The Social Meaning of Islamic Architecture

The architecture of the Islamic world—its spectacle of domes and minarets, arches and interior mind-boggling geometric decoration—has fascinated and perplexed many Western observers who have had few ways of really understanding the buildings or the beliefs and ways of life of the Muslims for whom these buildings were designed and erected. Architecture is more than a history of form and style: it is a product of cultural and environmental factors and an expression of the way of life of the people who live in the buildings. With that point of view in mind, the London orientalist scholar, George Michell, and a distinguished cast of contributors, in 1978 created for the first time a book titled “Architecture of the Islamic World: Its History and Social Meaning.” In 1995, this book, long available only in hardcover, was published in a rich paperback edition, making it available for $20 to a much larger audience. It is a classic created a quarter of a century ago yet ripe for our times. What does it say?

Arches of the Grand Mosque of Cordoba, Spain, demonstrating the perception of the endlessness of space, which is characteristic of Islamic architecture, according to Grube. Source: http://www.islamicway.netfirms.com /islamic_architecture.htm.

Engraving from “ THE TRAVELS OF OLEARIUS IN SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY PERSIA,” showing the unmistakable traditional Muslim urban appearance of an ancient town. Source: http://depts.washington.edu/uwch/silkroad/ texts/olearius/pictures/isfahan.jpg.

Ernst J. Grube, professor of Islamic art at the Universities of Venice and Padua, in the remarkable first chapter introduces the reader to Islamic architecture by asking, “Is there such a thing as Islamic architecture?” He decides that yes, there is an architecture produced for and by Muslims that serves Islam as a religion and reflects special qualities inherent in Islam as a cultural phenomenon. What then are those qualities that set Islamic architecture apart from non-Islamic architecture? Note that Grube avoids simply cataloguing famous Islamic buildings, exploring instead how Islamic architecture serves and reflects basic Islamic cultural traits and needs. The most prominent quality of Islamic architecture as compared with non-Islamic architecture, according to Grube, is its concentration on the interior of buildings.

Ivory Coast Islamic town, demonstrating many high mostly windowless walls hiding the architecture within. Source: http://www.friendshipcaravan.org/ images/Ivory%20Coast%20Six.jpg.

Guardaia, one of five towns in the M’zab Valley, an oasis in the Sahara in the middle of Algeria (360,000 inhabitants, 2005 estimate). M'zab is famous for its architecture, which is dominated by simple structures, curving walls and no ornamentation. Streets are narrow, and all of the towns are situated with one, very visible mosque in its center, situated on a rocky knoll. Source: http://kader1.chez.tiscali.fr/page09.html.

“One of the most striking features of all Islamic architectural monuments is their focus on the enclosed space, on the inside as opposed to the outside, the façade or the general exterior articulation of a building.” (p. 10) The Muslim house typifies this quality best with its inner courtyard and high windowless walls interrupted only by a single low door, often joined with other houses connected by corridors and inner private passageways to produce a complex maze that resembles “the natural growth of coral reefs or cell-structures of irregular form.” (p. 13) This unmistakable traditional Muslim appearance survives in many examples of ancient town centers including the casbahs, medinas, and “old cities” throughout the Islamic world [but also see Editor’s Note below]. To see photos of these amazing complexes is one thing; to watch people move about in them is another. Fortunately, films exist that depict people using these building-hives, e.g., “ The Battle of Algiers” (Gillo Pontecorvo, 1966) and “ Algiers” (Charles Boyer, Hedy Lamarr, 1938). Qualities of Islamic architecture that build on this theme of the enclosed space follow below.

1. Hidden architecture.

The emphasis on inner enclosed space in Islamic architecture, according to Grube, is accompanied by a “disregard for the outside appearance of a structure” by completely hiding it by “secondary adjacent buildings (for instance a bazaar). This ‘hiding’ of major monuments goes hand in hand with a total lack of exterior indication of the shape, size, function or meaning of a building. Even if a structure has a visible façade or a portal, these features tell us little, if anything, about the building that lies behind it. In other words, rarely does a façade give any indication of the inner organization or purpose of the building in question, and it is rare that an Islamic building can be understood, or even its principal features identified, by its exterior.” Grube then gives the example of domes, which loom over the mass of a building and can be seen from afar. Yet, as one approaches the dome, it seems to “sink into the maze of small cupolas and roofs of surrounding structures.” Grube concludes that “[i]n all times and in all regions of the Muslim world are ‘hidden architecture’—that is, architecture that truly exists, not when seen as monument or symbol visible to all and from all sides, but only when entered, penetrated and experienced from within.” (p. 11)

2. Absence of form adapted to a single function.

Students studying in an alcove of a mosque, demonstrating the “striking and almost total
absence of a specific architectural form for a specific function,” for example, a school for studying.
“As a result, Islamic buildings can be adapted for a variety of purposes and do not change their form
according to functional demands. Rather the building form remains fixed and functions are
adapted to fit within the contained internal spaces” (see accompanying text).
Source: http://www.exoticindiaart.com/article/islam

Closely related to the concept of a hidden architecture is the concept of a “striking and almost total absence of a specific architectural form for a specific function,” for example, a dining room for eating and a bedroom for sleeping. As a result, Islamic buildings can be adapted for a variety of purposes and do not change their form according to functional demands. Rather the building form remains fixed and functions are adapted to fit within the contained internal spaces.

3. Absence of building directionality.

Islamic buildings, according to Grube, usually lack an inherent local directional or axial quality. This means that the physical direction of the building is different from the functional direction. For example, if an ordinary person enters a Christian cathedral, it is by the front doors, which, when open, lead eventually to the altar, the metaphysical point of the building. The visitor who enters a mosque is generally drawn alongside the prayer hall, which is at right angles to the “metaphysical direction” as indicated by the mihrab. This can be disconcerting to a Western visitor who is used to a “logical sense of direction expressed in European architecture.

http://www.garba.cz/iran/bam_sm.jpg	http://www.stolac.org/album/slides/Mihrab.html
http://www.garba.cz/iran/bam_sm.jpg	http://gallery.netlog.net/albums/IR_shiraz /408_Shiraz_Regents_mosque_mihrab_1_pc_marble.jpg
Examples of mihrabs, important orienting architectural items in all mosques, providing directionality toward Mecca for Muslims situated throughout the world.

The mihrab is a niche in one wall, which indicates the qibla. The qibla (stay with me here) is the direction of prayer. The direction of prayer is always towards Mecca. Thus any time a Muslim anywhere in the world enters a mosque, his eyes likely will train to the mihrab. By locating the mihrab (dent in the wall), he receives an instantaneous and very personal orientation to (and reminder of) the physical point on Earth ( Mecca) that is the source of his faith. If you were to float above the Earth, look down and draw a line between each mihrab of each mosque, the lines should converge on Mecca. Thus, Islamic buildings lack a local directionality, because the only direction that is really important is the (global) direction of Mecca.

4. Building form irregularity.

The lack of local building directionality is also “clearly expressed in the lack of balance between the various parts of a building complex. European architecture is generally designed as a complete balanced plan: Islamic architecture” is “never hampered by an inherent principle governing the whole and conditioning all parts in an equal manner.” (p. 13) For example, even when the four-iwan courtyard plan (a balanced building conceived of in Iran) is used, it “soon disappears as a single balanced unit to become part of a greater complex…The very possibility of enlarging a given structure in almost any direction by adding units of almost every conceivable shape and size to the original scheme, totally disregarding the form of the original structure, is a characteristic that Islamic architecture shares with that of no other major culture,” contends Grube. (p. 13)

5. Interior space’s visual negation of the reality of weight and the necessity of support.

Enclosed space, defined by walls, arcades, vaults, and lavish decoration, is the most important element of Islamic architecture, contends Grube. The main purpose of “[d]ecoration in Islamic architecture appears to be the creation of non-tectonic values, the dissolution of all those elements that in other architectural traditions emphasize the structure, the balance and counter-balance of loads and stresses—the actual mechanics of a building. Islamic architecture…is truly a negation of architecture as conceived in Europe, that is, of structure; it aims at a visual negation of the reality of weight and the necessity of support. The various means by which the effect of weightlessness is created, the effect of unlimited space, of non-substantiality of walls, pillars, and vaults are all well known. They range from the use of mosaic and painted decoration to” lustrous tiles. ..”Its effect is extraordinary and its function quite unmistakable. It goes hand in hand with the non-directional plan, the tendency to an infinite repetition of individual units (bays, arches, columns, passages, courtyards, doorways, cupolas) and the continuous merging of spaces without any specific direction or any specific center or focus.” (pp. 13-14) Grube notes that when a terminal spatial limit, such as a wall, is reached, artists decorate that wall with patterns that repeat themselves, leading on visually beyond the given limit of that wall surface. The same is true with the decoration of a vault or a dome.

Editor’s Note: Not all Islamic scholars would agree with Grube’s assessment that a.) there is such a thing as Islamic architecture and b.) its primary qualities are as summarized above. Grube is aware of this and notes that he has made a start, which is an important milestone by itself. “It will take many years of research, hardly in its infancy at the present time, satisfactorily to ‘explain’ the phenomenon of Islamic architecture, that is to say, to correlate the physical appearance of Islamic architecture in the various parts of the Muslim world with the ‘spirit’ of Islam as it prevailed in any given region and period,” he cautions. (p. 14)

Grube helped me to better “see” what I was “looking at” in the two films noted above (and also in reading a book with excerpts on Palestinian-refugee camp building by a Canadian surgeon located in Beirut, Lebanon, which tells me that this same kind of building and architecture is continuing today in some parts of the world. Grube also points out there are exceptions to his observations and syntheses above, e.g., the Taj Mahal, but concludes that these exceptions (which often end up on Islamic architecture websites) do not disprove the rule (which is personified in The Alhambra, Spain). I enjoyed the photos in Michell and Grube’s book for another reason: they portray the range of Islamic architecture (urban and rural), including photos of the “vernacular” buildings in which ordinary Muslims live and work.