Maqsūra

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The Maqsūra in Arabic مقصورة, مقاصير, DMG maqṣūra, Pl. Maqāṣīr is an area in the prayer room of a mosque that was originally separated for the Islamic ruler or governor . It is usually located next to the minbar .

The maqsūra in history

The Umayyads

The Islamic historiography reported unanimously about the fact that the maqsura either at the time of the third Caliph Uthman ibn Affan , or from the first († 656) Umayyad Mu'awiya I. († 680), or of Marwan I. († 685) as a "lodge" was introduced for the rulers to prevent enemy raids on them. at-Tabari reports in his annalistic world history, al-Baladhuri in his Kitāb Futūh al-buldān "The Conquest of the Lands" that Marwan ibn al-Hakam, still in his capacity as governor of Medina , already in the year 664 as he of one Yemenis attacked and had a stone maqsūra built with a window. His example was followed by Muʿāwiya in Syria that same year. According to older sources, Ibn ʿAsākir reports that the maqsūra was also used as a meeting place for the caliph and his advisers at the time of Muʿāwiya. He also reports that after the inauguration of Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik in 717, a maqsūra was established for the caliph.

The Abbasids

As under the Umayyads, the maqsūra was also a place of public life at the time of the Abbasid caliph al-Mahdī († 785); During his visit to Medina, the Caliph entered the maqsūra in the Prophet's Mosque in Medina to distribute decorations and gifts to the distinguished representatives of the Quraish . According to historical reports, al-Mahdī is said to have banned this facility in prayer halls of the main mosques in the provinces by decree in 778. In Baghdad , at the seat of the Abbasids, the maqsūra remained, however, where al-Maʿmūn performed the festive prayer on the day of Arafat (“yaum ʿArafa”), at the height of the Islamic pilgrimage . Al-Ma'mun († 833) wanted to remove the maqsura from all mosques on the grounds that it states that it is one, but not only from the Umayyad Mu'awiya the Prophet Mohammed established Sunnah , therefore a Bid'a . Nevertheless, as Ibn Chaldun points out, the maqsūra was subsequently understood as “a specifically Islamic institution”.

The Maqsūra of Kairouan

Minbar with the maqsūra in the background. Historic postcard from around 1900

The oldest maqsūra, built around 1040 and still preserved today, is in the Great Mosque of Kairouan . It is by order of Al-Muʿizz b. Bādīs az-Zīrī († 1062) with a decorative wooden structure adapted to the adjoining minbar and the foundation inscription in stylized Kufi ductus. The inscription frieze on the upper edge of the maqsūra was first published in 1950 in Arabic and a French translation. According to another inscription on the wooden structure, the maqsūra was repaired between December 1624 and January 1625. The building, which was accessible through a double gate carved into the qibla wall, called Bāb al-Imām "Door of the Ruler", is one of the most beautiful examples of Islamic interior architecture.

The Kairouan Mosque Library, a collection of valuable Koran codices and literary manuscripts from the late 9th and 10th centuries, was still housed in the maqsūra in the late 19th century.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edition. Brill, suffering. Vol. 6, p. 196. at-Tabari: Taʾrīch , Vol. 2, 70: “This year Marwān created the maqsūra. And - it is reported - it also established Muʿāwiya in Syria. "Al-Balādhurī, p. 21 (Cairo 1959):" The first who had the maqsūra built (in the Prophet's mosque ) was Marwān ibn al-Hakam ibn al- Ās ibn Umayya. He had it built out of carved stone. "
  2. ↑ Taʾrīch Dimaschq , Vol. 7, p. 30 and Vol. 68, p. 119
  3. ↑ Taʾrīch Dimaschq , vol. 2, p. 271: "One establishes the maqsūra for Sulayman ibn ʿAbd al-Malik when he was elected caliph (ustuḫlifa)."
  4. ↑ Taʾrīch Dimaschq , Vol. 53, p. 431
  5. ↑ Taʾrīch Dimaschq , Vol. 33, p. 276
  6. ↑ AJ Wensinck and JH Kramers: Short dictionary of Islam. Brill, Leiden, 1941. p. 437
  7. ↑ AJ Wensinck and JH Kramers: Short dictionary of Islam. Brill, Leiden, 1941. p. 437
  8. ↑ S. Flury: Islamic writing tapes. Amida-Diarbekir. XI. Century. Appendix: Kairouan. Basel, Paris 1920; Paul Sebag: The Great Mosque of Kairouan , p. 105
  9. ^ B. Roy, P. Poinssot: Inscriptions arabes de Kairouan . Paris 1950. Vol. 1, pp. 18-23
  10. ^ B. Roy, P. Poinssot: Inscriptions arabes de Kairouan . Paris 1950. Vol. 1, pp. 23-24
  11. ^ Paul Sebag: The Great Mosque of Kairouan , p. 105
  12. ^ Georges Marçais: Tunis et Kairouan . Paris 1937. p. 60
  13. ↑ See about it the first report of the French orientalists Octave Houdas and R. Basset: Mission scientifique en Tunisie. In: Bulletin de Correspondance Africaine, Vol. 1, (1882)

literature

  • AJ Wensinck and JH Kramers: Concise Dictionary of Islam. Brill, Leiden, 1941. p. 437
  • Georges Marçais: Tunis et Kairouan. Paris 1937
  • The Encyclopaedia of Islam . New Edition. Brill, suffering. Vol. 6, p. 196.
  • B. Roy, P. Poinssot: Inscriptions arabes de Kairouan . Paris 1950
  • Paul Sebag: The Great Mosque of Kairouan . Translated from the French by Richard Howard. London, New York 1965