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Decisions on Designation of Properties as National Monuments

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60th session - Decisions

Site of the Husein-beg mosque with harem (courtyard/burial ground)

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Status of monument -> National monument

             Pursuant to Article V para. 4 Annex 8 of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Article 39 para. 1 of the Rules of Procedure of the Commission to Preserve National Monuments, at a session held from 1 to 7 July 2003 the Commission adopted a

 

 

D E C I S I O N

 

I

 The site of the Husein-beg mosque with harem (courtyard/burial ground) in  (Bosanski) Brod,is hereby designated as a National Monument of Bosnia and Herzegovina (hereinafter: the National Monument).

   The National Monument is located on cadastral plot 606/1 and 607/3, cadastral municipality  (Bosanski) Brod, Municipality (Bosanski) Brod, Republika Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The provisions relating to protection and rehabilitation measures set forth by the Law on the Implementation of the Decisions of the Commission to Preserve National Monuments, established pursuant to Annex 8 of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Official Gazette of Republika Srpska no. 9/02) shall apply to the National Monument.

II

The Government of Republika Srpska shall be responsible for ensuring and providing the legal, scientific, technical, administrative and financial measures necessary to protect, conserve, display and rehabilitate the National Monument.

The Government of Republika Srpska shall be responsible for providing the resources for drawing up and implementing the necessary technical documentation for the rehabilitation of the National Monument.

The Commission to Preserve National Monuments of Bosnia and Herzegovina (hereinafter: the Commission) shall determine the technical requirements and secure the funds for preparing and setting up signboards with the basic data on the monument and the Decision to proclaim the property a National Monument.

III

The following measures in particular shall be implemented:

The architectural ensemble of the Husein-beg mosque with harem shall be rehabilitated on its original site, in its original form, with the same dimensions, using new materials and to a design project approved by the Ministry repsonsible for regional planning in Republika Srpska and under the expert supervision of the heritage protection authority of Republika Srpska.

·         The reconstruction of the mosque building must be to the state it was in in 1992 prior to demolition;

·         all fragments of the mosque that may be found during the building works being carried out on the site of the Husein-beg mosque or that are found in the dumps to which they were removed after demolition shall be recorded, conserved, and rebuilt into the mosque

·         all fragments found that are too badly damaged or cannot for other justifiable reasons be reintegrated into the reconstructed building shall be displayed in appropriate fashion within the mosque ensemble

·         before the start of reconstruction the surface layers of soil must be removed to reveal the original foundation walls and a detailed survey, repair and consolidation of the original parts of the foundations and walls carried out;

·         all parts for which there is no reliable documentation shall be treated within the project in such a way as to ensure that their interpolation is clearly visible;

·         all fragments of nišan tombstones that may be found during the rehabilitation works or that are found in the dumps to which they were removed after demolition shall be recorded, conserved, and presented in the part of the ensemble where there were graves prior to demolition.

On all adjacent plots bordering the protected area, the rehabilitationi of existing buildings shall be permitted subject to their retaining their existing dimensions and height.  The interpolation of residential buildings may be permitted with a maximum height of two storeys (ground plus one upper) of a maximum height of some 6.50 m to the roof cornice.

                                                      IV

All executive and area development planning acts not in accordance with the provisions of this Decision are hereby revoked.

V

Everyone, and in particular the competent authorities of Republika Srpska, and urban and municipal authorities, shall refrain from any action that might damage the National Monument specified in Clause I of this Decision or jeopardize the preservation and rehabilitation thereof.

VI

            The Government of Republika Srpska, the Ministry responsible for regional planning in Republika Srpska and the heritage protection authority of Republika Srpska, and the Municipal Authorities in charge of urban planning and land registry affairs, shall be notified of this Decision in order to carry out the measures stipulated in Articles II to V of this Decision, and the Authorized Municipal Court shall be notified for the purposes of registration in the Land Register.

VII

          The elucidation and accompanying documentation form an integral part of this Decision, which may be viewed by interested parties on the premises or by accessing the website of the Commission (http://www.aneks8komisija.com.ba) 

VIII

Pursuant to Art. V para 4 Annex 8 of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina, decisions of the Commission are final.

IX

This Decision shall enter into force on the date of its adoption and shall be published in the Official Gazette of BiH and the Official Gazette of Republika Srpska.

 

This Decision has been adopted by the following members of the Commission: Zeynep Ahunbay, Amra Hadžimuhamedović, Dubravko Lovrenović,  Ljiljana Ševo and Tina Wik.

 

Chairman of the Commission

Amra Hadžimuhamedović

 

 

No: 08.1-6-803/03-1

2 July 2003.

Sarajevo

 

E l u c i d a t i o n

 

I – INTRODUCTION

 

            Pursuant to Article 2, paragraph 1 of the Law on the Implementation of the Decisions of the Commission to Preserve National Monuments, established pursuant to Annex 8 of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina, a “National Monument” is an item of public property proclaimed by the Commission to Preserve National Monuments to be a National Monument pursuant to Articles V and VI of Annex 8 of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina (hereinafter referred to as Annex 8) and property entered on the Provisional List of National Monuments of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Official Gazette of  BiH no. 33/02) until the Commission reaches a final decision on its status, as to which there is no time limit and regardless of whether a petition for the property in question has been submitted or not.

            In August 2002 the Commission received a petition from the Islamic Community of Bosnia and Herzegovina, office of the Banja Luka Mufti.

Pursuant to the provisions of the law, the Commission proceeded to carry out the procedure for reaching a final decision to designate the Property as a National Monument, pursuant to Article V of Annex 8 and Article 35 of the Rules of Procedure of the Commission to Preserve National Monuments.

II – PROCEDURE PRIOR TO DECISION

In the procedure preceding the adoption of a final decision to proclaim the property a national monument, the following documentation was inspected:

 

·         Data on the current condition and use of the property, including a description and photographs, data of war damage, data on restoration or other works on the property, etc.

·         Documentation on the location and current owner and user of the property

·         Historical, architectural and other documentary material on the property, as set out in the bibliography forming part of this Decision.

The findings based on the review of the above documentation and the condition of the site are as follows:

1.   Details of the site

Location

            The Husein-beg mosque is in the centre of (Bosanski) Brod, on c.p. 606/1 and 607/3, c.m. (Bosanski) Brod, municipality (Bosanski) Brod, Republika Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Historical information

            The mosque was built in the eighteenth century – neither the exact year nor who the founder was is known.  In 1908 the mosque was demolished and taken to Sijekovac and a new mosque erected on the site (Mašić, 2003).

            The Husein-beg mosque was rebuilt in 1327 AH (1909 CE) with funds provided by the government of Bosnia and Herzegovina.  A transcript of an inscription on this from Kadić (Collection 28, p. 502) is kept in the Gazi Husref beg library in Sarajevo.  The roof of the mosque had collapsed and the walls were damaged. The chronogram was composed by the poet Enverija.   As well as the year, written in numerals below the text, the inscription also includes an abjad in the last couplet of the chronogram (Mujezinović, 1998, p. 232)

            The Husein-beg mosque was demolished in October 1992.

2. Description of the monument

            The architectural ensemble consisted of the mosque and its harem with nišan tombstones.  Thirteen to fifteen recorded nišans are known to have stood in the harem, one of which is believed to belong to the founder of the mosque, Husein-beg (Mašić, 2003)

The only available documentation on the previous appearance of the mosque is photographs.

The original building, dating from the late eighteenth century, was an example of a single-space mosque with wooden minaret such as were built in those parts.  A typological link may be made, judging from the outward appearance on available photographs, with the ground plan arrangement and concept of the mosque.  Spatially, it consisted of a portico with sofas and a main prayer space, linked by a hipped roof from which the wooden minaret emerged. The entrance portico with gallery, of a depth of about one third of the main prayer space, was formed with four wooden pillars carrying the wooden floor and roof structure.  The portico was on the north-west side, opposite the mihrab, and was of two storeys.  It is not known how the gallery was reached.  The wooden sofas were surrounded by a wooden railing, and the entrance area was open.  The areas between the pillars on the gallery were divided into two parts by a wooden colonnette linked by segmental wooden arches.  The roughly square prayer area was entgered from the portico.  Since there is no available information about the appearance of the mosque interior at this time, on the principle of analogy it may be assumed that there was a frontal wooden mahvil.  These mosques generally had whitewashed walls, wooden ceilings, multicoloured carpets on the floor, and simple decoration.  The roof pitch would be about 45 deg. and the roof cladding would be shingles. The wooden minaret with open gallery was shaped like a stone minaret and was about 20 m in height from the ground floor level.  The mosque was plastered and painted.  A photograph shows that the south-west side wall had two rows of a total of four rectangular windows.  On the portico, to the right and left of the entrance to the mosque, windows of approximately the same dimensions as those on the side wall can be seen.  The mosque harem was surrounded by a wooden fence.

The new mosque that was built in 1909 was a single-space domed mosque.  The main prayer area measured about 10.00 x 10.00 m, the entrance portico with sofas 10.00 x 3.00 m, and the mosque was about 33 m high (according to Jusuf Mašić).  Available photographs show that the mosque had a wooden portico without a gallery, with a triple-pitched roof clad in sheet metal, resting on four wooden pillars.  The sofa area had a wooden railing.  To the right and left of the entrance, rectangular windows terminating in a decorative lunette with pointed arch are to be seen.  According to Jusuf Mašić, the mosque was built of baked brick with a stone dome.  The walls of the building terminated in a cornice extending the full length of the building except where the minaret stood.  The twelve-sided minaret stood to the right of the entrance to the mosque, and was built of baked brick.  It was about 33 m. in height.  The basal plinth of the minaret was also twelve-sided, and was of the same height as the cornice on the building.  Above the cornice was an octagonal drum, on which two narrow windows are visible on each of the eight sides, terminating in pointed arches and set one next to the other.  Above the drum there rises a shallow dome.  Three windows are visible on the side facade of the building, two lower and one upper.  The windows were rectangular, terminating in a decorative lunette with a pointed arch.  Both the mosque and the minaret were plastered and white painted, while the dome was clad in copper sheeting.  All that can be deduced of the appearance of the mosque interior is what Jusuf Mašić says: that the mosque had a frontal wooden mahvil about 2.50 to 3.00 m. deep with a semicircular projection for the muezzin projecting some 1.00 to 1.30 m from the level of the mahvil.  The mahvil was supported by two wooden pillars.  In addition to the mahvil, the mosque had a mihrab and a wooden minber.  The entrance to the minaret was from the mahvil.  No major works were carried out on the mosque prior to its demolition in 1992.  In the 1950s it was replastered and painted.

             A design project drawn up in 2003 provides for the new mosque building to be built in the form of a framework structure of reinforced concrete ring beams and beams with an infill of baked-brick blocks 30 cm thick.  The proposed dimensions of the new building are some 13.20 x 10.00 m.  At ground floor level the ground plan consists of two parts: the entrance area, and the main prayer area.  In the entrance area to the right and left of the centrally-placed entrance are an abdesthana (premises for ritual ablutions) with sanitary fittings.  Two windows are proposed for the entrance facade of the mosque, with openings measuring approx. 1.00 x 1.00 m. On the lateral facades of the entrance area, where the sanitary installations are, two windows on each side are planned, approx. 0.50 x 1.00 m.  The main prayer space is almost square, with interior dimensions of approx. 9.30 x 9.40 m.  At ground floor level it consists of two areas: the part by the entrance wall is covered by a mahvil about 3.00 m deep resting on two reinforced concrete pillars.  To the left of the entrance in the covered area is a staircase leading to the upper mahvil floor.  To the right of the entrance the entrance to the minaret is planned.  Along the side walls at ground floor level are two rectangular windows, 1.00 x 1.50 m.  There are also two upper windows, arched in this case, of the same size as the ground floor windows.  On the mahvil wall there are to be two lower and two upper windows of the same size and shape as those on the side walls.  At the upper floor level (2.20 m above ground floor level) the area is divided into the area with the staircase and mahvil and two areas in the angles of the entrance wall to the mosque, to be used by the imam.  The windows here echo those of the ground floor but are slightly larger – 0.50 x 1.50 m. Between these two windows is the extension of the mahvil area with a window above the entrance to the mosque, 1.00 x 1.50 m.  At this level there is yet another entrance to the minaret.  The open central area beneath the dome is about 10.50 in height. The central area of the mosque has a reinforced concrete dome with a radius of approx. 8.00 m. resting on an octagonal concrete drum with two windows terminating in pointed arches on each side of the octagon.  The entrance area to the mosque has three small concrete domes with a radius of 2.00 at a height of approx. 5.50 m. from the ground floor level.  All the domes are to be clad with copper sheeting.  The reinforced concrete minaret is to be 35.00 m in height and will stand alongside the south-west wall of the mosque.

Legal status to date

                        According to information from the Institute for the Protection of the Cultural, Historical and Natural Heritage of BiH, the Husein-beg mosque in (Bosanski) Brod has not been under protection.

3.      Research and conservation and restoration works

            No details are available of conservation and restoration works carried out to date.

4.      Current condition of the property

             Inspection of the current condition of the property revealed that no rehabilitation works have yet begun.  The site has been grassed over and turned into a park.  No remains of either the mosque or the harem with its nišans are visible, although it may be inferred from the mound that has formed on the site of the mosque that some remains might be found under the soil surface during investigation works.

III CONCLUSION

Applying the Criteria for the adoption of a decision on proclaiming an item of property a national monument, adopted at the fourth session of the Commission to Preserve National Monuments (3 to 9 September 2002), the Commission has enacted the Decision cited above.

The Decision was based on the following criteria:

A.  Time frame

E.     Symbolic value

E.ii. religious value

E.iii. traditional value

E.iv. relation to rituals or ceremonies

            The following documents form an integral part of this Decision:

-          Copy of cadastral plan

-          Copy of land register entry and proof of title;

-          Photodocumentation;

-          Drawings

Bibliography

Bećirbegović, Madžida, Džamije sa drvenom munarom u Bosni i Hercegovini, (Mosques with wooden minarets in BiH) Sarajevo-Publishing, Sarajevo, 1999.

Mujezinović, Mehmed, Islamska epigrafika Bosne i Hercegovine, (Islamic epigraphics of BiH) Vol. II, 3rd ed., Cultural Heritage Collection, Sarajevo Publishing, 1998.

 

Material provided by Mašić Jusuf, 2003



Site of the Husein-beg mosque with harem in Bosanski BrodHusein-beg mosque before the restoration in 1909Husein-beg mosque after restoration in 1909Site of the Husein-beg mosque, photo from 2003


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