FIG. 81.—MOSQUE OF KAÎD BEY, CAIRO.
DECORATION. Geometry, indeed, vied with the love of color in its hold on the Arabic taste. Ceiling-beams were carved into highly ornamental forms before receiving their rich color-decoration of red, green, blue, and gold. The doors and the mimber were framed in geometric patterns with slender intersecting bars forming complicated star-panelling. The voussoirs of arches were cut into curious interlocking forms; doorways and niches were covered with stalactite corbelling, and pavements and wall-incrustations, whether of marble or tiling, combined brilliancy and harmony of color with the perplexing beauty of interlaced star-and-polygon patterns of marvellous intricacy. Stained glass added to the interior color-effect, the patterns being perforated in plaster, with a bit of colored glass set into each perforation—a device not very durable, perhaps, but singularly decorative.
OTHER WORKS. Few of the mediæval Arabic palaces have remained to our time. That they were adorned with a splendid prodigality appears from contemporary accounts. This splendor was internal rather than external; the palace, like all the larger and richer dwellings in the East, surrounded one or more courts, and presented externally an almost unbroken wall. The fountain in the chief court, the diwân (a great, vaulted reception-chamber opening upon the court and raised slightly above it), the dâr, or men’s court, rigidly separated from the hareem for the women, were and are universal elements in these great dwellings. The more common city-houses show as their most striking features successively corbelled-out stories and broad wooden eaves, with lattice-screens covering single windows, or almost a whole façade, composed of turned work (mashrabiyya), in designs of great beauty.
The fountains, gates, and minor works of the Arabs display the same beauty in decoration and color, the same general forms and details which characterize the larger works, but it is impossible here to particularize further with regard to them.
FIG. 82.—MOORISH DETAIL, ALHAMBRA.
Showing stalactite and perforated work, Moorish cusped arch, Hispano-Moresque capitals, and decorative inscriptions.