Complex of Al-malik Aṣ-ṣāliḥ Najm Ad-dīn Ayyūb

The complex, part of which was built on the former site of the Eastern Fatimid Palace, comprises a madrasah and a mausoleum. It was built during the reign of the Ayyubid Caliph, Al-malik Aṣ-ṣāliḥ Najm Ad-dīn Ayyūb, in al-Mu‘izz street in the Nahassīn quarter (coppersmiths’ quarter). The Qalāʾūn Complex was built opposite the mausoleum. This madrasah, which follows the tradition of the Al-Mustansiriya Madrasah in Baghdad, was the first in Egypt to provide teaching that follows the four schools of Sunni religious law: Shāfi‘ī, Maliki, Hanafīyah, and Hanbali. The Islamic madrasahs fulfil two main functions: education and prayer, and therefore comprise a qibla wall and one or several mihrābs[1].

The madrasah is comprised of two distinct wings separated by a public passage. Each one had an open-air courtyard and two iwans, dedicated to each Sunni rite. Only the north-western facade of the second madrasah remains. However, we can gain some idea of its plan from the first madrasah[2]. There are small rooms for housing students on both sides of the courtyard. There’s a floor above, which is accessed by a flight of steps in the Sālihiyya quarter. This plan marks an important step in the diffusion of the four-iwan plan, which emerged two centuries earlier in Iran and was used in Cairo in the madrasah of Sultan Hasan (1354).

The madrasah has a magnificent entrance crowned with a minaret. The entry door is surmounted by decorative work consisting of a foundation plaque placed in a blind niche formed by a pointed elliptical arch surrounded by a decoration of radiating gadroons, which evolve into muqarnas. The decorations are reminiscent of the facade of the Fatimid Al-Aqmar Mosque in Cairo. Two rectangular niches either side are decorated with muqarnas in high relief emerging from arcading surmounting a rosette. In the upper section is the last surviving Ayyubid minaret, which is entirely preserved. It has three storeys: the first is cubic and on each of its sides are niches in polylobed arcading surmounted by a motif of radiating gadroons; the second is octagonal and is surrounded by a wooden corbelled balcony for the muezzin (Muslim crier who calls worshippers to prayer). On each of its sides are arch and niche motifs found on the lower storey. Finally, the minaret is crowned by a storey pierced with polylobed niches surmounted by muqarnas and topped by a ribbed dome. The minaret, each of whose storeys has a different plan, and whose third storey is reminiscent of a lantern, can be considered as the prototype for Mamluk minarets. This is found above the entry in the Mosque of Baybars (1267) and in the Qalāʾūn Complex (1295), where there is also a long inscription across the facade.

The mausoleum was built by the wife of the Caliph, Shajarat al-Durr, in 1250. It was the first in Egypt to be attached to a madrasah. Of square plan, it is surmounted by a raised dome placed on a high transition zone decorated with muqarnas. The mausoleum has a mihrāb decorated with a fine coloured marble inlay, known as ablaq. The mausoleum’s facade is considered to be the continuation of the madrasah’s facade, which contains the entry to the mausoleum.

The elevation of the madrasah’s long facade, with its large niches enclosing rectangular flat and relieving arch windows, was influenced by those of the Mosques of Al-Aqmar (1125) and Al Salih Tala'i (1160). Obvious Fatimid influences can be seen in the architectural elements such as the windows, the mihrāb, and the minarets. The minaret of this madrasah therefore bears a close resemblance to that of the Al-Juyushī Mosque (1085), as well as the minarets of the al-Husayn Mosque in Iraq, especially the bases (square base and cubic body) and the vegetal decorations engraved in the gypsum, which are similar to those on Fatimid mihrābs.

[2] K.A.C. Creswell and Ahmad Fikri worked out its plan.