OLD BRIDGE OF MOSTAR

Spanning the Neretva River since 1566, the Old Bridge of Mostar (Stari Most) is one of the most beautiful achievements of the Ottoman Empire in the Balkans: a large, light-colored arch, with pure lines and a humpbacked shape, 27 m long, 4 m wide and 29 m high. Located in the heart of the old city and guarded by two powerful defensive towers at each end, the structure is superb. It also impresses by its height: from 21 to 29 m above the water according to the level of the Neretva. Listed as a Unesco World Heritage Site since 2005, this venerable pedestrian bridge is the most famous monument in Bosnia-Herzegovina and former Yugoslavia, visited by hundreds of thousands of tourists during the summer season. Despite the crowds, one never tires of crossing it from one side of the old town to the other, admiring it at any time of the day or night from the terraces of the restaurants around it, and witnessing the always fascinating (and terrifying) spectacle of the young men of Mostar who, in summer and winter alike, majestically leap from its parapet to plunge into the swift, cold and shallow waters of the Neretva. The Old Bridge also owes its fame to its... destruction. On November 9, 1993, it collapsed under the blows of the artillery of the HVO (Croatian Defense Committee) which was then besieging the old Bosnian city. The images of this destruction went around the world. The emotion was such that the reconstruction of the identical structure became a priority, even before the end of the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. It took no less than ten years of studies and work carried out under the aegis of UNESCO for the Old Bridge to be reborn in 2004.

Origins. Excavations carried out during the reconstruction work proved that there were two versions of a wooden bridge here from the 11th century onwards. The site was a strategic crossing, allowing merchants from Ragusa (Dubrovnik) to travel with their caravans to the heart of Bosnia. At each crossing, the merchants had to pay a tax to the mostari. These "bridge keepers" gave their name to the city, making Mostar the second richest city in the region after Dubrovnik. After the Ottoman conquest in 1470, the city continued to grow and it soon became necessary to transform the "old wooden bridge" into a more solid stone structure. Mimar Hajrudin (c. 1490-1570), a pupil of the greatest Ottoman architect Mimar Sinan and designer of the Bayezid II Mosque in Istanbul, was called in to do this. This one arrives on the spot around 1557 and imagines an arch of light appearance, but of a great solidity. This is thanks to a revolutionary technique: the 456 limestone blocks that make up the bridge are held together by the force of the thrust, but especially by iron pins sealed with lead. Legend has it that Hajrudin fled before the scaffolding was removed, fearing the bridge would collapse. In fact, the strength of the building was such that the Old Bridge withstood more than four centuries of earthquakes and all conflicts except the last one.

Destruction. The destruction of the Old Bridge occurred while Mostar was under siege by the HVO and the Croatian army since May 9, 1993. In September, the ARBiH (Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina) launched a victorious counter-offensive. But this was stopped by the Bosnian government, morally destabilized by the murder of sixty Bosnian-Croat soldiers by its own troops. The HVO then subjected the Bosnian districts of the old town to a deluge of fire during the autumn of 1993: out of revenge, but also because it did not have the means to defeat the ARBiH, solidly entrenched on either side of the Neretva. In turn, all the bridges collapsed under the blows of the HVO artillery. The Old Bridge, which had held out for four hundred and twenty-seven years, was the last to collapse on 9 November, hit by about 60 shells. Later, the HVO admitted that it had been deliberately targeted, but for strategic reasons. In fact, before this coup de grâce, the damaged Old Bridge could no longer be used to supply the troops of the ARBiH posted on the front line of the right bank. The destruction had above all a political and symbolic objective: to remove a monument associated with Islamic and Bosnian culture. In 2013, the main Croat and Bosnian-Croat officers who led the HVO in the area were sentenced to long prison terms by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, including for the destruction of the Old Bridge, considered a violation of the laws or customs of war.

Reconstruction. The sight of the destroyed Old Bridge was a shock to the inhabitants of Mostar, who did not imagine that it could be rebuilt. However, four months after the shelling of the monument, while Bosnia-Herzegovina was still at war, UNESCO launched an appeal for reconstruction on March 10, 1994. Major international financial institutions, some patrons and countries such as France and Turkey responded favorably, later joined by Croatia. A temporary footbridge was installed in the place of the bridge by Spanish engineers. While divers of the Hungarian army recovered some blocks weighing up to eight tons in the Neretva, limestone of the same quality (of the tenelija type) was sought in the quarries of the region already used in the 16th century. But a scandal broke out. The initial project was to train local stonemasons, recruited from all parts of the population, with the aim of bringing the communities together and making the bridge a symbol of reconciliation. But in the end, a Turkish company specialized in the restoration of Ottoman buildings was commissioned in 2001. The company did not master the very particular techniques developed by Mimar Hajrudin and was unable to reproduce the perfect shape of the original arch. After two and a half years of laborious work, the "new Old Bridge" was inaugurated with great pomp on July 23, 2004.

Neighborhood. On July 15, 2005, less than a year after the reopening of the bridge, it was inscribed on the prestigious Unesco World Heritage List. It is not only the bridge itself, but the entire "Old Bridge Quarter of the Old City of Mostar" that has been listed by the United Nations cultural organization. the Old Bridge Quarter, with its architectural characteristics (pre-Ottoman, Eastern Ottoman, Mediterranean and Western European) is an outstanding example of multicultural urban occupation," explains UNESCO. The reconstructed bridge and the old town of Mostar are a symbol of international cooperation and the coexistence of diverse cultural, ethnic and religious communities." The World Heritage area covers an entirely pedestrianized 7.6-hectare space in the historic district of Stari Grad ("Old Town"), on either side of the Old Bridge on both banks of the Neretva River. On the right bank, to the west, the protected area includes: the Halebija tower guarding the western entrance to the Old Bridge, a portion of Onešćukova Street (former workshops turned into stores) and Rade-Bitanje Street (former Tabhana tanners' quarter with the Hadži Kurt Mosque and the Ćejvan-Ćehaja hammam), as well as the vicinity of the small, so-called "curved bridge". To the east, the classified area is narrower. It runs along the left bank of the Neretva River between the Tara Tower (which houses the Old Bridge Museum) and the beautiful Koski Mehmed-Pasha Mosque, connected by the splendid little Kujundžiluk Street (craftsmen's workshops and souvenir stores) and Mala-Tepa ("little hill") Street. The whole of this historic district is surrounded by a 48-hectare buffer zone where all construction is - in theory - strictly regulated. Most of Mostar's hotels, restaurants, bars, travel agencies and places of interest are concentrated in this small area.