Dome

View down the arcade of the sahn (courtyard); Ahmed's mosque (also known as the Blue Mosque) was placed in the heart of the city on a site containing the ruins of the Byzantine Great Palace and facing the Hippodrome to the west. It confronted at a distance of some 200 m to the north the most venerated and important mosque in the capital, the converted church of Hagia Sophia. With its six minarets and its semi-domes cascading on four axes, the mosque represents the ultimate evolution of the imperial Ottoman mosque after two centuries of linear development. The exterior arcading of the mosque and courtyard walls, the massing of semi-domes and the four tall and two shorter minarets provide an indelible architectural impression, which marks growing Ottoman architectural self-confidence vis-à-vis Hagia Sophia and contrasts strikingly with the Byzantine church. Source: Grove Art Online; http://www.groveart.com/ (accessed 1/22/2008)