week 5 Islamic art history

mural, pictorial, Persian, patterns, Samarra, Hellenistic, Orient,

A few words must, finally, be said about the many fragments of large ____ paintings brought to light in the dwellings and bath houses of Samarra and, most particularly, in the domed central hall and the private quarters of the palace of Jawsaq. The classical strain still predominant in Umayyad figural representations was overshadowed in Samarra by what may be called a ____ style in the old _____ tradition. Lively animals in full movement, drawn in the Hellenistic manner, still occurred, and one of the more imposing frescos of the palace consisted of powerfully composed rinceaux with branches like cornucopias, inhabited by human and animal figures, a theme common in late classical art. The bulk of the paintings, however, represent nearly static, heavily built, expressionless human figures and animals with close parallels in Sasanian silverware, and a few contemporary textiles; also similar is the treatment of the motifs as _____ and the lack of interest in landscape and the miseen-scéne. Comparable material has been found in frescos from Central Asia and Chinese Turkestan. The physiognomy and coiffure so common in _____ occurred in Turfan, and frescos excavated at Varakhsha and Panjikent, though in many respects quite different, also exhibit some related features. As Herzfeld, original excavator of the Samarra material and the foremost writer on the finds, already clearly saw, these paintings have to be seen as a mixture of strongly orientalizing versions of ______ themes on the one hand, and motifs and modes of representation derived directly from the Ancient _____ on the other. The use of both three-quarter and frontal views of the human face clearly demonstrates this dichotomy. Some marked differences are also apparent. There is, for instance, a pronounced preference for the female figure, which was already manifest under the Umayyads, while in early and middle Sasanian art it played a very minor role. Unfortunately the finds were too limited to allow much generalization about favoured themes, but obviously the pleasures of the court — the hunt, dance, and the drinking of wine — are frequently represented. Other subjects may be of a more symbolic nature or intended simply to produce rich surfaces; written sources even tell of a painting showing a monastic church, and one fragment came from bottle with the representation of a Christian monk. A typical example of this art is the scene of a huntress from the private part of the palace and reproduced here after Herzfeld's reconstruction. The main figure has often been compared with the huntress Diana, but the face has a distinctly oriental cast, with its long hooked nose and fleshy cheeks, as has the bunch of black hair at the back and the slender curl on the temple. She seems animated, as do her prey and the dog, but the movement is both petrified and exaggerated, an effect further accentuated by the expressionless gazes of both huntress and prey. The decorative spots on the animal and the patterned fall of the huntress's garment contribute to the unrealistic quality of this skillfully composed work. All the Jawsaq paintings were designed by Qabiha, mother of the caliph al-Mutazz, then covered with whitewash by his puritanical successor al-Muhtadi. At least so it is reported in a much later story. Like the other arts, the paintings from Samarra were apparently influential elsewhere in the caliphate. The Tulunids of Egypt even went one step further: the second ruler of the dynasty, Khumarawayh, whose role as a patron has already been mentioned, had painted wooden statues of himself, his harem, and singing girls put in his palace, a most unorthodox artistic display yet one that, in its presentation of the courtly pleasures, fitted well into the general picture of themes known to have gratified many of the ruling princes of this period.

mausoleum, ribat

A last group of Abbasid monuments are neither mosques nor obviously secular constructions. Their background and significance are not always easy to establish, and they demonstrate how much is still unknown about the period: the octagonal Qubba al-Sulaybiyya in Samarra for instance, may bc either a _____ built for one of the caliphs by his Greek mother or the earliest remaining sanctuary for a Shi'ite imam. An entirely different type of building is the ___, a military monastery developed in early Islamic times on the central Asian, Anatolian, and North African frontiers from which specially trained men engaged in battle against the infidels. Unfortunately it is impossible to say whether the Tunisian examples at Monastir and Susa — small, square fortified buildings with a central court, rooms and oratories on two floors around the court, and a high corner tower — were peculiar to North Africa or not.

Baghdad, round, Sasanian, cosmic, palaces, Raqqa, villas,

ABBASID CITIES AND PALACES Nothing remains of the most important Islamic monument of the second half of the eighth century, al-Mansur's _____ founded in 762, but it is sufficiently well described in written sources to lend itself to detailed analysis.' Officially called 'City of Peace' (Madina al-Salam), it was conceived in true imperial style as the navel of the universe, and al-Mansur called engineers and labourers from all parts of Islam to build it. Special bricks were made, and the foundations were begun at a time chosen by two astronomers. It was perfectly _____ (about 2000 metres in diameter), a plan by no means new, although Muslim writers considered it so. In the outer ring, as reconstructed by Herzfeld and Creswell, were houses and shops protected by heavy walls and cut by four long streets covered with barrel-vaults. Each street opened on the outside through a magnificent two-storeyed gateway and a complex system of vaults and passages over moats. On the second floor of the gateway, accessible by a ramp, was a domed reception hall (majlis) probably to be connected with a Mediterranean imperial tradition, for it was found in Rome and Byzantium and transmitted to the Muslim world by the Umayyads. The entrances were symbolic rather than defensive; indeed, three of the doors were actually taken from older cities, including one attributed to Solomon. The idea behind them was a statement of repossessing the ancient traditions of the area. The extent of the outer ring is uncertain, but the central area was clearly large and, originally at least, mostly uninhabited. At its heart lay a palace and a mosque. The mosque, which has already been mentioned, was at the same time the royal mosque attached to the palace and the congregational mosque for the whole population of the city. The palace was arranged around a court, an iwan of unknown shape, and two domed rooms, one above the other, all probably deriving from the _____ tradition already adopted in Umayyad buildings in Syria and in Iraq. At the centre of the whole city was a higher dome, the Green (or Heavenly) Dome, surmounted by a statue of a rider with a lance. The interest of Baghdad is twofold. 1) First, it is rare in being conceived and planned with the _____ significance of the centre of a universal empire. Ironically, it remained in its ideal shape for only a few years, for economic necessity pushed it out beyond the walls, and caliphs or major princes abandoned their palaces in the centre for the quietude and security of suburban dwellings whose names only have remained. 2) Second, many features derived from the architectural tradition of _____, for example both the gates and the domed throne room as well as the overall design with four gates for royal audiences. The Abbasid city was thus a magnified royal palace rather than the rich industrial, administrative and commercial centre that it later became. Since nothing is left of the round city of al-Mansur, it is difficult to say whether new methods of construction or architectural forms were introduced. We have only two other early Abbasid monuments to compare it with. One, the complex of cities in the middle Euphrates area known today as _____, is mostly buried. To this Abbasid city founded in 772 supposedly on the model of Baghdad (it is probably the horseshoe-shaped city still visible today), Harun al-Rashid added after 795 number of' further constructions. All that remains above ground is a much restored mosque; possibly the location of walls and gates also corresponds to the original Abbasid plan. In addition, Syrian and German excavations, mostly still unpublished, in and around the city proper have brought to light large private ____ which are interesting for the decoration found in them (such as elaborate stucco panels and glass floors, possibly trying to suggest pools) and as our only illustration of the growth documented in literary sources of private palaces inside cities or in their suburbs.

Fatimids, Abbasid, Tulunid, communication, Arab, urban, mosque of 'Amar, tribes, satellite, Abbasids, fused, Ibn Tulun, pleasure, palace, embellished

AL-FUSTAT, AL-'ASKAR, AL-QATA'I What we today call Cairo, or al-Qahira, is an agglomeration of four cities founded within the area. The name al-Qahira did not exist until the last of these was created in 969 as capital of Egypt under the ______. Before this city came a succession of capitals beginning with al-Fustat (641), the ___ foundation or al-'Askar (750), and the ___ establishment of al-Qata'i (870). Al-Fustat was founded as the capital of Egypt just after the ____ conquest of Egypt. Its location was a strategic decision by the Caliph (Umat Ibn al-Khattab in Medina, for although Alexandria was capital of Egypt at the time of the conquest, the Caliph preferred to settle his troops in an area less remote from the Arabian Peninsula. 'Amr Ibn al-'As, commander of the Caliph's troops in Egypt, thus abandoned his plans to settle in the former capital on the Mediterranean. The new capital, at the apex of the Nile Delta, was strategically situated near the Roman fortress town of Babylon. This site, at the junction of Upper and Lower Egypt, allowed easy _______ with the Arabian Peninsula without crossing the Nile and its Delta branches. 'Amr Ibn al-As redug the ancient canal connecting the Nile with the Red Sea, further facilitating communication with the Caliphate in the Hejaz Al-Fustat soon eclipsed Alexandria as the commercial and industrial center of Egypt, receiving goods from Upper and Lower Egypt and from the Mediterranean at its Nile port. In the ninth century, however, the Khalij or canal connecting the Nile with the Red Sea was partially filled in, and all that was left was a pond southeast of the Delta called Birkat al-Hajj, the first station on the caravan road to Mecca. Al-Fustat was typical of the garrison cities established in the early days of the Arab conquests. Like Kufa and Basra in Iraq and Qayrawan in Tunisia, it was an unplanned agglomeration that later crystallized into true _____ form. At the center of al-Fustat was the _____ __ _____, a simple construction for the religious needs of the troops and, adjacent to it, the commander's house. The mosque overlooked the Nile, whose channel was much closer to it than it is now. Al-Fustat was originally divided into distinct quarters occupied by the various _____ of the conquering army. This garrison gradually developed into a large town engulfing the town of Babylon around the Roman fortress Al-Fustat acquired its first ______ city after the _____ overthrew the Umayyad Caliphate of Damascus in 750 and established their new capital at Baghdad In order to reinforce their grip on the Egyptian province, the new rulers immediately sent troops and founded a new capital, al-'Askar ("the soldiers"), with a new mosque and governor's palace, to the northeast of al-Fustat. Despite the foundation of this satellite city, al-Fustat continued for some time to be the administrative and commercial center. In the following period, the two communities of al-Fustat and al-'Askar ____ into a larger city designated simply as al-Fustat, stretching to the Nile in the west and to the foot of the Muqattam hill to the east and north The Great Mosque of al-'Askar had already disappeared in the Middle Ages, and Maqrizi, the Egyptian historian of the early fifteenth century, mentions it only briefly. Following the precedent set by the Abbasids in founding al-'Askar, later dynasties created for themselves new seats of power, each farther to the northeast, farther inland, and each further grandiose than the last. Ahmad Ibn Tulun, sent to Egypt in 868 as the Abbasid Caliph's governor, soon asserted his independence, founding a new ruling dynasty (868-905) and a new capital, al-Qata'i ("the wards"), northeast of the Fustat-al-'Askar complex. The new city, standing on higher ground than al-'Askar, on the hill called Jabal Yashkut , the area today including the mosque of ____ ____ and the foot of the Citadel, was remote from the commercial and industrial center of al-Fustat and its busy port. It was celebrated as a magnificent ______ city, especially under the reign of Ibn Tulun's son Khumarawayh. Ibn Tulun constructed a grand ____ with vast gardens and a menagerie, as well as a hippodrome for horse races, polo, and other chivalric games The hippodrome had a special triple gate, where Ibn Tulun entered alone through the middle arch flanked by his soldiers marching through the side arches. The Gate of Lions, another of the hippodrome's entrances, was surmounted by two lions in stucco and a belvedere or gallery for the ruler. Ibn Tulun's son Khumarawayh _______ the works of his father in many ways He furnished one of his belvederes, the Golden House, with statues of women painted and adorned with jewelry, representing his slaves and singers. Khumarawayh took special care of the garden of rare flowers and trees. Tree trunks were coated with gilded copper from which pipes trickled water into canals and fountains to irrigate the garden, and nearby was an aviary with singing birds Most remarkable was a pool of mercury, where Khumarawayh, an insomniac, lay on an air mattress trying to rock himself to sleep. The entire complex, with its gardens, huge stables and menagerie of wild animals, did not overlook the Nile but rather the Birkat al-Fil, a large pond connected to the Khalij. In the surrounding area, luxury markets soon sprang up to serve the tastes of officers and notables. The Tulunid age with all its luxurious trappings came to an end in 905 when the Abbasid troops once again marched on Egypt, this time to reestablish order and replace the dynasty whose sovereigns had Jived so sumptuously During this campaign, the entire city of al-Qata'i was razed to the ground except for Ibn Tulun''s aqueduct and his mosque, the oldest mosque in Egypt surviving in its original form

soberly, Late Antique, qibla, secular, Iraq, bands, vine leaf, freehand, variety, Late Antique, moulded, bevelled, relationship, vertical axis, arabesque, abstraction,

ARCHITECTURAL DECORATION By and large Abbasid mosques were decorated very _____. At Samarra there is almost no applied ornament, and in the mosque Of Ibn Tulun stucco is used only to emphasize the major architectural lines. At Qayrawan and in the Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem — if the latter's fragments are indeed Abbasid — the painted or carved designs on Wooden ceilings involved the medium of construction itself. The same subservience to architectural forms or materials appears in the stone decoration of the dome at Qayrawan, where even the floral designs of niches and windows of the drum do not detract from the essential sturdiness and massivity of the construction. In other words, much of the architectural decoration of the Abbasid period, especially in mosques, is still quite ____ ____ in spirit, even though the themes may have changed. The two major extant exceptions are the ____ wall at Qayrawan, where ceramic tiles and marble panels (on which more below) have almost totally transformed the effect of the mihrab area, and the _____ buildings of Samarra. The former involve the arts of objects, and will be discussed later; here we shall concentrate on the decoration of the palaces and houses of the ninth-century capital in ____ where, in fascinating contrast to religious buildings, the walls of almost every house and every room in the palaces were covered with decorated and painted stucco) (in addition to occasional marble panels), in continuation of Iranian and Umayyad practice. Most of the material from Samarra was published by Herzfeld, who discovered and studied it in detail; Creswell Suggested certain alterations in chronology. Both agreed that, with few exceptions, the Samarra stuccoes can be divided into three basic styles. Their order of appearance cannot be determined, for the archaeological evidence, however limited, clearly indicates that all three existed, if not always simultaneously, at least throughout the period of Samarra's greatness in the ninth century. Furthermore, they often overlap both on the wall and in treatment of motifs, and any attempt to distinguish them should not obscure the fact that, in spite of some preliminary studies, many problems concerning their origins and relation to each other are far from being solved. Style A tends to develop within identifiable frames, most commonly in long ____ (at times T-shaped), but sometimes in simple rectangles or polygons. Its characteristic feature is the ____ ___, its parts always sharply outlined, with four deeply sunk 'eyes' and often with incised veins. The striking and effective contrast between the theme itself and the deeply carved void of the background can be explained by the peculiar technique of execution ex Situ on specially prepared mats. Both vocabulary and treatment are related to the vine ornament, already used by the Umayyads, which prevailed throughout the eastern Mediterranean in Late Antiquity. However, by the ninth century the same few formulas are being dully repeated, and Samarra is not comparable with the facade of Mshatta. Style B was usually carved _____, with a greater ____ of themes, motifs, and shapes. The motifs develop within much more diversified frames, from all-over patterns to many different polylobes and polygons. Moreover the contrast between subject and background is much less apparent than in the first style, because the design takes over almost the whole surface, and is heightened by the deep grooves around individual motifs. Also, while the vegetal origin of most of the themes is clear, the surface of the individual leaf or flower is almost totally covered with small notches and dots, and its outline has been simplified into an almost abstract shape which acquired its significance only in relation to other units of decoration and to a pre-established pattern. While perhaps not very beautiful, this style is peculiarly appealing because in the best examples its symmetrically arranged patterns constantly contrast an inner tension and movement with the rigidity of geometric frames. An Indian origin has been proposed but neither the historical context nor other known works of art fully justify it, and the style can best be understood as a further modification of ______ _____ ornament, perhaps to contrast with the exuberance of Umayyad palatial ornament; for the central characteristics described above were already present in the stuccoes of the great Umayyad palaces, and no new and external impetus has yet been identified. While the first two Samarra styles are related to the tendencies of the first Islamic century, Style C introduces something quite new and far-reaching in its implications. 1) Its first characteristic results from its technique: the design was _____, and consists of endless rhythmic repetitions of curved lines with spiral endings, at times with additional notches, slits, pearl borders, or other identifiable elements. 2) Moreover, throughout, the lines were '_____' i. e. they meet the surface obliquely — so that the wall surface has a strongly plastic quality. 3) Next, the style is identifiable not through specific units of design but rather through a certain relationship between lines, notches, and planes; in other words, the unifying factor is no longer the elements themselves but rather their _____ to each other. 4) Furthermore, none of the traditional geometric, vegetal, or animal themes is used, and the background has disappeared, so that in effect the whole surface of the wall is ornament. 5) The final characteristic (at least in stucco) is symmetry on a _____ ____; but (except where the exact size of the wall surface known, or where the decorator has introduced a geometric unit) the axis is not self-evident front the design, but can vary from place to place. Thus, the major characteristics of the third Samarra style are repetition, bevelling, abstract themes, total covering, and symmetry. Its significance goes beyond Abbasid architectural decoration, for it is the first, and in certain ways the purest and most severe, example of the 'delight in ornamental meditation and aesthetic exercise"" which has been called the _______. Its impact was immediate, for it appears in the stuccoes of the mosque of Ibn Tulun and in many small objects, and it remained in use for several centuries. The questions of the origins of Style C and of the exact date of its appearance are more complex. With respect to origins, close analysis reveals possible vegetal patterns of trefoils, palmettes, even cornucopias or vases in the background of many an interplay of line and plane. A series of capitals found in the area of the middle Euphrates, near or in Raqqa, shows an evolution from vegetal ornament which leads almost to the Samarra pattern, and the third style, like the second, could be another systematized variation on earlier decorative principles which was given striking effect through the use of an original technique and the impact of metal or wooden moulds. However, the eastern Syrian capitals are not datable with any degree of accuracy; they may be later than Samarra, and therefore perhaps indebted to it. Another explanation, first proposed by Kuhnel and amply supported by later archaeological discoveries, is based on the fact that Central and even Inner Asian wood work and metalwork from nomadic areas show a very similar technique and fairly similar transformations or vegetal designs. The difficulty lies in assuming that Turkic soldiers of Central Asian descent created a style of decoration based on their memory of their homeland, or on objects brought from it. Samarra's Style C. should probably be explained as a moment in an evolutionary process simplifying forms of Antique origin to the point of total _______, because of a willed or repressed avoidance of living beings in publicly accessible monuments. Its quality of abstraction may explain its impact in the rest of the Muslim world.

Samarra, public works, cruciform, iwans, eastern Iran, paradise, Iraq, royal palace,

Abbasid architecture of the ninth century shows significant changes. 1) First, in 836, the caliph al-Mu'tasim founded partly because of difficulties between the a new capital, Turkish guards and the Arab population of Baghdad, partly to express anew"' the glory of his caliphate. The chosen site was ____, some sixty miles up the Tigris from Baghdad. Until 883, it was abandoned as capital, every caliph added to al-Mu'tasim's city creating a huge conglomeration extending over some fifty kilometers. After it declined to a smallish town of religious significance only, the Abbasid city remained in ruins or buried underground, and recent excavations as well as photogrametrical surveys remain only partly published with very preliminary interpretations. From texts we know of major Abbasid constructions in most cities under their rule except in Syria (as opposed to The valley of the Euphrates) and Palestine, but recent archeological investigations may well challenge this conclusion. Tantalizing information exists on the quarters added to Fustat in Egypt by the Abbasid governors of the early seventh century and then by Ahmad ibn Tulun, who ordered the creation of a large open area (maydan) with fancy gates near his palace. Urban architecture is also represented by a series of major ____ ___mainly to do with water conservation and utilization: canals in Samarra, cisterns at Ramla in Palestine and in Tunisia, and the extraordinary Nilometer at Fustat (861) with its magnificent Stonework and relieving arches. Finally, there are the palaces, of which those at Samarra are the most important, though none has been totally excavated. Examination of the available information about the Jawsaq al-Khaqani, the Balkuwara, and the IstabuIat leads to a number of conclusions. 1) Their most striking feature is their size. All are huge walled compounds with endless successions of apartments, courts, rooms, halls, and passageways, whose functions are not known. From a city in the shape of a palace, as Baghdad was, we have moved to a palace the size of a city. 2) Second, each has clearly defined parts. There is always a spectacular gate: at Jawsaq al-Khaqani, an impressive flight of steps led up from an artificial water basin to a triple gate of baked brick, in all probability the Bab al-Amma, the 'main gate', of so many texts. Gates and gateways also appear inside the palaces, and in the Balkuwara a succession of impressive doorways emphasized passage from one court to the other. On the axis of the main entrance a series of courts generally leads to the main reception area, which is _____. A central domed room opens on four iwans which, in turn, open on four courts. At times, mosques, baths, and perhaps private quarters filled the areas between ____. Textual and archaeological sources indicate that this cruciform arrangement of official rooms derives from _______ _____. The only other clear feature of these palaces is the appearance in and around them of large gardens and parks, carefully planned with fountains and canals, game preserves, or even racing tracks, as is suggested by a rather extraordinary area in the shape of a four-leaf clover through air photographs near the Jawsaq al-Khaqani. Ancient Near Eastern and Hellenistic traditions of the royal '_____' were adopted by the Abbasids and sung by their poets. Not much can be said about structural technique: baked and unbaked brick, natural in ____, was the usual material and, so far as we can judge, vaulting the prevalent mode of covering. The real importance of these buildings lies in their conception of a ____ ____, totally new to Islam, although not unknown in previous civilizations. It is a hidden and secluded world, completely self-sufficient. The fact that its splendour was outside sparked the imagination of story-tellers and poets, who began at that time to develop the theme of secret marvels familiar to readers of the Arabian Nights. From Samarra this conception, if not always the scale of execution, spread to the provinces, as we can see from the description of the palace which Khumarawayh ibn Ahmad ibn Tulun built in Egypt.

baths, roman, entertainment, luxury, Rome, Byzantium, monuments, Umayyad

An important feature of these establishments is their _____; in the case of Qusayr Amra a bath is still standing alone in the wilderness. All have small hot-rooms, which follow in all practical respects the heating and water distributing techniques of _____ baths. But while the heated rooms shrank, a significant but variable expansion took place in what corresponds to the Roman apodyterium. At Khirbat al-Mafjar it is a large (slightly over 30 metres square) hall, with a pool at one side, a magnificently decorated entrance, and a luxurious small domed private room at One corner (marked X on the plan). The superstructure is more uncertain: there were sixteen huge piers, and clearly a central dome; whether we must assume something like two ambulatories around it, as was suggested by R. W. H; Hamilton, or some other system is less certain. The effect was certainly grandiose, especially if one adds the splendid mosaics, the carved stucco, and the paintings which decorated walls and floors. The bath at al-Hayr East had a simple basilical hall. The function of such a room is more difficult to define. It has already been pointed out that its size and decoration, as well as the two entrances one public to the east, one princely and private to the southwest — are fully appropriate for the relaxation generally associated with medieval baths. It was certainly not an apodyterium in the strict sense of the word: instead, it must have been a place for official royal ______, as practiced by Umayyad princes. It may even have had a complex mythical meaning connected with the legends surrounding the Prophet-King Solomon. Its pre-modern equivalent would be the ballroom of a rich residence, serving at the same time for pleasure and as a symbol of social status; for the bath always had the connotation of well-being (hence, for instance, the importance of astrological and astronomical symbols in baths, as in the domed room at Qusayr Amra), and royal entertainment (lahwa) increased well-being. Furthermore, to the Arabs from Arabia a bath building was indeed one of the higher forms of _____. In other Umayyad baths, the large hall had a different shape and fulfilled slightly different functions. At Qusayr Amra it looks like a throne room with a tripartite basilical hall followed by an apse and two side rooms with floor mosaics. Whether it was really a throne room is debatable and depends on the interpretation of the frescos, to which we shall return presently. At Qasr al-Hayr West, which had a nearby palace with a throne room, the large hall was probably a dressing room. In summary, the Umayyad chateaux, varying in size and wealth, transformed the fortress and the bath into places for gracious living, according to the norms of the time. In all specific aspects — shapes of rooms, methods of construction, size, techniques — the Umayyads followed the traditions of ____ and early ______, and in Iraq and Palestine dependence on precise pre-Islamic ____ and types is clear. But, at the same time, the bringing together of these features and their new use for early Muslim princes, as well as their location outside great urban centres, bestow upon them a specifically _____ character.

Fatimids, quarters, residences

At-QÄHIRA The fourth palatial satellite city was born with the conquest of Egypt by the _____, an Isma'ili Shi'a dynasty originating in North Africa. The fourth Fatimid Caliph, al-Mu'izz li-Din Allah, with his general Jawhar al-Siqilli, overthrew the Ikhshidids who had ruled Egypt between 934 and 969. Egypt's status rose with that of its conquerors, it became the seat of a Caliphate Jawhar accordingly began construction on the walls which were to enclose the new caliphal residence Al-Mu'izz first named the site al-Mansuriyya after his father, the Caliph al-Mansur, but four years later renamed it al-Qahira (The Victorious) after al-Qahir, the planet Mars, in ascendance when the signal was given to break ground for the new capital The new construction was completed in 971, with _____ for the various ethnic groups composing the Fatimid army Greeks, other Europeans, Armenians, Berbers, Sudanese, and Turks. Facing a huge esplanade for ceremonial activities, the palace complex of the Caliph stood midway along the artery that cut the city into two unequal parts on an approximate north-south axis. The ______ occupied the heart of the new imperial city into which the Caliph al-Mu'izz made his triumphal entry in 974.

Cairo, centralized

Cairo's architectural monuments rank among humanity's great achievements. Recognizing that their preservation is a matter of importance to the whole world, UNESCO has listed the Egyptian capital as one of the "Cities of Human Heritage." Such recognition is well justified, for few cities on earth display such a dense concentration of historic architectural treasures as does Cairo. This concentration reflects the political situation of Islamic Egypt, which never had another capital outside the space occupied by the city we now call _____. Historians describe a series of capital cities—al-Fustat, al-Askar, and al-Qata'i —but all of these were within sight of one another and eventually became a single city Cairo has been the uninterrupted center of power in Egypt since the year 641. Continuous, ______ power in one area distinguishes Egypt from other Islamic nations such as Syria, Iraq, Anatolia, Andalusia, and Persia, where different cities vied for supremacy in different epochs, sometimes simultaneously Muslim Egypt was ruled from a single site, the area between the mosque of 'Amr in the south and Bab al-Nay and Bab al-Futuh to the north. Outside this area very few medieval buildings of interest have survived, while within it, a large number of Egypt's medieval and post-medieval monumental still stand, witnesses to more than eleven centuries of history.

mosaics, rug-like, tassels, allegory,

In addition to their architectural meaning, these secular buildings have yielded an extraordinary amount of evidence for other aspects of Umayyad art. At Qusayr Amra, Khirbat al-Minya, and Khirbat al-Mafjar, there were many tessellated floors. The most spectacular ____ are at Khirbat al-Mafjar, where the bath hall was entirely covered with thirty-one different abstract designs, all related to classical themes, but with a decorative, _____-____ quality not usually found in pre-Islamic mosaics. These very same characteristics appear at Khirbat al-Minya, where one panel in particular has the colour pattern arranged so as to give the impression of woven threads. The small private room off the bath at Khirbat al-Mafjar has preserved the best-known of Umayyad floor-mosaics, showing a lion hunting gazelles under a tree. Here again the _____ around the panel suggest a textile imitation. The delicacy of the design, the superior quality of colour-setting in the progressively lighter tones of the tree, and the vivid opposition between the ferocious lion, the trapped gazelle still on the run, and the two unconcerned gazelles nibbling at the tree make this panel a true masterpiece. Its location in the apse of a semi-official room suggests an ______ of Umayyad power, since earlier examples had such a meaning, but recently Doris Behrens-Abu Sayf has proposed an erotic explanation based on the images of contemporary Arabic poetry. The stylistic antecedents are to be sought in the Mediterranean world, but the theme is an ancient Near Eastern one.

Syria, Sasanian, palace, Sasanian, outside

More or less contemporary with Baghdad is the palace of Ukhaydir, in the desert some 180 kilometers to the south. Creswell related its construction to events in the caliph's family and dated it around 778, the date at least is reasonable. Its location and fortified exterior relate it to the Umayyad palaces of _____, but its size (175 by 169 metres for the outer enclosure) and much of its construction are Quite different. The technique (rubble in mortar covered with stucco and brick for vaults), the heavy pillars making up arched recesses on the side of long vaulted halls, the pointed curve of the vaults, and the use of blind arches for the decoration of large wall surfaces all show the persistence of _____ methods. In plan, the entrance complex on several floors preceding a domed room followed by a long vaulted hall, plus the central official group of court, iwan, and dome, correspond on a small scale to the textual descriptions of Baghdad. Thus Ukhaydir confirms that in plan Baghdad relied on ____ architecture, and in technique on _____ methods. In addition, even though the reasons for its location remain obscure, Ukhaydir illustrates the continuation of the Arab aristocratic tradition of building ____ the main cities.

Dome of the Rock, geometrical frames, themes, motifs, geometric ornament, vegetal ornament, showplace, techniques, background

Several characteristics of Umayyad sculpted ornament can be defined, albeit tentatively. 1) First, with the exception of capitals and of certain niche-heads, especially at Khirbat al-Mafjar, it follows the mosaics of the ____ ___ ___ ____ in developing on its own, unrelated to the architecture. This is true of the large triangles of Mshatta and most of the panels at Khirbat al-Mafjar and Qasr al-Hayr West. 2) Second, except for a few border motifs, the Umayyad artists created their designs within simple ______ ____— squares, rectangles, triangles, even circles — which occur both on a large scale (for example the triangles of Mshatta or the rectangles of Qasr al-Hayr West) and on a small scale within the single panel. This point is important in explaining the operation of an Umayyad construction site. Such a tremendous mass of work was accomplished in such a short time only by means of a large corvée-created labour force. Some master-mind probably planned the basic outlines and then gave free rein to individual gangs for the details; thence derives the unity of organization as well as the multiplicity of detail. 3) The third characteristic of Umayyad decoration is the tremendous variety of its _____ and ____. They can be divided into two major categories: a) _____ ______ , used for borders and frames, but also for such features as the balustrades, parapets, lintels, and windows of Khirbat al-Mafjar (similar to the Damascus ones); b) and the more frequent _____ _____, from the luxurious naturalistic vine of Mshatta to the highly stylized artificial palmette of the Qasr al-Hayr West panel. In between we find almost all the themes and styles prevalent in the Mediterranean, Sasanian, and Central Asian worlds of the sixth, seventh, and eighth centuries. It is not yet known whether this eclecticism was due to mass migrations of workers or, as is more probable, to the greater impact, especially in the last decades of the Umayyad period, of people, objects, and impressions from the huge eastern world. The fact remains that the Umayyads provided a sort of _____ and incubator for the decorative arts of all conquered areas. course, there are individual characteristics. At Mshatta we have mostly plants of classical origin, in a fairly natural style, with animals from west and east, and, on certain triangles, the superposition of a geometric rhythm of circles. Qasr al-Hayr West has the most stylized decorative motifs, Khirbat al-Mafjar the greatest variety of themes of different origins and in different moods, but none relics on one source only: all express a catholicity consonant with the size of the empire. In addition, many different ____ are drawn on, with a curious predominance of textile patterns. This cheap and rapid reproduction of motifs from expensive sources (the point applies less to Mshatta than to the other palaces) also illustrates something of the nouveau riche side of the new civilization. All this may explain the origins and wealth of Umayyad designs. But is it possible to define the ornament as such? One of its principal features is its cultivation of contrasts. A panel from the facade of Khirbat al-Mafjar contains geometric division of space, highly stylized palmettes symmetrically set in a circle, and a handsomely luxurious double trunk, ending on one side in a fairly natural bunch of grapes and on the other in a geometricized vine leaf. On the Mshatta triangles a vigorous and lively movement of stems, leaves, and bunches contrasts with geometrically perfect, static series of circles with artificial pearl borders. At Qasr al-Hayr West the artificiality is more apparent, but even here a simple geometric design appears next to lively palmettes. In every case the ________ has wellnigh disappeared. All is decor at Khirbat al-Mafjar and at Qasr al-Hayr West, whereas at Mshatta only dark voids remain, giving the impression of filigree work. It is the opposition between intensely naturalistic and completely stylized features, the tendency to take over the whole surface of the wall, and the presence of so many different elements alongside one another that define Umayyad ornament. The latter does not yet have the sophistication and cleverness which were later to characterize Islamic decoration, but it has already separated itself from the traditions of the Mediterranean and of Iran, even though individual units and motifs and the general conception of a decorative programme partly independent from architecture derive directly from one or the other. In a curious way which, for the time being, defies explanation, much in this art bears comparison with nearly contemporary Irish and northern European art. Since there could not have been artistic contacts between these areas during the Umayyad period, the parallelisms must bc structural and require an eventual theoretical rather than historical explanation.

Cairo, Masr, Fatimid, residential, tent, Misr, Europeans,

THE NAMES OF CAIRO The word ____ is derived from the Arabic al-Qahira, which is not, however, the name commonly used by Egyptians to designate their capital. They have always called it ____ (the popular form of Misr, meaning Egypt). Al-Qahira is the official term used in written Arabic today. Egyptian medieval historians make a clear distinction between Misr and Al-Qahira. Al-Qahira is the name of that part of the capital established in 969 by the _____ dynasty as its _____ city. Misr is the abbreviation of Fustat-Miyr, or Fustat of Egypt, designating the first Muslim capital of Egypt founded by the Arab general 'Amr Ibn al-'As in 641-42. There are two interpretations of the word Fustat. While European scholars usually derive it from the Greek and Latin fossatum meaning trench, which could be a pre-Islamic local toponym, Arab scholars prefer to interpret it as the Arabic Fustat, meaning ____. According to legend, the name originated when the Arab troops on their way to Alexandria left the tent of 'Amr Ibn al-'As behind in order not to disturb a dove that had built a nest in it. In time, people dropped the word al-Fustat, and the area of the early Arab foundation was once again known as ____. The term Misr was later extended to refer to the whole capital, composed of both al-Fustat and al-Qahira. Ottoman coins from Egypt are inscribed, duriba fi misr, ' 'struck in Misr", and Ottoman coins always refer to the city rather than to the province where they were struck. The mint was at the Citadel, in al-Qahira. In the Ottoman period al-Fustat (or Misr) itself was called Misr al-'Atiqa, referring to the part of the city today called Misr al-Qadima, meaning Old Misr. Many people still call it Misr al-'Atiqa The habit of calling the entire Egyptian capital Cairo, or al-Qahira, was begun by _____ who visited Egypt. The name was reinforced by Napoleon's French scholars, who made a scholarly survey of the city which they called Le Kaire, translated by the British as Cairo. Cairo's traditional byname is Misr al-Mahrusa, or Cairo, the Protected City. Despite its many losses, Cairo has been spared wholesale devastations by wars and other calamities, and today offers us a wealth of historic architecture

road, Nile, cemetery, ponds, princely, Ottoman

THE OUTSKIRTS The city expanded on all sides under subsequent rulers. Under the Mamluks there was extensive development along the ____ leading from Bäb Zuwayla to the Citadel and its royal palaces Natural forces played a part as well. The ___'s course shifted to the west in the fourteenth century, transforming the island of Bulaq into a port on the eastern bank and leaving al-Maqs, which Salah al-Din had planned to fortify, far inland. On the eastern edge of al-Qähira the _____ founded by al-Nasir Muhammad, like that of Fustat farther to the south, expanded into the desert and soon became the site of important religious foundations The Khalij, which for centuries had formed the western border of the city, fed a number of ponds in the western, northern and southern outskirts. The Nile flooded these ____ in summer, leaving their beds green with vegetation when the waters receded. The beauty of these ponds made them the summer resorts Of Cairenes, and many ____ residences were built near them, particularly the Birkat al-Fil in the south. The pond of Azbakiyya came into vogue during the late Marnluk period and remained fashionable under the Ottomans. Orchards and pleasure buildings on the western bank of the Khalij gradually gave way to urbanization during the _____ period (1517-1914), as the city's northern areas expanded toward the Nile

Caliph, Mist, sewerage, narrow, mansions, palace, separation, catastrophes, Syrian, Citadel

THE Two CITIES Under the Fatimids, al-Qahira became the seat Of power, a residential center where the ____ dwelt with his court and army, but remained the productive and economic center Of Egypt. The older city, by that time called simply ____, had grown into a flourishing metropolis. Travelers visiting it from the tenth to the mid-eleventh centuries reported that it competed in grandeur and prosperity with the greatest Islamic cities of the time. Al-Muqaddasi in the tenth century described the highrise buildings of al-Fustat as resembling minarets. According to Nasiri Khusraw, a Persian traveler of the early eleventh century, some of these buildings climbed as high as fourteen stories up to roof gardens complete with ox-drawn water wheels for irrigating them. Khusraw dedicates long descriptive passages to the city's thriving markets, and finally confesses, "I have seen so much wealth in al-Fustat that if I tried to list or describe it, my words would not be believed I found it impossible to count or estimate it." Recent excavations at al-Fustat have corroborated some of these contemporary descriptions Eyewitnesses wrote that in the densest part of the city, around the mosque of 'Amr, merchants displayed goods from all over the world Excavations have revealed Chinese wares of the most refined quality that found their way to al-Fustat. The digs have also revealed considerable sophistication below the street level. The intricate _____ system took advantage of differing altitudes of al-Fustat's terrain to distribute water and eliminate wastes. According to other visitors' accounts, al-Fustat also suffered, for all its glory and sophistication, from problems familiar to the inhabitants of modern cities. The physician Ibn Ridwan (d. 1068) thought the streets were too ____ for their high buildings. The hills to the east and north prevented proper ventilation of the city so that the stagnant air became polluted, particularly with smoke from the furnaces of a multitude of steam baths Dead animals thrown into the Nile contaminated the drinking water , and the congestion and dilapidation of the heart of al-Fustat shocked some visitors In the twelfth century Ibn Sa'id from Seville noted that the mosque of 'Amr had fallen victim to a traffic problem. The monument, its premises crowded with women, children and peddlers and its walls covered with graffiti, served the city's population as a short-cut between two streets Al-Qahira, on the other hand, stood high above the problems of the mother city Nasirii Khusraw, describing the Fatimid Caliph's city, refers to _____ and gardens of incredible beauty. Of the ____ complex, dominating the center of town like a mountain, he writes: I saw a series of buildings, terraces and rooms. There were twelve adjoining pavilions, all of them square in shape There was a throne in one of them that took up the entire width of the room. Three of its sides were made of gold on which were hunting scenes depicting riders racing their horses and other subjects, there were also inscriptions written in beautiful characters. The rugs and hangings were Greek satin and moire woven precisely to fit the spot where they were to be placed. A balustrade of golden Iattice work surrounded the throne, whose beauty defies all description. Behind the throne were steps of silver I saw a tree that looked like an orange tree, whose branches, leaves and fruits were made of sugar. A thousand statuettes and figurines also made of sugar were also placed there A French ambassador to Cairo, speaking of the palace in 1167, mentions floors of colored marble, grouted with gold, and a courtyard surrounded by magnificent colonnaded porticos. Water from a central fountain trickled through gold and silver pipes into channels and pools. There was a menagerie and an aviary filled with exotically colored birds from all over the world. Long passages of Maqrizi's account tell of the different treasure halls of the Fatimid palaces and an academy with a vast library. These accounts imply that by the end Of the eleventh century, Egypt's two symbiotic capitals, Misr and al-Qahira, physically manifested the _____ between the indigenous people and the ruling elite The larger one., Misr, supported the productive and mercantile population, while al-Qahira was inhabited exclusively by the foreign rulers and their entourage. Commoners employed in the royal city returned to al-Fustat (Misr) at the end of the working day. Each city had a port. That of al-Fustat was close to its markets, while al-Maqs of Umm Dunayn (the pre-Islamic village of Tandunias) harbored the Fatimid fleet. This situation, however , did not survive the next century. In the twelfth century a series of natural _____, plague followed by famine and a violent earthquake, severely depopulated al-Fustat( and arrested its development. Al-Qata'i, on the northern outskirts, had not recovered from its destruction by Abbasid troops. The Fatimid vizier Badr al-Jamali, responding to the situation, permitted the transfer of some markets to al-Qahira and allowed wealthy citizens to build new houses in the formerly exclusive city. Al-Fustat was thus already in decline when the French King Amaury (amalric) and his Crusaders came from Jerusalem to attack Egypt. Nür al-Din of Syria sent his armies to aid the Fatimids, and the Muslim troops, led by Shirküh and his nephew Saläh al-Din, fought the Crusaders from 1164 to 1 169. During these campaigns the Fatimid vizier Shawär is reported to have ordered the burning of al-Fustat to stop the invaders. After his victory over the Franks, Salah al-Din became vizier under the last Fatimid Caliph, whom he overthrew in 1171 reestablishing the supremacy of the Sunni Caliphate of Baghdad and ending two centuries of Isma'ili Shi'ite rule in Egypt These upheavals consolidated changes already in progress. Once opened to whoever wished to livc there, al-Qähira completely eclipsed al-Fustat. The suburbs Of the older city had decayed, leaving large empty spaces between al-Fustat and al-Qahira. Salah al-Din set out to enclose both cities and the intervening areas within one long set of walls. Undaunted by the enormity of the task, he also intended his wall to extend westward across the Khalij to include the port of al-Maqs, and eastward to al-Muqattam, where he began his Citadel in the ____ tradition of hilltop fortifications. He died before these projects were completed, and the walls of Cairo were never continued. The _____, however, designed not only as a fortress but also as the residence of sultans, was enlarged and embellished with new buildings throughout its history.

landlords, Syrian, Iraq, fortress, roman, Syria,

The best-known Umayyad palatial monuments are a group built with one exception as places of living, rest, or pleasure for Umayyad _____. The most important are Kufa (the one urban exception), Jabal Says, Rusafa, Khirbat Minya, Qasr al-Hayr West, Mshatta, (Lusayr Amra, and Khirbat the last four particularly remarkable for their copious sculpture, paintings, and mosaics. Khirbat al-Mafjar, the best studied one; can be used as a basis for discussion. It consists of three separate parts - 1) a castle proper, 2) a mosque, 3) and a bath - linked by a long porticoed courtyard with a most spectacular fountain. With variations, these elements are found in most palaces. The castle always has an entrance, generally quite elaborate, and along the walls full towers often arranged in apartments (bayts) of three or five rooms. There was often a second floor with official apartments, throne rooms, and so on. In addition, Khirbat al-Mafjar's castle has a small private mosque on the south and a small underground bath on the west. Within the same framework, Mshatta, the most ambitious of all, although unfinished has a slightly aberrant interior with a large entrance complex (with mosque), a courtyard, and a throne-room complex opening on the court, all set on an axis independently from the living quarters. These differences from typical ____ constructions and plans can be explained by the impact of Umayyad architecture in ____, as we know it in Kufa. The origins of the ______-like plan, improper for defence, lie in the forts and palace-forts which started on the ______ frontier of Syria and spread to Roman imperial palace architecture elsewhere. The construction — both stone, the most common material, and brick, used in Mshatta and in some parts of other palaces — follows the traditional methods of _____, with the addition of a few Mesopotamian and strictly Constantinopolitan features. We know less about the ceremonial rooms, since in most instances they were on the second floor over the entrance. However, the remaining examples at Mshatta and Khirbat Minya used the ubiquitous basilical hall of the Mediterranean world which at Mshatta had an appended dome area and triconch.

Mediterranean, proportion, shadowing, classical, animals, Persian and Central Asian, imagination, mosaics, skilled, carved, mosque, representational

The style, quality, and origins of these paintings and sculptures vary considerably. In most instances the paintings can be related to common ______ traditions, but, although a certain loveliness was occasionally achieved, on the whole most figures have thick outlines, hefty bodily configurations, and lack of subtlety and _____ in the use of _____ or in composition. At first glance the sculptures are not of very great quality either, as in the crude eroticism of the Mafjar female figures. The decadence of sculpture in the round, hardly peculiar to Islamic art at this time, is clearly shown by the fact that the more successful and impressive figures are those in which heavily patterned clothes hide the body. The Umayyads achieved more remarkable results only in a few faces with rough planes and deep sunken eyes reminiscent of what prevailed in the Mediterranean world during the fourth and fifth centuries. The background of this sculpture is still Unclear. Its main source of inspiration must be sought in Iran, perhaps even in Central Asia; but there is some trace also of the local Syro-Palestinian pre-Christian styles of such Nabatean sites as Khirbat al-Tannur or of Palmyra, although we cannot yet tell why these sculptural styles were revived several centuries after their apparent abandonment. Finally there are instances of simply copying _____ figures. In addition to human beings, Umayyad painters and especially sculptors represented ____. Most of them are found at Khirbat al-Mafjar: rows of partridges or mountain goats below the bases of domes, winged horses in pendentive medallions, and an endless variety of monkeys, rabbits, and pig-like animals in vegetal scrolls. The significance of these fragments is twofold: on the one hand, practically all of them derive from ____ and ____ ____ models; on the other, they show a far greater ____ and vivacity than the representations of human figures, as is clearly shown in images of wild onagers at Qusayr Amra. Altogether the representations of humans and animals in paintings or sculpture can hardly be called great art, however interesting they may be, and they do not compare in quality with the ______ from the great mosques or from Khirbat al-Mafjar and Khirbat al-Minya, nor even with the ornament to be discussed shortly. This oddity can be explained in two ways. The artisans responsible for the mosaics may have been more ____ than those practising painting, where local provincials predominated, or sculpture, which was an artificial revival. In addition, the stylistic source of both paintings and sculptures may have been objects, textiles, ivories, silver gathered by the Umayyads all over western Asia. The process of magnifying small models may have led to their frequent formal awkwardness. Umayyad palaces have also preserved purely decorative fragments, mostly _____ in stone or stucco and in a few instances moulded in stucco. The greatest number come from the palaces of Qasr al-Hayr West and Khirbat al-Mafjar, but the most elaborate single unit is the facade at Mshatta with its superb twenty triangles of carved stone. The variety and complexity of this extraordinary accumulation of material is bewildering. Early attempts to explain it are unsatisfactory because the more recently discovered palaces of Qasr al-Hayr West and Khirbat al-Mafiar have provided a different context for Mshatta, and because they gave a great deal of emphasis to stylistic origins and the division of the twenty triangles into regionally related groups. One example illustrates the unrewarding character of many of these studies. A great deal of discussion has centred on the fact that almost all the panels on the left of the entrance have animals, whereas those on the right have no living beings. This led to varying conclusions about the place of origin of the artists, if not about the symbolic significance of the panels. A later study proposed that the most likely reason for the lack of living things to the right of the facade was that this was the back wall of the palace ______, which could not be decorated in any other way. If valid, this explanation would indicate a high degree of consciousness in the cultural and religious values of _____ art. Whether such an awareness was likely in the middle of the eighth century remains to be seen.

roman, syria, Palestine, large-scale, stucco, Sasanian, round, high relief, figural representations, Sasanian, glorification, own, coins, identified, Iranian, Umayyads, strength, power, astronomical, Orient, Umayyad, constant, pastime, decorative value, earthiness, non-courtly, Human, textiles, numerous, private, personality

The techniques of painting and sculpture in Umayyad palaces are not much different from those of preceding centuries: fresco painting in the ______ manner, and stone-carving as had been practised for centuries in ______ and ______. More important, both for its implication of oriental influences and for its impact on architecture, is the _____-____ use of _____ sculpture. Its cheapness and rapidity of execution permit the easy transformation of an architectural unit into a surface for decoration, a tendency common enough in the _____ world, and readily apparent on a facade like that of Qasr al-Hayr West, where an essentially classical composition was covered with ornamental panels which tended to obliterate or at least minimize and modify the basic architectural form. But the important issue is why the first Muslim dynasty revived an art of sculpture in the _____ or in ____ ____which had all but disappeared. One explanation may be the purely visual impact of the classical monuments which covered most of the Roman world and which would have appeared to the Umayyads as characteristic prerequisites of an imperial life. Out of the great number of painted or sculpted subjects remaining from Umayyad palaces, the most original are ______ _______, which form the majority of paintings at Qusayr Amra and include many fragments from Qasr al-Hayr West and Khirbat al-Mafjar. The subject matter is not always easy to determine, nor is it always simple to distinguish from among the great wealth of identifiable themes, most of which existed in pre-Islamic times, those which were adapted to new Umayyad meanings, and those which were merely used for their decorative value or because they reflected ideas and modes of life taken over by the Arab princes. Various levels Of iconographic interpretation exist for the sculptures and paintings which deal with courtly life. Four royal figures remain; whether they were caliphs or not is uncertain. 1) The first, at the gate to the bath of Khirbat al-Mafjar, is a prince standing on a pedestal with two lions. He wears a long coat and baggy trousers in the ______ manner and holds a dagger or a sword. 2) The second, at Qysayr Amra, is an enthroned and haloed prince in a long robe under a dais. An attendant with a fly-whisk stands on one side, a more richly dressed dignitary on the other. In front, a Nilotic landscape completes the composition. 3) The other two representations are at Qasr al-Hayr West: on the facade, a standing crowned man in another typical Sasanian outfit; in the court, a seated figure more closely related to a Mediterranean prototype as at Qusayr Amra. In all these instances, position as well as Iconography imply an official _______ of the prince. The considerable variations between these images borrowed directly from Sasanian and Byzantine princely representations indicate that, with the exception of a few details, the Umayyads did not develop a royal iconography of their ____; this is confirmed by the vagaries of early Islamic ____. It is, however, important that official representations derived almost exclusively from Sasanian or Byzantine types, for it indicates the level at which Umayyad princes wanted to be _____. An excellent example is the well-known Qusayr Amra painting of the Six Kings where an ______ theme of the Princes of the Earth is adapted to the Umayyad situation by the introduction of Roderic of Spain, a prince defeated by the Muslims. It is likely that there were other images with iconographic meanings catering specifically to the ideology or myths associated with the ______, but the first attempts at such explanations, however intriguing, have not been entirely persuasive. These subjects emphasize the ______ and ____ of the Arab princes. The same theme is implicit in a number of other representations, at Qusayr Amra, for example, in the _____ ceiling with its connotations of cosmic well-being. Again, in the small room in the back of the main bath hall at Khirbat al-Mafjar, the striking six heads in a flower on a dome supported by four winged horses and a procession of birds may have had some kind of cosmic symbolism, although here once more a peculiar ambiguity exists between decorative value and specific symbolic or other meaning. A second royal theme is of particular interest for three reasons: 1) it was almost exclusively borrowed from the Ancient _____ through the Iranian kingdoms conquered by the Muslims; 2) it corresponded to a certain extent to ______ practices; 3) and it remained a _____ in later Islamic princely art and practice. The theme is the royal _____. It includes male and female attendants, dancers, musicians, drinkers, acrobats, gift-bearers, and activities such as hunting, wrestling, bathing, and nautical games (the latter two shown clearly only at Qusayr Amra). In most instances a prince is the focus, and an idealized court is represented; but as usual there are modifications inconsistent with the official character of the imagery and which illustrate two further aspects of Umayyad art: its _______ ____ and its _____. At Khirbat al-Mafjar, the use of four acrobats or dancers in pendentives either means a confusion between the court theme and the old motif of Atlantes (mythical figures holding up world), or, more likely, serves simply to cover the surface of the wall. At Qusayr Amra the rather crude disembowelment of animals introduces an unfamiliar note to the traditional hunting cycle. It is not clear why a few ____-____ themes appear: at Qusayr Amra some badly faded erotic scenes and a series of personifications (History, Poetry) with legends in Greek; at Qasr al-Hayr a curiously classical painting of the Earth, probably to be related to the general theme of royal power, and a sculpture of a prone man with a seated woman reminiscent of Palmyrene funerary sculpture; at Khirbat al-Mafjar, as well as at Qusayr Amra or Qasr al-Hayr West, numerous remains too fragmentary to be fully interpreted. _____ beings also occur in a decorative context, especially at Khirbat al-Mafjar. Whether painted and fully integrated with a vegetal design, or sculpted and protecting from the decoration, their origins are probably to be sought in _____. Because of the fragmentary state of remains, one can only hypothesize about the existence of an iconographic programme at Khirbat al-Mafjar and Qasr al-Hayr West. Matters are quite different at Qusayr Amra , where removal of soot and dirt from the wall of the bath has brought back to light nearly all the paintings discovered at the turn of the century by Alois Musil. The first investigators concluded that at least the main hall had a formal programme depicting the court and ideology of an - Umayyad caliph, either al-Walid I or, more probably, the rather libertine al-Walid ibn Yazid, who is known to have lived in that area before his brief rule as caliph in 744. However, neither the size of the building nor its remote location point to its being anything other than a private pleasure domain. Its most singular characteristic, apparent as one enters, is that the paintings are so _____, so closely packed, that none of them, not even a theme, dominates the rooms. It is as though one has penetrated into the tight coexistence of a prince enthroned in state with a very local round-up of animals, rather lascivious nude dancers with a formally dressed one, carefully and vividly drawn figures or animals with miserable drawings, clear topics next to obscure ones, highly private images of nude figures next to the formal Kings of the Earth. All this Shows that Qusayr Amra was a rare medieval example of a _____ work of art, a combination of themes from many sources — from princely typology to personal whim to local events — which makes sense only from the point of view of a specific patron. What emerges is much less the official statement of a prince than the fascinating _____ of someone known only through his private photograph album.

secular, caravanserai, romanticism, forms, techniques, Late Antiquity, walled, Roman, wealth

UMAYYAD CITIES AND PALACES Most of what we know of Umayyad _____ architecture comes from the unique socio-economic setting of the Syro-Jordaman countryside. The urban palace in Damascus, al-Khadra ('the green one' or 'the heavenly one', as has been proposed recently) is gone and even the soundings being carried out in the area where it stood are unlikely to bring out much of its character; its Iraqi parallel in Wasit has never been excavated, although the dar al-imara or Government House in Kufa has been explored and published in part. Other urban examples of Umayyad buildings are known in the complicated cases of the citadel in Amman and of the unfortunately partial remains excavated in Jerusalem. By contrast, dozens of country or steppe foundations are available. Their interpretation in the past as reflections of an Umayyad bedouin taste was based on western _______ about Islam and it is true that in one or two cases — Qusayr Amra, for instance — something has remained of an Arabian aristocratic taste, as we shall see below. In fact these many settlements fulfilled a number of different functions within a new ecological setting. A most unusual example is Qasr al-Hayr East. A hundred kilometres northeast of Palmyra at the Intersection of the main roads from Aleppo to Iraq and from the upper Euphrates to Damascus, it consisted of a large (7 by 4 kilometres) walled enclosure probably for animals and agriculture, the earliest known _________ in Islam, a large bath, and a 'city' (madina, as is specifically mentioned in an Inscription, now lost) consisting of six large dwellings, a mosque, and an olive oil press. A few more primitive houses were scattered around. The whole ensemble may well have been the Zaytuna of the caliph Hisham. It was probably begun in the early decades of the eighth century and received major royal funding celebrated by an inscription dated 728. It was probably never finished according to its Planned scale and continued as a living, although small, city well into the ninth century To the archeologist, the historian of technology (especially for water and for construction), and the social historian, Qasr al-I-layr is a document of considerable importance. For the art historian, two points are particularly noteworthy. 1) First, the _____ and ______ used (large square buildings with towers filled with rubble, high gates [rained by half-towers and decorated with stucco or brick, organization of space around a square porticoed court, whether the large space of a whole city or the small space of a house, introduction of brick within predominant stone, highly polished skewed wall surfaces, and skewed vaults) originated in the architectural vocabulary of _____ ______, for the most part from the Mediterranean. There is no technical or formal invention here, but there is a different use of these forms, in many ways just as in the mosque of Damascus. For instance, three of the four gates of the 'city' were _____ almost immediately after construction, because the available type of a square with four axial gates was not adapted to the city's purpose. Moreover, while the central authority, probably the caliphate, created the infrastructure of foundations, water channels, and basic layout of nearly everything, the completion was much more haphazard, at times even in contradiction to the original plan. 2) The second point also derives partly from _____ architecture: utilities such as waterworks or inns are given a striking monumentality. One can only hypothesize about the historical and human conditions which created Qasr al-Hayr, but undoubtedly the exterior monumentality of its buildings served the purpose of demonstrating ______ and the power of a new empire. Similar conditions of economic, ideological, and political purposes were behind other idiosyncratic layouts, like those of Anjarr in the Beqaa valley in Lebanon which looked almost like a prototypical Roman military city, and of the citadel in Amman in Jordan, where ancient ruined dwellings were reused for a significant Umayyad establishment, whose exact functions are unclear, but which is remarkable for a massive entrance pavilion with many problematic details and a problematic date.

unusual, Iraqi—Iranian, function, meeting, typical, local

Yet another unusual example of Umayyad architecture is Qasr Kharana, wonderfully preserved on top of a waterless knoll in the Jordanian steppe. Small in size (35 by 35 metres), it has a single entrance, a court, and two floors of halls or rooms, some arranged in apartments and decorated with stucco. Its fortified look is misleading, as the arrow slits turn out to be purely decorative. The technique of construction (rubble in mortar) is ____ in the western part of the Fertile Crescent, and the ornament clearly derives from _____-______ sources. Date and purpose have been widely discussed. A graffito indicates that the building was standing by 710, and the general consensus is that this date is close to its foundation. Its ________ is more puzzling; location and internal arrangements give no clue, and recent soundings confirmed the nearly total absence of shards or other traces of regular life. In all likelihood, this was a ________ place of some sort, within the complicated pattern of relationships that existed between the ruling princes and tribal confederations. These examples are unusual within our present state of knowledge. The fact, however, that we can provide them, even hypothetically, with a social significance within the emerging Muslim world suggests that they were in fact typical than has been believed, and that each one was a _____ answer to the needs of a new society in an old land.

Qasr

____: castle (plural is Qusur) Palaces were a combination of Military and administrative centers They were luxury quarters for royalty extensive gardens---> impressive because they are in the desert, be able to command water and irrigation shows power Groups would come there: Think of it in terms of like a summer home/having different residence (large structure because they would need housing for all members of the entourage) In deserts in levant (Syria, Jerusalem, Jordan) Not a lot of urban remains (were built on top of) Desert Housing for all members of the entourage Was like a summer home/having different residence They Umayyad caliphs lived lavishly Functions: it served as a place for fun (hunting, entertain, vacation) political purpose: The Umayyad empire covered a lot of land, in order to keep people outside the city of Damascus under control and mange them you have to interface with them. They were anchors where people could come meet with the caliph. There are mosque in them It served as a place to escape the pressure of being rulers in Damascus. Have bathhouses In the 8th century epidemics would break out so they would go to the desert Start building begin in 8th century by mid 8th century the Umayyad fell to Abbasids and they escaped to Spain.

arabesque

_____- "Arab-like." A flowing pattern - intricate stylized - organic - vegetal motifs ornate design featuring intertwined curves; a ballet position in which one leg is extended in back while the other supports the weight of the body