Stari Most

Stari Most, the Old Bridge, is a stone arch bridge across the Neretva River in Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, commissioned by Ottoman sultan Suleiman the Magnificent and designed by the architect Mimar Hayruddin, an apprentice of Mimar Sinan, completed in 1566. Built in a style associated with Ottoman era Balkan Islamic architecture, it connected the two banks of the city and gave the town its name, from mostari, the keepers who guarded the bridge during the Ottoman era. The bridge was destroyed by shelling during the Croat Bosniak War in 1993 and was rebuilt using traditional methods and materials, reopening in 2004.