[p.91]having been erected piecemeal,-of its most classic period being that of its greatest irregularity.
Such "architectural lawlessness," such disregard for symmetry,-the result, I believe, of an imperfect "amalgamation and enrichment,"-may doubtless be defended upon the grounds both of cause and of effect. Architecture is of the imitative arts, and Nature, the Myriomorphous, everywhere delighting in variety, appears to abhor nothing so much as perfect similarity and precise uniformity. To copy her exactly we must therefore seek that general analogy compatible with individual variety; in fact, we should avoid the over-display of order and regularity. And again, it may be asserted that, however incongruous these disorderly forms may appear to the conventional eye, we find it easy to surmount our first antipathy. Perhaps we end in admiring them the more, as we love those faces in which irregularity of feature is compensated for by diversity and piquancy of expression.
There is nothing, I believe, new in the Arab Mosque; it is an unconscious revival of the forms used from the earliest ages to denote by symbolism the worship of the generative and the creative gods. The reader will excuse me if I only glance at a subject of which the investigation would require a volume, and which, discussed at greater length, would be out of place in such a narrative as this.
The first Mosque in Al-Islam was erected by Mohammed at Kuba, near Al-Madinah: shortly afterwards, when he entered Meccah as a conqueror, he destroyed the three hundred and sixty idols of the Arab Pantheon, and thus purified that venerable building from its abominations. He had probably observed in Syrian Bostra the two forms appropriated by the Christians to their places of worship, the cross and the parallelogramic Basilica; he therefore preferred for the prayers of the "Saving Faith" a square,-some authors say, with, others
[p.92]without, a cloister. At length in the reign of Al-Walid (A.H. 90) the cupola, the niche, and the minaret made their appearance; and what is called the Saracenic style became for ever the order of the Moslem world.
The Hindus I believe to have been the first who symbolised by an equilateral triangle their peculiar cult, the Yoni-Linga: in their temple architecture, it became either a conoid or a perfect pyramid. Egypt denoted it by the obelisk, peculiar to that country; and the form appeared in different parts of the world: thus in England it was a mere upright stone, and in Ireland a round tower. This we might expect to see. D'Hancarville and Brotier have successfully traced the worship itself, in its different modifications, to all people: the symbol would therefore be found everywhere. The old Arab minaret is a plain cylindrical or polygonal tower, without balcony or stages, widely different from the Turkish, modern Egyptian, and Hijazi combinations of tube and prism, happily compared by a French traveller to "une chandelle coiffee d'un eteignoir." And finally the ancient minaret, made solid as all Gothic architecture is, and provided with a belfry, became the spire and steeple of our ancestors.
>From time immemorial, in hot and rainy lands, a hypaethral court, either round or square, surrounded by a covered portico, was used for the double purpose of church and mart,-a place where God and Mammon were worshipped turn by turn. In some places we find rings of stones, like the Persian Pyroetheia; in others, circular concave buildings representing the vault of heaven, where Fire, the divine symbol, was worshipped; and in Arabia, columnar aisles, which, surmounted by the splendid blue vault, resemble the palm-grove. The Greeks adopted this idea in the fanes of Creator Bacchus; and at Pozzuoli, near Naples, it may be seen in the building vulgarly called the Temple of Serapis. It was equally well known
[p.93]to the Kelts: in some places the Temenos was a circle, in others a quadrangle. And such to the present day is the Mosque of Al-Islam.
Even the Riwak or porches surrounding the area in the Mosque are revivals of older forms. "The range of square buildings which enclose the temple of Serapis are not, properly speaking, parts of the fane, but apartments of the priests, places for victims, and sacred utensils, and chapels dedicated to subordinate deities, introduced by a more complicated and corrupt worship, and probably unknown to the founders of the original edifice." The cloisters in the Mosque became cells, used as lecture rooms, and stores for books bequeathed to the college. They are unequal, because some are required to be of larger, others to be of smaller, dimensions. The same reason causes difference of size when the building is distributed into four hyposteles opening upon the area: the porch in the direction of the Ka'abah, where worshippers mostly congregate, demands greater depth than the other three. The wings were not unfrequently made unequal, either from want of building materials, or because the same extent of accommodation was not required in both. The columns were of different substances; some of handsome marble, others of rough stone meanly plastered over, with dissimilar capitals, vulgarly cut shafts of various sizes; here with a pediment, there without, now turned upside down, then joined together by halves in the centre, and almost invariably nescient of intercolumnar rule. This is the result of Byzantine syncretism, carelessly and ignorantly grafted upon Arab ideas of the natural and the sublime. Loving and admiring the great, or rather the big in plan,[FN#4]} they care
[p.94]little for the execution of mere details, and they have not the acumen to discern the effect which clumsy workmanship, crooked lines, and visible joints,-parts apparently insignificant,-exercise upon the whole of an edifice. Their use of colours was a false taste, commonly displayed by mankind in their religious houses, and statues of the gods. The Hindus paint their pagodas, inside and outside; and rub vermilion, in token of honour, over their deities. The Persian Colossi of Kaiomars and his consort on the Balkh road and the Sphinx of Egypt, as well as the temples of the Nile, still show traces of artificial complexion. The fanes in classic Greece have been dyed. In the Forum Romanum, one of the finest buildings, still bears stains of the Tyrian purple. And to mention no other instances, in the churches and belfries of Modern Italy, we see alternate bands of white and black material so disposed as to give them the appearance of giant zebras. The origin of "Arabesque" ornament must be referred to one of the principles of Al-Islam. The Moslem, forbidden by his law to decorate his Mosque with statuary and pictures,[FN#5] supplied their place with quotations from the Koran, and inscriptions, "plastic metaphysics," of marvellous perplexity.