Mosques of the world

Excerpts from a new book about the development of the mosque in countries and kingdoms across the world - from ancient to ontemporary times.

GREAT MOSQUE OF SAMARRA
The Caliph al-Mutawwakil Mosque of 784x512 feet was by far the largest mosque in the world for centuries. It was two-and-a-half times the size of the Great Mosque of Damascus.

The mosque was isolated from the city by a ziyada (a surrounding enclosure encircling the courtyard walls). A fortress-like wall with forty-four buttresses and fourteen gates contained the main complex, covering ten acres. The entire site of the mosque covered about fifty acres.

The outstanding feature was the spiral minaret. This powerful form has been called the Malwiya (snail shell) because of its likeness to that form. Having a height of 180 feet, it was originally linked to the mosque by a bridge as it lay outside the main enclosure.

It tapered upwards with an ascending ramp, culminating in a cylindrical platform, with columned arches moulded into it. More than a place to call the faithful to pray, the minaret proclaimed the presence of the mosque, perhaps thought necessary in the early crusading days of the new religion. It was as much a symbol of faith as of the status of the person who built it.

THE SULEIMANIYE MOSQUE, ISTANBUL
The Suleimaniye Mosque complex surpassed all the mosques that Sinan ever planned or built. It announced the unequalled greatness of the sultan, who now ruled over a global empire.

The prototype for the Suleimaniye is the Byzantine basilica, the Hagia Sophia, later converted to a mosque...using its basic formulation, Sinan added his own masterful perspective to make a bolder composition. Both have a basic octagonal plan, consisting of the main hall with a central dome, buttressed by semi-domes and a courtyard.

Though vastly diminished in size to the sixth-century basilica, the sixteenth-century Suleimaniye makes a more articulate statement.

The domes and roof structure are clearer, revealing each component in its entirety. Inside, instead of the arcaded galleries on either side of the Hagia Sophia's longtitudinal axis, Sinan made wider arches to support the side domes. The courtyard too has domes on all four sides.

So magnificent a work was it and so loved by the Turks that the Suleimaniye Mosque and complex became a symbol of Istanbul, and replicas of it would be sold and given away as gifts at important festivals.

MASJID E-JAMI (FRIDAY MOSQUE), ISFAHAN
The Masjid e-Jami is reputed to have the largest courtyard in Iran (213x249 feet), in the centre of which is a pool made of marble.

Various rulers added to the mosque, especially repeating the Persian element of the chehel-sotuni (forty-columned hall), so that the existing plan no longer remains a straightforward rectangle but has a rather amorphous footprint.

The most distinctive feature to be introduced by the Persians was the iwan. It was typically a high arched portal in the centre of each of the four sides of the courtyard...the iwan changed the entire imagery of the mosque.

The character of the courtyard was dramatically transformed from an expansive, monotonous, usually open-to-sky space, to an awesome enclosure, calling attention to the splendid decoration endowed on the portals, and instilling an appropriate feeling of reverence when entering the confines of the hallowed space.

BHONG MOSQUE, PAKISTAN
Located in a village of about five thousand inhabitants, the Bhong Mosque in the Punjab region is a work of pure craftsmanship. No architect was employed to design this mosque, modelled on the Mughal architecture of India. It was a labour of love, conceived by a wealthy landlord in 1932 and completed by his son, Rais Ghazi Muhammad, in 1983.

Minaret-like towers, capped with jharokhas and cupolas, buttress the mosque on all sides. The actual minaret on the southeast is only two storeys high.

Three domes, elaborately ornamented with Multani tile work, surmount the mosque and library. In the profuse ornamentation of both the interior and exterior, the craftsmen have excelled in the use of a variety of materials "" ivory, onyx, mother-of-pearl and even industrial tiles.