مسجد Hicret

Hicret Camii — this second mosque of the same name in central Ankara — like its namesake in Mamak, takes its title from the Hijra, the great emigration of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وآله وسلم and his companions from Mecca to Medina. The repetition of the name across the capital is itself telling, reflecting the particular hold of this foundational event on the Turkish Muslim imagination and the way in which Turkish neighbourhoods have repeatedly reached for its resonances when choosing how to name their places of prayer. This central Ankara mosque is a well-proportioned neighbourhood structure with a single minaret, a central dome, and a forecourt paved in stone and planted with a few ornamental shrubs. Inside, the prayer hall is carpeted in warm tones, and the mihrab is framed in soft blue Kütahya tile. Calligraphic panels along the walls include a verse from Sūrat at-Tawba relating to the Hijra. The imam's Friday sermons often engage with the themes of journey, faith, and renewal that the Hijra continues to evoke for contemporary Muslims — the migrations that so many Turkish families have undertaken within and beyond their country, the journeys of conscience that every believer undertakes, and the reminder that the Islamic calendar itself begins not with a birth or a conquest but with a flight in search of a place in which faith can be practised freely. Women pray in a comfortable upper gallery, and Qur'an classes for children run throughout the year. Ablution facilities are clean and heated. During Ramadan the mosque runs a full programme of tarawih. A small framed inscription near the entrance bears a beautiful piece of classical Turkish calligraphy recording the date of the Hijra in both the lunar and solar calendars — a small reminder that the starting point of the Islamic calendar is not a birth or a coronation but a migration for the sake of faith, and that every year the whole community recalls that foundational journey together. For Muslim visitors to central Ankara, this Hicret Camii is an unfailingly welcoming place to pray, and the poetic and historical depth of its name rewards the thoughtful worshipper with matter for reflection.