Studying islamic architecture: Challenges and perspectives

Architectural History

Volumn 46, Issue , 2003, Pages

  Hillenbrand, Robert ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 61049345306     PISSN: 0066622X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/1568797     Document Type: Article

References (37)

1. For the most recent ambitious attempt of this kind see Sheila S. Blair and Jonathan M. Bloom, 'The Mirage of Islamic Art: Reflections on the Study of an Unwieldy Field', The Art Bulletin, LXXV, no. 1 (March 2003), 152ff
2. By the US News & World Report (again quoted from the cover of the latest reprint)
3. If it be argued that the system which the author had chosen to adopt for the book limited him to one example of architecture per chapter, the idea that the image of the Alhambra could in any sense 'represent' China and Japan is not worth considering. Yet his own words on the purpose of the architectural illustrations in the book are worth recalling here:'... the story of art as here conceived could not be told without a reference to the architectural background. While I had to confine myself to discussing the style of only one or two buildings in each period, I tried to restore the balance in favour of architecture by giving these examples pride of place in each chapter' (The Story of Art, p. 3). The 'Oriental' chapter was an obvious place to include two illustrations of architecture
4. Hence the remark made by the President of the Royal Asiatic Society, Sir Gerard Clauson (himself a lonely pioneer in the obscure field of Altaic linguistics) when in 1950 he presented the Society's Triennial Gold Medal to Archibald Creswell, the founding father of the study of Islamic architecture: 'Professor Creswell has not only got to the head of his profession; he has created it' (R. W. Hamilton, 'Keppel Archibald Cameron Creswell', Muqarnas, VIII [1991], p. 128)
5. This can be illustrated by the fact that no serious general history of Islamic architecture organized on chronological or geographical principles, as distinct from popular books on the subject, or histories of Islamic art which extend their remit to architecture, is in print. Some treatments of Islamic architecture are conceived thematically, such as Architecture of the Islamic World, ed. G. Mitchell (London, 1978), or my Islamic Architecture. Form, Function and Meaning, 2nd edn (Edinburgh, 2000). But the only chronological survey of any length is that of J. D. Hoag, Islamic architecture (New York, 1977), while the only detailed geographical survey is that by R. A. Jairazbhoy, An Outline of Islamic Architecture (Bombay, 1972). Many other books boast titles that promise a treatment of Islamic architecture as a whole, but they fail to deliver
6. D. Wilber, 'Qavam al-Din ibn Zayn al-Din Shirazi: A fifteenth-century Timurid architect', Architectural History, 30 (1987), pp. 31-44
7. See L. A. Mayer, Islamic Architects and their Works (Geneva, 1956). His list of 318 architects could easily be doubled as a result of subsequent research - for example, an unpublished list of Persian craftsmen drawn up by the late Douglas Pickett and extending to well over a hundred closely typed pages
8. O. Grabar, The Dome of the Rock (London, 1998), passim
9. For typical examples, see S. S. Blair, Islamic Inscriptions (Edinburgh, 1999), p. 50, pl. 4.19 and p. 211, pl. 15.86
10. As in the case of Jerusalem; see especially K. Salameh, 'Aspects of the Sijills of the Shari'a court in Jerusalem', in Ottoman Jerusalem. The Living City: 1517-1917, ed. S. Auld and R. Hillenbrand (London, 2000), pp. 103-44
11. H.C. Graf von Bothmer, 'Architekturbilder im Koran. Eine Prachthandschrift der Umayyadenzeit aus dem Yemen', Pantheon, XLV (1987), pp. 4-20, and O. Grabar, The Mediation of Ornament (Princeton, 1992), pp.155-93
12. G. Necipoglu, The Topkapi Scroll: Geometry and Ornament in Islamic Architecture (Santa Monica, Cal., 1995)
13. A. R. al-Gailani, 'Islamic art and the Role of China', unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Edinburgh, 1973,I, pl. 103B after p. 150
14. For the most up-to-date and focused discussion of the origins of the form of the minaret or mosque tower, see J. M. Bloom, Minaret. Symbol of Islam (Oxford Studies in Islamic Art, VI) (Oxford, 1988), pp. 9-20
15. For the intellectual background to this connection, see G. Makdisi, The Rise of Colleges (Edinburgh, 1980), and idem, The Rise of Humanism in Classical Islam and the Christian West (Edinburgh, 1990)
16. For a brief treatment of this connection, see R. Hillenbrand, Studies in Medieval Islamic Architecture, I (London, 2001), pp. 154-55 ('Islamic Art at the Crossroads')
17. This is the one architectural form which has an entirely Islamic origin and development. Typically enough, there is still no comprehensive study of this intriguing and protean feature. Meanwhile, see U. Harb, Ilkhanidische Stalaktitengewölbe. Beiträge zu Entwurf und Bautechnik (Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran. Ergänzungsband IV) (Berlin, 1978); I.I. Notkin, 'Decoding Sixteenth-Century Muqarnas Drawings', Muqarnas, XII (1995), pp. 148-71; M. A. J. Yaghan, 'Decoding the Two-Dimensional Pattern found at Takht-i Sulaiman into Three-Dimensional Muqarnas Forms', Iran, XXXVIII (2000), pp. 77-95, and idem, 'The Islamic architectural element 'Muqarnas': Definition, Geometrical Analysis, and a Computer Generation System', unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Tsukuba, 1997. The bibliography assembled in this latter study (pp. 286-97) is the fullest so far assembled on the subject
18. M. Meinecke et al., Die Restaurierung der Madrasa des Amirs Sabiq al-Din Mitqal al-Anuki und die Sanierung des Darb Qirmiz (Mainz, 1980)
19. H. Schmid, Die Madrasa des Kalifen al-Muslansir in Baghdad. Eine baugeschichtliche Untersuchung der ersten universalen Rechtshochschule des Islam. Mit einer Abhandlung über den sogenannten Palast in der Zitadelle in Baghdad (Mainz, 1980)
20. A. Borouiba, L'art religieux musulman en Algérie (Algiers, 1973)
21. T. J. al-Janabi, Studies in Medieval Iraqi Architecture (Baghdad, 1982)
22. E. Said, Orientalism (New York, 1978) remains the classic statement of the subject; see also his Culture and Imperialism (London, 1993). For a recent overview of the problem, see A. L. Macfie, Orientalism. A Reader (Edinburgh, 2000)
23. See, for example, J. Freely and R. Burelli, Sinan. Architect ofSüleyman the Magnificent and the Ottoman Golden Age (n.p., 1996); G. Öney, Türk Çini Sanati (Istanbul, 1976), and E. Atil, Levni and the Surname. The Story of an Eighteenth-Century Ottoman Festival (Istanbul, 1999). The latter two books were published by Yapi ve Kredi Bankasi and Koçbank respectively
24. Qusair 'Amra in Jordan, an Umayyad hunting lodge-cum-bath-house of the early eighth century with a cycle of fresco paintings of the utmost rarity - the major cycle of fresco painting in the Mediterranean world between Pompeii and twelfth-century France and Italy - has been comprehensively wrecked by hundreds of graffiti, almost all of them post-dating the 'discovery' of the building by a Czech scholar in 1898. For the extent of the damage, see M. Almagro, L. Caballero, J. Zozoya, and A. Almagro, Qusayr 'Amra: Residencia y ban̈os omeyas en el desierto de Jordania (Madrid, 1975)
25. As in the portal inscription of the tomb of Jalal al-Din Husain, dated 1187, at Uzgend in Kirghizstan. For an earlier view of this inscription, see E. Cohn-Wiener, Turan. Islamische Baukunst in Mittelasien (Berlin, 1930), p1. XV (top)
26. Hence the telling title of a Soviet-era book on Khiva: L. Y. Man'kovskaya, Khiva. A Museum in the Open (Tashkent, 1982). See also G. A. Pugachenkova's book of the same title: Muzei pod otkritim nevom (Tashkent, 1981)
27. As in the early eleventh-century Samanid mausoleum of al-Mustansir, known as the Alamberdar tomb, at Kerki in eastern Turkmenistan (V. Pilyavskii, Pamyainiki arkhitekturi Turkmenistana [Leningrad, 1974], pp. 235-40)
28. The case of the Yemen is perhaps the best known; scores of medieval buildings still in use within their local communities, but hitherto totally unknown to the scholarly world, have been 'discovered' in the last quarter-century. It will take decades before this material has been studied in the requisite detail and incorporated into the mainstream of scholarship. Its preliminary presentation is largely the work of Barbara Finster; by way of introduction, see her article 'An Outline of the History of Islamic Religious Architecture in Yemen', Muqarnas, IX (1992), pp. 124-47
29. Comité de Conservation des Monuments de l'Art Arabe, Procès verbaux des séances. Rapports de la Deuxième Commission, 32 vols (Cairo, 1882-1951)
30. See in particular The Muslim Architecture of Egypt, I (Oxford, 1952), and II (Oxford, 1959)
31. D. N. Wilber, The Architecture of Islamic Iran. The Ilklianid Period (Princeton, 1955)
32. L. Golombek and D. Wilber, The Timurid Architecture of Iran and Turan, 2 vols (Princeton, 1988)
33. Such as Shahr-i Zahhak and Shahr-i Gulghula; for colour pictures of all three, see A. Mazahéri, Les Trésors de l'Iran. Mèdes el Perses. Trésors des Mages. La renaissance Iranienne (Geneva, 1970), pp. 210-11, 213-16
34. For the city walls of medieval Islam, see J. M. Bloom, 'Walled cities in Islamic North Africa and Egypt with particular reference to the Fatimids (909-1171)', in City Walls. The Urban Enceinte in Global Perspective, ed. J. D. Tracy (Cambridge, 2000), pp. 219-46, with further basic bibliography in n. 1 on p. 219; C. B. Asher, 'Delhi walled: Changing boundaries', ibid., pp. 247-81; S. Pepper, 'Ottoman military architecture in the early gunpowder era: A reassessment', ibid., pp. 282-316; and S. S. Blair, 'Decoration of city walls in the medieval Islamic world: The epigraphic message', ibid., pp. 488-529
35. For the city walls of Konya as they appeared in the early nineteenth century, see N. Basgelen, Bir Zamanlar Konya (Istanbul, 1998), frontispiece and pp. 4-5
36. See J.-P. Greenlaw, The Coral Buildings of Suakin. Islamic Architecture, Planning, Design and Domestic Arrangements in a Red Sea Port (London and New York, 1995). It is ironic that the most evocative record of how Suakin used to look is to be found in the film The Four Feathers, an adventure story based on the novel by A. E. W. Mason and shot in technicolour in 1939
37. D. Champault, Yemen, trans. A. Campbell (Paris, 1997), pls on pp. 8-9, 215 and 220