Guide
Sinan designed his own tomb and kept it modest. It is an open tomb — a dome carried on six columns joined by pointed arches — built of küfeki stone and marble, standing at the corner of the Süleymaniye complex he had built for Süleyman the Magnificent.
In front of his sarcophagus a single slab of marble carries an inscription in thuluth by the poet Sâi, who wrote the account of Sinan's life. Three more graves stand inside the tomb: one belongs to the architect Ali Talat Bey, and the other two have not been identified.
The man buried here was chief imperial architect for forty-nine years, from 1538, under Süleyman, Selim II and Murad III. He entered the corps as a levy in the reign of Selim I and was promoted after the battle of Mohács; of everything he built, the source singles out the Selimiye Mosque at Edirne.
