The Mosque of al-kim in Cairo Author(s): Jonathan M. Bloom Source: Muqarnas, Vol. 1 (1983), pp.

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III

JONATHAN M. BLOOM

The
in

Mosque
Cairo

of

al-IHakim

The mosque of al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah in Cairo1is the product of a grammarof Fatimid mosquedesignthat had developedin NorthAfrica and Egypt over the previous century;it thereby represents the culminationof the early Fatimid congregationalmosque in many of its features. Taking over twenty years to build and requiring vast sums of money for its constructionand furmonument nishing,it was the majorarchitectural in a time already notable for its prosperity.The Hakim mosque, however, was not merely a larger and granderversion of the then standardFatimid mosque plan, for in it the mosque'spatrons made a statementabouttheirgoalsfor the contemporaryworld and about the historyof Islam. Thanks to K. A. C. Creswell'smonumental of work, the historyand structure the buildingnow As by pose few problems.2 reconstructed Creswell, the mosquemeasures120 metersby 113 meters;it is more than twice as large as the originalAzhar mosquebuilt only twentyyearsearlier(figs. 1 and 2).3 The enclosure walls of rough-cutstone are built using a technique that Creswell calls taldtdt4 and are capped with brick cresting. Thirteen entrancesoriginallyled to the interior,but many are now walled up. The lesser entranceson the northwest,northeast,and southwestare all made of dressed stone; only the central entrances on these walls project from the walls, and only the central facade entrance, decorated in elegantly cut stone, is truly monumental,projectingmore than six metersfrom the wall for a lengthof more than fifteen meters.5 Of the towers at the corners of the facade wall, now enclosedin cubicsalients,the one on the right side (called by Creswell"the westernminaret") is square and the one on the left side ("the is northernminaret") round(fig.3). Both are decocomrated with cut-stone bands of workmanship parableto that of the portal;this led Creswellto Creswell Thisarticle awarded firstannual was the in Prizeby the American University CairoPress.

concludethat the portal and the western minaret are the productsof the same architect.6 The interiorof the mosque consistsof a huge by courtyardsurrounded arcadesrunningparallel to the exteriorwalls. Each of the lateral arcades is three bays deep; the arcade behind the faqade wall is two bays deep; and the prayerhall is five baysdeep. The prayerhall, just as at al-Azharand the now-destroyedJami' al-Qarafa,has a higher and wider axial aisle leading from the court to a dome in the bay before the mihrab. The two lateral rear corners of the prayer hall are also is domed. The interiorconstruction brick- brick piers supported a now-lost wooden roof- and the bricksare covered with stucco. A continuous band of Kufic inscription runs along all of the below the roof. Apart from a arcadesimmediately few window grilles, no other stucco decoration remains. The only other extant decoration is a beveled design on a wooden tie-beam.7 Although this mosque has suffered from the vagariesof time, its originallayout is not difficult to establish,especiallysince Creswellhas already revealed the successive encasing of the minaret bases in squaresalientsand the relationshipof the mosque to the wall of Badr al-Jamali, which runs along its northeast side.8 It is significantly larger than previous Fatimid congregational mosques,thoughits projectingportal, corer bastions, courtyardarcades,raised central aisle, and prayerhall markedby three domes show it to have evolved from their formal tradition. It differs, however,from al-Azharin its roughstone exterior walls and dressed stone portals and minaretsand the brick pier construction of its interior. The interiordecorationis much more subduedthan at al-Azhar,where the remainingstucco decoration points to a complete mural treatment. The Hakim mosquehas only a plain, but elegant, inscription frieze under the roof, but it also claims the earliestFatimid-period remnantsof a programof exteriormosque decoration.At al-Mahdiyya,the firstFatimidcapitalin Tunisia,the facade shows a
15

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be

04 L-I~ L-

I#h I~ m a

CII a

a
a

I
I

I
a a

t,. . .,,

:.mi
:. 1I .I I
... , . ,*.

-. . I
.11 .

.1~
It W...'

Is

Figure 1. Mosque of al-Hakim. Plan, after K. A. C. Creswell, The MuslimArchitecture Egypt of (Oxford, 1952), fig. 32.

Figure2. Mosque of al-Hakim.Reconstructedbird's-eyeview, after Creswell, MAE, fig. 44.

JONATHAN JONATHAN

M. BLOOM M. BLOOM

17 17

-'i
,. ,*

t1

_ _--i __, ..__.

. ..
r 9s

~ .

?1..

anked

bybastios.

h..

after Creswell, MAE, fig. 36. ine what the decorative treatment arrangement of an elegant,

of the exteriors

tendency toward decorative composition in the

two-storied portal

flankedby bastions.Unfortunately,apartfromhypothesizingsimilarprojectingportals at al-Azhar

and the Qarafa mosque, it is impossible to imag-

of these mosques might have been.

Creswell often cites the affinities between the mosque of Ibn Tailin and the Hakim mosque,9

first sight. The remaining Fatimid monuments

in

enough columns of sufficient size.

he inspiration

was dictated solely by difficulties in procuring

for the exterior decoration of the Hakim mosque is not to be found in the mosque of Ibn Tuilfn. Despite its decorated windows and its cresting on the exterior wall to the ziydda, the mosque of Ibn Tulin did not inspire the hierarchical decorative composition that is present in the faqade of the Hakim mosque. At Ibn Tulun, the decoration was unrolled evenly over the wall surfaces; at al-Hakim it was concentrated on the minarets and portals. Apart from the Kufic frieze, the interior decoration of the Hakim mosque was not made of long-lasting materials. In 403/1012-13, to complete the furnishing, al-Hakim ordered thirty-six thousand square cubits of matting, brocade curtains to be hung at all the doors, and four silver chandeliers, along with many silver lamps, to provide light. l Al-Hakim's final furnishing was the culmination of some twenty years' intermittent work under various patrons. According to the biography of Ya'qfib b. Killis, part of which is preserved in the Khitat of Ahmad b. 'All al-Maqrizi, the foundations of the new mosque were laid out on 10 Ramadan 379/989,12 a year earlier than the usually accepted date given by al-Musabbihi.13 AlMusabbihi also states, under the events of 393/ 1002-03 that al-Hakim ordered "the completion of the building of the mosque which the vizier Ya'qib b. Killis had begun at the Bab alFutiuh."14 This is not even mentioned in the vizier's biography,15 however, and, in any event, Ibn Killis died late in 380/990-91 before any significant work on the mosque could be done.16 In 393/1002-03 the estimate of the money needed to finish the mosque came to forty thousand dinars, indicating that quite a substantial amount of work remained upon the death of al-'Aziz. In 401/ 1010-11 bastions (arkdn) were added to the corner towers, and in 403/1012-13 the cost of the final furnishings amounted to five thousand dinars.17 The sources refer to the mosque by various names. A text contemporary with the construction calls it jdmi' kharij bdb al-futah ("the mosque outside the Bab al-Futih"); by 415/1024-25, however, it had gained a new epithet, al-anwar ("the bright"),18 possibly inspired by the epithet al-azhar ("the splendid") given to the mosque of al-Qahira. The common moder name, Jami' al-Hakim ("the mosque of al-IHakim"), does not appear in the sources until later. Regardless of these minor confusions, the mosque is still one of the best-documented monuments of medieval Islamic architecture. It is therefore all the more surprising that the program of inscriptions, the meanings of the minarets and

18

MUQARNAS
were caused by the work of medieval or even modernrestorers,but whateverthe case the interior inscriptionprogramof this mosque does not indicatethe same carefulselection of verses as at the Azhar mosque.20Instead of using selected versesof the Qur'anto supportspecificideological points, the inscriptions in the interior of the Hakimmosque simplycontain the opening verses of nine chaptersof the Qur'an.Medieval sources assertthat the interiorinscriptionsat the mosque of Ibn Tilfin contained the whole text of the While demonstrably Qur'an.21 false, this image is remarkablysimilar to that conveyed by the remainingevidence from the Hakim mosque; there the use of the opening verses of a sura may have synecdochicallysuggested the presence of the whole. The apparent absenceof an ideologicalprinciof selection in the Hakim mosque is imporple tant, for betweenthe time al-Azharwas decorated and the time the Hakiminscriptions were chosen, a decision had clearly been made to avoid that kindof iconographically chargedinscriptional program. For the moment one can only guess at the reason, but it seems likely that the complex references of the earlierinscriptions were either unappreciatedor misunderstood. The inscriptions the exteriorof the mosque of are much more interesting.22 now-lost marble A inscription, first published in 1838, contains Qur'an28:4, followed by the standard Fatimid formulawith standardtitufoundation-inscription lature(inscription1).23Its interestlies in the verse chosen: "Yet We desired to be graciousto those that were abased in the land, and to make them leaders [a'imma],and to make them the inheritors."The choice is triplyappropriate: context the of the verse is the story of Moses and Pharaoh, which takes place in Egypt. God speaks of his divine plan, and his words could be directedwith

portals, and the functional relationship of this mosque to other mosques in the Fatimidcapital have not been thoroughlystudied,for it is through these features that this extraordinary monument to reveal the secretsof why it was built and begins how it was viewed in its own time. INSCRIPTIONS Parts of inscriptionsfrom both the interior and exterior programs remain. The interior inscriptions are found in a band of carved stucco, sixty centimeterswide, runningimmediatelybelow the beams of the roof of the prayerhall. They have been examined carefully by Samuel Flury, who 9istinguishedtwo stages of decoration, the first presumablybelonging to the original period of construction,the second datingfrom a later restoration.19 While the two stages differ in style, the medieval restorerswere generallyfaithful to the originalsubject. The inscriptional programbeginsin the dome in front of the mihrab, with the opening four verses of Qur'an48 the Sirat al-Fath (fig. 4 and inscription14; for inscriptions,see appendixbelow). The next eleven verses are inscribedaround the centralaisle and into the first (i.e., qibla) bay of the left (i.e., northern)side of the prayerhall, ending with verse 22. The remainingfour bays of the left side contain, respectively, the opening verses of suras3, 7, 6, and 8. On the rightside the qur'anic versesare somewhat less regular,especiallyin the qibla and third bays, where sections from the very long Surat al-Baqara(Qur'an2) are used in both. The first, second, fourth, and fifth bays, respectively,contain the opening verses of suras 1, 36, 2, and 4 (inscriptions21-25). The inscriptionsin all bays but the fourthand fifthbegin in the cornerclosest to the mihrab. It is possible that such anomalies

4. of Schematic of the inscriptions. Figure Mosque al-Hakim. plan

15 (
16 17 18 19 14

20
21 22 23 24

JONATHAN equal applicabilityto Moses or to the Fatimid imam. Finally, the word a'imma- the plural of imam, the title assumedby the Fatimidrulerswould have ensured that this latter interpretation was made. Althoughdifferentin form, both minaretsare decorated with horizontal inscriptionbands. Inscriptions in borders framing the windows are found only on the northernminaret.The middle band on the western minaret contains Qur'an 11:73 and an accompanying text, both parallelto 1. The verse contains the key phrase inscription ahl al-bayt ("people of the house"), which was alwaysunderstoodby the Fatimidsto be a direct reference to themselves as descendantsof 'Ali. The lower inscriptionon this same minaret (inscription3) follows the form of the previoustwo, but uses a verse (Qur'an9:18) appropriate any for mosque anywhere.Its specialFatimidsignificance lies in the use of the word al-muhtadTn ("the guided"), for, in inscription2, al-Hakim'sancestors are said to be al-mahdiyytn ("rightly guided"). Both words come from the same root, h-d-y, from which also derivesthe regnalname of the first Fatimidimam, al-Mahdi. The majorinscription the northernminaret of is on the fourth band and follows the familiar form: a verse precedes a foundation text. The verse (Qur'an9:128) is not common, as is the precedingone, althoughit is to be found in the facade of the mosque of al-$alih Tala'i' of 555/1160.24 may have been chosen for its use of It the word 'azTz("grievous"),a pun of sorts on the name of the late ruler. Around the four windows of the third band (inscriptions 5-8), we find the very famous and very common Qur'an24:3537(38?), a parableof the lightof God in a lampin a niche. While the major theme of these verses is this beautiful image of God, they have a very special meaningto the Shi'a, for they were taken to be evidence for the na.s, the divine portionof light transmittedto the successive'Alid imams.25 Ibn Shahrashub,a [Twelver] Shi'i writer of the sixth/twelfthcentury, gives al-Husaynthe following names: "the lamp of those who trustin God," "thelampof the lofty familyties," "theshiningfull moon," "the light of the Fatimidfamily,"and "a The choice of these verses on part of the light."26 the Hakim mosque may be explained further if these associationscan be taken back to the late fourth/tenthcentury. A medallion on the northeast side of the second band (inscription supports this 'Alid 9) for interpretation, it containsQur'an5: 55, "Your friend [walt] is only God...." The term wall was used in inscriptions1, 2, and 4 as a qualifica-

M. BLOOM

19 19

tive for al-Hakim("the slave and friend of God") in the standardFatimidtitulature.The field of the medallioncontainsa verse that appearsfive times in the Qur'an:"fromthe shadowsinto the light." The qur'anic context,however,is irrelevant,as the verse continues the image of divine light established in the previousinscriptions. This emphasis on the divine light of God suggests that the significanceof the epithets the Fatimidsattachedto their mosque names may run deeper than was previouslyimagined.The epithet al-anwar,appliedto this mosque in the fifth/eleventh centuryresonateswith this same concept of divine light. Over the entranceto the northernminareta short inscription(inscription10) of almost anecdotal quality is perfectly appropriate:"And say, 'MyLord, lead me in with a just ingoing, and lead me out with a just outgoing. ..."' The fragment of the inscription on the main portal (inscription 12) is the end of Qur'an3:198. It is impossible from the little that remains to tell whether the fragmentwas used as a pious filler phrase at the end of an inscriptionor whetherit representsthe tail end of the verse, whichdealswithparadise.Six blocksof limestone,now in the IslamicMuseumin Cairo (inscription11) may have come from this portal, but their context has yet to be established; in the meantimethey are of no help whatsoever. Arkan were added to the mosque in Safar convinc401/1010,and Creswellhas demonstrated that these arkan can only be the great ingly salientsaroundthe minarets.Their additioncompletely hid the minaret inscriptions, but a new inscriptionfrieze of marble was inserted into the masonryof the salients.The friezeon the northern salient was removed and probablyrecarvedwhen Badr al-Jamalienclosed the salient in yet another sheathof masonryin 480/1087-88.27 change The in tone betweenthe firstinscriptions whichemphasize the role of the imam as builder and use verses with Isma'iliovertones- and the new inscriptions a serious of purely qur'anicadmonitions to unbelievers, corrupt women and men, warningagainstundue familiarityand urging the proper observance of Friday prayer (inscription 14) - is startling.One can only assume that the patronhad had a majorchangeof heart, for these admonitionsseem to have more to do with alHakim'serraticprohibitionsagainstwomen, certain foods, wine, Christians,and Jews than with the ideologicallychargedinscriptionscharacteristic of the minarets. In their characterthese verses are similarto the interiorinscriptions, both groupsare nothfor ing more than series of statements. The rukn in-

20

MUQARNAS
tural, and functional variations of the minaret throughoutthe Islamic world is yet to be produced. The only referenceto minaretscontemporary with the building of the Hakim mosque is by al-Musabbihil, quoted in the Khitat.He says, "In Safar 401 the mandra of the Jami' Bab alFutih was increased: arkan were made for it, each rukn was one hundred cubits long."32The word mandra, from which our word minaret is derived, can originallyhave meant, accordingto J. H. Gottheil, "only 'an object that gives light.' As such, it is used in old Arabic poetry for the oil lamp or rushlight used in the cell of the Christian monk.... It is then used for a 'light-tower' or 'light-house."'33 Abi 'Abd Allah Muhammad al-Maqdisi,describingthe coastal defense system of Syria in the late fourth/tenth century, mentions ribats with manaras, which were lit up at night.34 the on Unfortunately, foundationinscriptions the minaretsof the Hakim mosque (inscriptions 2-4) do not give a name for what al-Hakim ordered constructedin 393/1002-03, for they use only the relative pronoun md ("what"). The inscriptions around the windows of the northern minaret (inscriptions5-8), however, do develop an image of the divine light of God, which is reinforcedby the medallion inscription (inscription 9) on the same minaret. An examinationof qur'anicinscriptionson minarets generally contemporaryto those of the Hakim mosque produces no other instancesof the use of these otherwise commonverses. Theiruse thereforeimpliesa consciouschoiceby the builderand offersa clue to the minarets'purpose. The Hakim mosque was located outside the northernwalls of the city, in the direction from whichany attackmightcome (and did, in the form of the Qarmatian siege of 361/971-72); the northern minaretoverlookedthe plain stretchingto the north. It is not improbable, therefore, that this minaret was used as a watch tower or beacon tower. If so, the window inscriptionswere intended to parallelthe one over the door (inscription 10), both being anecdotallyappropriate,although the beacon light would have been in a window, not in the niche of the qur'anicverse. As attractiveas this interpretation may be, it does not explain the western minaret, whose inscription has none of this divine-light imagery. Al-Musabbihi's text states that arkan were added to the manarain 401/1011. Creswell'sinterpretationof the arkan is correct as far as it goes, but it avoids an analysisof the textualproblems. Although al-Musabbihimentions only one

scriptionsare extractedfrom their contexts: they simply say, "Do this" or "Do not do that." The interiorinscriptionsstringtogether one sura after another, unlike the inscriptions in the Azhar text. mosque, where the verses form a meaningful While Flury suggests that the first stage of the interior ornament was completed before 393/ of the 1003,28 similarity tone in the passageson the salients and the interior inscriptionssuggests a date no earlier than 401/1011, when the salients were begun, and no later than 403/1013,when the mosque was consideredfinished. The change in tone between the originaland the new inscriptionssuggests that the arkanwhose function has never been discussedwere built to cover the original minarets.Whatever excited the displeasureof the patron, it is unlikely to have been the inscriptions,because they could easily have been replaced. MINARETS The historyand meaningof the minaret,the most visible symbol of the presence of Muslims in a place, is still poorly understood,even after some fifty years of intermittentstudy.29In 1918 Max van Berchem characterizedthe problem of the minaret as philological, architectural,and functional (i.e., as religious custom),30but this neat analysisin itself has hinderedinvestigation.Stuavoid the questionsof placedents of architecture ment and number in favor of investigatingthe varieties of minaret form (square, cylindrical,or octagonal). Studentsof its philologicaland functional aspects concentrate on the early Islamic of that minaret,ignoringthe proliferation minarets to be characteristic only of later periods. appears The problem itself may also have been poorly formulated,for it reflectsan "Orientalist" assumption that the minaret- like the mihrab- was given a basic shape (tower) and a basic purpose (the calling of the faithfulto prayer)in the early Islamic period, which continuedunchangedover the centuries. Far from suggestingone tripartite problem,the minaretposes a whole seriesof problems reflectingthe diversity of medieval Islamic civilization. It would not be fair, however, to say that everyone has ignoredthese questions,for individual studieshave pointed out the practical impossibility of using certain minarets for the adhdn ("call to prayer"), or that, of the three Arabic words for "minaret,"mi'dhana ("place of adhan"), the one which best describesits supposed function,was the last to appear.31 Nevertheless,a coherentexplanation the philological,architecfor

JONATHAN manara, he does use the plural, arkdn. The possibilitiesof textual corruptionare great in the Khitat,but it can be arguedthat only one manara was "increased" that at least three ruknwere and built, since the plural, arkdn, not the dual, rukndn, is used. This readingwould suggest that at least three, and possibly four, corer towers existed. Unfortunately,there is as yet no physical evidence whatsoever to support this hypothesis, but the crucialcornersof the mosque(that is, east and south) were inaccessibleto Creswellfor examination, as they were encased in later construcIn tion.35 any event, this line of reasoningdoes not explain the two existing minarets, or even why they were covered up with arkan. The philological evidence does not solve the problem of the paired minaretsat the Hakim mosque. In the mosquesof the Islamicworld contemporary with the Fatimids, a single minaret was usuallylocated opposite the mihrab.This was the case in Spain and North Africa (Cordova,Qayrawan, and the Qal'a of the Banf Hammad), Iraq (both mosques at Samarra), Iran (Siraf), and Egypt (Ibn Tulun). Paired and multiple minarets became more commonin later periods, especiallyin Iran, India, and OttomanTurkey,but the single minaretremainedthe rule in Spain, North Africa, Egypt, Syria,and Iraq, althoughin exceptional cases multiple minarets were used there, too.36In OttomanTurkey,multipleminaretsindicated imperial patronage, since only royal mosqueswere allowedto have morethanone.37In Iran, multiple minaretshad no such significance; their use was tied to the developmentof the pishtdq compositional unit.38 In Ottoman Turkey, most mosques had only one minaret. In Safavid Iranminaretswere used, it wouldseem, for everything except the call to prayer, which was given from a guldasta, an aedicule on the roof of the mosque.39 In each of these instances,the multipletowers were designed at the same time and consequently
were of similar if not identical appearance.

M. BLOOM

21 21

of Thus, the appearance two differentminaretson the Hakim mosque is most unusual for its time and place. Another groupof monumentscontainedmulfor tiple structures the call to prayer.They are all from the early Islamic period in Egypt, Syria, Palestine, and the Hijaz; specifically,the mosque of 'Amr in Fustat, the UmayyadMosque of Damascus, the Haram al-Sharif in Jerusalem, the Mosqueof the Prophetin Medina,and the Masjid al-Haramin Mecca. An understanding these of mosques is essential to any explanation of the minaretsof the Hakim mosque.

According to al-Maqrizi, the Umayyad caliph Mu'awiyaordered Maslama,the governorof Egypt, to build $awdmi'for the adhin on the mosque of 'Amr in Fustat; four sawami' were placed at the four corners, or rukn, of the mosque.40Creswell argues that these sawami' were likely to have been four squaretowers, since the order came from Damascus.41 Writingearlier thanCreswell,however,Gottheilstates that "what the sawma'a was, we do not know."42Joseph Schacht later suggests that the sawma'a was a minaret" a hut with a pointed roof "sentry-box at the cornerof the mosque and reached perched Schacht'ssuggestionseems by laddersor stairs.43 all the more likely, consideringthe lack of evidence of actual towers at the mosque of 'Amr. Creswell'shypothesisis based on his interpretation of the Damascus mosque, for he believes that the cornertowersof the originaltemenoswere used for the call to prayer.Lackingany monumental evidence of early Muslim additions to these towers, it is much more likely that $awami'like those at Fustatwere used. The earliestmentionof a real tower is from 375/985 when al-Maqdisi refers to a single minaret of "modernconstruction" (mandra muhaddatha) over the Bab alFaradis, opposite the mihrab.44Thus, though Mu'awiya had introduced four $awami', there was, three centuries later, only a single minaret oppositethe mihrab.Whenwas this minaretbuilt? Creswell believes that al-Maqdisi's phrase, "of modern construction,"implies a date at the beginningof the fourth/tenth century.If Umayyad architecturein Syria was a model for developments in North Africa and Spain, however, and if the placement of minarets in these regions was influencedby Syria, it seems likely that a tower manaraexisted in Damascusbefore the 'Abbasid revolution. Al-Maqdisi's use of "modem" may mean no more than that it was constructedlater than the other parts of the mosque. Al-Maqdisi is also a crucial source for the history of the Haram al-Sharifin Jerusalem, for he was a nativeof that city andhis detailedaccount is generally assumed to be very accurate. While Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi(c. 300/912)mentionsfour mandwir for the muezzins at Jerusalem,45 al-Maqdisi does not mention them at all, nor does Ibn al-Faqih,who wrote some ten years earlier than Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi.46 the early tenth/sixteenth In century, Mujir al-Din traced the four minarets back to the time of 'Abd al-Malik.Creswellfinds that impossible,47 and instead accepts Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi'sstatement, even though the latter may never have visited Jerusalemand has been shown to be mistakenin his enumerationof the minarets

22

MUQARNAS

at Medina.48Inasmuch as al-Maqdisiis a most reliable source, it is likely that all four minarets were not in existence in 300/912, but were built some time afterward,certainlybefore the tenth/ If sixteenthcentury.49 Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi'saccount is accurate,however, it is possiblethat the Haram was given four minarets by al-Walidwhen four minarets were added to the other great Muslim in sanctuaries the Hijaz. Muchmoreworkis necessary to clarify the history of the Haram al-Sharif duringthe medieval period. The earliest mention of minaretsin Medina comes from the reign of al-Walid b. 'Abd alMalik (86-96/705-15).50 His successor, Sulayman, demolished the minaret at the southwest corner of the mosque; the 'Abbasid caliph alMahdi (158-69/775-85) demolishedthe northeast and northwest minarets and rebuilt them when he extended the mosque one hundred cubits to the north in 162-65/778-82.51 Thus, the southeast minaret was the only Umayyad one to remain with the two 'Abbasidminaretson the north. All three were seen by Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi,who mislocated them. Abu'l-HusaynMuhammad Jubayr b. (c. 580/1184)said that there were three sawami', two small ones on the north that each had the shape of a burj (ka-annahumd'ala hai'at burjayn), and one at the southeastcornerthat looked
like a sawma'a ('ala hai'at al-sawdmi').52 No

mosque; the fourth is said, depending on the source, to have been either at the north corer or along the northeastwall.56
Qutb al-Din a late source states that a

fifth minaretwas probablyadded by al-Mu'talid (279-89/892-902) when he built the Dar alNadwa at the mosque.57By 580/1184, however, when Ibn Jubayrvisited Mecca, there were seven
minarets (,awdmi'), four on the four sides (ja-

doubt the one Umayyad "minaret" looked like a $awma'a,and the two 'Abbasidones looked like Ibn does not explainthis distinction burjs.53 Jubayr was not a further;it is possible that the $awma'a tower-shapedminaret, but rather a "sentry-box minaret," as Schacht suggested for Fustat. Ibn Jubayr describes three minarets, or sawami', at Damascus: the ones at the southeast and southwest cornersof the ancienttemenoswere like high the burjs (ka-'l-burjal-mushayyad); third was located oppositethe mihrabbut was not described.54 Knowingthe form of the two southernminaretsat
Damascus -

The third mosque -

wanib, "corners"),one on the Dar al-Nadwa, a small one on the Bab al-$afa, and one at the Bab Ibrahim. The annex of the Bab Ibrahim was built under al-Muqtadir(295-320/908-32);58 the Bab al-$afa--the most magnificent portal of the mosque- was probablybuilt or enlarged by al-Mahdi,59 althoughthe date of the minaretis uncertain. Qutb al-Din mentions that the latter two minaretswere no longer standingin his time, but that the one on the Bab Ibrahimresembled a sawma'a.He remarkedthat the one on the Bab al-$afawas mentionedby Ibn Jubayr,who said it was "so small it could not be climbed." He also noted that two of the minarets- Bab al-'Umra and al-Hazwara had been restored by Muhammad al-Jawad b. 'Ali b. Abfi Mansir alIsfahani, vizier to the ruler (sdaib) of Mosul, al-AshrafSha'banb. Husayn, in 551/1156-57.60 Thus at the time of the building of the Hakim mosque, only two, or perhapsthree, mosques in the entire Muslimworldare knownto have had more than one minaret. In two cases -the Mosque of the Prophetin Medinaand the Masjid al-Haram Mecca- four minaretswere planned in for the cornersof a rectangular enceinte. Through time, however, Medinaretainedonly three minarets and Meccaacquiredfive and eventuallyseven.
Jerusalem is a special

clude from his remarkthat the Umayyadminaret of Medina differed from them in shape. The history of the minarets of the Masjid al-Haramat Mecca is even more confusingthan that of their counterparts Medina,owing to the at continuousrestorationsof the mosque under the caliphs and to the variety of terms used for the same parts of the building. A four-minaret plan was probably introduced during al-Walid'scaliphatewhen the mosquewas restoredin 91/709-10. Under 'Abbasid rule, al-Mansurrestored ('ammara) one minaret; his son al-Mahdi restored three others.55 is not clear whetherthree or all It four minarets were placed at the corners of the

rather square towers -

we can con-

case: if it had multipleminaretsin the pre-Fatimid in period,they were probablyarranged an L-shape rather than a square, for the Haram is set in a cornerof the walled city. A minaretin the southeast corner of the Haram would have stood far away from the populated areas. The minaretsof the Hakim mosque may have been unique in their arrangement,but their number seems to suggestsome effort to establisha formalrelationship of sorts to the holiest sanctuariesof Islam. For the decorationof the Meccan minarets, we can returnonce again to Ibn Jubayr,who did not stop at enumerating minarets,but went on the to describethem in fascinatingdetail: Theminarets haveanadmirable Thatis, upto also form. halftheir with height areangular foursidesin stone, they carvedand marvelous manner['ajfbalof perfectly Around themthere a wooden is of wid']. grille [shubbdk]
exquisite workmanship.Above the grille is a column

JONATHAN
rita mukhattam].Al of it is in faceted brick, some

M. BLOOM

23 23

tower[makhin ['amad] the air,as if it werea faceted

takhtimanyatadakhiluba'dihi 'ald ba'd], which offers

bricksset moredeeplythanothers[kulluhu bi-l-djurr also is a lovelysight.Abovethe column a lantern [fahl] as surrounded a grillein the same workmanship by from are below.All [theminarets] different oneanother, the but all sharea general relationship: lowerhalf is without and half angles angular the upper is columnar,
[rukn].61

Ibn Jubayr singled out the minaret at the Bab Ibrahimfor special description: is Nearto thisdoor,to theright entering, a minaret upon different formfromthe othersmentioned in [sawma'a] of above.It hascarvings in [ji/S] [takhdrim] the plaster form It elongated as if theyweremihrabs. is surrounded tion of the portalfollows.]The lantern[fahl]of the from minaret on plaster is which separated are columns, eachotherby openspace.62 According to the chronology established above, only two of the seven minaretsseen by Ibn restoraJubayrdate to the sixth-/twelfth-century tions by the vizier of the ruler of Mosul. While these two minaretswould very likely have been made of brick, like contemporaryminarets in Jibal and the Jazira, Ibn Jubayr clearly states that all the minarets shared general similarities: angular stone bases and columnarbrick shafts. The stone was carved, the bricks set in patterns. The five other minaretsseen by Ibn Jubayrmust therefore have been standingin the fourth/tenth and fifth/eleventhcenturiesand would have been built of stone, brick, and stucco. Ibn Jubayr'sdescriptionof the minarets at Meccasuggeststhat they resembledbrickminarets in Persia, whose earliestremainingexamplesdate from the fifth/eleventhcentury.63 More important for our purposes,however,is a poorlyunderstood groupof five minaretsin UpperEgypt,whichhave been assigned with the minaret of the Mashhad al-Juyishi in Cairo64 to the middle Fatimid period. Apart from the originalhelicoidalminaretof the mosque of Ibn Tilun and the two minarets of the Hakim mosque, these six minaretsare the oldest remainingin Egypt. They varyin qualityof constructionand in size, but share some common features: square bases, often of stone; tapering cylindrical shafts of brick (except al-Juyishi); and domed lanterns, often of three stories, that make them resemble the domed mausoleumsof Aswan. The brickwork uniformly is plain,relieved of archedwindows only by varyingarrangements and, on the minaretsof Aswan and al-Mashhad al-Bahrinear Shellal, by two or three horizontal
by qarnaoaof exquisite workmanship.... [A descrip-

bands of cut-brick Kufic inscription the only of this techniquein Egypt. The minaappearance ret of the Mashhad al-Juyishi also introduces a vocabnew featureinto the Egyptianarchitectural ulary: the use of two, and sometimes three, coursesof brickand stucco stalactitesas a cornice to separatethe firstand second stories of the shaft The Esna and sometimes to supporta balcony.65 minaretis also a first,in that its foundationinscription, dated 474/1081-82, calls the structure a mi'dhana,the first appearanceof this word in the A Arabic epigraphyof Egypt.66 nearlycontempominaretat Shellal (Bilal) is called a mandra rary in an undatedfoundationinscription.67 For stylisticas well as historicalreasons, the Juyishi minaretcan be included with the Upper Egyptian minarets.68Creswell saw the Upper Egyptian group as commemorationsof Badr alJamali's victorious campaignsthere.69This may be the case, but the explanationdoes not explore the formal sources of this minarettype in Egypt. Horizontalcut-brickKufic inscriptionbands, the stalactitecornice,and a new name for the form are introducedalong with the squarebase and tapering cylindricalshaft. The location of these monumentsin Upper Egypt provides a clue to their inspiration. The region near Aswan was not only the thaghr, or frontier, between Islamic Egypt and Christian Nubia, but also a majorway station on the pilgrimage route to the holy cities in Arabia. Nasir-i Khusraw,who lived at the time of the buildingof these minarets, described, among the various routes from Egypt to the Hijaz, one that led directly east from Cairo to the Red Sea, which it followed either on land or through water.70Another, which he followed in late 441 and early 442/1050,went south from Cairo to Asyut, Qis, and Akhmim, where the route bifurcated. Pilgrims could either go east over the desert to the Red Sea or continuealong the Nile to Aswan and from there via Dhayqahand Hawd to the town of 'Aydhabon the Red Sea.71In Aswan, he had to wait for pilgrimsto returnfrom the hajj so that he could rent their camels.72 The connectionof these minaretsto the Hijaz is supportedby other evidence:the minaretof the Mashhad al-Qibli near Bilal must date from before 534/1139-40, when pious pilgrims to the Hijaz wrote graffiti on its interior.73Thus, the similarities between the Upper Egyptianminarets and those describedover a centurylater in Mecca are more than fortuitous: the general formsquare base, rounded shaft, and lantern- the materials of construction usually stone below
and brick above and the decoration cut-

24

MUQARNAS
the pilgrimagewas as a transmitterof ideas and formsthroughout medievalMuslimworld.The the simultaneousappearanceof forms and ideas at oppositeends of the Islamicworldis not surprising when one remembers that inhabitantsof those regions met more or less annually in common, pious devotion. The central importance of the Haramanled their rulers and overlordsto lavish upon them the finest and most magnificentproducts of their realms, but only the literaryrecord remainsto suggesthow splendida sight they must have been in the Middle Ages. In addition to servingas an entrepot for the exchange of goods and ideas, the Haraman can be seen as the world'sfair exhibitionof their time, with the same influence on taste in that time and place as the Chicago,Paris,or Londonexpositionsonce had in the West. With the exhibition parallel in mind, questions about the simultaneousappearancesof the muqarnasin the Maghriband Mashriq, previouslythoughtto be unrelatedphenomena,might be more easily answered. of Finally,the conscioustransferral a minaret type to the farthestreaches of the Muslimworld suggests that the minaret form had a symbolic meaningfar beyond a mere locus for the call to prayer.Its height made it a landmark.The minarets along the pilgrimageroute in Upper Egypt and at the terminusfor the pilgrimagein Cairo probablymarkedthe trailfor pilgrims.Before this theory can be used to explain other minarets, however, we need to know more about where minaretswere situated in other lands, most notablyin Iran. Even if the hypothesisthat they were markersshould prove to be wrong, pilgrim-route their symbolicfunction, as opposed to their quotidien function, is confirmed. PORTALS A characteristic feature of Fatimidmosque architectureis the projectingmonumental portalon the faqadeopposite the mihrab.It firstappearson the it at mosqueat al-Mahdiyya;78reappears al-Azhar, on the Qarafamosque,79 againthree times on and the Hakim mosque, whose portals project from the lateral facades as well as the main facade of the building.It is generallyagreedthat the projecting portals at the Hakim mosque are direct descendants of the Mahdiyya innovation, itself thoughtto be the result of a purely local transfer from the late-antiquetriumphal-arch form. The monumentalportal has been considereda formal innovationof the Fatimids:"Down to the end of the 3rd/9thcentury,"Creswellwrites, "no mosque had a monumental entrance.All mosques,largeor

brick Kufic inscriptionsand stalactitecornicesare all clearly derived from Meccan prototypes. This explanation of the eccentric group of Upper Egyptianminaretsthroughmodels known for at Mecca has a number of ramifications the One of them is that historyof Islamicarchitecture. the continuous tradition of brick minarets in Mecca and Medina during the 'Abbasid period suggestsa continuitybetweenearlyMesopotamian 'Abbasiduse of bricksset in patterns(such as in the BaghdadGate at Raqqaor Ukhaydir)and the development of the brick minaret in Iran, for which the undatedminaretat Nayin is the earliest Furtherresearchis needed on extant example.74 the developmentand meaningof this Iranianminaret traditionin light of this new evidence, for it would supportthe belief that the helicoidalminarets of Samarraand Cairo were exceptions to a tradition of cylindricalminaretsduring 'Abbasid times. Since it is unlikely that the Hijaz was a center of artistic innovation, the Medinan and Meccanminaretswere probablyproductsof an as traditionin Iraqor Iran, of which yet unidentified the incompletelyunderstoodruin near Ukhaydir, ManarMujda, is an example.75 This Hijaz traditionthat inspiredthe Upper Egyptian series of minaretsin the mid-fifth/eleventh centuryis also the formalantecedentfor the minaretsof the Hakim mosque. Their shape and decorationclosely resemble the horizontalbands of geometricand epigraphic materialon the circular and octagonalbrick minaretsof Iran. Formal and ideological referencesto Mecca and Medina are rife in the Hakim mosque, and the time was ripe for such references. The use of the stalactitecorniceon the minaret of the Mashhad al-Juyfishibrings to mind he Ibn Jubayr'sdescriptionof the qarnava saw on the minaret at the Bab Ibrahimin Mecca; the influencewas eitherdirector, morelikely, through now-lost intermediariesin Upper Egypt. Where the stalactite cornice and squinchoriginatedis a problem not yet solved to universalsatisfaction, but it now at least appearscertainthat the cornice made its way into Egypt through the pilgrimage route. This suggestsa similarroute for the muqarnas squinch,which also makes its firstappearance in Upper, ratherthen Lower, Egypt. It is unclear when these forms first appeared in the Hijaz: according to the historical record, al-Muqtadir built the Bab Ibrahim annex to the Masjid alHaram, on which the minaret rested, in 306/ 918-19.76This suggestsan early, but by no means impossible, date for the first known use of muqarnas.77 This Hijaz connection shows how important

JONATHAN M. JOAHNM.BOM2 BLOOM

25

ture.87 small, were entered by simple rectangulardoor'Abbasidmosquesdid not have monumenMore recent retal portals either, except the Masjid al-Haramat ways in the enclosure walls.""8 searchat the GreatMosqueof Cordova,however, Mecca, which was rebuilt by the 'Abbasidswith shows that its majorportalhad been given a comtwenty-three portals.These portalsrangedfrom a parable, though not projecting, monumentalizaplain, single-archedopening to a many-arched tion nearly fifty years earlier than al-Mahdiyya.81 portal, lavishly decorated in mosaic, teak, and This early appearancein Andalusiaand Ifriqiyya other precious materials.88Over the centuries, these portals were changed: for example, Qutb stronglysuggeststhat the innovationwas, like the al-Din could count only nineteen gates with square minaret, a Maghribistyle. Scholarshave tried to explainwhy the portals thirty-nine arches; Muhammad al-Azraqi at al-Mahdiyyaand Cordova were monumentalcounted twenty-three gates with forty-three ized as they were, but their theories are irreconarches. Since the entire Haram has since been cilable. Klaus Brisch has suggested that the rebuilt, only textual descriptionsof these gates remainto give informationabout their actual apmilitarycharacterof the Bab al-Wuzara' betrayed Umayyad influence. He claims that the physical pearance. and ideological proximityof the mosque to the The simplest of the gates was described by palace in Cordovaaccountsfor the use of secular al-Azraqias a single, plain, archeddoorway, like forms in this religiousarchitecture. The proximity the Bab BanfuSahm. Its arch was ten cubits in of these institutionsdates from before the Muslim arc and seven cubitswide and was approachedby ten steps.89 Therewere some eight of these portals conquest, when the cathedral and the bishop's residencewere on this site. Fortification was also and eight others that had two arches resting on a functional,for the builderhad just cause to worry single column. With one exception- the Bab about security.82 Banf Jumah on the southwest- al-Azraqi The explanation proposed by Alexandre does not mentionany decorationthese gates may L6zine for the portal at al-Mahdiyya relies on a have had. He reserved his energies for the five psychological assessment. He argues that the major gates, which had three or more arches: Mahdiyyaportal was inspiredby late-antiquetrihas [Bab Banii Shayba] two columns[ustuwanatdn], umphalarchesto provide an elaboratesetting for on which threearches, cubits arc.Thefaceof rest ten in Fatimid court ceremonial. Lezine's hypothesis the portalis decorated in [manqash] mosaic[fusaywas inspiredby MariusCanard,who had recently of fisd'];over the portalis a balcony [rushan] carved translatedInostrantsev's seminalstudy of Fatimid teak [sdj manqush]ornamentedwith gold [muzakhrif courtceremonial.83 the Unfortunately, ceremonies The runs bi-'l-dhahab]. embellishment the length the of are from a muchlaterperiodin Egypt, andthereis balcony, twenty-seven cubits,and is threeand a half no contemporarydocumentationthat can vouch cubits wide.From balcony theground seventeen the to is for elaborate ceremonial at al-Mahdi's court. and the of cubits, between twowalls theportal twentyis fourcubits. twowallsof the portalarerevetted The Lezine's hypothesis that the Fatimidsresponded in both marble, whiteandred.There fourstepsleading are to the ceremonial content of Roman triumphal downintothe masjid.90 arches assumes an art-historicalsophistication otherwiseunknownin the Middle Ages.84 The other four major gates were similar, with The similaritiesbetween these two early pordecorationin mosaic, multicoloredmarble, imitatals are great, but the disparities between the tion marble (rihdm mamawwah), gold writing, explanationsfor their presencemake it difficultto and carved teak. The largest, the Bab $afa, had claim that the two are in any way related, even four columns and five arches: the rest only two though they are both chronologicallyand geocolumnsand three arches. close. The problemsthese monumental graphically Accordingto al-Azraqi'sdescription(fig. 5), the width "betweenthe two walls"is twenty-four mosque portalspose are similarto those posed by the minarets.The similarityof the problemssugcubits; therefore, the twenty-seven-cubit balcony gests that a similarapproachto the solutionmight abovethe portalprobablyprojectedone and a half be fruitful. cubits beyond each wall. Al-Azraqi notes this Apartfromthe Dome of the Rock, whichhad discrepancybetween portal width and balcony four porches in front of its four doors,85 and the length in other portals, such as Bab al-'Abbas UmayyadMosqueof Damascus,whichretainspart b. 'Abd al-Muttalib.The projectionof these porof two antiquemonumental entrancesto the temetals is slight,but sufficientto distinguish them from nos,86early Islamic religious buildingswere not the flat expanse of wall surface and make them given monumentalportals, though monumental appearmonumental. portalswere ubiquitousin Umayyadcivil architecThe 'AbbasidMasjidal-Haramat Meccais, in

26

MUQARNAS

riishan fusaifisa'

D 0

cu 0

lcd C-3 3

10 Cubits

5. Bab al-Haram, Figure Masjid Banf Shayba, Mecca. reconstruction Hypothetical to according al-Azraqi. significanceof this name appears even greater when considered along with a hadith quoted by Nasir-i Khusraw's contemporary, al-Mu'ayyad fi-l-Din Shirazi: "I [the Prophet] am the city of knowledge and 'All is its gate; let those who want to acquire knowledge approach it by its proper gate."94The monumentalized portal, just like the minaret from which comes divine light, may have had a very specificIsma'ilisignificance. Unfortunately, the fragments of inscription remainingon the portal of the Hakim mosque are not enough either to supportor disprovethis hypothesis. The use of the name 'All in the central roundelof the portalhood of the Aqmarmosque of 519/1125,however,suggeststhat this identification was made in later FatimidEgypt.95 This interpretationof the inclusion of the projecting monumental portal in the formative vocabularyof Fatimid mosque architecturegains furthersupportfrom the allusionsto Meccain the early Fatimid panegyric description of al-MahThe introductionof minaretsin the iiadiyya.96 kim mosquealso had Meccanresonances,indicating that the symbolicimportanceof Mecca was as as great after the foundingof al-Mahdiyya it had been before. While this could be explainedeasily as a naturalreactionof pious Muslims,contemporary historicalsources show that Fatimidinterest in the holy cities was extraordinary. Throughout the third/ninthcentury, the 'Abbasid caliphs expended vast sums of money in Mecca, ostensibly for pious purposes,but also with the idea of assur-

fact, the earliestknownexampleof the projecting in anywhere Islam. portalon religiousarchitecture The form this monumentalization took, however, than was far more dependenton local vocabularies it was on any central form: at al-Mahdiyyait resulted in the use of a late-antique triumphal arch;in Cordovait showeditself in an Andalusian interpretationof a once-SyrianUmayyad palace gateway. At the Hakim mosque, the third extant ideas and local formswere once example,standard again combined. The overall shape and general articulationof the facade portal can be imagined as the product of a Fatimid style going back to al-Mahdiyya,but the actual motifs of the richly carved stone of the portal decorationappear, in Creswell'swords, to be "arabesque worked, so to into the skeletonof a classicalentablature"; speak, they are undoubtedlythe productsof a local main d'oeuvre.91 The Persian traveler Nair-i Khusraw ofof fered a possibleexplanationfor the significance in Fatimidarchitecture the monumentalized portal when he called the triple portal, usuallyknownin the sources as the Bab Banu Hashim, "Bab 'All," because "thisgate was used by the amiralmu'minin, 'All [b. Abi-Talib], when he went

to prayin the masjid."92 name mustfirsthave The or been appliedto this gate duringthe fourth/tenth fifth/eleventh for it was knownonly century, early as Bab Banu Hashim by al-Azraqi. Nevertheless, the name stuck, for in the tenth/sixteenth The century Qutb al-Din recordedboth names.93

JONATHAN ing Meccan allegiance. In spite of their efforts, 'Alid power grew so strongthere that al-Ma'mun appointed'Alids to be the governorsof Mecca. In the fourth/tenth century,'Alid powercontinuedto grow there, both officially and unofficially,for 'Alids were often prominent among the bandits who ravaged the pilgrim caravans. In its early decades, Qarmatianpower over Mecca was so great that they were able to steal the Black Stone from the Ka'bain 317/929-30. By the middleof the century,however,a new power began to emerge, encouragedby Fatimid support. In 348/959-60, the Fatimids supported the Banu Hasan over the Banf Ja'farto assure the eventual recognitionof the Fatimidsas suzerains; shortly after, the Hasanid sharifate In emerged.97 358/969,months after the conquest of Egypt, the Fatimidcaliphal-Mu'izzwas recognized in the khutbain both Meccaand Medina,an act encouragedby the vast sumsof money he had distributedthere.98 Some idea of the scale of expenditurecan be imaginedfrom the descriptionof an object which al-Mu'izzhad made for the Ka'ba:
had the shamsawhichhe had had madefor the Ka'baset up in the iwan of his palace. It was twelvespansin each direction.The background was red brocade [dibaj].In each crescentwas an openworkgolden ball; inside each ball were fifty pearls the size of doves' eggs, as well as red, yellow, and blue precious stones. Around it, the versesof the Sirat al-Hajjwere writtenin emeralds,the spaces [between the letters] filled with pearls as big as could be. The shamsawas stuffedwith powderedmusk. Because of the heightwhereit was set up, people could see it fromoutsidethe palaceas well; the men who set it up had to drag it because of its great weight.99

M. BLOOM

27 27

On the dayof 'Arafa Dhu'l-Hijja al-Mu'izz 362/973], [9

The shamsa was an ornamentshaped like a sun (shams), designed to be attachedto the covering (kiswa)of the Ka'ba.The firstshamsawas sent by al-Mutawakkil (232-47/847-61);100 al-Mu'izz's of commissioning one was recognizedby contemporariesas a consciousimitationof 'Abbasidpractice. When it was displayedin al-Mu'izz's palace, the Egyptians, Syrians, Iraqis, and Khurasanis who had been on the pilgrimagesaid that there was none to equal it: although the 'Abbasid shamsawas more finely worked, it was only onequarterthe size.101 The purpose of gifts to the Ka'ba has been exploredby Grabarin a differentcontext.102 They were sent to emphasizethe holiness of the place and the piety of the donors; to acquire holiness and sacrednessfromthe sanctuary's holiness;and, of finally,to symbolizethe submission the rulerto Islam. The shamsa,however,seems to have had a

slightlydifferentfunction.Al-Mu'izz'sshamsawas not, it seems, mentioned by Meccan sources, althoughthey (and Fatimidsources,too) duly noted the dispatchand receipt of the Fatimidkiswa. Its importance to contemporary people, however, depended not on its receipt in Mecca, but on its displayin Egypt, the expressedintention of sending it, and most important,the politicaland financial resourcesneeded to send it. and Nevertheless,al-Mu'izz his successorshad a tenuous hold on the allegiance of the Meccan sharifs. In 362/972-73, the year he ordered the shamsa,al-Mu'izzhad not been mentionedin the khutbafor two years; and, althoughhe had been recognizedin 363/973-74, his successor, al-'Aziz, still felt in 365/975-76that the Meccansneeded to be taughta lesson. He sent an armyto besiege the city, whichwas forced to capitulatebecause of its In dependenceon Egypt for food and supplies.103 368/978-79, al-'Aziz sent a gold mihrab for the Ka'ba, in addition to grain and oil for the Meccans.104 the followingyear he sent the kiswa, as In well as one hundred thousand dinars' worth of goods.105In 380/990, al-'Aziz himself reviewed the caravan ladenwith the kiswaand goods.106 The herald of the successfulcompletion of the pilgriwith mage was greeted on the first of Muharram robes of honorand a paradethroughout Egypthe tian capital.107 pilgrimage not only a pious The was obligation,but also a majormeans of communication and a source of information:in 380/991 al'Aziz learned through the returningpilgrims of the establishment his name of a da'wain Mosul in and the Yemen.108 Despite the lavish gifts to Mecca and its inhabitants and the warm welcome accorded the amir when he visited al-'Aziz,109the sharifs wishedto be independentof Fatimidinterference. With increasingfrequencythe pilgrimageproved dangerouseven for the Shi'i Egyptians. In 394/ 1004, al-Hakim ordered the pilgrims to leave even earlier than usual, probably to allow them time to cope with problemsin the Hijaz. In 401/ 1010, after the caravanwas forced to returnwithout even visitingMedina,anotheredict moved the departure date to the middle of Shawwal and orderedthat Medina be visited first.110 In the same year, the amir of Mecca called himself "amir al-mu'minin,"gave the khutba in his own name, took on the regnal name alRashid, and claimed to possess Dhf'l-Faqar, the sword of the Prophet, as well as his rod
(qadib). 11

This use of the traditionalcaliphal symbols - swordand rod - was also a reactionto events of the previousyear, when al-Hakimsent a func-

28

MUQARNAS
orders at the time: covering up the al-IHakim's minaretssomehow has its equivalent in his 405/ 1014-15 edict prohibitingshoemakersfrom making sandalsfor women in an effort to discourage public immorality. FUNCTIONAL RELATIONSHIPS Its formalfeaturesshed some light on the meaning the Hakim mosque had for contemporaries,but the buildingcan also be studiedfrom a functional perspective- how and when it was used - by examining the contemporary accounts of Ibn Zilaq and al-Musabbihi preserved in alMaqrizi's Khitat.119These chronicles do not mention the daily and Friday prayers that were held in any of the Fatimid mosques; they do, however, describethe celebrationof special holidays, and these provide another key to understandingthe many facets of the Hakim mosque. In FatimidEgypt, three kindsof holidaycelebrationsinvolved the participationof the rulers: Muslimholidays,specifically Isma'iliholidays,and local Egyptianfestivals of the agricultural calendar. Al-Maqrizi provides a convenient list of these festivals.They includethe Muslimholidayof 'Id al-Fitr and 'Id al-Nahr, which the Fatimids celebratedonly at the musalla.The Christian population celebrated Epiphany and Christmasand other holy days without official patronage- and often at the ruler'ssufferance- but the festivalof Nawrfiz, which marked the height of the Nile flood, and the Breaking of the Dike, which signaled the start of a new agricultural year, were celebratedwith the approvaland participation of the ruler himself. The specificallyShi'i-Isma'ili holidays added quite a numberto those celebratedby all Muslims alike. They included the birthdaysof 'Ali, Fatima, Hasan, Husayn, and the ruling imam; 'Id Ghadir Khumm, commemoratingMuhammad's selection (na.g) of 'All as his successor, on 18 Dhu'l-Hijja;and the four Fridaysof Ramadan, which were given special importancein the Fatimid period. The best descriptions of all these holidaycelebrationsare to be found in the Khitat, but since al-Maqrizi's sources are from the sixth/twelfthcentury, they do not necessarilyreflect the activitiesof the earlierperiod under considerationhere. Ratherthan using these late compilations,it is better to rely on the yearlyaccounts of the Itti'dz, supplementedby dated references in the Khitat. This evidence shows that the Hakim mosque was built in a period of great innovation and development in holiday celebration.

tionaryto Medinato findthe house in whichJa'far al-$adiq, the sixth imam, had lived. The mission was accomplishedwhen the functionarydiscovered Ja'far'sQur'an,some of his utensils, and his prayermat, which the Fatimidimamswere to use as their own.112 They already possessed Ja'far's
sword. 13

Al-Rashid's actions forced al-Hakim to prohibitpeople from going to Mecca so as to cut off the city's food and supplies.14Challengedalso by his own family, al-Rashid's caliphate was short-livedandhe was forcedto come to an understanding with the Egyptians, on whom he deYet pended for food.115 the conflict between the Egyptiansand the Meccanseruptedonce againin 414/1023-24, when, according to the Meccan sources, an Egyptian "heretic"struck the Black Stone with a mace (dabbas) and broke off a piece of it. A melee broke out and a number of Egyptianswere killed.16 Accordingto the Egyptian sources, the guilty party was a Daylamite member of the Batiniyyasect.17 In 415/1024-25, Egyptians,undoubtedlyfearingfor their lives, did not go on the pilgrimage.118 Thus, Fatimidinvolvementin Meccanaffairs appearsto have had varyingsuccess. During the reigns of al-Mu'izzand al-'Aziz, it was generally on the upswing, despite the attemptat independence in 365/975-76, and it culminatedin the cordial welcome given the amir of Mecca in 384/ to 994-95. The importanceof the pilgrimage both Mecca and Medina is underscoredby al-Hakim's order of 394/1003-04,despite the growingtension and attacks on the caravans.The constructionof both the Hakim mosque and its second phase take placewithinthis periodof good relations.The use visual referencesin the particular of minarets and portalsin this periodmay well, then, not have been merely fortuitous. The Hakim mosque stood to the north of the city on the route to the assemblygroundsfor the pilgrimcaravanat Birkat al-Jabb. With its high minaretsit may well have been conceived not only as a fittingterminusfor the pilgrimage,but also as a sign that Cairo- the new capital of the Prophet'sfamily- possessed some of the attributesof the holy cities of Islam. At the turn of the century a decline in Egyptian-Meccanrelations presumably led alHakim to terminate any association that had been established between the new mosque and Mecca or Medina. Ratherthan simplytearingthe minaretsdown, he made the extraordinary decision to cover them up. That way he could remove theirvisualreferenceto Meccaandstill retaintheir This practicalfunctionas beaconsor watchtowers. irrationalact is consistentwith other of seemingly

I~

JNTA JONATHAN

M. BLOOM .BOM2

29

There is little, if any, evidence from the Ifriqiyyan Fatimidperiod for the celebrationof holidays in any but a strictly religious manner. The of description the celebrationof GhadirKhummin arrivedin Egypt, 362/973,the year when al-Mu'izz is indicative: of Ibn Zuilfqsaid, "A greatnumber Egyptians and and themgathered for Maghribis otherswho followed it the the sermon, because wasa festival, Prophet hav'All as ing- on that day- designated b. Abi-Talib of Commander the Believers his lieutenant and [khalttime for al-Mu'izz, it wasthefirst it was fa]. Thispleased donein Egypt."120 In the same month, al-Mu'izzrode to open the dike. Ibn Zilaq described his route and menThe tioned that it was a big procession.121 festival of Ghadir Khumm presents a strictly religious character,the Breakingof the Dike a strictlysecular one, but neither festival was comparablein splendorto al-Mu'izz'saudience (majlis)of three months earlier.122 Eighteen years later, al-'Aziz celebratedthe second Fridayof Ramadanby ridingto the Jami' al-Qahira (al-Azhar) under a golden parasol him (muzalla).Five thousandpeople accompanied on foot. He held a scepter, wore a mantle (taylasdn), and carried a sword. He gave the khutba, prayed, and then left, receivingpetitionsfromthe people on the way back to the palace. Al-Musabbihi, describing the event, said that "it was a great day which the poets described."123 At the end of the month, al-'Azizcelebrated the 'id al-Fitr at the musalla outside the Bab al-Nasr. Between the palace and the musalla, mastabaswere set up for the muezzinsand reciters (fuqaha'), "so that the takblr would be simultaneous from the musallato the palace."Accompanied by troops in full regalia, horses with bejeweled golden saddles,an elephant,and a giraffe, the caliph paraded between the lines of people, who had been arrangedaccordingto their social station. Whenthe calipharrivedat the musalla,he prayed and gave the khutbaas usual.124 In this same month- Ramadan380/990 the new mosque was probablybegun, and on the seventeenth day al-'Aziz gave the khutba and prayedthere. This is the firstinstanceof the ruler going to a mosque other than Jami' al-Qahira during Ramadan. The practice was to become standardfor the Fatimids. The descriptionof al-Hakimprayingin the in Jami'al-Qahira Ramadan 388/998marksanother innovationin the Fatimidcelebration Ramadan: of He worea cloak[rida'], carried sword a staff. and a and Whenhe gavethe khutba, curtains the from] [hanging

thequbba theminbar] buttoned He gavea were [on up. shortened khutba whichcouldonly be heardby those closeby. Thiswasthe firstFriday. alsoprayed He anotherFriday the mosque] the 'Id al-Fitr the and at [at wherehe gavethe normal khutba ['ald-l-rasm musalla, and the the al-mu'tad] offered mealbreaking fast.125 This form of khutba, with its buttoningup of the imamin the minbar,also becamestandard Fatimid describedit in minute practice,for Ibn al-Tuwayr detail at a much later date.126 In the years of al-Hakim's reign that followed, the celebrationof Ramadanbecame more and more formalized. In Ramadan 398/1008, he prayedone Fridayin the new mosque he had had built in the Rashida district. When the Hakim mosque was finished in 403/1012-13, al-IaHkim went one step further and, in Ramadan, prayed once in the Jami' Rashida, once in the mosque outside the Bab al-Futiuh(that is, the Hakim mosque), and once in the Jami' al-'Atiq in Misr, "the first of the Fatimid caliphs to pray there."'27The following year in Ramadan, the process was complete, for he prayed in all four After that, the celecongregationalmosques.128 brationof the four Fridaysof Ramadanwas institutionalized.The imam visited the four congregational mosquesof the city in succession,a practice that became standardfor the Fatimidsforty years after their arrival, but is found nowhere else in contemporary practice. The four mosques where the imam prayed were al-Azhar, al-Hakim, Rashida, and 'Amr. The Qarafa mosque was never used for these celebrations, because it had a special role as a funerary mosque for women. Ibn Tilun, the other greatcongregational mosque of the city, was not then used for the Ramadanprayers,although it was kept in repair129 was used in Ramadanin and later years.'30 The Jami'al-Qahira the Azhar mosquehad special prominenceas the first mosque built by the Fatimids in Egypt. In 378/988-89, the role of this mosque was expandedwhen al-'Aziz, at the suggestion of his vizier Ya'qib b. Killis, ordered a group of fuqaha' to build a house for themselvesnext to the mosque. The establishment of resident legists marks the inaugurationof the mosque'srole as a teachinginstitution.131 Constructionof the mosque outside the Bab al-Futfihwas begun around 379 or 380 (988-90) by al-'Aziz, also at the suggestionof the vizier Ibn Killis. Work began anew on the mosque in 393/ 1002-03 and constructionof another mosque, the Jami' al-Rashida, which al-Hakim located on a site overlooking the Birkat al-Habash, began in the same year.132 That mosque was finished by

30

MUQARNAS
comes from the tenth centuryA.D. and his Muslim sourcescome fromthe twelfth, the very end of the Fatimidperiod. Now that some of the innovations in Fatimidceremonialcan be ascribedto a period only slightly later than Constantine's manual, Canard's discussionof Fatimid-Byzantine parallels gains credence. Although the correspondencebetween Fatimid and Byzantineceremonialis never exact, the parallelsare striking:al-Azharwas certainlypreeminent among the mosques the Fatimids built, but it never played the kind of role that Hagia Sophia did. The caliph's visiting four mosques duringRamadanhas its parallelin the emperor's visiting churches during the Easter season: the Churchof the Holy Apostles was visitedon Easter Saint Sergios on Easter Tuesday.142 Monday,141 The Fatimid caliph paraded in state to the mosques and festivalplaces much as the emperor paraded through the city on his way to these churches.143 unusualform of Fatimidkhutba, The where the caliph gave the khutba from inside a curtainedminbar,is similarto the Byzantinecelebration of the mass at an altar enclosed in the bema by curtains.144 In view of the number and quality of these parallels,Byzantineceremonial,ratherthan 'Abbasid or Egyptian customs, offers the most convincing source for the development of Fatimid ceremoniesandfor some of the unusualfeaturesof Fatimid architectureas well - the domes in the rear corners of the prayer halls of early Fatimid congregational mosques, for example. These domes, which became standard features of the mosques, must have been places of some ceremonial significance.Textual evidence is still lacking for this early period, but establishedparallels allow us to imagine that these spaces- perhaps closed off by curtains- were set aside, just as the pastophoriaof Byzantinechurcheswere, for special functions associated with the service. If this hypothesis holds, these "rooms" would have served some of the functions which the ddr alimdra, formerly adjacent to the mosque, had servedin Umayyadand 'Abbasidtimes. Nevertheless, untilmuchmoreworkis done on the chronology of ceremonialpractices, these more general questionswill have to remainunanswered. The Hakim mosque can, then, be explained in functionally ceremonialterms:the Fatimidscreated an imperialsettingin the city and a stage for the performance imperialpageants.This imperof ial policy can be tracedin part to Ya'qubb. Killis, the vizierwho had orderedthe construction the of Hakim mosque and was also the architectof the

Ramadan 398/1008, when al-Hakim prayed in it.133 is possible that the mosquesvisited during It Ramadanwere those constructedwith the rulers' patronage, for each of these three mosques was built - or at least started- by one of the three rulers.The FridayRamadanprayerin the mosque of 'Amr in 403/1013 disproves the theory, however, for al-Hakim was the first of the Fatimid caliphsto use this mosque, and it is identifiednot with the rulersbut with one of the Companions of the Prophet. Nevertheless, the Fatimidsdid not ignore this venerable mosque: in 378/988-89, under al-'Aziz'sorders, Ibn Killis built a fountain in this mosque;134 the followingyear the vizier in removed the minbar of Qurra b. Sharik and substituteda gilded one;135 387/997, at the bein ginning of al-Hakim's reign, the mosque was whitewashedanew, some mosaics removed, and Fatimid gilded, engravedplaques put in place.136 patronage was thus not limited to the mosques which they had built. Patronagealone still does not explainthe generalincreasein the ceremonial celebrationof Ramadanand its localization four in congregationalmosques of the city. Another possibleexplanation the elaborafor tion of ceremonyis the influenceof local Egyptian customs. Nothing would have been more normal for the Fatimids, in their efforts to win popular support,than to take on the local holidays- such as the Breaking of the Dike or Nawriz - or to make their own holidaysmore like Egyptianones. Undoubtedly both processes were at work. The officialcelebrationof secularEgyptianholidaysat the expense of Christianones can be discerned as early as 381/991, when al-'Aziz paraded to but open the dike137 prohibitedthe festivities ac'id al-$alib, the Discovery of the companying Cross.138The public spectacle associated with these new celebrationsof Muslimand Shi'a holidays was accessibleand visibleto the entire Egyptian community. Still, Egyptian practicesdo not fully explain the increasingceremonyand localizationof festivals during this period. Nor do 'Abbasid ceremonialpracticesprovidea source. Derived from a Persiantraditionof the staticruler,'Abbasidceremony was localized in the palace and did not involve the processionscharacteristic Fatimid of
celebrations. 139

Nearly thirty years ago, Marius Canardexaminedthe relationship betweenFatimidand Byzantineceremonialby comparing texts preservedin al-Maqrizi's Khitaf with ConstantineVII Por14 Book of Ceremonies. This otherphyrogenitos's wise important study lacks chronologicalprecision, however, since Canard'sByzantine source

JONATHAN Fatimid financialand administrative system, the most centralized and hierarchialadministration ever known in Islam up to that point.145 it, the In imam, as God's representativeon earth, was the source of all power, ruling over administrative, judiciary, and missionarybureaucraciesheaded respectivelyby the vizier, the qadi, and the chief missionary. The Hakim mosque symbolizesthis new Fatimidconceptof the imam'spowerin all its features. The inscriptionsof the first stage constantly reiterate the role of the imam in Isma'ili featuresrecognizthought;the use of architectural ably associatedwith those of the holiest shrinein Islamalso contributes the imageof the imamas to head of the faith. In its scale, it is an eloquent monument to Fatimid power at its apogee and marksthe culmination the firstcenturyof Fatiof mid rule, when Cairo was transformedfrom an accidentalcapital into a splendidimperialcity. A comparisonof the Hakim mosque to the first mosque built by the Fatimidsat al-Mahdiyya measuresthe distancetraveled.Althoughthe formal elementsof its designcan andshouldbe traced to the traditionof Fatimid mosque architecture, the mosque displaysan incrediblewealth of new symbolicreferences- Isma'ili,Meccan,andceremonial- as well. This rangeof references,drawing upon Muslim,Fatimid,andcontemporary Byzantine traditions,underscores role of this conthe gregationalmosqueat the seat of a Mediterranean
empire. HARVARD UNIVERSITY MASSACHUSETTS CAMBRIDGE, NOTES 1. This article originated in somewhat different form as part of my doctoraldissertation,"Meaningin IslamicArt in NorthAfrica EarlyFatimidArchitecture: and Egypt in the FourthCenturyA.H. (Tenth Century 2. K. A. C. Creswell, Muslim Architectureof Egypt (hereafterMAE) (Oxford, 1952), 1: 65-106. 3. Ibid., 1: 67. The mosqueat al-Mahdiyya measures approximately m by 78 m; the Azhar mosque 55 85 m by 69 m (an increase of 137 percent); and the Hakimmosque 120 m by 113 m (an increaseof 231 percent over the mosque at al-Mahdiyya). 4. Ibid., 1: 68. 5. Ibid., 1: 68-76. 6. Ibid., 1: 101. 7. Ibid., vol. 1, pls. 20b and 20c. For the Jami' al-Qarafa, see JonathanM. Bloom, "The Mosque of the Qarafain Cairo,"IslamicArt, vol. 1 (forthcoming). 8. MAE, 1: 85 ff. 9. Ibid., 1: 101. Their sizes are roughlythe same: the mosque of Ibn Tuilfinmeasures 140 m by 122 m;
A.D.)" (Harvard University, 1980).

M. BLOOM

31

the arrangement arcadesis similar,althoughthe patof tern at Ibn Tiulin is 5-2-2-2, whereas at al-Hakimit is
5-3-3-2.

10. Ibid., 2: 155 ff. 11. Al-Maqrizi,al-Mawd'i;wa'l-'tibdrbi dhikralkhitatwa'l-dthdr (Cairo, 1853), 2: 277,1. 30-31. 12. Al-Maqrizi,Khitat,2: 277, last line. 13. Al-Maqrizi, Itti'ad al-hunafd' bi-akhbdr ala'immat al-fdtimiyyln al-khulafd' (Cairo, 1967-73), 1: 267, gives the date as Ramadan380, as in the Khitat. Both texts derive from the now lost history of alMusabbili. 14. Al-Maqrizi, Khitat, 2: 277, 11.25-26, and 11.38-39, where it is said that Ibn 'Abd al-7ahir saw in the sira of al-HIkim that the "Fridayprayer was held in the mosquewhich the vizier had built." 15. Ibid., 2: 5-8, which is by Ibn al-Sayrafi, a secretaryin the Fatimidchancellorywho died in 542. 16. Al-Maqrizi,Ittd;g, 1: 268-69. 17. MAE, 1: 65, 85-90 for rukn/arkdn. 18. Al-Maqrizi,IttuidZ, 159. 2: 19. SamuelFlury, Die Ornamente Hakim-und der Ashar-Moschee(Heidelberg, 1912), pp. 13-15; MAE, 1: 79. 20. Bloom, "Meaningin Early Fatimid Architecture," pp. 113-24 and appendixA. 21. Antoine Fattal, Ibn Tulun'sMosque in Cairo (Beirut, 1960), p. 29; K. A. C. Creswell,A ShortAccount of Early Muslim Architecture(Beirut, 1968), p. 313: 22. Max van Berchem, Materiaux pour un Corpus InscriptionumArabicarum,Ire partie: Egypte, vol. 1 (hereafterMCIAEgypte,1) (Paris, 1903);GastonWiet, Mattriauxpour un CorpusInscriptionum Arabicarum, 1e partie: Egypte, vol. 2 (hereafter MCIA Egypte,2) (Cairo, 1929-30); Flury, Ornamente der HakimMoschee;and MAE, 1. 23. See, for example,the foundationinscription for al-Azharin Etienne Combe, Jean Sauvaget, G. Wiet, eds., Rdpertoire chronologique d'epigraphe arabe (hereafterRCEA) (Cairo, 1931-75), 5: 95, no. 1821. 24. MCIA Egypte, 1: 74, n. 1. 25. Caroline Williams, "The Fatimi Mausolea of Cairo" (M.A. thesis, American University in Cairo, 1970), p. 56. 26. Ibid. 27. MAE, 1: 88. 28. Flury, Ornamente Hakim-Moschee, 10. der p. 29. The major studies on the minaret are J. H. Gottheil, "The Origin and History of the Minaret," Journalof the AmericanOrientalSociety13 (1909-10): 132-54;K. A. C. Creswell,"TheEvolutionof the Minaret, with SpecialReferenceto Egypt,"Burlington Magazine 48 (1926): 134-40, 252-58, 290-98; and Joseph in Schacht,"Ein archaischen Minaret-Typ Agyptenund Anatolien,"Ars Islamica5 (1938): 46-54. 30. In Ernst Diez, Churasanische Baudenkmaler (Berlin, 1918), p. 133. 31. Oleg Grabar, The Formation of Islamic Art (New Haven, 1973), p. 120;MCIAEgypte,2: 4-5, n. 5. 32. Al-Maqrizi, Khitat, 2: 277, 1. 27: zayada ft

32

MUQARNAS
(Beirut, 1384/1964), p. 173; Maurice Gaudefroyed. Demombynes, andtrans.,IbnJobair:Voyages(Paris, 1949-65), p. 224. 53. Gaudefroy-Demombynes somewhatcareless is with his translation here: "Deux autres,aux deux angles du c6t6 nord, sont petits et ont la forme de tours; le premierseul a la forme d'un minaret."This is not quite what Ibn Jubayris saying. 54. Ibn Jubayr, Rihla, p. 240; GaudefroyDemombynes,Ibn Jobair, p. 307. 55. Qutb al-Din al-Nahrawali, Kitab al-'ilam bi-'ilam bayt allah al-hardm, ed. Ferdinand Wiistender feld, Chroniken StadtMekka,vol. 3 (Leipzig, 1857; reprinted., Beirut, 1964), pp. 424-26. 56. Muhammadb. 'Abd Allah al-Azraqi, Kitdb akhbdrmakka, ed. FerdinandWiistenfeld, Chroniken der Stadt Mekka, vol. 1 (Leipzig, 1858), pp. 331-32, gives a differentenumerationthan Qutb al-Din does. 57. Qutb al-Din, Kitabal-'ilam,pp. 424-26. 58. Maurice Gaudefroy-Demombynes, PeleriLe nage d la Mekke(Paris, 1923), p. 123. 59. Ibid., p. 140. 60. Qutb al-Din, Kitdbal-'ilam,pp. 426-27. 61. Ibn Jubayr, Rihla, p. 77; GaudefroyDemombynes,Ibn Jobair, p. 119. 62. Ibn Jubayr, Rihla, p. 83; GaudefroyDemombynes,Ibn Jobair, pp. 125-26. 63. E.g., the minaret at the Tarik Khana, Damc. ghan,probably 1027;the minaretat Sangbast,c. 1028, or any of the early minaretsillustrated,for example, in AntonyHutt andLeonardHarrow,IslamicArchitecture: Iran (London, 1977), vol. 1. 64. The minarets,publishedin MAE, 1: 146 ff., are Esna: minaret(dated 474/1081-82);Shellal: minaretof the Mashhad al-Bahri; Shellal: minaret of the Mashhadal-Qibli;Aswan: minaret;Luxor: minaret of Abu'l-Hajjaj; Cairo: minaret of the Mashhad alJuyishi (dated 478/1085).See also, for the minaretsat Shellal and Aswan, Hassan Moh. Eff. el-Hawary, "Trois minarets fatimides A la fronti&renubienne," Bulletinde l'Institut d'Egypte17 (1934-35): 141-53. 65. MAE, 1: 159. 66. Ibid., 1: 148; Gaston Wiet, "Nouvellesinscriptions fatimides," Bulletin de l'Institut d'Egypte24 (1942): 145-47. 67. RCEA, no. 2733. 68. MAE, 1: 155. 69. Ibid. 70. Nfair-i Khusraw,Safar ndma, ed. and trans. CharlesShefer as Sefer-nameh (Paris, 1881), p. 123. 71. Ibid., pp. 172-77. 72. Ibid., p. 176. 73. MAE, 1: 150. 74. Hutt and Harrow,Iran, vol. 1, pl. 7. 75. In additionto EMA, vol. 2, see B. Finsterand J. Schmidt,Sasanidische und friihislamische Ruinen im Iraq, Deutsches Archaologisches Institut, Abteilung Baghdad:BaghdaderMitteilungen,8 (Berlin, 1976). 76. Ferdinand Wiistenfeld, Geschichte der Stadt Mekka: Deutsche Bearbeitung,Chroniken der Stadt

mandra jami bdb al-futuh wa-'umila liha arkan; tawl kullu rukn mi'a dhira'. 33. Gottheil, "Originof the Minaret,"p. 132. 34. Abf 'Abd Allah Muhammadb. Ahmad alMaqdisi [al-Muqaddasi], Ahsdn al-taqasim ima'rifatal-aqdlim,ed. M. J. de Goeje (Leiden, 1877), p. 177. 35. MAE, 1: 68 and fig. 32. 36. Examples in Egypt are the mosque-madrasamausoleum of Sultan Hasan and the khanaqah and mausoleumof SultanBarqiq. Archi37. GodfreyGoodwin,A Historyof Ottoman tecture(Baltimore, 1971), p. 10. 38. The earliestmentionof a portalwith two minarets appears to be in Husayn b. MuhammadMffarrukhi's Mahdsin Isfahan, c. 421/1030, where he describes the Masjid al-Adina(masjid-ijame): "Hardby was a gate [bab] of great beauty, built by Abi Mudar al-Rimi at an expense of one thousanddinars, apart from the expense of the arch [tag]and the two minarets built on the buttresses [faylafd'in]that form an arch spanningthe passage from the mosque to the head of the bazaar known as the Suq of the Dyers [al-sibdghin]."This text is found on p. 85 of the editionof Jalal al-Tihrani al-Dinal-Husayni (Tehran,n.d.), andp. 63 of the Persian translation, Tarjuma-iMahdsin-iISfahdn, ed. 'Abbas Iqbal (Tehran, 1328). See also EdwardG. Browne's "Account of a Rare ManuscriptHistory of Isfahan, presented to the Royal Asiatic Society . .. " Journalof the Royal Asiatic Society, 1901, p. 438; and Myron Bement Smith, "The Manars of Isfahan," Athdr-eIran 1 (1936): 315. 39. Grabar,Formationof IslamicArt, p. 120. 40. Al-Maqrizi,Khitat,2: 248, 11.14-17. 41. K. A. C. Creswell,Early MuslimArchitecture, 2d. ed. (hereafterEMA) (Oxford, 1969), vol. 1, pt. 1, p. 59. 42. Gottheil, "Originof the Minaret,"p. 136. 43. Schacht, "ArchaischenMinaret-Typ Agypin ten," p. 46. 44. Al-Maqdisi,Ahsdn al-taqasim,pp. 158-59. 45. Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi, al-'lqd al-farld (Cairo, 1368/1949), 6: 264, 11.3 and following; Muhammad of Sahfi', trans., "A Descriptionof the Two Sanctuaries Islamby Ibn 'Abd Rabbihi,"in T. W. ArnoldandR. A. StudiesPresented Nicholson,eds., A Volumeof Oriental to EdwardG. Browne (Cambridge,1922), pp. 416-38. Shafi's translationis of special importance,for he has glossed manyof the technicaltermsused by the author. 46. Guy Le Strange, Palestineunder the Moslems (London, 1890), p. 163. 47. EMA, vol. 1, pt. 1, pp. 60, n. 3. 48. Shafi', "Description of Two Sanctuaries," p. 434. 49. Grabarhopes to publishan articleon this subject. 50. Gottheil, "Originof the Minaret,"p. 135. 51. Jean Sauvaget, La mosquee omeyyade de Medine(Paris, 1947), p. 75. 52. Abu'l-Husayn Muhammadb. Jubayr, Rihla

JONATHAN JONATHAN
Mekka,vol. 4 (Leipzig,1861;reprinted., Beirut, 1964), p. 209. 77. The earliest dated use of muqarnasis at the 'Arab-Ata mausoleum at Tim, dated 366/976-77, for which see Oleg Grabar,"The Visual Arts," Cambridge History of Iran, vol. 4: From the Arab Invasionto the Saljuqs, ed. RichardN. Frye (Cambridge, 1975), pp. 343-44. 78. Alexandre Lezine, Mahdiya: Recherches islamique(Paris, 1965), p. 108. d'archeologie 79. Bloom, "Meaningin Early Fatimid Architecture," pp. 94 ff. 80. Encyclopaedia Islam (hereafterEI), 2d. ed. of (Leiden, 1954-), s.v. "Bab." 81. Klaus Brisch, "Zum Bab al-Wuzurd'(Puerta de San Esteban) der Hauptmoscheevon C6rdoba," Studies in Islamic Art and Architecture Honour of in ProfessorK. A. C. Creswell(Cairo, 1965), pp. 30-48. 82. Ibid. 83. Alexandre Lezine, "Notes d'arch6ologieifriqiyenne, IV: Mahdiya, Quelques precisions sur la 'ville' des premiers Fatimides,"Revue des Etudes Islamiques35 (1967): 90. 84. The interpretationof ancient monumentsby Muslim geographersis a subject unto itself. See, for sectionson the Pyramids and the example, al-Maqrizi's Sphinx (Khitat, 1: 111-23), where the explanationsoffered show how differentmedievalinterpretations were from our own. 85. EMA, vol. 1, pt. 1, pp. 82-85. 86. Ibid., p. 161. 87. See, for example, the monuments publishedin ibid., pt. 2, such as Khirbatal-Mafjar,the two Qasr al-Hayrs,or KhirbatMinya. 88. Al-Azraqi, KitdbakhbarMakka,pp. 323 ff. 89. Ibid., pp. 328-29. 90. Ibid., p. 323. 91. MAE, 1: 69. 92. Nasir-i Khusraw,Safar ndma, ed. Muhammad Dabir Siyaqi (Tehran,n.d.), p. 127. 93. Qutb al-Din, Kitabal-'ilam,p. 423. 94. Jawad Muscati and Khan BahadurA. M. Moulvi, Life and Lectures of the Grand Missionary al-Muayyad fid-Din al-Shirazi(Karachi,1950), p. 151. 95. Williams,"FatimiMausolea,"p. 53. 96. Bloom, "Meaningin Early Fatimid Architecture,"p. 29. The poem in questionis to be foundin Ibn 'Idhari al-Marrakashi, Al-bayan al-maghrib, ed. G. S. Colin and E. Levi-Provencal(Leiden, 1948), 1: 184. 97. El, 1st ed., s.v. "Mecca," 437-48. The date pp. of the emergenceof the sharifateis uncertain(p. 443). 98. Muhammad al-Fasi, Shafa' al-ghardm biakhbdr al-balad al-hardm, in FerdinandWustenfeld, der ed., Chroniken StadtMekka,vol. 2 (Leipzig,1858), p. 245. 99. Ibn Muyassar,Akhbar misr, ed. Henri Masse (Cairo, 1919), p. 94; Al-Maqrizi, Itta'dz, 1: 140-42; idem, Khitaf,1: 135.

BLOOM M. BLOOM

33

100. Al-Maqrizi,Ittcd;z,1: 140-42. 101. Ibid. 102. Oleg Grabar, "The Umayyad Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem," Ars Orientalis (1959): 30 ff. 3 103. Al-Maqrizi, Itti'dZ,1: 238; al-Fasi, Shafd' alghardm,pp. 245-46. 104. Al-Maqrizi,Itti'd, 1: 246. 105. Ibid., p. 252. 106. Ibid., p. 268. 107. Ibid., p. 271. 108. Ibid., p. 274. 109. Ibid., p. 281. 110. Ibid., 2: 86, n. 1. 111. Al-Fasi, Shafd' al-ghardm, pp. 207-08; on Dhi'l-Faqar, see El, 2d. ed., s.v. It became a commonly used 'Alid symbol. 112. Al-Maqrizi, Ittid;, 2: 118-19; idem, Khitat, 1: 453; MCIA Egypte,2: 163-64. 113. Al-Maqrizi,Khitat,1: 417. 114. Al-Maqrizi,Itti`dZ, 90. 2: 115. EI, 2d. ed., s.v. "Mecca,"p. 443. 116. Al-Fasi, Shafd'al-ghardm, 249. p. 117. Al-Maqrizi,Itti`d;, 2: 131. 118. Ibid., p. 166. 119. Al-Maqrizi,Khita, 1: 490. 120. Ibid., p. 389; idem, Ittueaz, 142. 1: 121. Al-Maqrizi, Khiat, 1: 480; idem, IttidZ,1: 139. 122. Al-Maqrizi, 1: Khitat,1: 385; idem, Itti'dZ, 136. 123. Al-Maqrizi, 1: Khitat,1: 280; idem, Ittuidz, 267. 124. Al-Maqrizi,Khitat,1: 451. 125. Al-Maqrizi,Ittdz, 2: 20. 126. Al-Maqrizi,Khitat,2: 280 ff. 127. Al-Maqrizi,Itti'dz,2: 96. 128. Ibid., p. 103. 129. Al-Maqrizi,Khitat,2: 268-69. 130. Ibid., pp. 280 ff. 131. Ibid., p. 273. 132. Al-Maqrizi,Ittifdz,2: 44. 133. Al-Maqrizi,Khitat,2: 282. 134. Ibid., p. 250. 135. Ibid., p. 248. 136. Ibid., p. 250. 137. Al-Maqrizi,Itti`dz,1: 271. 138. Ibid., p. 272. 139. DominiqueSourdel, "Questionsde ceremonial 'abbaside," Revue des Etudes Islamiques28 (1960): 121-48. 140. MariusCanard, "Le cerdmonialfatimite et le c6r6monialbyzantin, essai de comparaison,"Byzantion 21 (1951): 355-420; ConstantinVII Porphyrog6nete, Le Livre des ceremonies,ed. and trans. Albert Vogt (Paris, 1935). 141. Livre des ceremonies,bk. I, ch. 10. 142. Ibid., ch. 28 (11). 143. Canard,"Ceremonial fatimide,"pp. 403 ff. 144. RichardKrautheimer, and Early Christian ByzantineArchitecture (Baltimore, 1975), p. 107. 145. M. A. Shaban, Islamic History (Cambridge, 1976), 2: 199.

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MUQARNAS

APPENDIX INSCRIPTIONS OF THE HAKIM MOSQUE Translation and Citation "InJ. von Hammer-Purgstall, [Bismillah]"Yet We desired to be grascriptioncoufiquede la mosquee cious to those that were abased in the de Hakim bi-Emrillah," Journal land, and to make them leaders, and to make them inheritors"[Qur'an28:4]. asiatique,3e ser., vol. 5 (1838), This is what the slave and friend of God, p. 390; RCEA, 2089. Abf 'All al-Manfir, the Imam alHakim bi-Amr Allah, Commanderof the Believers- may the Blessings of God be on him and on his pure ancestors orderedto be done in the month of Rajab of the year 393. Reproduction and Reference pl. Flury, Ornamente, 33:1-3; RCEA, 2090. "The Mercy of God and His blessingsbe upon you. O people of the House! Surely He is All-Laudable,All-Glorious"[fragment of Qur'an11:73]. This is what the slave of God and His Friend, al-Manfir Abf 'All, the Imam al-HakimbiAmr Allah, Commander the Believof ers - may the blessingsof God be on him and on his rightlyguided ancestors -ordered to be done in the month of Rajab of the year 393. [Bismillah]"Only he shall inhabit God's places of worshipwho believes in God and the Last Day, and performsthe prayer, and pays the alms, and fears none but God alone; it may be that those will be among the guided"[Qur'an9:18]. This is what al-Hakimbi-Amr Allah, Commanderof the Believers ... "Now there has come to you a Messenger from among yourselves;grievousto him is your suffering;anxiousis he over you, gentle to the believers, compassionate" [Qur'an9:128]. This is what the slave of God and His Friend, al-Manfir Abf 'All, the Imam al-HakimbiAmr Allah, Commander the Believof ers - may God's blessingsbe upon him and on his pure ancestors- ordered
Rajab of the year

Exterior Location 1. Marble plaque: whereabouts unknown

2. West minaret:middle band

3. West minaret:lower band

Flury, Ornamente, 32:4; pl. RCEA, 2091.

4. North minaret:lower band

Flury, Ornamente, 18, fig. 4; p. MAE, 1, pl. 25d; RCEA, 2092.

5. North minaret:third band, west window

MAE, 1, pl. 24b.

"God is the Light of the heavens and the earth; the likeness of His Light is as a niche wherein is a lamp (the lamp in a glass, the glass as it were a glitteringstar) kindled from a Blessed Tree, an olive"

JONATHAN M. BLOOM
Reproduction and Reference MAE, 1, pl. 24a.

35

Exterior Location 6. North minaret:third band, north window

Translation and Citation "thatis neither of the East nor of the West whose oil well-nighwould shine, even if no fire touched it; Light upon Light (God guides to His Light whom He will). And God strikes similitudesfor men, and God has knowledgeof everything" "in temples God has allowed to be raised up, and His Name to be commemorated therein; therein glorifyingHim, in the morningsand the evenings, are men whom neither commercenor trafficking divertsfrom the remembrance God of and to performthe prayer, and to pay the alms," ["fearinga day when hearts and eyes shall be turned about, that God may recompense them for their fairest works and give them increase of His bounty; and God provideswhomsoeverHe will, without reckoning"(Qur'an24:35-38)]. "Yourfriend is only God, and His Messenger, and the believers who performthe prayerand pay the alms, and bow them down" [Qur'an5:55]. "[In the field of the medallion:]From the shadowsinto the light" [Qur'an5:16; 14:1,5; 33:43; 57:9; or 65:11]. "And say: 'My Lord, lead me in with a just ingoing, and lead me out with a just outgoing"' [Qur'an17:80]. [?] [End of eulogy or qur'anic verse]. This is what al-Manfir the Imam al-Hfkim bi-Amr Allfh, Commanderof the Believers- may God's blessingsbe upon him and his pure ancestors ordered ...

7. North minaret:third band, east window

MAE, 1, fig. 36.

8. North minaret:third band, south window

9. North minaret:second band, MAE, 1, p. 24d. northeastmedallion

10. North minaret:entranceto stair 11. Six limestone blocks in Islamic Museum

MAE, 1, p. 23a and d; MCIA Egypte,2, p. 127, no. 580. MCIA Egypte,1, pl. 22; MCIA Egypte,2, pl. 2; RCEA, 2093.

12. Main portal

MAE, 1, pl. 17.

"[But those who fear their Lord- for them shall be gardensunderneathwhich rivers flow, therein dwellingforever- a hospitalityGod himself offers; and that which is with] God is better for the
pious .. ." [fragment of Qur'an 3:198].

13. West salient frieze

MAE, 1, pi. 27d.

Accordingto Creswell(p. 88) these verses appearon the salient frieze: "God and His angels bless the Prophet. O Believers, do you also bless him, and pray him peace" [Qur'an33:56]. "And those who have taken a mosque in opposition and unbelief, and

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MUQARNAS
Exterior Location Reproduction and Reference Translation and Citation to divide the believers, and as a place of ambushfor those who fought God and His Messengeraforetime- they will swear "We desired nothing but good"; and God testifies they are truly liars" [fragmentof Qur'an9:107]. women for corruptmen, and "Corrupt corruptmen for corruptwomen; good women for good men, and good men for good women- these are declared quit of what they say; theirs shall be forgiveness and generousprovision. O believers, do not enter houses other than your houses until you first ask leave and salute the people thereof; that is better for you; haply you will remember.And if you find not anyone therein, enter it not until leave is given to you. And if you are told, 'Return,'return;that is purer for you; and God knows the things you do" 24:26-28]. [Qur'an "O believers, when proclamation is made for prayeron the Day of Congregaand tion, hasten to God's remembrance leave trafficking aside; that is better for you, did you but know" [Qur'an62:9]. Citation Qur'an48:1-4 Qur'an48:5-11 Qur'an48:11-22 Qur'an3:1-17 Qur'an7:1-22 Qur'an6:1-17 Qur'an8:1-13 Qur'an1:1-5, 2:255-56 Qur'an36:1-25 Qur'an2:255-86 (ff.?) Qur'an2:1-20 Qur'an4:1-12

14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

InteriorLocation Dome before mihrab Central aisle Left side: qibla riwaq Left side: second riwaq Left side: third riwaq Left side: fourth riwaq Left side: fifth riwaq Right side: qibla riwaq Right side: second riwaq Right side: third riwaq Right side: fourth riwaq Right side: fifth riwaq