The Mosque of Rinat Abdullakhan

Rinat Abdullakhan Mosque is located in the center of the city of Osh at the southeastern foothills of Suleiman Mountain. The name of Abdullakhan II (1534-1598) from the Shaybanid dynasty has preserved the architectural monument in popular tradition. The mosque was built in the mid-16th century during the period of Abdullakhan II's greatest power, when as a result of his military campaigns, he managed to unite under his rule not only Maveraunahr (the region between the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers) but also Balkh, Khorezm, Khorasan, and part of the Fergana Valley, including the city of Osh.

Abdullakhan II combined military glory with the fame of a builder of his country. In the conquered territories, he erected buildings for religious purposes: mosques and madrasahs. Legends and folk traditions say that Abdullakhan built his structures very quickly, always having builders with him. Seven mosques like Ravat Abdullakhan were built in different cities, including cities in Iran and Afghanistan.



In the Fergana Valley, only two architectural monuments built in the late 16th century by Abdullakhan II have survived to this day. These are the jami or juma (congregational) mosque of Ravat Abdullakhan in the city of Osh and the mosque-madrasa of Abdullakhan in the village of Navgilem, eight kilometers from the city of Isfara in Tajikistan.

Historical, bibliographic, and archival research on the monument has not yielded specific material. No documents about the Ravat Abdullakhan mosque have been found in any of the state archives. There is no information about this architectural monument in the works of historians, orientalists, architects, and researchers from the 19th to the early 20th centuries.

The main facade of the building features a three-arch composition, where the central arch is higher than the side arches and is framed by a portal. The central entrance in the portal niche also has an arched finish. The small domes of the side wings of the structure can be seen from the western facade. The roof is surrounded by a small parapet. The interior space of the mosque consists of three main rooms: a central one covered by a spherical dome, and two side rooms, each covered by four small domes on squinches. All the domes rest on pylons.

During field surveys, two large Arabic inscriptions were identified above the mihrab niche. One of them was made with contour carving on clay plaster and painted with black Chinese ink. Numerous small Arabic inscriptions, made with black ink, were found on the side walls in niches. All the inscriptions are late and date back to the 19th century. The mosque had seven exits, five of which faced east, and two faced west, towards the foothills of Suleiman Mountain.



For four centuries, the Ravat Abdullakhan mosque was the largest religious building in the city and played a significant role in the life of the people of Osh. By the beginning of the 20th century, it was particularly popular among the faithful as a monument of antiquity located at the foot of the sacred Suleiman Mountain. Thousands of pilgrims visited it during Muslim holidays.

The courtyard paved with burnt bricks in front of the mosque was surrounded by a low wall (duval). The main entrance from Alabastrovaya Street to the inner courtyard was designed as a two-story passage portal-dome structure with wooden gates. The second floor of this structure consisted of small hujras-cells for students. Several hujras were also located in the southern part of the inner courtyard, the volumetric-spatial layout of which represented a closed structure. The minaret, located in the inner courtyard, was built of burnt brick with facing masonry. The height of the minaret was 10-12 meters. The base of the minaret is an octagonal pedestal. The minaret was round, two-tiered, tapering towards the top and topped with a "pavilion-lantern" with a domed roof made of sheet iron. A spiral staircase, enclosed within the minaret, led to this small pavilion. The muezzins ascended the stairs to call Muslims to prayer.

The outer courtyard of the complex, following established tradition, represented a garden of fruit trees covering an area of at least 2.5 hectares. In 1963, the complex of the Ravat Abdullakhan mosque was transferred to the regional museum.