SASSANIAN AND MOHAMMEDAN ARCHITECTURE:ARABIC ARCHITECTURE

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CHAPTER XII.

SASSANIAN AND MOHAMMEDAN ARCHITECTURE.

(ARABIAN, MORESQUE, PERSIAN, INDIAN, AND TURKISH.)

BOOKS RECOMMENDED: Bourgoin, Les Arts Arabes. Coste, Monuments du Caire;

Monuments modernes de la Perse. Cunningham, Archæological Survey of India.

Fergusson, Indian and Eastern Architecture. De Forest, Indian Architecture and

Ornament. Flandin et Coste, Voyage en Perse. Franz-Pasha, Die Baukunst des Islam.

Gayet, L'Art Arabe; L'Art Persan. Girault de Prangey, Essai sur l'architecture des

Arabes en Espagne, etc. Goury and Jones, The Alhambra. Jacob, Jeypore Portfolio of

Architectural Details. Le Bon, La civilisation des Arabes; Les monuments de l'Inde.

Owen Jones, Grammar of Ornament. Parvillée, L'Architecture Ottomane. Prisse

d'Avennes, L'Art Arabe. Texier, Description de l'Arménie, la Perse, etc.

GENERAL SURVEY. While the Byzantine Empire was at its zenith, the new faith of

Islam was conquering Western Asia and the Mediterranean lands with a fiery

rapidity, which is one of the marvels of history. The new architectural styles which

grew up in the wake of these conquests, though differing widely in conception and

detail in the several countries, were yet marked by common characteristics which set

them quite apart from the contemporary Christian styles. The predominance of

decorative over structural considerations, a predilection for minute surface-ornament,

the absence of pictures and sculpture, are found alike in Arabic, Persian, Turkish,

and Indian buildings, though in varying degree. These new styles, however, were

almost entirely the handiwork of artisans belonging to the conquered races, and

many traces of Byzantine, and even after the Crusades, of Norman and Gothic

design, are recognizable in Moslem architecture. But the Orientalism of the

conquerors and their common faith, tinged with the poetry and philosophic

mysticism of the Arab, stamped these works of Copts, Syrians, and Greeks with an

unmistakable character of their own, neither Byzantine nor Early Christian.

ARABIC ARCHITECTURE. In the building of mosques and tombs, especially at

Cairo, this architecture reached a remarkable degree of decorative elegance, and

sometimes of dignity. It developed slowly, the Arabs not being at the outset a race of

builders. The early monuments of Syria and Egypt were insignificant, and the sacred

Kaabah at Mecca and the mosque at Medina hardly deserve to be called architectural

monuments at all. The most important early works were the mosques of 'Amrou at

Cairo (642, rebuilt and enlarged early in the eighth century), of El Aksah on the

Temple platform at Jerusalem (691, by Abd-el-Melek), and of El Walid at Damascus

(705732, recently seriously injured by fire). All these were simple one-storied

structures, with flat wooden roofs carried on parallel ranges of columns supporting

pointed arches, the arcades either closing one side of a square court, or surrounding

it completely. The long perspectives of the aisles and the minute decoration of the

archivolts and ceilings alone gave them architectural character. The beautiful Dome

of the Rock (Kubbet-es-Sakhrah, miscalled the Mosque of Omar) on the Temple

platform at Jerusalem is either a remodelled Constantinian edifice, or in large part

composed of the materials of one.

FIG. 80.--MOSQUE OF SULTAN HASSAN, CAIRO: SANCTUARY.

a, Mihrâb, b, Mimber.

The splendid mosque of Ibn Touloun (876885) was built on the same plan as that

of Amrou, but with cantoned piers instead of columns and a corresponding increase

in variety of perspective and richness of effect. With the incoming of the Fatimite

dynasty, however, and the foundation of the present city of Cairo (971), vaulting

began to take the place of wooden ceilings, and then appeared the germs of those

extraordinary applications of geometry to decorative design which were henceforth to

be the most striking feature of Arabic ornament. Under the Ayûb dynasty, which

began with Salâh-ed-din (Saladin) in 1172, these elements, of which the great

Barkouk mosque (1149) is the most imposing early example, developed slowly in the

domical tombs of the Karafah at Cairo, and prepared the way for the increasing

richness and splendor of a long series of mosques, among which those of Kalaoun

(12841318), Sultan Hassan (1356), El Mu'ayyad (1415), and Kaîd Bey (1463),

were the most conspicuous examples (Fig. 80). They mark, indeed, successive

advances in complexity of planning, ingenuity of construction, and elegance of

decoration. Together they constitute an epoch in Arabic architecture, which coincides

closely with the development of Gothic vaulted architecture in Europe, both in the

stages and the duration of its advances.

The mosques of these three centuries are, like the mediæval monasteries, impressive

aggregations of buildings of various sorts about a central court of ablutions. The

tomb of the founder, residences for the imams, or priests, schools (madrassah), and

hospitals (mâristân) rival in importance the prayer-chamber. This last is, however,

the real focus of interest and splendor; in some cases, as in Sultan Hassan, it is a

simple barrel-vaulted chamber open to the court; in others an oblong arcaded hall

with many small domes; or again, a square hall covered with a high pointed dome on

pendentives of intricately beautiful stalactite-work (see below). The ceremonial

requirements of the mosque were simple. The-court must have its fountain of

ablutions in the centre. The prayer-hall, or mosque proper, must have its mihrâb, or

niche, to indicate the kibleh, the direction of Mecca; and its mimber, or high, slender

pulpit for the reading of the Kôran. These were the only absolutely indispensable

features of a mosque, but as early as the ninth century the minaret was added, from

which the call to prayer could be sounded over the city by the mueddin. Not until the

Ayubite period, however, did it begin to assume those forms of varied and

picturesque grace which lend to Cairo so much of its architectural charm.

ARCHITECTURAL DETAILS. While Arabic architecture, in Syria and Egypt alike,

possesses more decorative than constructive originality, the beautiful forms of its

domes, pendentives, and minarets, the simple majesty of the great pointed barrel-

vaults of the Hassan mosque and similar monuments, and the graceful lines of the

universally used pointed arch, prove the Coptic builders and their later Arabic

successors to have been architects of great ability. The Arabic domes, as seen both in

the mosques and in the remarkable group of tombs commonly called "tombs of the

Khalîfs," are peculiar not only in their pointed outlines and their rich external

decoration of interlaced geometric motives, but still more in the external and internal

treatment of the pendentives, exquisitely decorated with stalactite ornament. This

ornament, derived, no doubt, from a combination of minute corbels with rows of

small niches, and presumably of Persian origin, was finally developed into a system

of extraordinary intricacy, applicable alike to the topping of a niche or panel, as in

the great doorways of the mosques, and to the bracketing out of minaret galleries

(Figs. 81, 82). Its applications show a bewildering variety of forms and an

extraordinary aptitude for intricate geometrical design.

DECORATION. Geometry, indeed, vied with the love of color in its hold on the

Arabic taste. Ceiling-beams were carved into highly ornamental forms before

receiving their rich color-decoration of red, green, blue, and gold. The doors and the

mimber were framed in geometric patterns with slender intersecting bars forming

complicated star-panelling. The voussoirs of arches were cut into curious interlocking

forms; doorways and niches were covered with stalactite corbelling, and pavements

and wall-incrustations, whether of marble or tiling, combined brilliancy and harmony

of color with the perplexing beauty of interlaced star-and-polygon patterns of

marvellous intricacy. Stained glass added to the interior color-effect, the patterns

being perforated in plaster, with a bit of colored glass set into each perforation--

a device not very durable, perhaps, but singularly decorative.

FIG. 81.--MOSQUE OF KAÎD BEY, CAIRO.

OTHER WORKS. Few of the mediæval Arabic palaces have remained to our time.

That they were adorned with a splendid prodigality appears from contemporary

accounts. This splendor was internal rather than external; the palace, like all the

larger and richer dwellings in the East, surrounded one or more courts, and

presented externally an almost unbroken wall. The fountain in the chief court, the

diwân (a great, vaulted reception-chamber opening upon the court and raised slightly

above it), the dâr, or men's court, rigidly separated from the hareem for the women,

were and are universal elements in these great dwellings. The more common city-

houses show as their most striking features successively corbelled-out stories and

broad wooden eaves, with lattice-screens covering single windows, or almost a whole

façade, composed of turned work (mashrabiyya), in designs of great beauty.

The fountains, gates, and minor works of the Arabs display the same beauty in

decoration and color, the same general forms and details which characterize the

larger works, but it is impossible here to particularize further with regard to them.

FIG. 82.--MOORISH DETAIL, ALHAMBRA.

Showing stalactite and perforated work, Moorish cusped arch, Hispano-Moresque capitals,

and decorative inscriptions.

MORESQUE. Elsewhere in Northern Africa the Arabs produced no such important

works as in Egypt, nor is the architecture of the other Moslem states so well

preserved or so well known. Constructive design would appear to have been there

even more completely subordinated to decoration; tiling and plaster-relief took the

place of more architectural elements and materials, while horseshoe and cusped

arches were substituted for the simpler and more architectural pointed arch (Fig. 82).

The courts of palaces and public buildings were surrounded by ranges of horseshoe

arches on slender columns; these last being provided with capitals of a form rarely

seen in Cairo. Towers were built of much more massive design than the Cairo

minarets, usually with a square, almost solid shaft and a more open lantern at the

top, sometimes in several diminishing stories.

HISPANO-MORESQUE. The most splendid phase of this branch of Arabic

architecture is found not in Africa but in Spain, which was overrun in 710713 by

the Moors, who established there the independent Khalifate of Cordova. This was

later split up into petty kingdoms, of which the most important were Granada,

Seville, Toledo, and Valencia. This dismemberment of the Khalifate led in time to the

loss of these cities, which were one by one recovered by the Christians during the

fourteenth and fifteenth centuries; the capture of Granada, in 1492, finally

destroying the Moorish rule.

The dominion of the Moors in Spain was marked by a high civilization and an

extraordinary activity in building. The style they introduced became the national

style in the regions they occupied, and even after the expulsion of the Moors was

used in buildings erected by Christians and by Jews. The "House of Pilate," at

Seville, is an example of this, and the general use of the Moorish style in Jewish

synagogues, down to our own day, both in Spain and abroad, originated in the

erection of synagogues for the Jews in Spain by Moorish artisans and in Moorish

style, both during and after the period of Moslem supremacy.

Besides innumerable mosques, castles, bridges, aqueducts, gates, and fountains, the

Moors erected several monuments of remarkable size and magnificence. Specially

worthy of notice among them are the Great Mosque at Cordova, the Alcazars of

Seville and Malaga, the Giralda at Seville, and the Alhambra at Granada.

FIG. 83.--INTERIOR OF THE GREAT MOSQUE AT CORDOVA.

The Mosque at Cordova, begun in 786 by `Abd-er-Rahman, enlarged in 876, and

again by El Mansour in 976, is a vast arcaded hall 375 feet × 420 feet in extent,

but only 30 feet high (Fig. 83). The rich wooden ceiling rests upon seventeen rows of

thirty to thirty-three columns each, and two intersecting rows of piers, all carrying

horseshoe arches in two superposed ranges, a large portion of those about the

sanctuary being cusped, the others plain, except for the alternation of color in the

voussoirs. The mihrâb niche is particularly rich in its minutely carved incrustations

and mosaics, and a dome ingeniously formed by intersecting ribs covers the

sanctuary before it. This form of dome occurs frequently in Spain.

The Alcazars at Seville and Malaga, which have been restored in recent years,

present to-day a fairly correct counterpart of the castle-palaces of the thirteenth

century. They display the same general conceptions and decorative features as the

Alhambra, which they antedate. The Giralda at Seville is, on the other hand, unique.

It is a lofty rectangular tower, its exterior panelled and covered with a species of

quarry-ornament in relief; it terminated originally in two or three diminishing stages

or lanterns, which were replaced in the sixteenth century by the present Renaissance

belfry.

FIG. 84.--PLAN OF THE ALHAMBRA.

A, Hall of Ambassadors; a, Mosque; b, Court of Mosque; c, Sala della Barca; d, d, Baths;

e, Hall of the Two Sisters; f, f, f, Hall of the Tribunal; g, Hall of the Abencerrages.

The Alhambra is universally considered to be the masterpiece of Hispano-Moresque

art, partly no doubt on account of its excellent preservation. It is most interesting as

an example of the splendid citadel-palaces built by the Moorish conquerors, as well

as for its gorgeous color-decoration of minute quarry-ornament stamped or moulded

in the wet plaster wherever the walls are not wainscoted with tiles. It was begun in

1248 by Mohammed-ben-Al-Hamar, enlarged in 1279 by his successor, and again in

1306, when its mosque was built. Its plan (Fig. 84) shows two large courts and a

smaller one next the mosque, with three great square chambers and many of minor

importance. Light arcades surround the Court of the Lions with its fountain, and

adorn the ends of the other chief court; and the stalactite pendentive, rare in

Moorish work, appears in the "Hall of Ambassadors" and some other parts of the

edifice. But its chief glory is its ornamentation, less durable, less architectural than

that of the Cairene buildings, but making up for this in delicacy and richness. Minute

vine-patterns and Arabic inscriptions are interwoven with waving intersecting lines,

forming a net-like framework, to all of which deep red, blue, black, and gold give an

indescribable richness of effect.

The Moors also overran Sicily in the eighth century, but while their architecture there

profoundly influenced that of the Christians who recovered Sicily in 1090, and

copied the style of the conquered Moslems, there is too little of the original Moorish

architecture remaining to claim mention here.

SASSANIAN. The Sassanian empire, which during the four centuries from 226 to

641 A.D. had withstood Rome and extended its own sway almost to India, left on

Persian soil a number of interesting monuments which powerfully influenced the

Mohammedan style of that region. The Sassanian buildings appear to have been

principally palaces, and were all vaulted. With their long barrel-vaulted halls,

combined with square domical chambers, as in Firouz-Abad and Serbistan, they

exhibit reminiscences of antique Assyrian tradition. The ancient Persian use of

columns was almost entirely abandoned, but doors and windows were still treated

with the banded frames and cavetto-cornices of Persepolis and Susa. The Sassanians

employed with these exterior details others derived perhaps from Syrian and

Byzantine sources. A sort of engaged buttress-column and blind arches repeated

somewhat aimlessly over a whole façade were characteristic features; still more so

the huge arches, elliptical or horse-shoe shaped, which formed the entrances to these

palaces, as in the Tâk-Kesra at Ctesiphon. Ornamental details of a debased Roman

type appear, mingled with more gracefully flowing leaf-patterns resembling early

Christian Syrian carving. The last great monument of this style was the palace at

Mashita in Moab, begun by the last Chosroes (627), but never finished, an imposing

and richly ornamented structure about 500 × 170 feet, occupying the centre of a

great court.

PERSIAN-MOSLEM ARCHITECTURE. These Sassanian palaces must have strongly

influenced Persian architecture after the Arab conquest in 641. For although the

architecture of the first six centuries after that date suffered almost absolute

extinction at the hands of the Mongols under Genghis Khan, the traces of Sassanian

influence are still perceptible in the monuments that rose in the following centuries.

The dome and vault, the colossal portal-arches, and the use of brick and tile are

evidences of this influence, bearing no resemblance to Byzantine or Arabic types. The

Moslem monuments of Persia, so far as their dates can be ascertained, are all

subsequent to 1200, unless tradition is correct in assigning to the time of Haroun Ar

Rashid (786) certain curious tombs near Bagdad with singular pyramidal roofs. The

ruined mosque at Tabriz (1300), and the beautiful domical Tomb at Sultaniyeh

(1313) belong to the Mogul period. They show all the essential features of the later

architecture of the Sufis (14991694), during whose dynastic period were built the

still more splendid and more celebrated Meidan or square, the great mosque of

Mesjid Shah, the Bazaar and the College or Medress of Hussein Shah, all at Ispahan,

and many other important monuments at Ispahan, Bagdad, and Teheran. In these

structures four elements especially claim attention; the pointed bulbous dome, the

round minaret, the portal-arch rising above the adjacent portions of the building, and

the use of enamelled terra-cotta tiles as an external decoration. To these may be

added the ogee arch (ogee = double-reversed curve), as an occasional feature. The

vaulting is most ingenious and beautiful, and its forms, whether executed in brick or

in plaster, are sufficiently varied without resort to the perplexing complications of

stalactite work. In Persian decoration the most striking qualities are the harmony of

blended color, broken up into minute patterns and more subdued in tone than in the

Hispano-Moresque, and the preference of flowing lines and floral ornament to the

geometric puzzles of Arabic design. Persian architecture influenced both Turkish and

Indo-Moslem art, which owe to it a large part of their decorative charm.

INDO-MOSLEM. The Mohammedan architecture of India is so distinct from all the

native Indian styles and so related to the art of Persia, if not to that of the Arabs,

that it properly belongs here rather than in the later chapter on Oriental styles. It

was in the eleventh century that the states of India first began to fall before

Mohammedan invaders, but not until the end of the fifteenth century that the great

Mogul dynasty was established in Hindostan as the dominant power. During the

intervening period local schools of Moslem architecture were developing in the

Pathan country of Northern India (11931554), in Jaunpore and Gujerat (1396

1572), in Scinde, where Persian influence predominated; in Kalburgah and Bidar

(13471426). These schools differed considerably in spirit and detail; but under the

Moguls (14941706) there was less diversity, and to this dynasty we owe many of

the most magnificent mosques and tombs of India, among which those of Bijapur

retain a marked and distinct style of their own.

FIG. 85.--TOMB OF MAHMUD, BIJAPUR. SECTION.

The Mohammedan monuments of India are characterized by a grandeur and

amplitude of disposition, a symmetry and monumental dignity of design which

distinguishes them widely from the picturesque but sometimes trivial buildings of the

Arabs and Moors. Less dependent on color than the Moorish or Persian structures,

they are usually built of marble, or of marble and sandstone, giving them an air of

permanence and solidity wanting in other Moslem styles except the Turkish. The

dome, the round minaret, the pointed arch, and the colossal portal-arch, are

universal, as in Persia, and enamelled tiles are also used, but chiefly for interior

decoration. Externally the more dignified if less resplendent decoration of surface

carving is used, in patterns of minute and graceful scrolls, leaf forms, and Arabic

inscriptions covering large surfaces. The Arabic stalactite pendentive star-panelling

and geometrical interlace are rarely if ever seen. The dome on the square plan is

almost universal, but neither the Byzantine nor the Arabic pendentive is used,

striking and original combinations of vaulting surfaces, of corner squinches, of

corbelling and ribs, being used in its place. Many of the Pathan domes and arches at

Delhi, Ajmir, Ahmedabad, Shepree, etc., are built in horizontal or corbelled courses

supported on slender columns, and exert no thrust at all, so that they are vaults only

in form, like the dome of the Tholos of Atreus (Fig. 24). The most imposing and

original of all Indian domes are those of the Jumma Musjid and of the Tomb of

Mahmud, both at Bijapur, the latter 137 feet in span (Fig. 85). These two

monuments, indeed, with the Mogul Taj Mahal at Agra, not only deserve the first

rank among Indian monuments, but in constructive science combined with noble

proportions and exquisite beauty are hardly, if at all, surpassed by the greatest

triumphs of western art. The Indo-Moslem architects, moreover, especially those of

the Mogul period, excelled in providing artistic settings for their monuments.

Immense platforms, superb courts, imposing flights of steps, noble gateways,

minarets to mark the angles of enclosures, and landscape gardening of a high order,

enhance greatly the effect of the great mosques, tombs, and palaces of Agra, Delhi,

Futtehpore Sikhri, Allahabad, Secundra, etc.

The most notable monuments of the Moguls are the Mosque of Akbar (15561605)

at Futtehpore Sikhri, the tomb of that sultan at Secundra, and his palace at

Allahabad; the Pearl Mosque at Agra and the Jumma Musjid at Delhi, one of the

largest and noblest of Indian mosques, both built by Shah Jehan about 1650; his

immense but now ruined palace in the same city; and finally the unrivalled

mausoleum, the Taj Mahal at Agra, built during his lifetime as a festal hall, to serve

as his tomb after death (Fig. 86). This last is the pearl of Indian architecture, though

it is said to have been designed by a European architect, French or Italian. It is a

white marble structure 185 feet square, centred in a court 313 feet square, forming

a platform 18 feet high. The corners of this court are marked by elegant minarets,

and the whole is dominated by the exquisite white marble dome, 58 feet in diameter,

80 feet high, internally rising over four domical corner chapels, and covered

externally by a lofty marble bulb-dome on a high drum. The rich materials, beautiful

execution, and exquisite inlaying of this mausoleum are worthy of its majestic design.

On the whole, in the architecture of the Moguls in Bijapur, Agra, and Delhi,

Mohammedan architecture reaches its highest expression in the totality and balance

of its qualities of construction, composition, detail, ornament, and settings. The later

monuments show the decline of the style, and though often rich and imposing, are

lacking in refinement and originality.

FIG. 86.--TAJ MAHAL, AGRA.

TURKISH. The Ottoman Turks, who began their conquering career under Osman I.

in Bithynia in 1299, had for a century been occupying the fairest portions of the

Byzantine empire when, in 1453, they became masters of Constantinople. Hagia

Sophia was at once occupied as their chief mosque, and such of the other churches as

were spared, were divided between the victors and the vanquished. The conqueror,

Mehmet II., at the same time set about the building of a new mosque, entrusting the

design to a Byzantine, Christodoulos, whom he directed to reproduce, with some

modifications, the design of the "Great Church"--Hagia Sophia. The type thus

officially adopted has ever since remained the controlling model of Turkish mosque

design, so far, at least, as general plan and constructive principles are concerned.

Thus the conquering Turks, educated by a century of study and imitation of

Byzantine models in Brusa, Nicomedia, Smyrna, Adrianople, and other cities earlier

subjugated, did what the Byzantines had, during nine centuries, failed to do. The

noble idea first expressed by Anthemius and Isidorus in the Church of Hagia Sophia

had remained undeveloped, unimitated by later architects. It was the Turk who first

seized upon its possibilities, and developed therefrom a style of architecture less

sumptuous in color and decoration than the sister styles of Persia, Cairo, or India,

but of great nobility and dignity, notwithstanding. The low-curved dome with its

crown of buttressed windows, the plain spherical pendentives, the great apses at

each end, covered by half-domes and penetrated by smaller niches, the four massive

piers with their projecting buttress-masses extending across the broad lateral aisles,

the narthex and the arcaded atrium in front--all these appear in the great Turkish

mosques of Constantinople. In the Conqueror's mosque, however, two apses with

half-domes replace the lateral galleries and clearstory of Hagia Sophia, making a

perfectly quadripartite plan, destitute of the emphasis and significance of a plan

drawn on one main axis (Fig. 87). The same treatment occurs in the mosque of

Ahmed I., the Ahmediyeh (1608; Fig. 88), and the Yeni Djami ("New Mosque") at

the port (1665). In the mosque of Osman III. (1755) the reverse change was

effected; the mosque has no great apses, four clearstories filling the four arches

under the dome, as also in several of the later and smaller mosques. The greatest and

noblest of the Turkish mosques, the Suleimaniyeh, built in 1553 by Soliman the

Magnificent, returned to the Byzantine combination of two half-domes with two

clearstories (Fig. 89).

FIG. 87.--MOSQUE OF MEHMET II., CONSTANTINOPLE. PLAN.

(The dimensions figured in metres.)

In none of these monuments is there the internal magnificence of marble and mosaic

of the Byzantine churches. These are only in a measure replaced by Persian tile-

wainscoting and stained-glass windows of the Arabic type. The division into stories

and the treatment of scale are less well managed than in the Hagia Sophia; on the

other hand, the proportion of height to width is generally admirable. The exterior

treatment is unique and effective, far superior to the Byzantine practice. The massing

of domes and half-domes and roofs is more artistically arranged; and while there is

little of that minute carved detail found in Egypt and India, the composition of the

lateral arcades, the simple but impressive domical peristyles of the courts, and the

graceful forms of the pointed arches, with alternating voussoirs of white and black

marble, are artistic in a high degree. The minarets are, however, inferior to those of

Indian, Persian, and Arabic art, though graceful in their proportions.

Nearly all the great mosques are accompanied by the domical tombs (turbeh) of their

imperial founders. Some of these are of noble size and great beauty of proportion and

decoration. The Tomb of Roxelana (Khourrem), the favorite wife of Soliman the

Magnificent (1553), is the most beautiful of all, and perhaps the most perfect gem of

Turkish architecture, with its elegant arcade surrounding the octagonal domical

mausoleum-chamber. The monumental fountains of Constantinople also deserve

mention. Of these, the one erected by Ahmet III. (1710), near Hagia Sophia, is the

most beautiful. They usually consist of a rectangular marble reservoir with pagoda-

like roof and broad eaves, the four faces of the fountain adorned each with a niche

and basin, and covered with relief carving and gilded inscriptions.

FIG. 88.--EXTERIOR AHMEDIYEH MOSQUE.

FIG. 89.--INTERIOR OF SULEIMANIYEH,

CONSTANTINOPLE.

PALACES. In this department the Turks have done little of importance. The

buildings in the Seraglio gardens are low and insignificant. The Tchinli Kiosque, now

the Imperial Museum, is however, a simple but graceful two-storied edifice,

consisting of four vaulted chambers in the angles of a fine cruciform hall, with domes

treated like those of Bijapur on a small scale; the tiling and the veranda in front are

particularly elegant; the design suggests Persian handiwork. The later palaces,

water's edge; they possess richly decorated halls, but the details are of a debased

European rococo style, quite unworthy of an Oriental monarch.

MONUMENTS. ARABIAN: "Mosque of Omar," or Dome of the Rock, 638; El Aksah, by

'Abd-el-Melek, 691, both at Jerusalem; Mosque 'Amrou at Cairo, 642; mosques at

Cyrene, 665; great mosque of El Walîd, Damascus, 705717. Bagdad built, 755. Great

mosque at Kairouân, 737. At Cairo, Ibn Touloun, 876; Gama-El-Azhar, 971; Barkouk,

1149; "Tombs of Khalîfs" (Karafah), 12501400; Moristan Kalaoun, 1284; Medresseh

Sultan Hassan, 1356; El Azhar enlarged; El Mûayed, 1415; Kaïd Bey, 1463; Sinan

Pacha, 1468; "Tombs of Mamelukes," 16th century. Also palaces, baths, fountains,

mosques, and tombs. MORESQUE: Mosque at Saragossa, 713; mosque and arsenal at

Tunis, 742; great mosque at Cordova, 786, 876, 975; sanctuary, 14th century.

Mosques, baths, etc., at Cordova, Tarragona, Segovia, Toledo, 960980; mosque of

Sobeiha at Cordova, 981. Palaces and mosques at Fez; great mosque at Seville, 1172.

Extensive building in Morocco close of 12th century. Giralda at Seville, 1160; Alcazars in

Malaga and Seville, 12251300; Alhambra and Generalife at Granada, 1248, 1279,

1306; also mosques, baths, etc. Yussuf builds palace at Malaga, 1348; palaces at

Granada. PERSIAN: Tombs near Bagdad, 786 (?); mosque at Tabriz, 1300; tomb of

Khodabendeh at Sultaniyeh, 1313; Meidan Shah (square) and Mesjid Shah (mosque) at

Ispahan, 17th century; Medresseh (school) of Sultan Hussein, 18th century; palaces of

Chehil Soutoun (forty columns) and Aineh Khaneh (Palace of Mirrors). Baths, tombs,

bazaars, etc., at Cashan, Koum, Kasmin, etc. Aminabad Caravanserai between Shiraz and

Ispahan; bazaar at Ispahan.

INDIAN: Mosque and "Kutub Minar" (tower) cir. 1200; Tomb of Altumsh, 1236; mosque

at Ajmir, 12111236; tomb at Old Delhi; Adina Mosque, Maldah, 1358. Mosques

Jumma Musjid and Lal Durwaza at Jaunpore, first half of 15th century. Mosque and

bazaar, Kalburgah, 1435 (?). Mosques at Ahmedabad and Sirkedj, middle 15th century.

Mosque Jumma Musjid and Tomb of Mahmûd, Bijapur, cir. 1550. Tomb of Humayûn,

Delhi; of Mohammed Ghaus, Gwalior; mosque at Futtehpore Sikhri; palace at Allahabad;

tomb of Akbar at Secundra, all by Akbar, 15561605. Palace and Jumma Musjid at

Delhi; Muti Musjid (Pearl mosque) and Taj Mahal at Agra, by Shah Jehan, 16281658.

TURKISH: Tomb of Osman, Brusa, 1326; Green Mosque (Yeshil Djami) Brusa, cir. 1350.

Mosque at Isnik (Nicæa), 1376. Mehmediyeh (mosque Mehmet II.) Constantinople,

1453; mosque at Eyoub; Tchinli Kiosque, by Mehmet II., 145060; mosque Bayazid,

1500; Selim I., 1520; Suleimaniyeh, by Sinan, 1553; Ahmediyeh by Ahmet I., 1608;

Yeni Djami, 1665; Nouri Osman, by Osman III., 1755; mosque Mohammed Ali in Cairo,

1824. Mosque at Adrianople. KHANS, cloistered courts for public business and

commercial lodgers, various dates, 16th and 17th centuries (Validé Khan, Vizir Khan),

vaulted bazaars, fountains, Seraskierat Tower, all at Constantinople.

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