Bachelors' Mosque, Ottoman mosque in Mangalem neighborhood, Berat, Albania.
Bachelors' Mosque is a structure with covered arcades running along three of its sides and a short minaret above its two-story base. Open colonnades frame the courtyard, creating shaded spaces that define the layout of the complex.
Completed in 1828 during the Ottoman era, the mosque was formerly known as the Sylejman Pasha Mosque. It was designated a Cultural Monument of Albania in 1961. Under Enver Hoxha's communist government, the building was closed for worship and its portico (hajati) was later used as a shop for women's underwear.
The name Beqarëve refers to bachelors, while the earlier name honoured Sylejman Pasha. The interior paintings are dated 1927–1928. Since the communist period under Enver Hoxha, the portico (hajati) has housed a women's underwear shop, a use that some Muslims regard as a disgrace to Islam.
The mosque stands in the lower Mangalem neighbourhood, reached on foot through the steep lanes of Berat's old quarter. The portico facing the street has housed a women's underwear shop since the communist period, so the entrance is easy to pass by; look for the low minaret and the arcades on three sides.
The mosque's portico, the hajati, has housed a women's underwear shop since the Communist dictatorship of Enver Hoxha, a use that persists today. Visitors looking for the prayer hall often pass the shopfront without realising it occupies part of the mosque itself.
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