A Holy Place in Islam: Time, Space, and Ideology in Mosque Architecture

The mosque as a holy place was born in order to serve the ritual and ceremonies of prayer. Its additional functions, such as a place for community assemblies, meetings with government representatives, a space for Quran studies and dissemination of knowledge of religious law (the madrasa as mosque), were devised in the course of history into a functional structural complex of architectural and decorative power.

The spread of Islam to the Mediterranean region as well as the Iranian east and the west of North Africa produced monumental and fascinating mosque buildings that presented an eclectic wealth deriving from a combination of rigid liturgical needs and expressions of a local, traditional architectural language. Thus in the Middle Ages and also in the course of modernism.

In the course we shall discuss the various problems of the institution of the mosque both past and present, and attempt to decipher the symbols, messages, and meanings accorded to mosques by their patron (a ruler, religious leader, or architect) on the one hand, and those that were understood and accepted by their congregations on the other.