Brusa Bezistan

Sarajevo


Built in 1551 as a silk-trading bazaar, this elegant two-storey building is topped with six green-metal domes and encircled by shops. It's now a branch of the Museum of Sarajevo, providing an overview of the city from prehistoric times up until 1914. At its centre is a scale model of Sarajevo as it looked in 1878. The only concession to recent history is a series of grisly large-scale photographs of the mass-grave excavations from the 1990s genocide.


Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

Nearby Sarajevo attractions

1. Baščaršija Mosque

0.04 MILES

Sitting behind a curtain of mature trees and a triple-arched porch, this elegant octagonal mosque has been providing solace within the bustle of the…

2. Baščaršija

0.08 MILES

Centred on what foreigners nickname Pigeon Square, with its ornate gazebo-like Sebilj drinking fountain (built in 1891), Baščaršija is the very heart of…

3. Sebilj

0.08 MILES

This ornamental drinking fountain, looking more like an enclosed oriental gazebo, dates from 1891 and marks the centre of Baščaršija's central square.

4. Gazi Husrev-beg Mosque

0.08 MILES

Bosnia's second Ottoman governor, Gazi Husrev-beg, funded a series of splendid 16th-century buildings, of which this 1531 mosque, with its 45m minaret, is…

5. Old Orthodox Church

0.1 MILES

While the final form of this outwardly austere stone church dedicated to the archangels Michael and Gabriel dates to 1730, it was founded considerably…

6. Muzej Sarajevo 1878–1918

0.1 MILES

On 28 June 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie were shot dead in their car by 18-year-old Gavrilo Princip directly outside this building…

7. Emperor's Mosque

0.1 MILES

Across the river from the old city, this large stone mosque was built in 1565 to replace Sarajevo's very first mosque, a wooden structure built in 1457…

8. Gazi Husrev-beg Museum

0.1 MILES

The 1537 Kuršumlija Madrasa building is distinctive for its pointed chimneys and the lead roof from which it takes its name. Although built as a religious…