Indian Antiquary Vol 50

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 56

50
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
(FEB., 1921
I am aware that a study of the plates of Coste and Prisse d'Avesnes would lead one to suppose that the soffits of every arch in the mosque were covered with similar ornament. Coste, whose work was published in 1837-9, shows the soffit of every arch as so decorated, but each with the same pattern, which we can even now see was not the case. In Plate VI he is guilty of e grave inaccuracy, viz., he makes the south outer arcade run through the sanctuary to the qibla wall, although it is the outer srcade of the sanctuary which runs through to the south wall of the mosque (see my Fig. 1). It is therefore obvious that his Plate VI has been produced afterwards from potes end sketches, instead of being drawn on the spot, and consequently cannot be taken as safe historical evidence. I must own that I feel equally sceptical towards Prisse d'Avesnes' plates, and do not take his Plate I (by Girault de Prangey), which shows ornament on the soffit of an arch of the inner arcade of the sanctuary, next the mihráb, as weighty evidence either, as I have a strong suspicion that he has transposed it in the same way from a page in his sketch book.
The first recorded restoration of this mosque took place in 696 7. (1296—1297) by Alam ad-Din Sangar, under the orders of Lägin, but the stucco ornament of the end of the 13th century, of which many examples have come down to us,* is utterly different from anything we have here. The same remark applies to Fátimide ornamert (967-1171 A.D.) and this, together with the fact that although there is a feeling for strict geometrical ornament, the familiar interlacing star pattern has not yet been evolved, leads me to ascribe it without hesitation to the original foundation.
We will now turn to the bistory of the mosque and its founder, with a view to finding a possit le clue to the source of this ornament. Ahmad Ibn Talon was a Turk, whose home was Sâmarrá, at that time capital of the Khalifate. He was sent to Egypt in 254 1. (868) as Deputy, by the Emir Bakbak, who had been appointed Governor of Egypt by the Khalif al-Mu'tazz. This being so, one would almost expect to find Mesopotamian influence in his mosque, more especially as Maqrizi (11, p. 266) quotes al-Qod&'i (d. 454 1. = 1062 A.D.) to the effect that Ibn Talon built his mosque “on the plan of the mosque at Sâmarra, and likewise the mineret." Ibn Duqmaq, who died 1406 A.D., says the same thing about the mosque, but without an express reference to the minaret (IV, p. 123). The minaret at Samarrà referred to is, of course, that built by Mutawakkil (847-861 A.D.), wbich still exista and is known as the Malw lys Tower. Although the minaret of Ibn Talap is now of circular section above and of square section below, it would appear certain that it once resembled the miparet of Sâmarrâ more closely than it does at present, since Maqrizi (II, p. 267), Ibn Duqmag (IV, p. 124) and Abd'l Mahalin (II, pp. 8 and 9) repeat , little fable to the effect that Ibn Talan, tuying one day with a piece of paper and rolling it round his finger, produced a spiral, and then ordered his architect to take it as a model for his minaret. At Samarr& the same fable is told of the Malwiya Tower, but, whereas it provides an exact description of that minaret, it does not accurately fit the minaret of Ibn Talun in its
E.g., Muristán, Madrassa, and Mausoleum of Qalaan, Zawiyat al Abbar, Madrassa and Mauso. loum of Sultan al-Malik al-Ashraf Khalil, Mausoleum of Hosâm ad-Din Tarantây al-Mangary, Mausoleum of Ahmad Ibn Suleyman ar-Rifa'i: Madrassa of al-Malik an-Nasir Muhammad, Madrassa and Mausoleum of Zeyn ad-Din Yasuf, and the Madrasss of the Emirs Salar and Bangar al-G&wly Seo my Brief Chronology of the Muhammadan Monuments of Egypt to 1517 A.D., in the Bulletin de l'Institus français d'archtologic orientales ou Caire, 1919, pp: 81–85.
"The earliest known example occurs on the window of the north minaret of the Mosque of al-Hakim (600--1012 A.D.). Soo Flury (S), Dor Ornamente der Ashar und Hakim-Moschee.