Historical mosques and their architectural significance

History of Great Mosque of Aleppo, Syria (also known as Umayyad Mosque of Aleppo)

The Great Mosque of Aleppo remains, despite historical vicissitudes and subsequent reconstructions, one of the most important expressions of Muslim art in the Middle East. This paper will look at the history of the mosque, including as it relates to the history of the city of Aleppo, whenever this is determining the evolution of the mosque as well.

Since the mosque has been built in what was once the Agora of the Roman-Greek city and since it coexisted with the Greek Cathedral on the proximity (201405111342), it is useful to briefly discuss, in a paragraph, the evolution of the city until its conquest by the Muslims, in 636, mainly the period from Alexander the Great to the Muslim takeover of the city.

As such, one of the generals of Alexander the Great, Seleucus Nicator, received Aleppo as part of the treaties that divided his empire following his death. He founded the city of Beoria, which prospered during the Roman and Byzantine times, when, among other urban elements, an agora was also added, where the Great Mosque would subsequently be constructed (201405111342). The atmosphere was a tolerant one, with Catholics, Jews and pre-Muslim communities coexisting in the city.

The city surrendered to the Muslims in 636. The peaceful surrender meant that the Muslim army guaranteed existing rights and protection for all existing religions, including of existing worship places, with an important impact on the subsequent construction of the Great Mosque. The agreement meant that the first mosque in the city was built on the outskirts of Aleppo, and that it took another hundred years before a central mosque, namely the Great Mosque, was constructed (201405111342).

As several sources emphasize, the only Umayyad element that remains of the Great Mosque is the basic plan (nnnn). Although the general elements related to the beginning of the construction are similar in different sources, the details differ from one to another. The generally accepted version is that the Great Mosque was begun by the Umayyad Caliph Walid, who ruled in Aleppo between 705 and 715 (nnnn).

The Mosque would have been finalized by his brother, Suleiman, who succeeded him as Caliph in 717 and who ruled for two years. Most sources thus argue that the wish of the caliphs was for the Great Mosque to rival with the one that their brother al-Walid had built in Damascus, also named as the Great Mosque of Damascus.

According to Mitchell (1978), the land that was used for the construction of the mosque resulted from what had served as the Cathedral's cemetery. The land had definitely been used as the city's agora and had been incorporated into the Cathedral of Saint Helena after the advent of Christianity in the city, during the time of the Roman rule.

Another theory was launched by Bacharach (1996), who argued that the actual supporter of the construction of the mosque was neither Walid, nor Suleiman, but Maslamah ibn Abd al-Malik, a brother of Walid and Suleiman. For Bacharach, the main argument in this sense is the fact that the primary reason why the construction passes over two caliph reigns is that, in fact, there is a third figure who is more actively involved in the mosque's construction.

Furthermore, he links the construction of the mosque with al-Malik's military and political role in the caliphate. As such, he is the governor of the local province of Jund Qinnasrin and he uses this province as a starting point for some of his military campaigns against the Byzantine Empire and against the Khazar Khaganate. A mosque of this size and importance would have been most important given the strategic and political role of Aleppo as a starting point in the mentioned campaigns.

Until the 10th century, not much can be said about the history of the mosque, which, similar to the city, was negatively affected by different factors over long periods of time. This included the fact that Aleppo had become a provincial city of lesser importance during the Abbasid caliphs and that several periods of tumult and unrest affected both the city and the Great Mosque.

Under the Abbasid caliphs, for example, the city was at the border between Mesopotamia and Egypt and was ruled, for a large period of time, from Egypt, during the second half of the 9th century (nnnn, 1st part). Furthermore, the Abbasids are reported to have vandalized the mosque, which stood as a monument of their predecessors and rivals, the Umayyad caliphs.

The cultural revival during the Hamdanid dynasty, without a direct impact on the Great Mosque, which saw no additions to its architecture, was ended by the sack of the city by the Byzantine forces, in 962, which significantly affected urban life (some attributed to this sack the fact that the mosque's mosaics disappeared). During the three hundred years from the initial construction to the construction of the famous minaret, almost no work was undertaken at the Mosque, except for the construction of a fountain in the mosque's courtyard.

In 1090, Abu'l Hasan Muhammad, the chief Islamic judge in the city, built the minaret, 45 meters tall. The construction was achieved in 1094, under the rule of Tutush I, Seljuk ruler of Damascus. The Seljuk Turks had taken over Aleppo in 1078, but the city still continued to suffer from the wars and conflicts, particularly since from the crusades. The mosque was also particularly affected by a great fire, despite the fact that the minaret was also built during this time. It was until the Zengid sultan Nur al-Din that the expansion and development of the city was resumed at a more accelerated pace, including through the work that Nur al-Din undertook on the Great Mosque.