Bursa, art and architecture - Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE
[Article]
Kuban, Doğan
Leiden
Brill
(2,385 words)
Bursa , in northwest Anatolia (Illustration 1), was the first capital of the Ottoman Empire, from 726-66/1326-65. The period from the eighth/fourteenth to the ninth/fifteenth century, the most important in the city's history, was also the most important in terms of its art and architecture . During that time a number of successive sultans built architectural complexes (often called külliyye or ʿimāret ) in undeveloped parts of the city, which then became the nuclei of new quarters, a process that made Bursa the model for early Ottoman