship.  Due  to  this  high  order, "Bajrak"  mosque  was  chosen as  the  most  appropriate  one  and  the  Minister  of Construction  as at my request sent the professional people to examine the same mosque, and a house next to it, where the mullahs will reside...."

By the Decree of Prince Mihailo Obrenović from May 1868, The Minister of Education and Church Affairs was authorized to "give to khoja 240,  and  a  muezzin  120  talirs  a  year",  and  the  servants of the mosque had even income from real estate - waqf property. The first imam and the muezzin at the Bajrakli Mosque were appointed in 1868.

Between the two world wars, the mosque was restored even by the Municipality  of  Belgrade, when  in 1935  it  was  protected  for the first time by the Regulation on the Protection of Antiquities in Belgrade. The restoration was performed several times and after the Second World War by  the  National  Committee  of  the  City  of Belgrade and by the Cultural Heritage Preservation and Scientific Research  Institute  and,  from  the  mid  sixties  of  the 20th century even by the Cultural Heritage Preservation Institute of Belgrade. After the  recent  damage  in  2004  conservation  works  on  rehabilitation and restoration of stone facades with the restoration of window openings were carried out.

Architecture
The architecture  of  the  mosque  belongs  to  the  type  of  one-storey cubic building with a  dome  and minaret. With massive  walls  and small  openings,  it  was  built  of  stone,  and  some  segments  were  carried out in brick and stone. The building has the square plan, while the octagonal dome  is  supported  by  oriental  domed  arches  and  niches -trompes,  with  modest  decoration  of consoles. The number  of  windows on the facades is uneven, while the one is located on each side of the tambour of the dome. Dome supporting elements and all the openings on  the  building  end  in  characteristic  ogee  oriental  arches. Minaret - a thin tower with conical roof, with a circular terrace at the top, from  which  the  faithful  are  called  to  prayer  by  the muezzin -  is located on the northwest exterior side. Opposite the entrance, in the interior of the mosque, there is the most sacred space - the mihrab, a shallow niche with elaborate vault decoration, set in the direction of the holy city of Mecca to the southeast, while the raised wooden pulpit, mimbar, is set to the right of the mihrab, in the south-west corner. Above the  entrance,  there  is  a  wooden  gallery (mahfil) from which one can come to the serefa, terrace on the minaret.

Interior decoration of the mosque is very modest. The walls are without plaster  with  shallow  moldings,  rare  stylized  floral  and geometrical motifs and calligraphic inscriptions of verses from the Muslim holy  book  Koran,  then  with  the  names  of  the  first  righteous  religious  leaders caliphs,  as  well  as  of  the  God's  i.e. Allah's magnificent properties and names written in Arabic letters on a specially decorated carved panels levhas. At the entrance to the mosque there was an arched  arcade  porch  with  three  small  domes. There is a fountain for prayer washing in the yard, as well  as  uncompleated  religious  school  (madrassa)  with  the  library. The Bajrakli  Mosque  is the  main  Islamic  cultural  center  in  Belgrade. Today is  a  bit  hidden  in  the  environment  of  higher housing units in Gospodar Jevremova Street.

Because of  its  antiquity,  rarity,  preservation  of the  original  purpose  and  representativeness  of religious architecture and Islamic culture, in 1946 was  placed  under  state  protection  as a  cultural monument,  and  in  1979  was  declared  cultural monument  of  great  value  (Decision, "Official  Gazette of SRS" No. 14/79).