Interior (undergoing restoration). The old court of ablutions on the N.W. side of the building is again in use. The chief portal of the medreseh leads into a vestibule with a stalactite dome. We then pass through a second vestibule and a corridor to the main quadrangle, 38½ by 35 yds., containing the ruinous meidâ, or basin for ablutions, and a Turkish fountain (hanefîyeh), both disused. The four lîwâns, with their massive barrel-vaulting, are entered from the court by lofty marble portals, and are in this exceptional case all used as halls of prayer. The four small medresehs in the angles of the outer precincts, each with its court and lîwân, served as lecture-rooms and dwellings.
The sanctuary, 76 ft. in height, is adorned with a *Frieze bearing an inscription in Cufic (or old Arabic) characters, carved in stucco on a beautiful groundwork of arabesques. The wall of the mihrâb is richly decorated with marble. Of the once sumptuous furnishings the mimbar (pulpit), the dikkeh (reading-stand), and the wire-chains of the countless lamps (see p. [451]) and candelabra are now the sole relics.
To the right of the pulpit a bronze door, inlaid with gold and silver, leads into the sultan’s *Mausoleum, a domed chamber of 23 yds. square, 92 ft. in height. The only remains of the original dome are the wooden spandrels of the stalactites. The inscriptions on the wooden frieze are in the round characters (naskhi) used since the time of Saladin.
The Citadel (Pl. E, F, 6; ‘El-Kala’), commanding the city but itself overtopped by the Mokattam hills (p. [454]), was built by Saladin after 1166, in connection with the third town-wall (p. [444]), on the model of the Crusaders’ castles in Syria. The only remains of that building are the E. outer wall and several towers in the interior. The palaces of the Aiyubides (1171–1250), already half in ruins when Selim I. entered the city (1517), have entirely disappeared. The first restoration of the fortress dates from the reign of El-Ghûri (1501–16).
The direct way to the Citadel from the Place Rumeileh is by a street beyond the huge gate-tower Bâb el-Azab (Pl. E, 6), where the Mameluke leaders were shot by order of Mohammed Ali (p. [444]) in 1811. The chief approaches, ascending from the broad Shâria el-Maghar (Pl. E, 6), are the Shâria Bâb el-Gedîd and the Shâria ed-Defterkhâneh. The latter, for foot-passengers only, passes the S. side of the Defterkhâneh (Pl. F, 6; state-archives). The Bâb el-Gedid (Pl. F, 6; ‘new gate’) leads into the outer court of the Citadel. We then pass through the Bâb el-Wastâni (‘middle gate’) into the main court, where the ‘alabaster mosque’ faces us and the mosque of Nâsir rises on the left.
The Gâmia en-Nâsir (Pl. F, 6), built by En-Nâsir (p. [448]) in 1317, later used as a military storehouse and a prison, has now been cleared out, but may be seen by leave of the British military authorities. The fortress-like façade, and the portals in particular, show traces of Romanesque influence. The peculiar minarets, with their bulbous domes, are adorned with coloured fayence in the Persian style. The finest columns in the court are Byzantine; others are antique. The sadly disfigured lîwâns still retain their old coloured fretwork ceiling. The dome in front of the prayer-niche, which has collapsed with the exception of its drum, rests on ancient Egyptian granite columns, as in the mosque of Merdani (p. [450]).
The Gâmia Mohammed Ali (Pl. E, F, 6), known as the ‘alabaster mosque’ from the building-material chiefly used, was begun by Mohammed Ali in 1824 but completed only in 1857 by his successor Saîd. The architect was the Greek Yûsuf Boshna of Constantinople, who built it on the model of the Nuri Osmanieh mosque (p. [550]) with a staff of Greek workmen. The tall and unduly slender minarets form one of the chief landmarks of Cairo. The forecourt, with its hanefîyeh (fountain with taps), is flanked with arcades. The *Sanctuary, a domed Byzantine hall, borne by four square pillars, is grandly proportioned and beautifully lighted. To the left of the entrance is Mohammed Ali’s tomb (d. 1849).
From the S.W. wall of the Citadel, opposite the Viceregal Palace, we enjoy, especially towards evening, a magnificent *View of the city with its countless minarets and domes. To the N. and W. are the windmill-hills and the green plains watered by the Nile. To the W. rise the Pyramids of Gîzeh.
The view is far grander from the **Mokattam Hills, or Gebel Giyûshi, a fine standpoint being the conspicuous Gâmia Giyûshi, a Fatimite mosque (1085), reached in ½ hr. from the Bâb el-Gebel (Pl. F, 6), the ‘hill-gate’ of the citadel. A side-path to the right leads to the Convent of the Bektashi (Turkish dervishes), picturesquely situated on the bare hill-side.
From the Bâb el-Attaba (Bâb el-Atabeg; Pl. F, 5), the N. gate of the Citadel, we proceed past the cemetery Karâfet Bâb el-Wezîr (Pl. F, 5) to the Mameluke tombs (comp. p. [458]).