In A.H. 802, a fire completely destroyed the north and west sides of the mosque: two years after, it was rebuilt at the expense of El Naszer Feradj Ibn Dhaher Berkouk, Sultan of Egypt. The wood necessary for that purpose was transported partly from Egypt and partly from Tayf, where the tree Arar, a species of cypress or juniper, furnished good timber.
In A.H. 906, Kansour el Ghoury, Sultan of Egypt, rebuilt the greater part of the side of Bab Ibrahim; and to him the Hedjaz owes several other public edifices.
In A.H. 959, in the reign of Solyman Ibn Selim I., Sultan of
Constantinople, the roof of the Kaaba was renewed.
In A.H. 980, the same Sultan rebuilt the side of the mosque towards the street Mosaa, and caused all the domes to be raised which cover the roof of the colonnades. He also placed the fine pavement, which is now round the Kaaba, and a new pavement all around the colonnades.
In A.H. 984, his son Murad repaired and partly rebuilt the three other sides, that had not been touched by him.
In the year 1039, (or 1626 of our era,) a torrent from Djebel Nour rushed into the town, and filled the mosque so rapidly, that all the persons then within it were drowned; whatever books, fine copies of the Koran, &c. &c. were left in the apartments round the walls of the building, were destroyed; and a part of the wall before the Kaaba, called Hedjer, and three sides of the Kaaba itself, were carried away. Five hundred souls perished in the town. In the following year the damage was repaired, and the Kaaba rebuilt, after the side which had escaped the fury of the torrent had been pulled down.
In 1072, the building over the well Zemzem was erected, as it now stands; and in 1079, the four Makams were built anew.
After this time, the historians mention no other material repairs or changes in the mosque; and I believe none took place in the eighteenth century. We may, therefore, ascribe the building, as it now appears, almost wholly to the munificence of the last Sultans of Egypt, and
[p.170] their successors, the Osmanly Sultans of Constantinople, since the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
In the autumn of 1816, several artists and workmen, sent from Constantinople, were employed in the Hedjaz to repair all the damage caused by the Wahabys in the chapels of the saints of that country, as well as to make all the repairs necessary in the mosques at Mekka and Medina.