Old Bridge: free audio guide
The story of Old Bridge in Mostar, as the Votura app tells it on location. Read it here, or hear it on the spot with turn-by-turn walking directions.
Before you go
- Address
- Neretva, 88000 Mostar
The story
Old Bridge (Stari Most) spans the emerald Neretva in Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and it is one of the most famous Ottoman bridges in the Balkans. The bridge rises as a single stone arch with a span of about 28.7 meters and a width of about 4 meters, giving it a slender profile that looks almost impossibly light above the river. Its original construction begins in 1557 and finishes in 1566 under the Ottoman sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, with the project commissioned by the local ruler Hercegovački sandžak-bey and carried out under the supervision of Mimar Hayruddin, who is traditionally identified as a student of the great architect Mimar Sinan.
What makes Stari Most extraordinary is the way it is built from local tenelija stone and locked together as a single masonry arch, a design that lets it dominate the river crossing with pure geometry rather than heavy mass. The bridge quickly becomes the symbolic heart of Mostar, linking the two banks and giving the city its very name in the Ottoman-era urban landscape of bridge keepers and river traders. For centuries it is not just a crossing but a place of public life, where the city’s identity, commerce, and daily movement concentrate around one dramatic span.
The bridge is destroyed on 9 November 1993 during the Bosnian War, when Croat forces shell it and the arch collapses into the Neretva, an event that becomes one of the war’s most searing images. Its loss is not only local; it strikes people around the world because Stari Most has already become an international symbol of Ottoman engineering and Bosnian urban heritage. The shattered stones remain in the riverbed until restoration begins under a major international effort led by UNESCO, the World Bank, and the city’s own experts.
The reconstruction is completed in 2004, using traditional techniques and materials as closely as possible to the original work, with stone from the same historic quarry in the village of Tenelija near Mostar. Divers recover original blocks from the river, and the rebuilt bridge reopens as a powerful act of cultural recovery. In 2005, along with the surrounding historic core, it is inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List as the Old Bridge Area of the Old City of Mostar, recognizing both the bridge and the urban fabric that grew around it.
Today the bridge is still one of Mostar’s defining landmarks, and its fame is reinforced every year by the long-running tradition of diving from the arch into the Neretva below. The span is high enough to make the jump a serious feat, and the river’s cold current adds to the drama that has made this practice part of the city’s living heritage. Stari Most remains both a reconstructed masterpiece and a working symbol of endurance, with 1566, 1993, 2004, and 2005 all tied to the story of one unforgettable stone arch.
Written for the Votura audio tour and read aloud in the app. Opening hours change, so check with the venue before you go.
Self-guided tours that stop at Old Bridge
- Mostar’s Old Town on Foot: Old Alleys, Old Bridge & Panoramic Views
- Mostar Underground Pulse: A Four-Stop Guided Walk
- Mostar on Foot: Historic Lanes, Stari Most & Hidden Stories
- Mostar After the Siege: A Two-Day Walk Through War, Bunkers, and Bridges
Hear it on the spot
Votura plays this guide when you reach Old Bridge, then walks you to the next stop. Works offline.