Great Mosque of Algiers

This mosque, which is Algier’s oldest and largest mosque, has an Arabic floor plan that is emblematic of Almoravid religious architecture. A rectangular construction, this edifice is wider than it is deep, with a double tiled roof, like all Almoravid mosques. You enter the courtyard through a portico leading to three entries pierced in the northern wall. The oblong courtyard is surrounded by porticos, some of which extend from the naves of the prayer hall. Entered by a series of lateral entrances, the prayer hall is divided into eleven naves that run perpendicular to the qiblî wall in five bays. Poly-lobed arches run parallel to the mihrâb and alternate with slightly broken horseshoe arches, running perpendicular to it. They rest on rectangular and cross-shaped pillars.

Along with their broken arches, which were already present in earlier monuments, the Almoravids put great emphasis on varying the design of their arches. They were the ones to develop the poly-lobed arch in the Maghreb, which the Andalusians had used in the Great Mosque of Córdoba. Their arches varied from five, nine and eleven lobes, introducing a true hierarchy of arches into religious constructions—a feature that continued to be carried out by their successors. The robustness of the pillars combined with the startling elegance of the broken horseshoe arches instils the bays of the Great Mosque of Algiers with simplicity and harmony.

The central and much wider nave leading to the mihrâb is amplified by the effect of indented lobed arches, circumscribed by interlacing braids. The mihrâb has been reconstructed and is flanked by two small spiral columns, covered by an ogive stucco arch in relief. It has a niche with a flat bottom and cut sides; unfortunately, its decoration has not survived. Alongside the mihrâb, two doors provide access to little oblong rooms. One of these still has its ingenious system of rails on the floor for moving the minbar—fitted with wheels—from the storage room to the prayer hall. In conservation at the National Museum of Antiquities and Islamic Arts, the mosque’s minbar is the oldest and most finely sculpted of its kind in Algeria.

In the north-eastern corner we find the Bâb al-Jenina with its various service rooms, which, along with the minaret, are reserved for the imam. A characteristic of the productions of the Abd al-Wadides, who tended to imitate the Almohads’ organizational plan, is their placement of the minaret, namely in the north-eastern corner, as we see in the Kutubiyya mosque (Marrakesh) and the Qasaba mosque in Seville (Andalusia). Its quadrangular shaft is topped by merlons set at an angle and a lantern, similarly set. The surface is punctuated by rectangular niches with poly-lobed blind arches and blue and white ceramic tiles, which were added when it was restored during the colonial period.