Romanesque architecture is an architectural style of medieval Europe characterized by semi-circular arches. There is no consensus for the beginning date of the Romanesque style, with proposals ranging from the 6th to the 11th century, this later date being the most commonly held. In the 12th century it developed into the Gothic style, marked by pointed arches. Examples of Romanesque architecture can be found across the continent, making it the first pan-European architectural style since Imperial Roman architecture. The Romanesque style in England is traditionally referred to as Norman architecture.
Byzantine architecture is the architecture of the Byzantine Empire, or Eastern Roman Empire.
Sultan Ahmed Mosque, also known as the Blue Mosque, is an Ottoman-era mosque located in Istanbul, Turkey. A functioning mosque, it also attracts large numbers of tourist visitors. It was constructed between 1609 and 1616 during the rule of Ahmed I. Its Külliye contains Ahmed's tomb, a madrasah and a hospice. Hand-painted blue tiles adorn the mosque’s interior walls, and at night the mosque is bathed in blue as lights frame the mosque’s five main domes, six minarets and eight secondary domes. It sits next to the Hagia Sophia, the principal mosque of Istanbul until the Blue Mosque's construction and another popular tourist site.
A tile is a thin object usually square or rectangular in shape. A tile is a manufactured piece of hard-wearing material such as ceramic, stone, metal, baked clay, or even glass, generally used for covering roofs, floors, walls, or other objects such as tabletops. Alternatively, tile can sometimes refer to similar units made from lightweight materials such as perlite, wood, and mineral wool, typically used for wall and ceiling applications. In another sense, a tile is a construction tile or similar object, such as rectangular counters used in playing games. The word is derived from the French word tuile, which is, in turn, from the Latin word tegula, meaning a roof tile composed of fired clay.
A triforium is an interior gallery, opening onto the tall central space of a building at an upper level. In a church, it opens onto the nave from above the side aisles; it may occur at the level of the clerestory windows, or it may be located as a separate level below the clerestory. Masonry triforia are generally vaulted and separated from the central space by arcades. Early triforia were often wide and spacious, but later ones tend to be shallow, within the thickness of an inner wall, and may be blind arcades not wide enough to walk along. The outer wall of the triforium may itself have windows, or it may be solid stone. A narrow triforium may also be called a "blind-storey", and looks like a row of window frames.
The Süleymaniye Mosque is an Ottoman imperial mosque located on the Third Hill of Istanbul, Turkey. The mosque was commissioned by Suleiman the Magnificent and designed by the imperial architect Mimar Sinan. An inscription specifies the foundation date as 1550 and the inauguration date as 1557. Behind the qibla wall of the mosque is an enclosure containing the separate octagonal mausoleums of Suleiman the Magnificent and that of his wife Hurrem Sultan (Roxelana). The Süleymaniye Mosque is the second largest mosque in the city, and one of the best-known sights of Istanbul.
The Selimiye Mosque is an Ottoman imperial mosque, which is located in the city of Edirne, Turkey is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The mosque was commissioned by Sultan Selim II, and was built by the imperial architect Mimar Sinan between 1568 and 1575. It was considered by Sinan to be his masterpiece and is one of the highest achievements of Islamic architecture.
This page is a glossary of architecture.
Indo-Islamic architecture is the architecture of the Indian subcontinent produced by and for Islamic patrons and purposes. Despite an initial Arab presence in Sindh, the development of Indo-Islamic architecture began in earnest with the establishment of Delhi as the capital of the Ghurid dynasty in 1193. Succeeding the Ghurids was the Delhi Sultanate, a series of Central Asian dynasties that consolidated much of North India, and later the Mughal Empire by the 15th century. Both of these dynasties introduced Persianate, Turkic and Islamicate architecture and art styles from Western Eurasia into the Indian subcontinent.
The Green Mosque, also known as the Mosque of Mehmed I, is a part of a larger complex located on the east side of Bursa, Turkey, the former capital of the Ottoman Turks before they captured Constantinople in 1453. The complex consists of a mosque, türbe, madrasah, kitchen and bath. The name Green Mosque comes from its green and blue interior tile decorations.
Ceramic houses are buildings made of an earth mixture which is high in clay, and fired to become ceramic. The process of building and firing such houses was developed by Iranian architect Nader Khalili in the late 1970s; he named it Geltaftan. "Gel" means "clay" and "taftan" means "firing, baking, and weaving clay" in Persian language. Khalili's research into creating ceramic houses was strongly based on the idea that permanent, water-resistant, and earthquake-resistant houses could be built with the implementation of the four elements: earth and water to build the forms, and fire and air to finish them. His impassioned work led to a few small scale projects in Iran, including the Javadabad Elementary school, and the Ghaled Mofid restoration project. Aside from Khalili's own documented work, there seems to be little widespread research on ceramic houses.
Ulu Cami, is a 16th-century mosque in Adana, Turkey. It forms part of a complex (külliye) that includes a madrasah and a mausoleum (türbe). The buildings are on Kızılay street, next to the Ramazanoğlu Hall.
Muqarnas, known in Iranian architecture as Ahoopāy and in Iberian architecture as Mocárabe, is a form of ornamented vaulting in Islamic architecture. It is the archetypal form of Islamic architecture, integral to the vernacular of Islamic buildings. The muqarnas structure originated from the squinch. Sometimes called "honeycomb vaulting" or "stalactite vaulting", the purpose of muqarnas is to create a smooth, decorative zone of transition in an otherwise bare, structural space. This structure gives the ability to distinguish between the main parts of a building, and serve as a transition from the walls of a room into a domed ceiling.
Zenshūyo is a Japanese Buddhist architectural style derived from Chinese Song Dynasty architecture. Named after the Zen sect of Buddhism which brought it to Japan, it emerged in the late 12th or early 13th century. Together with Wayō and Daibutsuyō, it is one of the three most significant styles developed by Japanese Buddhism on the basis of Chinese models. Until World War II, this style was called karayō but, like the Daibutsuyō style, it was re-christened by Ōta Hirotarō, a 20th-century scholar. Its most typical features are a more or less linear layout of the garan, paneled doors hanging from hinges, intercolumnar tokyō, cusped windows, tail rafters, ornaments called kibana, and decorative pent roofs.
Madrasa Ennakhla ou Madrasa of the Palm is a former madrasa and one of the monuments of the Ottoman era in the medina of Tunis. It is named after the palm tree at the center of its patio which still stands today.
The Lavirotte Building, an apartment building at 29 Avenue Rapp in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, France, was designed by the architect Jules Lavirotte and built between 1899 and 1901. The building is one of the best-known surviving examples of Art Nouveau architecture in Paris. The facade is lavishly decorated with sculpture and ceramic tiles made by the ceramics manufacturer Alexandre Bigot. Lavirotte was awarded the prize for the most original new facade in the 7th arrondissement in 1901.
St. Helena is a Catholic church in Karşıyaka, Turkey. It was built in 1904 by Raymond Charles Péré.
The Izmir Atatürk Museum is a museum in İzmir, Turkey. Founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, a Turkish field marshal, revolutionary statesman, and the first President of Turkey, the Izmir Atatürk Museum opened to the public on 11 September 1941, on the 19th anniversary of Atatürk’s arrival in Izmir. On 13 May 1988 it was officially named the Izmir Atatürk Museum, which it is called today.
The Shrine of Khwaja Abd Allah, commonly called the Shrine at Gazur Gah and the Abdullah Ansari Shrine Complex, is the funerary compound of the Sufi saint Khwaja Abdullah Ansari. It is located at the village of Gazur Gah, three kilometers northeast of Herat, Afghanistan. The Historic Cities Programme of the Aga Khan Trust for Culture has initiated repairs on the complex since 2005.
Buruciye Medrese or Buruciye Madrasah is a former medrese, in Sivas, Turkey. It was built during the reign of Seljuk sultan Gıyaseddin Keyhüsrev III in 1271.
