دراسة لمبنى نموذجي من العهد المملوكي ١_a .. كتاب العمارة العربية الاسلامية

A study of a typical building from the Mamluk era
_Al-Jaqmaqiya School in Damascus_

History of the School: The Al-Jaqmaqiyya School is considered one of the most beautiful schools of the era. It is located next to the Umayyad Mosque, close to its northern door. It was established by Prince Saif al-Din Jaqmaq, the deputy of the Sultanate in Damascus (1), to be a place and a place for him and his mother. Its construction was completed in the year 824 / 1421, as stated in the inscription on the door and the facade. Jaqmaq granted many endowments to it, including the market named after him, and the khan located in the Medha Pasha market still bears his name. Before his death, Jaqmaq was devoted to the school, so he appointed teachers for it and decorated it with woven lanterns and all kinds of precious rugs. The sources mention that the school was looted when he was killed and its endowments were taken. But it remained open for teaching until our time. It stopped working when it was destroyed by a bomb from a raiding plane during World War II (1941). The General Directorate of Antiquities and Museums undertook its restoration and spending on it until it returned to its original condition (2), so it was used as the headquarters of the Arabic Calligraphy Museum.

School planning and architecture: The school is small in size, with a semi-square shape and lengths of (18 x 16) metres. Its plan consists of an entrance consisting of a door and a broken vestibule that leads to the courtyard of the madrasa, which is roofed and surrounded by four or utensils and a turret occupying the northeastern corner (see plan No. (27). It has two beautiful facades on the road, one northern and the other eastern, with a height of 5.90 meters. Windows opened in the lower section and small windows at the top, some of which are round and some of which are rectangular with a pointed arch. The façade is beautified by its courses colored in alternating black and yellow and a colored band of overlapping stones, then the writing band, which occupies two courses and is engraved in a beautiful thuluth type script, in relief and gilded. The text includes a Qur’anic verse followed by historical writing. We find it necessary to provide its text in detail to give an idea of ​​the style of writing on buildings in this era: This suffocation and blessed soil was established by the noble, exalted headquarters of the Mawlawi, the emir, the great, the universal, the Mahdi al-Abdi, the Hashemi, the hermit, the leader, the Muqadamis, al-Dakhri, al-Dhahiri, al-Sayfi, the glory of Islam. And the Muslims are the master of princes in the worlds, the sword of the Commander of the Faithful, Jaqmaq al-Dawadar al-Mu’aydi, the guarantor of the guarded Levantine kingdoms. May God multiply his reward and forgive him, his parents, and his loved ones on the Day of Judgment by directing the sword’s side, one blink and the other, in the months of the year eight hundred and twenty-four.

Moreover, at the top of the two facades there is a decorated band, the other consists of a series of niches. Then comes the merlons, which are in the shape of mashrabiyas. They have also been made in alternating black and white colours, to add more beauty to the general view of the building.

On the eastern façade, there is a window within a mihrab surmounted by muqarnas and an architectural ornament consisting of interwoven geometric threads of many colors (Photo No. 76).

Above the other two windows is another ornament that forms a circle in which stone mashrabiyas are set, colored alternately white and black. In the middle of the circle is the blazon of Prince Jaqmaq, which is composed of three fields. In the upper field is an inkwell, in the middle is a large cup with two small cups on it, and in the lower field is a smaller cup (see Figure No. 28).

It is noted that the angle resulting from the meeting of the two facades is non-existent in the lower section of the building, as it is cut off, and the muqarnas solve the problem of transition between the upper and lower sections.

The door and the entrance: The door is located at the end of the northern façade. It is an iwan equipped with two maksalats (two stone benches on either side of the door) roofed with a muqarnas arch ending in a shell, and in a chest. The iwan is the door opening and has a molded rectangular frame. It is surmounted by a shoulder arch composed of overlapping lobed stones of alternating black and white colours. Above that is a band of decoration, and another on which historical writing is engraved, along the length of the facade. The door is followed by a vestibule consisting of a small square room roofed with a cross arch resting in the corners on cupboards of protruding stones. In the middle of the arch is a small shell dome within an octagonal frame. The aforementioned room is equipped with a window facing outward, another facing inward, and a door leading into the courtyard. The courtyard: As for the madrasa, it is small, like the smallest courtyards of schools, mosques, and other buildings. It is approximately square in shape (13 x 14 meters), with a well-constructed eight-sided pool in the middle, and its floor is paved with colored stones and marble decorated with geometric shapes. The courtyard is roofed, but in a new way. There is nothing similar to it in buildings of previous eras. It is a flat roof made of wood, rising above the level of the ceilings of the iwans. This increase allowed the opening of windows that provide the courtyard with light. There are four on each side.