Magribija Mosque

The story goes that one Sheikh Magribija came to Sarajevo with Isa Bey Ishaković (the founder and first administrator of Sarajevo) and built a mosque beneath Gorica, in an area called Zagorica.

The original structure was burned down in a fire in 1459, and the mosque that can be seen today was built between 1538 and 1565, when it was first mentioned in a Sarajevo court ledger.

The mosque went up in flames again in 1697, when Eugene of Savoy ravaged the city, and all that was left were the walls and stone minaret.

It was reconstructed in 1766, and the walls were covered with woodwork, decorative reliefs and painted ornamental details that were taken from old Turkish artistic traditions.

English scholar Sir Thomas W. Arnold visited Sarajevo in 1929 and was especially taken by the decorations in Magribija Mosque when he stated, “I’ve only seen the likes of these in the mosques of Delhi in India.

The mosque was damaged again during a period of heaving shelling in 1992, it was renovated in 1997 and declared a National Monument of BiH in 2005.