Religious and Cultural Dimensions Reflections in Levantine Schools Architecture During the Zengid, Ayyubid, and Mamluk Periods

Abstract

The cities of the Levant, especially the cities of Damascus and Aleppo, witnessed the construction of hundreds of schools from the Zengid era to the Mamluk era. These schools are considered stand-alone urban cultural monuments, so this study aims to shed light on this historical urban edifice and research its religious and cultural dimensions that were reflected in its various urban elements. Those elements are the dome, the minaret, the decorations, muqarnas, symbols that adorned its walls, the pulpit (Minbar), Al-Mihrab, a description of the school courtyards and study halls (Iwan) overlooking them, and other urban elements such as libraries, the kitchen, and bathrooms. Then, in describing these urban elements, the study adopted an analysis approach for each element separately in order to know the dimensions that were reflected in the employees working in the school and the students enrolled there. The most important result reached by the study points out that these urban elements reflected several important dimensions of the school, including religious dimensions that changed the function of the school as a scientific institution and made it a religious and scientific institution at the same time. Urban elements left administrative dimensions on the school’s administrative and organizational structure as they imposed on the school’s administrative officials to appoint administrative employees in addition to the teachers who work in these schools. The other urban elements left psychological consequences on the school’s staff and students enrolled there.