AR 6402

HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE & CULTURE –IV

LECTURE -1
UNIT 1
INTRODUCTION TO ISLAMIC ARCHITECTURE

Islamic Architecture
What is Islamic architecture, as we studied in our previous semesters to
understand any particular style of architecture especially that has
religious links we have to first understand the basis of the religion and
philosophy. Basically Islamic architecture is nothing but any architecture
that has any building style that has to do with the religion Islam, when
the religion of Islam evolved various construction activities took place
based on the Religious principles of Islam, they were not only religious
but secular building which reflected the design principles. These
included Mosque and funerary monuments, Funerary monuments are
nothing but Toms because Muslims did not have the culture of cremating
the dead, they built tomb in memory of the dead so that also became a
style of architecture, then down to private dwellings and fortifications.
Basically Islam has a religion started and this became a way of life. It
began to grow as an Islamic culture which automatically started
reflecting in the architecture. Before understanding about the
architectural part of it let's go back in history and see how initially Islam
originated and started spreading throughout the world. They have a very
interesting story in history that whom we call as Prophet Muhammad
now was originally called as Al Amin. In this picture you see that he was
actually a wealthy merchant who was travelling from Mecca to Medina
and then on the way he met this particular angel called Gabriel and then
he realised that he was the messenger of God so it was kind of
enlightenment which started gaining more follower for Prophet
Mohammed, then he started his journey from the holy place of Mecca to
Medina, it was in this part of the world in Arabia that Islam actually
originated this was somewhere in the 6th century. He was actually a
very important personality not only religiously but also politically because
in that time in Arabian region they were many countries which were
revolting for various reasons. This origin of a particular religion unified
the entire reason politically. You know it unified based on the religion,
this is how Islam actually originated and then from here it’s slowly
started spreading to various parts of the world. As you can see in the
map this brown colour of ocean from where Mecca and Medina he
travelled this is where it originated and from here his followers travel to
various parts of Arabian, then Asia and even two parts of India and here
different parts of Africa, so even parts of Europe, here towards Spain
and other countries, basically from here Islam started spreading in
various regions.
Since Islam started spreading to various parts of the world each part had
its own unique regional component which added to the Islamic
principles, so very varied style of Islamic architecture started evolving in
these different places. Islamic architecture initially started based on the
principles of the religion but once its starts spreading to different parts of
the world based on the regional aspects it started creating a more
variety in the architectural styles. Let’s see some early examples of
Islamic architecture one of the most the earliest example comes under
the Ummaday dynasty. This was between the 6 and 7th century during
this part you can see in the map, this green colour portion shows the
extent of the Ummaday dynasty so in this period of time the capital
shifted from Mecca to Damascus. Jerusalem city is not only concerned
Holy by the Christian community but also by the Muslim people. It’s is
considered as that there is a particular Rock in Jerusalem where
Prophet Mohammed was supposedly waiting to meet God so it was also
considered as the holy place by the Muslims, this particular Rock they
built a shrine around it called the Dome of the rock, hence this was one
of the earliest examples of Islamic architecture. You can see the picture
here some more detailed version here so this building is called the dome
of the rock this is located in Jerusalem. This is octagonal structure which
you can see in this image in terms of planning, it has archways all
around the building. It has a huge dome the central dome which is
covered in gold leaf and all the surrounding walls are laid with Turquoise
colour tiles, you can see the blue colour tiles, it's a kind of actually
merges with the sky, so that the golden domes stands out. This was the
first time an architectural monument was being built by the Islamic
community, so they did not have any predecessors, they did not have
any particular style to begin with, what they did was they used craft men
and skilled people who are actually byzantine architects. You can see a
lot of influences of Byzantine style of architecture in Islamic Architecture,
so that is why the domes and other features started coming in. If you see
the interior of the building, this is where the Rock is and you have
actually here two Ambulatory or circulatory passages Around the rock
which has calligraphic images from the inscriptions and then about the
rock is the big Golden drum and just below the Dome you have these
openings all along the circumference. What it indicates is that as light
passes through these openings it falls directly on the rocks, so as a
person enters through the building he immediately sees the glow of the
light that falls on the rock first and then he gets to see the actual rock.
This is the picture of the interior dome, this building set a very high
standard in terms of elaborate building structures in Islamic architecture.
This is an image of a palace that is ruined now these walls have now
been transferred to a museum but this is one of the early examples of a
palace as I mentioned earlier Islamic architecture does not be with the
religious buildings but also secular and public building. This was one
such example of a palace it was constructed in Jolland, you can see the
plan here it is actually of fortified wall complex it had series of courtyard,
pools it had a Mosque within it an audience hall and separate
apartments, so it was kind of a hunting lodge or a palace or may be
rulers stayed and relaxed for a while. Here you have these triangle kind
of inscriptions on the wall surfaces and also there were some line
sculptures found in the exterior, so probably this denotes kind of an
Assyrian influence you have seen the example of Assyrian Architecture
with the tall gateways and other things. There was similarity of such
Assyrian influences in this particular Palace Complex.

Principles & Planning

It was during this dynasty that typical mosque format came into being till
then there was not any particular format in which mosque was built.
During this period that they formed a particular format, the format was
based on what? Obviously it is a religious building so they have a set of
religious principles based on which, they form the principles for
architectural tool. If you see the plan of typical mosque it is square in
nature, it has a huge Courtyard surrounded by hypostyle hall that is
series of columns.
How this came into being is that when Prophet Mohammed initially
started teaching his disciples his house was actually a very simple and
modest brick structure with an open Courtyard and a colonnaded
structure around. It was a small house but this small house was taken as
a prototype and the mosque was also built on that particular pattern. So
if you see the image these are the typical parts in a Mosque, usually the
prayer mats are laid along the kiblah. Kiblah is nothing but the axis
which faces Mecca. Muslims usually face Mecca and pray, that axis is
called as kiblah and then you have the minarets or the towers it is their
prayer Towers then lecturn to place the Quran and mihrab is the wall in
the west. West is nothing but the wall towards Mecca, so you have in
nish in that wall that is the mihrab and to the right of the mihrab is small
raised pedestal called as the minbar, so usually a preacher in a Mosque
use this space for preaching the people gathered in the courtyard and
then you have a place called Dikka. Again here it is a small platform
raised on columns so usually Quran recited from this platform and then
you have Ablution fountains where you cleanse your hands and feet. A
typical Mosque began to look like this, you can see that there are no
sculptures involved, there are no human figures involved, and there are
no sculptures of animals or celestial figures as we saw in Hindu
architecture. It is a very simple planning, very open and well lit in nature,
not much of architectural decorations.
After the Umayyad dynasty was overthrown, certain members of the
dynasty travel to Europe in parts of Spain, they built this great mosque of
Cordoba, this is nothing but it was actually a Roman Cathedral. It was on
the ruins so they built Mosque from the ruins. You can see in the picture,
it is one of the most beautiful structures, which was actually a cathedral
but now a Mosque you can see the interiors. If you see the plan this was
actually a cathedral initially later it expanded and became the Mosque
that was in Spain and then the Abbasid dynasty in Baghdad they build
this great mosque at Samarra. If you can see the structure is very
unique and this minaret was the largest ever built during that time, this
kind resembles a ziggurat in Sumerian Architect, hence we can say that
there was a lot of Persian influence in building this particular structure.
Then this was a time a format developed called as four Iwan Mosque,
this was in Persia four Iwan Mosque was nothing but it has 4 large
hypostyle halls early we saw just one but this had 4 halls with barrel
vaults that each face towards an internal Courtyard.
As Islamic culture became more and more diversified with less
centralised political structure, architecture also became increasingly
more varied. This is an example of a buildings constructed during the
Seljuk Turks period, what they did was they rule portions of
Mesopotamian and Persia, they combined elements from Syria into the
Persian style, they invented this particular roofing system called the
turbe. These were built for Domes and funerary monasteries. This
particular Dome is a unique feature that was invented by the Seljuk
Turks. It was actually derived from the chapels and tents of early styles.
In addition to this Seljuk also build a particular style of building called
Medresas. It was nothing but religious school, they weren't as open as
Mosque they were very closed in terms of planning and spatial
arrangement and the Turks also built bridges, can see a typical plan of
a religious school here, you can see there aren’t open courtyard.
The Ottoman Empire in 1453 the Ottomans captured Constantinople and
named it Istanbul that’s now Turkey and they converted the famous
building Hagia Sophia into a Mosque which was actually a Cathedral,
what they did was they added minarets in the exterior and in the interior
they added inscriptions from the Quran, you can see it is one of the
largest structures famous for Islamic architecture and you can see the
interior of the Dome again with clear story lightings.
Now we saw about how Islamic architecture evolved through various
dynasties. Now we will see about Islamic cities, Islamic culture started
evolving more and more and particular style of city planning also came
into being. Traditional Islamic cities if we see they followed Islamic law
and Islamic teachings on both social and cultural aspects of community
life, that reflected in there city planning, not only they responded to the
local condition but also certain architectural features were there. One of
the important thing is, it is a congregational Mosque mostly any
traditional Islamic city if you see the congregational mosque will be the
centre of the city and it grew from the Mosque so all other administrator
activities and commercial activities was surrounded around this
congregational Mosque. That was the most Central feature and again
religion and commerce also had a link so there were markets spaces
around the congregation Mosque and how these markets were arranged
is that the market that was selling more expensive commodities like gold
and other things well located closer to the Mosque and the less
important items were located further away. These are some examples of
traditional Islamic markets, this image represents a typical city life in
ancient Islamic city you have a congregational mosque, you have the
market spaces happening around it.
The another building typology called as the Caravanserai, it was nothing
but road side inn where usually travellers who are travelling for long
distances with camels, loaded with goods and other things they needed
to take a day or two off, this was the place for them to rest. Since trade
was a thriving activity these building structures came into existence. If
you see a typical plan of caravanserai was mostly square or rectangular
there was just one opening and was usually wide enough for people to
enter with animals like camel along with goods, there was a central
Courtyard in the centre and small niches for travellers to take rest or
store goods and some caravanserai also had elaborate baths and even
to wash animals etc. Basically this was the kind of culture that was
happening in Islamic city if you see the elevation of any Islamic city you
will see that it is very simple, plain and even the height of structures are
also not very elaborate very low height. But in contrast to the simplicity
of the exterior all the interior of the residences and other Public buildings
were richly decorated, hence the kind of philosophy exist, thou it was
simple on the outside it allows for individual freedom of expression in the
interior part of the house, it brings out the individuality of that particular
person in the dwelling.