page_title: Great Mosque of Kairouan
section_title: Courtyard
hierarchical_section_title: Great Mosque of Kairouan / Architecture and decoration / Exterior / Courtyard
caption_attribution_description: English: Panorama of the courtyard of the Great Mosque of Kairouan, in Tunisia. This huge mosque, also called Mosque of Uqba, was founded in 670 A.D. It dates, in its present form, from the 9th century (under the Aghlabid dynasty). The Great Mosque of Kairouan is the oldest mosque in the Muslim West. Français&#160;: Panorama de la cour de la Grande Mosquée de Kairouan, en Tunisie. Cette immense mosquée, également appelée mosquée Oqba, a été fondée en 670. Elle date, dans son état actuel, du IXe siècle (sous la dynastie des Aghlabides). La Grande Mosquée de Kairouan est la plus ancienne mosquée de l'Occident musulman.
context_page_description: The Great Mosque of Kairouan, also known as the Mosque of Uqba, is a mosque situated in the UNESCO World Heritage town of Kairouan, Tunisia and is one of the most impressive and largest Islamic monuments in North Africa.
  Established by the Arab general Uqba ibn Nafi in the year 50 AH at the founding of the city of Kairouan, the mosque occupies an area of over 9,000 square metres. It is one of the oldest places of worship in the Islamic world, and is a model for all later mosques in the Maghreb. Its perimeter, of about 405 metres, contains a hypostyle prayer hall, a marble-paved courtyard and a square minaret. In addition to its spiritual prestige, the Mosque of Uqba is one of the masterpieces of Islamic architecture, notable among other things for the first Islamic use of the horseshoe arch.
  Extensive works under the Aghlabids two centuries later gave the mosque its present aspect. The fame of the Mosque of Uqba and of the other holy sites at Kairouan helped the city to develop and expand. The university, consisting of scholars who taught in the mosque, was a centre of education both in Islamic thought and in the secular sciences.
context_section_description: The courtyard is a vast trapezoidal area whose interior dimensions are approximately 67 by 52 metres. It is surrounded on all its four sides by a portico with double rows of arches, opened by slightly horseshoe arches supported by columns in various marbles, in granite or in porphyry, reused from Roman, Early Christian or Byzantine monuments particularly from Carthage. Access to the courtyard by six side entrances dating from the ninth and thirteenth centuries.
  The portico on the south side of the courtyard, near the prayer hall, includes in its middle a large dressed stone pointed horseshoe arch which rests on ancient columns of white veined marble with Corinthian capitals. This porch of seven metres high is topped with a square base upon which rests a semi-spherical ribbed dome; the latter is ribbed with sharp-edged ribs. The intermediary area, the dodecagonal drum of the dome, is pierced by sixteen small rectangular windows set into rounded niches. The great central arch of the south portico, is flanked on each side by six rhythmically arranged horseshoe arches, which fall on twin columns backed by pillars. Overall, the proportions and general layout of the façade of the south portico, with its thirteen arches of which that in the middle constitutes a sort of triumphal arch crowned with a cupola, form an ensemble with "a powerful air of majesty", according to the French historian and sociologist Paul Sebag (1919–2004).
caption: Panorama of the inner courtyard of the Great Mosque of Kairouan
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