The Architect's Apprentice

by Elif Shafak

  ‘He thinks we’re stupid,’ someone else ventured.

  They did not believe him. The man whom they had obeyed and respected all this time was suddenly seen as someone who was putting their lives in danger.

  ‘Brothers!’ said Sinan finally. ‘I see I cannot convince you. I shall put in writing everything I have said and seal it. Should anything happen, give my letter to our honourable Sultan. As a reward for your trust we will distribute tips.’

  Their silence was approval enough. Thus Sinan wrote, in his elegant handwriting, that he was the sole person responsible for any failures related to the Suleimaniye Mosque. The success belonged to God – and then to the workers. The letter was signed and sealed, and buried outside the walls. If things went wrong, they all knew where to find it.

  The next morning no one failed to turn up. Baksheesh were given out. Jahan managed to benefit from the disruption, snitching fifty aspers from the coffers. He silenced the guilt-ridden voice inside by reminding himself that he was not stealing from his master, but from the Sultan, who already had plenty.

  They picked up where they left off, working till late hours. Dozens of hands were brought in. Every unemployed stonecutter in the city was asked to join, every carver, etcher, draughtsman. Just when everyone thought he would be frozen with fear, Sinan was moving heaven and earth. His frenzy was contagious. Seeing him so driven, his apprentices strove harder. The expenses soared. Suleimaniye Mosque would cost the treasury 54,697,560 aspers.

  Even amid the whirl there was not a single feature the Chief Royal Architect had not considered at length. The tiles, made in the ateliers in Iznik, were in vivid colours – turquoise, red, white. The beautiful thuluth that spelled out Allah, Mohammed and Al was completed by the Court Calligrapher, Molla Hasan. While people adored the decorations inside, most failed to understand how the buttresses had been incorporated into the walls. Very few saw how the side walls, freed from the burden of having to carry the dome, were dotted with numerous windows, so that the light poured in as warmly as milk from the breast of a mother to her infant. And even fewer were aware that each jutting stone inside the mosque was placed in such a way as to make the sounds in the mosque reverberate, allowing every member of the congregation to hear the sermons, regardless of how close or how far he might be seated from the imam.

  Murano-glass oil lamps and mirror globes hung from the ceilings. Among them were ostrich eggs, dainty and delicate, tastefully painted, decorated with silk tassels, suspended from iron hoops. Miniature mosques of ivory were planted inside glass globes that dangled alongside each other. In the centre was a massive gilt ball. After dusk, when the lamps burned and the mirrors cast back their light, the entire mosque looked as though it had swallowed the sun. And carpets … hundreds of them. In countless homes in Cairo and Kure, women and girls of every age had been weaving the carpets of Suleimaniye.

  The mosque was colossal, its dome majestic; its double-storeyed gallery was unusual, and its quadruple minarets pierced the sky. The central baldachin’s red-granite columns were four in total, and were likened to the friends of the Prophet – the caliphs Abu Bakr, Omar, Osman and Ali. Every verse from the Qur’an that was displayed inside was chosen by the Shayh al-Islam Ebussuud. The calligraphy reminded Muslims to pray five times a day and never to deviate from the beliefs of the congregation. At a time of conflict with Shia Iran, the Ottoman rulers were adhering scrupulously to Sunni Islam, and becoming, at least on the surface, more and more pious.

  Erected upon layered terraces, and surrounded by a college, library, hospital and shops, the mosque site viewed from below was impressive. In addition to a madrasa, there was a convent for dervishes, guest rooms, a kitchen, a bakery, a refectory, a hospice, a medical college and a caravanserai. By the time Sinan and his apprentices had laid the last stone nothing was the same – neither the city nor the throne. Between the time of its inception and its completion the world had become a darker place and the Sultan a sadder man. That was the thing about colossal buildings. While they did not change, the people who ordered, designed, built and eventually used them constantly did.

  Everyone came to see the Suleimaniye, the mosque that surpassed all other mosques. The Bailo, the ambassadors, even Shah Tahmasp’s envoy, though no real peace had been achieved between the two kingdoms, only a respite from enmity.

  The Sultan, his eyes brimming, said, ‘My architect built me a mosque that will survive till the Day of Judgement.’

  ‘When Hallaj Mansur rises from the dead to shake Mount Damavand, he might shake the mountain but not your dome, your Highness,’ Sinan responded.

  The Sultan held the gilded key in his hand and addressed the crowd. ‘Who among you is the most worthy? I want that man to take this key and open the door.’

  Jahan looked around. All the people who had been gossiping about his master were now silent, smiling.

  ‘None among you deserves this more than the Chief Royal Architect,’ the Sultan said. He turned to Sinan. ‘You have not let me down. I’m pleased with you.’

  Sinan, his face flushed, lowered his gaze. He took the key, opened the gate and invited the Sultan in. One by one the others followed. Jahan wormed his way through the crowd, determined to make the most of this day. Encircling him on all sides were the wealthiest men in the empire. Gems shone on their fingers, pouches bulged from under their elegant robes. To his left he saw a figure of ample proportions, a kadi from Rumelia, talking fervently with another officer. A deep crimson rosary dangled from the man’s hand, his prayers made of rubies.

  As they poured towards the entrance, Jahan propelled himself against the man, wearing a contrite look as if being helplessly shoved in the commotion.

  ‘Effendi, I beg your pardon.’

  The kadi glowered, looking over Jahan’s shoulder. He was swirled with the others through the door, unaware that the young man had snatched his rosary. To avoid encountering him again, Jahan moved in the opposite direction, allowing people to pass him by. He waited to one side for a while. Thus it was some time before he entered the Suleimaniye Mosque. By then most of the guests had left the mosque itself and were touring the complex.

  Feeling the gems under his fingers, Jahan walked into the mosque. His buoyant mood changed to dismay when he remembered Captain Gareth. The man was away on another voyage that would take at least a couple of months. Jahan had to keep his booty somewhere safe and give it to him upon his return. Even so, he wondered if he could sell the rosary and buy a gift for Mihrimah. Perhaps a haircomb made of mother-of-pearl and tortoiseshell. Secretly, he had been working on her sketches, over and over again, unsatisfied with the results. He had never expected it to be so hard to put on paper an image that was already etched indelibly in his mind.

  With these thoughts he stepped over the threshold and stopped. Inside, a strange rainbow spilled from the windows. Crimson, cobalt-blue, vermilion. He remembered, suddenly, how as a boy he would lie under birch trees and stare up, as though in search of heaven. Should the sky fall down the trees would hold it up, he would reassure himself. He had done this many times but once had an odd experience. On that day the sky was lurid, the clouds so close he could reach out and tickle one. As he looked up, the green of the leaves had melted into the blue beyond. The feeling was so remarkable it had almost choked him up. It had lasted no longer than the blink of an eye, but he still remembered, after all these years, the taste of that elation.

  Now, as he stood admiring the dome they had built on four giant piers, seeing it for the thousandth time but almost seeing it anew, he felt the same thing. The dome had blended with the firmament above. He fell on his knees, without a care as to who might be watching him. He lay down on the carpet, eyes closed, arms and legs open wide, once again that boy under the birch trees. Alone in the mosque, only a dot in this vast expanse, Jahan could think only of the world as an enormous building site. While the master and the apprentices had been raising this mosque, the universe had been constructing their fate. Never before had he th
ought of God as an architect. Christians, Jews, Muslims, Zoroastrians and people of myriad faiths and creeds lived under the same invisible dome. For the eye that could see, architecture was everywhere.

  Hence, with a stolen rosary in his hand and an inexplicable gratitude in his heart, full of conflicts and confusions, under the majestic dome of the Suleimaniye Mosque, Jahan stood, a most intelligent animal-tamer and a most perplexed apprentice. Time, too, stopped with him. It seemed to him that in that instant he had, unknowingly, come a step closer to the centre of the universe.

  Every now and then Master Sinan sent the apprentices and novices on odd errands – from buying a pot of ink at the bazaar to rummaging around the ruins of an ancient church and reporting, upon their return, why some parts had fallen into decay while others had lasted; from digging in various hills to see which types of soil crawled with worms to spending a day with the ney-makers and observing how a simple musical instrument could be made to capture sounds of such immensity. They were instructed to carry out these orders to the best of their ability, however trifling they seemed to be. Yet, in truth, each always weighed their assignments against those of the others, judging, begrudging. Having never been assigned such tasks, Jahan had been spared this contention.

  That changed one Thursday afternoon. As if to make up for lost time, Sinan gave him not one but two tasks. First, Jahan was to visit a couple of ostrich-egg vendors to inform them that Sinan would soon be in need of their merchandise. Then, he was to drop round a bookseller’s to purchase a book. Sinan hadn’t said which book. He said when he got there he would know. This last detail Jahan found strange, but he didn’t mind. Child’s play, he thought to himself as he got ready to leave the site. He was bent on accomplishing his tasks so fast and so flawlessly that the master would have to entrust him with more serious duties the next time.

  ‘Well, what is it?’ came a voice from behind.

  When he turned he found the other three apprentices watching him.

  ‘Oh, naught. Ostrich eggs and a book.’

  ‘A book?’ Nikola asked. ‘Is it from the bookseller in Pera?’

  When they saw Jahan nod, their faces clouded over. Davud said, ‘Congratulations, novice! The master only sends his favourites to the old goat.’

  As pleased as he was to hear this, Jahan felt a pang of unease.

  ‘Don’t be humble next to him,’ said Nikola. ‘Show him how much you know. He’ll like that.’

  Yusuf smiled in agreement.

  ‘Don’t forget to shout. Simeon is deaf as a log,’ said Davud.

  Jahan thanked them for their advice. Much as he hated entrusting Chota to the care of others, he made provision for him. Before noon he set off with a horse – a lazy, listless creature – and a pouch of money that had been provided for him. Passing by fields covered in lush vegetation and cemeteries lined with cypress trees, he and the horse picked their way towards Unkapani. Once there, though it was the longer route, Jahan went via the quay. He enjoyed going there whenever he could, as though to reassure himself that if things got too dreary, he could jump on board one of the vessels and return to the home that, deep in his heart, he still believed awaited him.

  The port was teeming with sounds and smells. The soughing of waves, the shrieking of seagulls and the barking of orders mingled with the clanking of chains and the cracking of whips. A tang of seaweed permeated the air, and the reek of sweat and excrement wafted in from hundreds of bodies trudging in tandem – the captives from the recent naval victory. Children, the elderly, women and men – people who weeks ago had names and families of their own. With their ankles shackled, looking about but unseeing, they were here and not here. Jahan jumped off the horse and joined the multitude watching this grim procession.

  They were all covered head to toe in grime. Some wore garbs that had once been elegant, which they had arranged to retain some semblance of dignity. These, Jahan supposed, were the gentry. Others were clad in tatters that the beggars of Eyup would slight. Regardless of who they might have been in their previous lives, they were now subject to the whip, which descended at random, less to quicken their pace than to snatch them back from any daydream in which they might have momentarily taken shelter.

  Jahan hopped back on his horse and set out for the bazaar. He spoke with several merchants who traded in, among other things, ostrich eggs. He told them Sinan would soon have need of their stocks. The Chief Royal Architect used these eggs to keep the spiders away, so as to prevent cobwebs from gathering in the mosques. When a hole was pricked in each end of the egg and it was suspended from the ceiling, it would release a smell that would not bother humans but would surely keep all insects at bay.

  The vendors listened. But when Jahan inquired if the goods would be ready in a month’s time, all they said was Insha’Allah. Not quite sure whether he had fulfilled his first assignment, Jahan proceeded to the second one.

  When Jahan arrived at the bookseller’s, a two-storey wooden house that had seen better days, the horse looked as happy to be rid of him as he was of the horse. Remembering what the apprentices said, he pounded hard. The door opened and a doddering man appeared, looking enraged.

  ‘You want to break my door or what?’

  ‘Selamun aleikum, I was sent by the –’

  ‘Why are you shouting? You think I’m deaf, you dolt!’

  Puzzled, Jahan stammered, ‘No, effendi.’

  ‘Who sent you here?’ asked the bookseller stiffly, but when he heard Sinan’s name his face softened. ‘Come on in, then.’

  Inside, the smell of a freshly baked loaf wrapped round them like a blanket. Sitting in a corner was a woman, gaunt and old, hunched over her sewing. Simeon said, ‘That’s my wife, Esther. Let’s not disturb her.’

  They pottered down the dark, draughty corridors. The house was a maze. Inside were shelves laden with volume after volume of leather-bound books, mostly in hues of brown and black. Some had been looted by corsairs from remote islands, port towns or enemy vessels. Knowing Simeon’s delight in such articles, the sea dogs brought them over in return for a decent sum. Others had been gathered in Frankish kingdoms. Among them were medical treatises by Spanish physicians and volumes by French noblemen. Still others had been printed in Istanbul or Salonika. The Sephardic Jews, with permission from the Sultan, published their own books. In one corner there was a compendium of mathematical manuscripts, which, Jahan learned, were once owned by a scholar called Molla Lutfi; drawings of the winds and the airstreams, stars and heavenly bodies, were incorporated into the borders of each page. There was The Book of the Knight Zifar, freshly arrived from Spain; a pile of wooden engravings by Antonio da Sangallo; a treatise titled Regole generali di architettura by a certain Sebastiano Serlio, a Bolognese architect; and a gilt-edged manuscript in Latin, De Architectura, by Vitruvius. The last, found during the conquest of Buda, had ended up in Istanbul. A tract by a Leon Battista Alberti was titled De re aedificatoria, which Simeon translated as The Art of Building. There was a tome by a man with an awkward name – Ibn Maimon. Its title was The Guide for the Perplexed, which Jahan thought was well suited to himself.

  They arrived at a large, dim room at the back. A cupboard with dozens of drawers, its doors intricately carved and fretted, stood in the middle. Simeon gestured to the boy to sit in the only chair.

  ‘How’s your master? Haven’t seen him in a while.’

  ‘He sends you his regards,’ said Jahan. ‘He wanted me to choose a book. But didn’t say which.’

  ‘That’s easy. First, tell me, honestly, are you a learner?’

  Jahan gave a surprised look. ‘I attend the Palace School and –’

  ‘I didn’t say are you a student. I asked, are you a learner? Not every pupil is a learner.’

  Remembering Nikola’s counsel, Jahan decided this was his moment to stand up to this grumpy man. ‘Working on construction sites all day long, one learns whether one wants to or not.’

  The expression on Simeon’s face was one of belittlemen
t. ‘Our Sultan, may the mercy of God be upon him, should levy a tax on idiocy. If he could collect a coin for every stupid word uttered, his treasury would be full.’

  It suddenly dawned on Jahan that his fellow apprentices had misled him. Everything he did or said only helped to annoy the old man. He said meekly, ‘The others have been here before, have they?’

  ‘Oh, yes, many times,’ said Simeon. ‘Lucky you, being a novice to a man like Sinan. Are you aware of your good fortune?’

  Jahan averted his eyes, feeling like an impostor. What would the man think if he heard that Jahan was trying to steal from construction sites? Slowly, he said, ‘I do my best, effendi.’

  ‘Masters are great but books are better. He who has a library has a thousand teachers. Your Prophet said, “Seek lore, even if it be in China.” Mine said, “God created us because He wanted to be known.” Ignorant men think we are here to fight and make wars and to couple and have children. Nay, our job is to expand our knowledge. That’s why we’re here.’ Simeon paused. ‘Tell me, do you talk to God?’

  ‘I pray.’

  ‘Didn’t ask do you pray, dunce. You want to become an architect, you have to speak to something bigger than you!’

  Jahan lowered his gaze. ‘I wouldn’t bother God with my worries. But I talk with my elephant. Chota is bigger than me and wiser. He is young, but I think he was a hundred years old when he was born.’

  When Jahan lifted his head there was something in the old man’s stare that wasn’t there a moment ago. A trace of appreciation. ‘You seem like a kind soul but your mind is confused. You are like a boat with two oarsmen rowing in separate directions. That means you have not found the centre of your heart yet.’

  Remembering his master’s words the other day, Jahan shivered imperceptibly. Simeon went on, ‘Now, tell me, what do you like to build best?’

  ‘I like bridges.’

  It began to rain. From the depths of the corridor came the rustle of a page being turned. Was it Simeon’s wife who was reading? Or was there someone else in the house? In that moment Jahan had a suspicion that one of the apprentices was there, hiding, listening. He glanced at the bookseller, as though for confirmation. But the man was busy fumbling inside a chest. Finally, he produced a sketch. ‘Look. A bridge on the Golden Horn. It was made by Leonardo.’