Seismic assessment of historical mosques under exceptional earthquakes:

A case study in Skopje

F. Portioli, O. Mammana, R. Landolfo & F.M. Mazzolani
University of Naples “Federico II”, Naples, Italy

ABSTRACT: This paper is concerned with the evaluation of seismic behaviour of Mustafa Pasha mosque in
Skopje by numerical analysis. The numerical investigation was carried out by a finite element model that was
calibrated and validated against shaking table tests on a large scale model performed in the framework of
PROHITECH project. In order to determine the capacity of original monument, to design the FRP reinforce-
ments and to analyze their effects on the full scale prototype, pushover analysis analyses were carried out.
The analysis allowed the effectiveness of proposed intervention to be evaluated in case of catastrophic earth-
quakes and the existing crack pattern on the mosque to be analyzed.

1 INTRODUCTION To investigate the seismic behaviour of the

mosque and to determine if any strengthening or re-
Ottoman mosques are located in high-risk seismic pair work is required, shaking table tests were car-
regions and their vulnerability is affected by several ried out on a large scale model at the Laboratory of
factors. the Institute of Earthquake Engineering and Engi-
Although numerous collapses and structural dam- neering Seismology in Skopje in the framework of
age were caused by earthquakes, in the literature not PROHITECH project (Mazzolani et al., 2007; Maz-
many studies investigated their seismic behaviour zolani, 2008).
(Dogangun et. al, 2008). The length scale of the model was 1: 6. The
In this paper, an assessment of the seismic behav- model was built using the same materials and tech-
iour of Mustafa Pasha mosque in Skopje as a repre- niques used for the original prototype and according
sentative historical monument of Ottoman architec- to the
ture is presented. The evaluation of the effectiveness
of a strengthening intervention with FRPs is carried
out as well.
The mosque was built in 1492 and is located in
the central area of the city of Skopje. The structural
framework of the monument is typical of the
mosques in the provinces of Ottoman Empire. The
mosque presents a square-plan, topped with a
monumental dome supported by a system of a po-
lygonal tambour and four pendentives. The dimen-
sions of the main square area are 20.0x20.0 meters.
The diameter of the dome spanning over the main
part is about 16 meters. The massive walls and the
tambour of the dome are composed of two outer-
leaves of natural stones and bricks with an inner
core of stone and brick rubble set in the lime mortar,
in accordance with typical design technique of Byz-
antine churches in Macedonia. The height of the
main structure is about 22.0 meters. Connected to a
corner of the main part is the minaret, that is about
47 meters in height with 138 spiral stairs and which
was built with cut stone blocks. Figure 1. View of Mustafa Pasha mosque
 2 THE FINITE ELEMENT MODEL

The finite element model of the mosque was devel-

oped in ABAQUS. In particular, three-dimensional
models of the whole structure and of the main square
part of the mosque were generated for linear dy-
namic and non-linear pushover analysis, respectively
(Fig. 3). In the following, the details of geometric,
material and load modeling are presented.

2.1 Geometric modeling and meshing

The three dimensional solid model of the experimen-
tal prototype was implemented in a computer aided
design system and then was imported into the finite
element code to generate the geometry of FE mod-
els.
In order to properly evaluate the structural inter-
actions among the different parts, the implemented
geometrical model reproduces all the main parts of
the building accurately, including the openings and
the pendentives connecting the walls with the dome.
Modal analysis was carried out on the whole
three dimensional model presented in Figure 3.
As far as nonlinear analysis on the mosque, the
symmetry of the model along the vertical plane par-
allel to the direction of the input displacement was
Figure 2. Main dimensions of the mosque. considered, in order to save CPU time for solving
non-linear equations.
gravity forces neglected approach. The results of ex- To model the reinforcement, the outer surfaces of
perimental investigation have been presented in the mosque were partitioned into different areas and
(Krstevska et al., 2009). strings corresponding to the FRP sheets and bars
In order to support the experimental investiga- that were designed to strengthen the structure.
tion, to design the FRP reinforcement and to analyze
its effectiveness on the prototype, a finite element
analysis was performed on a detailed three dimen-
sional model of the Mosque.
The numerical model was calibrated and vali-
dated against the results of experimental tests on the
large scale mosque. The comparison of experimental
and numerical results allowed to validate a model-
ling approach based on inelastic homogeneous iso-
tropic constitutive law for masonry and push-over
analysis for the assessment of structural response
under seismic loads.
On the basis of developed finite element model,
an assessment of the seismic behaviour of the origi-
nal full scale prototype was performed. The analysis
allowed the results of experimental investigation to
be extended to the historical monument, addressing
in particular issues related to scale effects as the in-
fluence of gravity loads and the inelastic behaviour
of materials.
In the following, a description of the different
types of finite element analysis and relevant results
is reported in detail.
Figure 3. The FE model of the mosque
 The solid parts of the model were meshed with
the C3D4 4-node linear tetrahedron element, with
three degrees of freedom at each node, namely the
translations along the nodal x, y, and z directions.
S4R elements were used to model the FRP sheets.
The shells corresponding to the FRP reinforcement
were directly overlapped to the masonry bricks and
no interface elements were considered. The parts of
the mosque model reinforced with bars were mod-
elled using beam elements T3D2.
Different mesh sizes were used for modal and
nonlinear analysis in the range from 600 to 720mm,
respectively. Figure 4. FE model of masonry wall sample in shear compres-
sion with distribution of maximum principal stresses at col-
lapse load.
2.2 Material modeling
The concrete damaged plasticity model was selected
for constitutive law. The model is based on isotropic
damaged elasticity in combination with isotropic
tensile and compressive plasticity to represent the
inelastic behaviour of brittle material. The yield
function of Lubliner is considered as failure surface,
with the modifications proposed by Lee and Fenves
to account for different evolution of strength under
tension and compression (ABAQUS, 2007).
The values of parameters considered in the analy-
sis are reported in Table 1.

Table 1. Masonry material properties considered for concrete

damaged plasticity model.
Material properties
γ E ν Ψ σc σt GFI
(kN/m3) (MPa) (Deg) (MPa) (MPa) (N/mm)
19.0 900 0.2 30 2.1 0.04 0.18
The elastic parameters are referred to the values
that have been calibrated on the basis of performed
ambient vibration tests. The mosque was tested in
situ by ambient vibration tests in order to identify
the dynamic properties of the structural system,
namely natural frequencies and mode shapes. The
natural frequencies and the mode shapes of the
structural system were derived from recorded data of
different sensors placed along the height of the
structure and by means of Fourier analysis. The elas-
tic properties of the numerical model were calibrated
by modal analysis by varying the value of Young’s
modulus until the natural frequencies become close
to the measured values. The comparison of experi-
mental and numerical frequencies for the calibrated
values of the elastic Young’s modulus showed that
all the initial frequencies measured on the mosque
were well fitted.
The non-linear material properties of the finite
element model were calibrated on the basis of com-
pression and shear compression tests carried out on
masonry wall samples at the IZIIS Laboratory and
Figure 5. Comparison of experimental and numerical response
of wall samples under shear-compression loads.
on the results of shaking table tests on the original
large scale mosque (Figs. 4, 5). As far as compres-
sion behaviour, an elastic-perfectly plastic response
is assumed. The post-failure behaviour of cracked
masonry in tension is modelled with linear strain-
softening, defined by the fracture energy GFI. The
considered value of dilation angle Ψ characterizes
the non-associated potential plastic flow. To evalu-
ate the sensitivity of the implemented numerical
model to calibrated material properties, different pa-
rametric analyses were carried out. In particular a
mesh sensitivity analysis was performed and the in-
fluence of tensile strength and fracture energy was
considered. It should be noted in this case that a sig-
nificant variation in the ultimate capacity and ductil-
ity was obtained for selected values of tensile
strength and fracture energy.
With regard to composites, an elastic material
model was considered. In particular, the Young’s
modulus is equal to 240 GPa and the considered
equivalent thickness is 1.0 mm. For pultruded bars
in the shear walls the nominal material properties
and geometric dimensions declared by the manufac-
turer were assumed. In particular, a cross-section of
6 x 1 mm2 was considered.
2.3 Load modeling and boundary conditions
With regard to the load modeling in pushover analy-
ses, a uniform distribution of accelerations along the
horizontal direction was applied to the FE model of
the mosque.
As far as the boundary conditions are concerned,
full restraints were assumed at the base of the struc-
ture in the performed analyses.

3 SEISMIC RETROFITTING WITH FRP

On the basis of numerical and experimental investi-

gation carried out on the large scale model, the
strengthening of the actual prototype was designed
as shown in Fig. 6 (Mazzolani et al., 2009; Landolfo
and Mazzolani, 2009).
The proposed retrofitting intervention for
Mustafa Pasha mosque consists in the placement of
CFRP wraps on the dome, in the incorporation of
carbon rods in longitudinal mortar joints of shear
walls and in the strengthening of the foundation
structure. As far as the dome, a C-FRP wraps on a
layer of epoxy glue will be placed along the perime-
ter at the base within a width of 2.9 m, according to
the system applied to the testing model. C-FRP bars
have to be located in the horizontal joints of the out-
side surface of the walls with a depth of about 8.0
cm and covered by an epoxy mortar layer, connect- Figure 6. Strengthening of Mustafa Pasha mosque (Mazzolani
ing them to the vertical joints. Then, it is planned to et al., 2009).
fill the joints with pointing lime mortar.

4 PUSHOVER ANALYSES

The results of pushover analysis carried out on the

original and strengthened mosque are reported in the
following.
This type of analysis allowed the experimental
results obtained on the large scale model to be ex-
tended to the full scale prototype and to assess the
effectiveness of the designed strengthening interven-
tion.
The results of the analysis in terms of plastic
strain distributions are shown in Fig 7.
The numerical analysis shows that original model
collapses with an out of plane mechanism of the
shear walls with cracks along the spandrels. The for-
mation of collapse mechanism determined by the fi-
nite element analysis can be divided in different
phases. The first tension cracks occur in the shear
walls, namely in the spandrels under the openings at
the first level. In this phase, the damage also devel-
ops at the base of the walls perpendicular to the di-
rection of ground motion, owing to bending mo- Figure 7. Distribution of plastic strains on the original model
ments induced by out of plane horizontal loads. of the mosque prototype at collapse load. Amplification factor
of the deformed shape: 50.
The seismic strength of the structure is attained
when the damage in the shear walls extends from the
spandrels up to the openings in the tambour.
In Fig. 8 the crack pattern on the mosque after the
Skopje Earthquake in 1963 is depicted. The com-
parison with distribution of plastic strains obtained
with the finite element model shows a good agree-
ment of prototype response and numerical results.
The non-linear analysis of strengthened model
showed that the wraps around the dome and the top
of shear walls contribute to prevent the propagation
of cracks from the bottom part to the drum. The FRP
bars in the shear walls allow the spandrels to be
stiffened and strengthened forming a sort of rein-
forced masonry beams at different levels able to dis-
tribute the seismic action among the piers.

5 SEISMIC PERFORMANCE ANALISYS

The assessment of the seismic capacity of the

mosque was carried out according to N2 method
(Fajfar, 2000).
The elastic seismic demand was defined accord-
ing to Eurocode 8, considering a soil type C.
As for inelastic demand, a reduction factor Rμ
equal to ductility factor μ was assumed.
The capacity diagrams were derived from push-
over curves on the basis of modal characteristics ob-
tained from numerical analysis.
The comparison of seismic capacity and demand
for the original and strengthened mosque shows that Figure 8. Crack patterns on the mosque after Skopje earth-
quake in 1963.
the seismic performance is increased of about 50%
by retrofitting with FRPs (Fig 9). The corresponding
2.5
return periods of seismic events were estimated to be
475 and 975 years. It is worth to note that the peak Original mosque
ground acceleration obtained for the seismic capac- 2 Strength. mosque
ity of the original mosque is consistent with the level
of input acceleration measured during the 1963 1.5
Skopje earthquake, of about 0.30g.
Sa/g

6 CONCLUSIONS
0.5

In order to support a large scale experimental inves-

tigation on the seismic behavior of Mustafa Pasha 0
mosque in Skopje carried out in the framework of 0 10 20
Sd [mm]
30 40 50

PROHITECH project, different types of finite ele-

ment analysis were performed.
In particular, the numerical analysis of the
mosque allowed to extend the experimental results
obtained on the large scale model built at IZIIS
Laboratory to the prototype structure and to assess
the effectiveness of proposed retrofitting interven-
tion with FRPs.
The mechanical properties of the non-linear finite
element model were calibrated according to experi-
Figure 9. Seismic performance evaluation of original and
strengthened mosque.
mental results obtained from shaking table tests on
the large scale model and ambient vibration tests on
the full scale prototype.
The obtained results on the original mosque in
terms of damage distribution are in good agreement
with existing crack patterns that occurred after past
earthquakes. The analysis on the strengthened proto-
type shows a remarkable increase of capacity under
lateral loads.
The implementation of non-linear dynamic analy-
sis including soil interaction will be taken into ac-
count in further developments of this study for the
seismic assessment of the monument.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Authors are grateful to the financial support of the

European Commission for funding the research pro-
ject PROHITECH (earthquake PROtection of HIs-
torical buildings by reversible mixed TECHnolo-
gies), which is the main framework of the study
presented in this paper, within the Sixth Framework
Programme Priority FP6-2002-INCO-MPC-1 “Spe-
cific Measures in support of international coopera-
tion – Mediterranean Partner Countries”, Contract
No. INCO-CT-2004-509119.

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