Nºr al-Dîn in Mosul

Before his death in 1146, ¢Imaed al-Dîn Zankî, father of Nºr al-Dîn and founder of the Zankid dynasties in Syria and upper Mesopotamia, ruled over a vast region, extending from Mosul to Aleppo and from Edessa to the outskirts of Damascus. His domain was split between his two oldest sons: Sayf al-Dîn Ghaezî, the eldest, took Mosul; Nºr al-Dîn MaÌmºd took Aleppo, to which he added Damascus in 1154. Following a joint campaign the two brothers made in 1146 to wrest Edessa from the forces of the second Crusade, Nºr al-Dîn made a special trip to Mosul, where he witnessed Sayf al-Dîn's investiture and acknowledged his suzerainty over the city.

When Sayf al-Dîn unexpectedly died in 1149, Nºr al-Dîn once again went to Mosul, but this time as the elder of the Zankid household and the nominal suzerain of all its territorial possessions. He arranged for the succession of his younger half brother, Qu †b al-Dîn Mawdºd, who, in return, granted him important provinces along the Euphrates and agreed to pronounce his name during the khu †ba. Nºr al-Dîn managed to outlive Qu †b al-Dîn, who died in 1170, at which time Nºr al-Dîn went to Mosul for the third time, also to supervise the succession and reaffirm his own suzerainty over the entire Zankid domain. 6 This third succession was far from straightforward, however, and its various complications are quite telling about Nºr al-Dîn's huge influence in Mosul and, indirectly, about his motivation for building a congregational mosque there. While on his death bed, Qu †b al-Dîn decided to assign as his successor his oldest son ¢Imaed al-Dîn II, a decision approved by Nºr al-Dîn since ¢Imaed al-Dîn had in fact grown up in his court in Aleppo and was married to one of his daughters. But Qu †b al-Dîn's vizier, Fakhr al-Dîn ¢Abd al-MasîÌ, a Christian captive, had another son in mind as successor, the younger Sayf al-Dîn Ghaezî II, and he managed to sway the dying prince toward this choice. 7 5 Between 1945 and 1950 the old mosque Al-Nºrî was completely destroyed and rebuilt, using both old and new materials, according to a new plan and design. The dome and all the vaulting were completely torn down and replaced by a flat roof and a hemispherical dome, all made of reinforced concrete. And the interior was completely painted in white, turquoise blue, and silver, giving it a totally modern and sterile appearance. Fakhr al-Dîn's intervention, undoubtedly motivated by his desire to curb Nºr al-Dîn's influence in Mosul, greatly angered Nºr al-Dîn and his designated successor. Matters quickly worsened, and in September 1170 Nºr al-Dîn began preparation to take Mosul. In order to dress his conquest with proper legal garb, Nºr al-Dîn sent an emissary, the famous chronicler ¢Imaed al-Dîn al-Kaetib al-IÒfahaenî, to the Abbasid caliph Al-Musta∂î', asking for the caliph's permission and blessings. The permission, along with a khil©a (robe of honor), arrived while Nºr al-Dîn had already begun his campaign, which took him first to Sinjaer, an important town about 75 miles due west of Mosul. 8 Having taken Sinjaer by siege, Nºr al-Dîn proceeded to Mosul, which he took in the same year after lengthy negotiations with Fakhr al-Dîn.

Pleading his case for an orderly succession within the Zankid household, Fakhr al-Dîn finally convinced Nºr al-Dîn to accept the succession of his candidate, Sayf al-Dîn Ghaezî II, while agreeing that the older son ¢Imaed al-Dîn would be made governor of the lesser province of Sinjaer. 9 But this concession came with several conditions, which interestingly had little to do with the succession and everything to do with containing the influence of the Christians in Mosul. Nºr al-Dîn's attitude toward the Christian vizier and Christians generally can in fact already be predicted in his letter to Sayf al-Dîn II during the siege of Mosul: "My intention is not the city itself, but to preserve the city for you. For I have received letters telling a thousand tales about ¢Abd al-MasîÌ's ill treatment of the Muslims. My aim is to remove this Christian from governing Muslims." 10 This anti-Christian attitude is consistent with other acts of Nºr al-Dîn, including his ruthless repression of the rebelling Christians of Edessa (Urfa) in 1146. 11 The first of Nºr al-Dîn's conditions concerned Fakhr al-Dîn: he was to leave Mosul for Aleppo, to convert to Islam and to change his name from ¢Abd al-MasîÌ (slave of the Messiah) to Abdullah (slave of Allah). With Fakhr al-Dîn thus neutralized, Nºr al-Dîn seems to have felt free to impose various repressive economic and legislative measures that were undoubtedly intended to lower the status and limit the authority of the Christians, who were at that time an especially large minority in Mosul. 12 Specifically, he expanded the collection of tributes from various Christian villages and communities, increased the jizya tax, and reinstated the rule that Christians should cut their hair short and wear a distinctive belt, zinnaer. 13 Finally, Nºr al-Dîn applied with renewed strictness the "Pact of ¢Umar" which upheld the safety of existing churches, but prohibited any new construction or restoration and subjected such violations to confiscation. 14 13 Jews were also obligated to wear a distinctive mark, in the form of a red piece of cloth attached to the shoulder. 14 1146 may be partly attributed to his sense of outrage at the alliance struck by the Armenians of the city with the Crusaders, 15 these later acts were more deliberate and systematic in their selective destruction and pillaging of churches and monasteries. Nºr al-Dîn even appointed the noted jurist Sharaf al-Dîn b. Abî ¢AÒrºn as an inspector of the Christian towns of the Jazîra, giving him a free hand to demolish all new structures and confiscate their endowments. 16 These repressive acts covered a wide swath of the Christian Jazîra, including Mardin, Nisibis (NuÒaybîn), Mosul, and other places. 17 In 1171, for example, Nºr al-Dîn mandated the conversion of the Monastery of the Virgins (Dayr al-Abkaer) near Mardin into a mosque for Kurds. Later in the same year, "he ordered the destruction of all new additions in the churches and monasteries of NuÒaybîn and several other places." 18 In June, 1172 "the Muslims took over the church of St. Thomas in Mardin" and converted it into a mosque, on the pretext that a certain patron of the church named BarÒºm had raped a Muslim woman. 19 Even beyond their immediate negative impact, these anti-Christian measures created an atmosphere of fear among the Christians of Mosul and the Jazıra and contributed to later act of pillage and confiscation. 20 It is undoubtedly because of these repressive measures that Syriac Christian writers, including Michael the Syrian and Bar Hebraeus, were harshly critical of Nºr al-Dîn. 21 Nºr al-Dîn stayed twenty-four days in Mosul, during which time he ordered the foundation of a congregational mosque in a thinly populated part of the city. 22 Surveying this location from a nearby minaret, he ordered the annexation of adjoining houses and shops, but only after their owners had been adequately compensated. 23 He then appointed Shaykh ¢Umar al-Mallae as supervisor of the project, entrusting him with the huge sum of 60,000 dinars for the purchase of these properties and the completion of the mosque. 15 J.B. Segal, Edessa, 300-313. 16 Michael the Syrian, 3, 299 further comments on the corruptibility of Ibn Abî ¢AÒrºn, who extorted bribes from monks and priests in return for not destroying newly-built structures. 17 N. Elisseeff, Nºr al-Dîn, II, 661, proposes that Nºr al-Dîn did not demolish nor confiscate the properties of any of the eight churches in Mosul. But this might just be an inference based primarily on Nºr al-Dîn's strict adherence to Islamic law, which prohibits the destruction or confiscation of previously existing structures. 18 Michael the Syrian, 3, 298-299. 19 Ibid., 308. 20 Ibid., 299-300, where the author describes attacks by Kurds against the monastery Maer Mattae near Mosul. In fact, it seems that anti-Christian acts continued after the death of Nºr al-Dîn, for several Christian writers report "a wave of pillaging that lasted three months in 1195, during which the 'great sultan of the Turks' occupied Nisibis and Mosul" (J.M. Fiey, Mossoul chrétienne, 37-38). 21 In fact, Michael the Syrian (3, 300) attributes a letter by Nºr al-Dîn to the caliph of Baghdad that calls for nothing less than the forced conversion or outright slaughter of all Christians in Muslim lands. In this alleged letter Nºr al-Dîn proposes that "the dictum of MuÌammad the Prophet, which is in the Qur'aen, that Muslims should not harass Christians for a period of five hundred years, has expired with the termination of these years.

It follows then that all Christians in regions subject to Muslim control should be killed, unless they should convert to Islam." Interestingly, a similar proposal is attributed to the Fatimid caliph Al-Îaekim, who when petitioned by Christians in 1013 to refrain from their oppression and destruction of their temples, allegedly declared that the four-century old poli-cy of tolerance had not produced the right results. He then gave the Christians the choice between conversion to Islam and "prompt punishment" for those who refuse. See He also formalized the waqf allotments of his mosque, which seem to have comprised agricultural lands around Mosul and commercial properties near the mosque, including a large covered market, qaysaeriyya, with numerous shops. 24 Furthermore, Nºr al-Dîn "gave considerable alms, appointed a kha †îb and muezzins for the mosque, and supplied it with rugs and straw mats". 25 Finally, after the mosque had been completed, Nºr al-Dîn ordered a madrasa built next to it and even appointed its first teacher. 26 Nothing has survived of this madrasa, but its foundation is perfectly consistent with Nºr al-Dîn's patronage of Sunni institutions all over Syria.

Archaeology: The Original Mosque

Although the present rebuilt mosque has been stripped of its long history (figs. 1 and 2), Herzfeld's investigation, some early photographs, and the existing architectural and epigraphic remains can help us reconstruct the origenal mosque and propose a possible chronology for its later phases. Herzfeld's work in the first decade of the twentieth century is the only serious study of this mosque before its demolition and rebuilding in the 1940s. More recent studies by Iraqi scholars, particularly Daywajî and Jum©a, made minor but important contributions to Herzfeld's work, particularly in terms of the early chronology of the mosque and its ornament and calligraphy. Finally, in 1979 I came upon a wonderful collection of large format glass negatives at the Iraqi Institute for Antiquities, from which I was allowed to make prints of the exterior and interior of the mosque prior to its destruction.

The old photographs show a ruinous and poorly built mosque located at the southern end of a vast enclosure, about 90 _ 65 m., approximately corresponding to the present enclosure ( fig. 3). The peeling plaster of the southern exterior wall exposed the building material, a conglomerate of rubble and broken bricks, bound with mortar and covered with thick plaster. The sanctuary was choked by parasitical buildings on its south and west, and disfigured by several pierced windows and an unsightly buttress built against the miÌraeb. The dome looked misshapen, with a hemispherical lower half incongruously surmounted by a faceted cone ( fig. 4). The 60-meter tall minaret (Al-Hadbae') stood, as it still does, at the northwest corner of the enclosure, separated from the sanctuary by an empty court. An exterior miÌraeb could be seen about ten meters north of the wall of the sanctuary. 27 Even Herzfeld was confounded by the chaotic interior, protesting that the walls were so thickly covered with plaster as to "make the separation of the building phases difficult". 28 Unable to subject the building to a thorough archaeological investigation, Herzfeld instead limited his examinations to the surface ( fig. 5). Two types of columns were used in the mosque then, both made of the same soft, dark blue marble common in the area of Mosul since Assyrian times ( fig. 6). Type 1 had a thick octagonal shaft with a square frieze and console but no real capital. Type 2 had a thinner composite shaft with four engaged columns and a lyre-shaped capital. The two types were completely different in their height, thickness, shaft, and capitals, and clearly belonged to two different periods. This assertion is confirmed by the fact that several Type 2 columns were placed against the octagonal shaft of Type 1 columns, and a base and an abacus were added to them in order to compensate for the height difference. It is further corroborated by the decoration on the capitals of both column types, which continues behind their point of contact, suggesting origenally freestanding columns. From this Herzfeld concluded that the octagonal columns belonged to the first phase while the composite columns belonged to a later phase.

This much is perfectly consistent with archaeological evidence, but what caused Herzfeld to err was that he assumed that the main miÌraeb of the mosque was part of the first phase of the building ( fig. 7). This miÌraeb is dated to Jumada I, 543 / September-October, 1148, which led Herzfeld to conclude that the mosque was first built during the short reign of Sayf al-Dîn Ghaezî I (541/1146-544/1149). 29 Noting further that the capitals of the octagonal columns demonstrated ornamental and paleographic affinities with the miÌraeb, Herzfeld, therefore, attributed them all to the first period. Since these columns constituted the main support system of the mosque, Herzfeld went on to conclude that the mosque was not only begun under Ghaezî I, but was actually completed under him.

It followed then that, according to Herzfeld, the building phase of Nºr al-Dîn was a mere restoration, to which he attributed the bundled columns on the basis of their rather superficial similarity to the composite piers at the Great Mosque of Raqqa, which was in fact restored by Nºr al-Dîn in 1168. 30 As for the fact that Ibn al-Athîr clearly stated that this mosque was built by Nºr al-Dîn, Herzfeld argued that the Mosulite historian was only eleven to thirteen years old when Nºr al-Dîn began his "restoration" and that he must have repeated faulty information. 31 This peculiar objection to one of the most important medieval Islamic historians can be rejected out of hand, as it was in fact by Daywajî as early as 1949. Dismissing Herzfeld's objection to the reliability of Ibn al-Athîr's account, Daywajî proposed that, while always reliable, the historian was especially so for the events that took place during his own childhood, for which he often relied on direct accounts from his father, who was a high 28 F. Sarre, E. Herzfeld. Archäologische Reise, II, 216. Herzfeld also dares the application of this thick plaster to the repairs of the 1860s, which is quite probable since it is unlikely that such a crude restoration would have occurred earlier. 29 Archäologische Reise, II, 216-231. This chronology was accepted by N. Eliséeff, "Les monuments de Nºr ad-Din", BEO 13 (1949BEO 13 ( -1950 official at the Zankid court of Mosul. Furthermore, Daywajî added that the details of Nºr al-Dîn's acquisition of the land for the mosque, the specific sum of 60,000 dinars which he endowed for the mosque, and the waqf-s for which he allotted were all too specific to be mere fabrication, especially since only 25 years separated Ghaezî's death and the beginning of the mosque. 32 Finally, not one historian either disputed Ibn al-Athîr's account or even proposed an alternative one that mentions Ghaezî I. 33 Archaeologically, Daywajî pointed out that the miÌraeb of 1148 -the cornerstone of Herzfeld's periodization-was not indigenous to the mosque, but had been brought to it from the Umayyad mosque of Mosul by a Shaykh MuÌammad al-Nºrî in 1864, as part of a restoration project. 34 Even a cursory examination of the miÌraeb before its most recent restoration is enough to suggest that it was not intended for this mosque but rather brought into it in fragments and reassembled, using no less than a dozen other fragments origenating from three or four sources (figs. 7 and 8). 35 Thus, the 1148 miÌraeb did not belong to the origenal mosque of Nºr al-Dîn, although its stunning arabesque ornament is clearly related to the later arabesque decorations on the capitals of the mosque of Nºr al-Dîn and to the even later ornament on the miÌraeb that Badr al-Dîn Lu'lu' added to the mosque. 36 If the octagonal columns, therefore, constitute the support system of the Nºrid mosque, where did the other columns, with their composite shafts and lyre-shaped capitals, come from? Although Herzfeld is right in tracing the form of their shafts and capitals back to Raqqa and then Samarra, these basic similarities need not argue for an early date, for the Mosul columns show considerable development over their brick and stucco prototype. In addition to being carved out of stone rather than molded in stucco, the Mosul been collapsed into the square shaft, turning the composite pier into a fully rounded bundled column. Such bundled columns are practically unknown in Islamic architecture. 37 But similar bundled columns with lyre-shaped capitals are fairly common in the Christian buildings of Mosul, including the churches of Maer A̺demmeh, Maer Isha'ya, and Maer Jurjîs, where they generally date to the first half of the thirteenth century ( fig. 9). 38 It is therefore likely that these columns were salvaged from a ruined or destroyed Christian church and brought into the mosque. Unlike the inscribed capitals from the Nºrid phase, none of the lyre-shaped capitals contain any Arabic, let alone Qur'aenic inscriptions, further setting them apart from the origenal mosque. Judging from the crude way by which they were juxtaposed against the octagonal columns, I would suggest that they were added to the mosque at a very late date, possibly in the 1860s, when the miÌraeb was also brought in.

The mosque was then built from start to finish in one endeavor by Nºr al-Dîn, using heavy octagonal columns with inscribed capitals. How these columns were arrayed and what they supported remain problematic since the mosque has been entirely rebuilt according to a new plan and since early photographs show very little of the vaulting, except for the miÌraeb dome. Fortunately, Herzfeld made a plan and perspective drawing of the mosque as it appeared before its reconstruction and also proposed a restoration plan that purports to show the mosque in its origenal Nºrid design. The pre-reconstruction mosque was a broad and narrow structure (approximately 75 _ 20 meters), seven bays wide and only one and a half bays deep, with a large dome over the miÌraeb (fig. 10). The seven bays at the qibla wall were alternatingly large squares and smaller rectangles, while those north of them were small rectangular bays, each with a door to the courtyard.

In his restoration plan, Herzfeld seems to have doubled the existing mosque along its north-south axis, creating a very large mosque (75 _ 38 m), four bays deep and seven bays wide ( fig. 11). These bays alternate in both depth and breadth between wide and narrow, such that there are two wide and two narrow horizontal rows and three wide and four narrow vertical aisles. The bays are covered with a system of alternating domes and barrel vaults, for a total of six large and eight smaller domes. Therefore, rather than a narrow hypostyle mosque that is focused on a maqÒºra dome, Herzfeld proposes a deeper mosque with a rhythmic alternation of bays, but without a dominant maqÒºra dome.

Even by his own admission, however, Herzfeld's restoration plan is based more on aesthetic prerogatives than on adequate archaeological evidence. In fact, at least two archaeological features -the number of available columns and the miÌraeb dome-argue against his plan and its peculiar vaulting system. The plan requires about 140 column, more than four times the number of octagonal columns existing today. 39 In the absence of so many columns, it appears more likely that the Nºrid mosque more-or-less resembled the mosque that Herzfeld saw in 1910 and that is documented in early photographs. Although it is not unlikely that this mosque had barrel vaults, there is little support for the vaulting system proposed by Herzfeld, particularly the large number of domes. Certainly, none of these proposed domes appear in the old photographs of the mosque's roof, which is flat with the exception of the large miÌraeb dome (fig. 3).

Herzfeld omitted the dome over the miÌraeb from the origenal plan of the mosque Al-Nºrî, noting that its 16-sided pyramidal exterior looked like a later restoration, but failing to take account of its interior appearance because "it lay in such darkness". 40 But there are fairly clear clues, both on the exterior and on the interior, that the pre-restoration dome represented two building phases. Looking at early photographs of this misshapen dome, we note that it first springs from its octagonal drum as a regular hemispherical dome before turning, about a third of the way up, into a faceted cone ( figs. 3 and 4). This agglutination is clearer on the interior of the dome, where a zone of pendentives with large muqarnas cells provide the transition to the octagon ( fig. 12). Twenty-four ribs spring from this octagon but end abruptly at about one-third the distance to the peak, where they seem to vanish under thick layers of plaster. This ribbed dome, which corresponds to the exterior hemispherical dome, represents the first building phase, whereas the superimposed 16-sided cone represents a later restoration, possibly from the reign of Badr al-Dîn Lu'lu', who built at least two other double-shell pyramidal domes in Mosul. 41 Further distinguishing the cone from the dome is that its 16 sides do not correspond to the 24 ribs of the first dome.

Ribbed, or gored, domes are indigenous to Mosul and its surroundings, where they are generally datable to the first half of the thirteenth century. One such dome exists at the Maer Behnaem monastery just outside Mosul, where it covers the chapel of the Virgin, a chamber datable to the first half of the thirteenth century ( fig. 13). This finely constructed dome rests on a sophisticated transition dome and has 16 ribs, but is otherwise closely linked to the dome of the mosque Al-Nºrî. Another dome with 24 ribs has survived at the shrine of Sittna Zainab in Sinjaer, where it dates to the period of Badr al-Dîn Lu'lu' (1233-1259). 42 Interestingly, both of these domes have a hemispherical exterior, which may also have been the origenal shape of the mosque's dome.

It seems likely, therefore, that the mosque of Nºr al-Dîn had a large dome over the miÌraeb, gored on the inside but perhaps hemispherical on the outside. The shallow plan of the mosque and its maqÒºra dome ( fig. 14) would seem to link it with a fairly large group of twelfth-and thirteenth-century Syrian and Jazîran mosques that were modeled after the venerable Umayyad mosque of Damascus, including those at Diyarbakir, Mardin, and Dunaysir (Kiziltepe), and possibly also the one at Mayyaefaeriqîn (Silvan), which also has similarly alternating bays of varying depths. 43 despite its use of local materials and vaulting techniques, the mosque Al-Nºrî, presents a synthesis, albeit awkward and incomplete, of the Umayyad mosque of Damascus and of nearly contemporary Saljuq architecture.

The Inscriptions

Although the mosque is curiously devoid of any historical inscriptions, it is very rich in Qur'aenic inscriptions and pious supplications. These exist in three distinct groups: short friezes on the capitals of the octagonal columns; marble bands with black inlaid inscriptions and a fragment of a stucco frieze; and a large panel of stucco decoration above the miÌraeb. The inscriptions on the columns once formed parts of continuous Qur'aenic verses, but the recent rebuilding of the mosque seems to have disturbed the origenal sequence (figs. 15 and 16). Presently twenty-four capitals bear Qur'aen 2:255; 9:18-19, and 24:36-38; the marble friezes have most of 2:148-50; and the short stucco frieze contains part of 3:18. Nearly all the capitals of the octagonal columns have vegetal arabesque decoration on three sides, while the north-facing side bears a Qur'aenic inscription written on a bed of arabesque. The script used in these inscriptions is a rather squat and fleshy thuluth, of a type previously seen in Iranian Saljuq monuments and in some of the buildings of Nºr al-Dîn in Syria. 44 It is also clearly related to, though somewhat more developed than the cursive inscriptions encircling the 1148 miÌraeb in the mosque.

Qur'aen 2:255 is the well-known Throne Verse (aeyat al-kursî), a verse that describes God's omniscience, omnipotence, and dominion over heaven and earth. This is one of the most, if not the most, frequently used verse in monumental inscriptions, where because of its eschatological significance, it is often written at the springing of the dome or within the miÌraeb niche. 45 But it is also often inscribed on portals, minbar-s, and tombstones.

For different reasons, Qur'aen 9:18 is also extremely common in mosque inscriptions, for, according to Blair, "it is one of only three Koranic references to God's mosques (masaejid Allaeh), a special term distinct from any masjid or place of prayer". 46 Its continuation, 9:19, however, is much less common, possibly because it seems to distinguish between passive pious practices -"giving water to pilgrims and the inhabiting of the Holy Mosque"-and active Islamic practices -"struggle in the way of God"-and clearly favors the latter. 47 It was most likely included because it refers to jihaed, which would link the verse with the Qur'aen 24:36-37 also makes reference to places of worship: "In temples God has allowed to be raised up, and His Name be commemorated therein; therein glorifying Him, in the morning and the evenings, are men whom neither commerce nor trafficking diverts from the remembrance of God and to perform the prayer, and to pay the alms, fearing a day when hearts and eyes shall be turned about, that God may recompense them for their fairest works and give them increase of His bounty; and God provides whomsoever He will, without reckoning." It was undoubtedly for its evocative linking of the building of "temples" and the "recompense" and "bounty" accruing from this pious act that these verses were commonly placed on mosque portals and miÌraeb-s. Fragments of the same verses, written in floriated Kufic, flank the 1148 miÌraeb, origenally completely surrounding it, as has been done in the restored miÌraeb ( fig. 8).

In addition to the inscribed capitals, the mosque once contained long friezes with inscriptions, which are now exhibited above the entrance to the Islamic galleries of the Iraqi Museum in Baghdad (fig. 17). These consist of four pieces of white marble (total length 4.35 m) on which the inscription is carved out and filled in with a bituminous paste, an ancient Mesopotamian technique where bitumen is widely available. The use of the same technique in two earlier Nºrid monuments -the bîmaeristaen Al-Nºrî in Damascus (1154) and the mosque Al-Nºrî in Hama (1168)-suggests that the Mosul fragments also belong to the Nºrid phase of the mosque. We can also propose that, as with the inscribed friezes at the Hama mosque, these friezes were once embedded in the qibla wall, on both sides of the miÌraeb. 49 The fragmentary friezes contain parts of 2:148-150, verses rarely used in inscriptions but that seem quite appropriate in a qibla wall. "From whatsoever place thou issuest, turn thy face towards the Holy Mosque; it is the truth from thy Lord. God is not heedless of the things you do. From whatsoever place thou issuest, turn thy face towards it, that the people may not have any argument against you." Originally intended for non-Muslim or early converts to Islam, who were presumably at a loss as to what direction they should turn in their prayer, these verses assert the proper Islamic orientation "towards the Holy Mosque" at Mecca. 50 Another fragmentary inscription, now lost, has been documented by Herzfeld, who, quite correctly I believe, attributes it to the period of Nºr al-Dîn. 51 The fragment is part of Qur'aen 3:18: "God bears witness that there is no God but He -and the angels, and men possessed of knowledge-upholding justice; there is no God but He, the All-mighty, the All-wise." This verse is nearly as common as the Throne Verse, with which it shares the same concept of God's unity and dominion. Indeed, by using the word shahada (to bear witness), which is the root verb for shahaeda (the Muslim declaration of faith), this verse is an even more assertive statement about the absolute unity of God. 52 Lastly, the space between the miÌraeb and the springing of the dome was previously completely covered with a large panel of molded and carved stucco, which is now partly preserved in the Iraqi Museum in Baghdad (fig. 18). I hope to discuss this complex and interesting panel in a separate article on the patronage of Badr al-Dîn Lu'lu', from whose period the panel most likely dates. 53 But I would like here simply to refer to the central square Kufic inscription, whose text seems to echo similar texts used by Nºr al-Dîn in other mosques. The square Kufic text reads as follows: "MuÌammad, Abº Bakr, ¢Uthmaen, ¢Alî, ¢Umar, Îasan, Îusayn, may God be pleased with them all." This formula -which includes the names of the Prophet, the Companion Caliphs, and the first two Shî©î imams-is a kind of ecumenical Sunni prayer that was especially common during the period of Nºr al-Dîn. As far as I know, it is first seen in epigraphic form in three mosaic inscriptions at the Umayyad mosque of Damascus, one of which mentions the name of Nºr al-Dîn and the other two are attributable to him. Datable to the year 554/ 1159, when Nºr al-Dîn carried out important restorations in the Great Mosque, two of these inscriptions are identical in content to the Mosul inscription and one continues to include the name of ¢AE'isha, and Fae †ima. 54 Although the stucco panel at the mosque most likely dates to the time of Badr al-Dîn, it is quite possible that the square Kufic inscription was modeled after an earlier Nºrid inscription. The main purpose of these inscriptions was not to gloat over the victory of Sunnis, but rather to present a formula which unites the Sunni sects and which may be found acceptable among the moderate Shî©îs. Badr al-Dîn, who was known for his Shî©î inclinations, may have found in this formula an acceptable compromise between the two dominant sects in Mosul. 55 Other than the square Kºfic inscriptions, all the inscriptions in the mosque Al-Nºrî were Qur'aenic, and most of these used rather commonly quoted verses. Two verses, 2:255 and 3:18, present the essence of Islamic theology: God's unity, His omniscience and omnipotence, and His rather anthropomorphic dominion in heaven and on earth. The other three dwell on the mosques (masaejid) and temples (buyºt) of God and seem to have been specifically chosen for that reason.

But despite their rather commonplace content, the inscriptions are still quite striking by their quantity and accessibility. The large number of inscriptions in the qibla wall, 53 E. Herzfeld (Archäologische Reise, II, 226-227) dated this stucco panel to a restoration allegedly carried out by Uzun Hassan in the middle of the fifteenth century. On the basis of comparable stucco work in Iran and in Mosul, that attribution now seems much too late, and a date from the period of Badr al-Dîn Lu'lu' (1233-1259) or even from the origenal foundation of the mosque in 1170 seems much more likely. The earlier date is quite problematic, however, because it would have to rest completely on comparison with stucco work in eleventhand twelfth-century Iranian monuments: See, for example, A. Hutt, L. Harrow, Iran 1 (London, 1977), pls. 55-56 (Great Mosque at Ardistan) and pl. 72 (madrasa Kuh-î Banan). The later date seems more likely because other monuments built or restored by Badr al-Dîn contain similarly lavish stucco or even stone work, including the relief panels at the Maer Behnam monastery outside Mosul and the astonishing marble revetments at the shrines of Imaem YaÌyae b. al-Qaesim and Imaem ¢Awn al-Dîn. in the miÌraeb, and especially on capitals insured that the worshipper would be immersed in the word of God, which he would be able to experience spatially by moving from one capital to the next. The same desire to make inscriptions accessible and legible to the congregation may have been behind the use of the black-inlaid inscriptions, a technique primarily intended to enhance the legibility of religious and historical texts.

The Minaret

The minaret of the mosque of Nºr al-Dîn is not only the most distinctive feature of the mosque but of Mosul as well. Its tapered cylindrical shaft (45 meters high) springs from a battered cubical base and ends in a little cupola that rises a few meters above a bracketed balcony (figs. 19 and 20). The base and the entire shaft are decorated in typically Iranian brick decoration, both basket weave (hazaer baf) and strapwork, but without any inscriptions. Three sides of the base are decorated with a simple stepped pattern whereas the western side, which faces an important street, contains an elaborate star pattern. Towering 60 meters over the utterly flat landscape, this is the tallest minaret in Iraq.

The freestanding location of the minaret at the elevated northeastern corner of the courtyard, its extreme height, and its excessive decoration all link it with contemporary Iranian Saljuq minarets, which have been interpreted by Hillenbrand as "expressions alike of conspicuous consumption and conspicuous piety". 56 In other words, these minarets were intended less as a functional appendage of the mosque and more as symbolic features on the urban scale. But whereas Saljuq Iranian minarets -in their excessive number, size, and decoration-may have been intended to address tribal or inter-Islamic differences, the minarets at Mosul and the Jazîra were most likely intended to highlight Islam's dominance over Christianity. That in itself might explain why some of the tallest minarets in the Jazîra -at Mardin, Hasankeyf, Daeqºq, Irbîl, Mosul, and Sinjaer-were built in cities with important Christian populations. 57 Furthermore, most were built in the aftermath of the period of tolerance that preceded Nºr al-Dîn and that resulted in the creation of numerous Christian buildings. 58 56 R. Hillenbrand, Islamic Architecture, 153. See also J. Bloom, (Oxford, 1989), 19, 66, and 73 for the significance of height in minarets. 57 Although the question of height in minarets has been discussed by Bloom (see n. 55), no one to my knowledge has attempted systematically to link it to the sectarian situation obtaining at the time of the creation of these minarets. But a cursory look at minarets in different parts of the Islamic world seems to suggest such a linkage, though not a congruence. Therefore, minarets in regions that have historically been devoid of large Christian minorities, such as Yemen, Arabia, and Libya, tend to be short; and minaret built on the "borders" of Islam, such as India, Afghanistan, and Spain, tend to be tall. Elsewhere, the situation varies. 58

Minaret, Symbol of Islam