Post-restoration seismic performance assessment of a historic hypostyle mosque in Anatolia (13th century AD)

Abstract

Assessment of structural performance under seismic effects is a very important step for restoration process of historic buildings that represent construction techniques and material characteristics of their era. This process consists of three stages namely, on-site examinations, restoration practices, and seismic analysis, and therefore, requires a multidisciplinary approach. Hypostyle structures are mostly timber-framed buildings with masonry walls on two or three facades. This construction method is a combination of Asia (wooden pillar) and Byzantine (masonry walls) techniques. The primary load-bearing system in these buildings is composed of multiple rows of wooden pillars. This paper presents post-restoration seismic assessment of a historic wooden hypostyle mosque complex constructed in 1273. This mosque complex is an important structure representing wooden hypostyle architecture in the Anatolia region of Turkey and is composed of three separate structures namely, a main mosque building, a minaret, and a tomb. Linear performance analysis, displacement-controlled nonlinear analysis, and kinematic limit analysis for failure mechanisms were conducted for the structures after the restoration. The linear performance analysis results indicated that the structures meet shear strength requirements for DD3 and DD2 earthquakes with recurrence periods of 72 and 475 years, respectively. Furthermore, according to the linear and non-linear analyses, the complex was found to satisfy performance limits for both ground motion levels in terms of inter-story drifts.