How grand designs from early Islamic civilisation has endured

War and looting are poisons to Islamic culture and yet, despite these predatorial forces, the earliest flowerings of great civilisations remain to baffle and teach us. An exhibition in Sharjah is poised to broaden our understanding and appreciation of the past.

The spiral minaret of the Great Mosque at Samarra is testimony to the vision of Muslim leaders, their architects and builders. Courtesy Museum fur Islamische Kunst / Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
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What would life at court have been like during the reign of one of the world’s most famous early Islamic leaders, the Abbasid Caliph Harun Al Rashid?

There are many great leaders and visionaries, but only a few early Islamic rulers have approached the fame of Al Rashid (786-809AD), who was largely misrepresented in the tales of 1,001 Nights and established Baghdad as a centre of artistic patronage.

A glimpse of those times is captured by some of the few items that have survived. One is a delicate bronze vessel, known as an aquamanile and used to carry water, in the shape of what appears to be an eagle.

In the luxury of the Abbasid court, familiar with such elegant and lavish vessels, residents and visitors ate from gold and silver plates encrusted with gems. None of these, or the often quoted lavish silver trees with singing birds in their branches, have survived.

From a much later time is a grainy black and white photo that dates from between 1911 and 1913, capturing the mystical Samarra of Iraq and its famous Great Mosque, with its distinctive spiral minaret, known as Malwiyaa.

More than 52 metres tall, it is said to have been inspired by the Babylonian spiral ziggurats.

The mosque, built in 847AD and once the largest in the world, stood for hundreds of years until it was damaged during the recent conflict in Iraq, where a bomb destroyed the top of the minaret in 2005.

The photo and the bronze vessel are among 100 rare artefacts and objects displayed at the Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilisation as part of the exhibition on Early Islamic Capitals – the Artistic Legacy of Umayyad Damascus and Abbasid Baghdad (650-950).

It is being held under the patronage of Dr Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, Ruler of Sharjah, in a collaboration between Sharjah Museums Department and Berlin State Museums.

“The aim of this exhibition is to make a historical and intellectual link between Sharjah as Capital of Islamic Culture 2014 and two of its earliest predecessors, Umayyad Damascus and Abbasid Baghdad,” said Manal Ataya, director general of Sharjah Museums.

“Indeed, with regard to the vision of its leaders, the extensive and inspired building programs, the patronage of art, culture and the sciences, and the active encouragement of intercultural tolerance and dialogue, there are many aspects that Sharjah shares with historical capitals of Islamic culture throughout history.”

The Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilisation collaborated with the Berlin Museum of Islamic Art to select rare archaeological material and art objects.

They include finds from the former Sassanid capital and early Islamic provincial capital Ctesiphon in Iraq (5th to 7th century), the Umayyad “Desert Castles” of Khirbet Al Minya (705 to 15AD), Qusayr Amra (730AD), and the famous Mshatta castle (744AD), charting the transition from pre-Islamic to Islamic cultures.

One rarity from the Umayyad period is a rosette from Mshatta, a monumental flower from the very beginning of Islamic art.

The palace is about 30 kilometres south of Amman in Jordan and was built by Al Walid II, who ruled between 743 and 744AD.

“Inside the palace of Mshatta, the entrance facade to the official part with the throne hall was adorned with elaborate stone carvings, with strongly protruding rosettes in the centre,” says Dr Ulrike Al Khamis, senior strategic adviser at Sharjah museums and an expert on Islamic and Middle East art.

“In the exhibition, one of these exceptional pieces will be shown in a fascinating mirror setting that evokes the entire facade around it.

“The Berlin Museum of Islamic Art is very fortunate in that it was gifted a large section of the Mshatta facade [33 metres] in the course of the construction of the Hijaz railway at the beginning of the 20th century, a personal gift from the Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II to the German Kaiser Wilhelm II.”

Most of the objects come from the Syrian region (Bilad Al Sham), with 24 large items of architectural decoration from the famous temporary Abbasid capital of Samarra (9th century).

Different objects raise different theories and stories, such as a luxurious brass tray with architectural decor from the Umayyad period.

“This exceedingly rare and richly ornamented tray raises many questions,” says Dr Al Khamis. “The centre shows a domed building with a column in the centre.

“A double wing of Persian provenance marks the building as one of outstanding significance. The floral decor and the radial architectural arcades are also of Iranian origin, and previous scholars often interpreted the building as a temple.

“However, interestingly, similar vegetal motifs can also be found in the Dome of the Rock. Umayyad coins of that same year show a similar column to the one on the tray, perhaps a symbol of the qibla, the Islamic direction of prayer.

“Consequently, this tray may possibly show the Dome of the Rock, the column referring to its location, Jerusalem, as the first qibla.”

The exhibition also includes pre-Islamic inscription stones from the period before Arabic as we know it today developed and became the language of the Quran. “With the spread of Islam, Arabic and its script were disseminated far and wide. Due to its close link to God’s revelations, the Quran, Arabic also became a central element of Islamic art,” Dr Al Khamis says.

With history and cultural heritage of Islam under constant threat, and much already destroyed due to war and looting, exhibitions like this highlight the importance of artefacts of the past that shape our identities.

“The exhibition shows impressively how deeply Islamic art and culture are rooted in the age-old heritage of this region on the one hand and how they are intricately linked to world history through the ages,” says Dr Al Khamis.

Founded in 1904, the Berlin Museum of Islamic Art is the only institution of its kind in Germany and the second oldest in the world after the Cairo Islamic Museum.

With about 50,000 objects it is one of the world’s major collections of Islamic art.

This is the Berlin museum’s second exhibition in Sharjah. In 2008, it presented The Radiance of Islamic Art to celebrate the opening of the Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilisation.

Dr Stefan Weber, director of the Berlin museum, says the region’s links with Germany’s explorations of important sites are long.

“It has been more than 110 years that scholars from [Berlin] first went to excavate in the Arab-Islamic world and undertook the first ever excavation on an Islamic site in 1911,” Dr Weber says.

“Other aspects of collaboration since then have included professional training, joint restoration projects like the recent restoration of the Mschatta palace, or institutional cooperations, like the remaking of the National Museum in Herat or the Haram Al Sharif Museum in Jerusalem.”

His commitment to the Arab world goes beyond work. He is married to a Syrian and has lived in Syria and Lebanon for 12 years.

“I see it as one of our key objectives to be in constant cooperation with Muslim countries,” Dr Weber says.

rghazal@thenational.ae