Beside a monastery, springs the Buna river…
Forming Blagaj's signature attraction, the centrepiece of this complex of traditional stone-roofed buildings is a very pretty half-timbered dervish house with wobbly rug-covered floors, carved doorways, curious niches and a bathroom with star-shaped coloured glass set into the ceiling.
Thelast sheikh died in 1923 and dervish spirituality was suppressed following WWII. The Blagaj Tekke is now once again a venue for Zikr praise-chanting three nights a week.
The dervishes follow a mystical strand of Islam in which the peaceful contemplation of nature plays a part, hence the tekke's idyllic positioning above the cave mouth from which the Buna River's surreally blue-green waters flow forth.
— Lonely PlanetOttoman-era vocabulary
Bosnian: tekija /tɛˈkija/ ("teh-KEE-ya") Albanian: teqe /ˈtɛcɛ/ ("TEH-cheh") - From Ottoman Turkish tekke — a dervish lodge. The Blagaj tekke, described above, is one such lodge.
Bosnian: tekija /tɛˈkija/ ("teh-KEE-ya") Albanian: teqe /ˈtɛcɛ/ ("TEH-cheh")
From Ottoman Turkish tekke — a dervish lodge.