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This book highlights an understudied experiment at the intersection of 19th-century European and Islamic architectural histories. It draws attention to a body of buildings designed by architects trained in Central Europe for use by Muslims in Habsburg-ruled Bosnia-Herzegovina (1878-1918). They include mosques, madrasas, and other buildings corresponding to a traditional Islamic formal and functional typology. The composition and decoration, however, is the product of 19th-century European Historicist conduct. It became a prominent style for town halls and private residences; on occasion, it was also used for railway stations, schools, or hotels. The spread and concentration of buildings in this style in Bosnia is extraordinary. This monography not only fills a gap in an art history that has long turned a blind eye to Europe's Southeast but also contributes to our understanding of European powers' historical responses to the challenge of cultural diversity in territories under their control.
List of contents
I. Introduction - II. Alterity as novelty: The multi-sited history of Bosnia's 'colonial style' and the patterns of Orientalist
appropriation - III. Monumental transitions: Building meaning and 'meaning buildings' on a former frontier - IV. Muslim but not Islamic? Habsburg Sarajevo's new landmarks and the evolution of an Orientalizing aesthetic - V. Furnishing a foreign home: Topographies and typologies in flux - VI. Making heritage knowable: Bosnia's Muslim tradition in the late Habsburg imaginary - VII. General conclusion - VIII. Glossary - IX. Works cited and abbreviations.
About the author
Maximilian Hartmuth (PhD 2011, Sabanc¿ University, Istanbul) is an architectural historian focused on Central and Southeast Europe. Since 2012 he is employed with the University of Vienna's Department of Art History (since 2017 as a permanent post-doctoral faculty member), teaching and researching in his area of expertise. Between 2018 and 2023 he directed an ERC Starting Grant project (GA 758099), of which this monograph is the central outcome.
