Tiles

Found in Tyr, this tile is decorated with a lion walking through a framework of palmettes and spirals. The animal, with its left foreleg raised and its bushy tail curved, is showing a forked tongue. A crown seems to be placed on its head, and its neck, which is decorated with two ribbons, is unnaturally long, giving it the appearance of a fantastical creature.

A noble beast, the lion has since Antiquity been a symbol of many things, sometimes linked to monarchy. In Islamic civilisation, the lion plays an important role: thus the Shi'ites confer to ‘Ali the title of "Lion of God". Frequently used in literature and in the titles of monarchs, the lion is doubtless the most represented animal in visual arts, sometimes a simple decorative pattern, sometimes an astrological symbol, a symbol of power or a heraldic symbol. The lion (or the panther) has been associated in particular with Mamluk sultan Baybars (r. 1260-1277) as well as to his son Baraka Khan (r. 1277-1280). It is found on their coins, as well as on the monuments of Baybars in Egypt[1] and Syria. In Europe, the lion is also by far the most frequent heraldic charge. It appeared on the coat of arms of certain Crusaders, such as the Lusignans, kings of Jerusalem and then of Cypress (1186-1291), and became the emblem of Venice from 1261. The presence of lions on the walls of Anatolian monuments such as the citadels of Hosap Güzelsu and Uraf, as well as in the citadel of Alep, also evokes its role as a protector. The presence of a crown on the lion's head in this tile seems to evoke a heraldic emblem, despite its unusual position, called regardant, that is, turned toward the right.

The use of tiles as architectural ornamentation dates back to the pre-Islamic period. As early as the third dynasty in Egypt, turquoise blue glazed tiles were used in the pyramid of Djoser in Saqqarah. Certain Achaemenid palaces also had panels of glazed bricks. The first Islamic tiles appeared during the Abbasid period: tiles covered with a monochrome glaze and lustre were discovered on the Iraqi site of Samarra. The use of tiles developed from the end of the century in Iran, where it became the specialty of the city of Kashan[2], but also in Anatolia, the Maghreb and in Spain.

Although techniques for decorating ceramic tiles are generally the same as those used on objects, sgraffiato is rarely used. The style of this tile is akin to the production of ceramics with incised decorations that made its way from east to west and which dominated in the twelfth-thirteenth centuries in the Byzantine regions, Cypress and Syria, and in the fourteenth century in Mamluk Egypt. It is difficult to know if this is a single example or if it was part of a larger grouping, as well as to determine its position in an architectural context.

[1] Cairo, Burj al-Siba‘

[2] In Persian, the term "kashi" refers to ceramic.