Qasr al-Hallabat

Qasr al-Hallabat is perhaps one of the most representative and important sites in the Near East to understand the socio-political and cultural changes that took place in the transitional period from Late Antiquity to Early Middle Ages that gave birth to Islamic culture.

Originally al-Hallabat was a small Roman fort built to protect the Via Nova Trajana, the Roman road stretching from Bosra to Aqaba established after 106 A.D. This fort was part of the Limes Arabicus (the Arabian frontier). It was enlarged and transformed into a fort with four corner towers in the fourth century A.D., probably under Diocletian. Apparently, it was heavily damaged in an earthquake in 551 A.D., being heavily transformed afterwards into a monastery and a palace.

At the beginning of the sixth century A. D., the role of christianised Arab tribes (the Tanukh, then the Salih and finally the Ghassanid tribes) in the defence of the frontier started to be determinant. Most of the forts from the Limes Arabicus were abandoned by the regular Roman Army and occupied, in many cases, by monastic communities, very active in the conversion of the pastoralist inhabitants of the pre-desert steppe or Badiya. The monasteries, especially those following the Monophysite faith, enjoyed the decisive support of the Ghassanids, the federate Christian Arabs that had the effective military command of the area in the sixth century A. D. Their increasing military and political importance was sanctioned by emperor Justinian. The Ghassanids needed theatres of power to play their new role ; in many cases, as at Hallabat, they chose some abandoned forts to set their audience halls.

In many aspects the Ghassanids can be seen as forerunners of the Umayyads, especially when dealing with their patronised building activities. They relayed not only on the Byzantine imagery but on their own Arab traditions from Yemenite origin to achieve a visual culture of their own aimed to support their new status and political agenda. It can be seen not only at al-Hallabat but also in Umm al-Jimal and Bosra. The Umayyads, not anymore vassals but rulers of a truly new empire of their own, following in many aspects the footprints left by the Ghassanids built a new culture that was drown upon that of the two empires they had defeated (Persian and Byzantium), but also on the basis of that strong Arab identity shared and already affirmed by the Ghassanids. Many of the ‘Umayyad palaces’ were built (as at al-Hallabat, Qasr al-Hayr al Gharbi, Qastal, Jabal Says, Burqu, etc.) on previous Ghassanid settlements. In our case the intervention on the Qasr was aimed to the reuse of the palatine halls keeping their function and transforming the monastic dependences into functional stores for the palace. The building activities consisted mainly on the removal of any lining that would carry any political or religious meaning linked to the previous Christian lords. Interestingly a mosque was built outside the existing premises, not reusing the humble setting of the inner monastic chapel but placing it in an outstanding and commanding location so that it could be seen from the distance.

A new set of mosaics, mural paintings and stucco friezes were applied to the floors and walls of the audience halls, bearing the new message to be conveyed to the observer. This decoration represents geometric, floral, animal and human motives; different styles can be distinguished in the different rooms. Notably, the great mosaic floor discovered in the room 11, sketchy treated, could be linked with Byzantine tradition, but also with the lion and gazelles mosaic of Khirbat al-Mafjar, according to G. Bisheh. Its complex iconography, where a man appears leading an ostrich, had probably a signification, which we have lost. In the greatest of the two courts stand the coping of a well, carved of arch motives, decorated with geometrical designs.

This dual intervention (refurbishing and reusing the Ghassanid palace, and the construction of an extramural mosque) is very important and illuminating. It demonstrates the double seizure, political and religious, that actually took place, but also demonstrates the interest in seizing something even more important: the ascendant and influence both on political and religious terms upon the pastoralist population that used to flock to these places, as they would be, once more, the main support for the new rulers.

The merging process of Roman-Byzantine, Parto-Sassanian and Arab influences carried out by the Umayyads to achieve the required brand new visual culture of their own, can be seen not only in the decorative linings of the Qasr, but also in the architecture of the mosque. A new language is sought in structural and decorative terms, bridging East and West and setting the path for the future development of a mature Islamic art.