Muhammad Ali Mosque

The Muhammad Ali Mosque or Mosque of Muhammad Ali (Arabic: مسجد محمد علي) is a historic mosque in Cairo, Egypt. It was commissioned by Muhammad Ali Pasha and built between 1832 and 1857. Situated in the Cairo Citadel in a position overlooking the city, it is one of the most visible mosques and landmarks in the skyline of Cairo. Unlike the traditional Cairene architecture that preceded it, the mosque was built in an entirely Ottoman and European-influenced style, further setting it apart from other monuments. It is sometimes called the Alabaster Mosque due to the prominent use of alabaster as a covering for its walls.
The mosque was built within the Citadel of Cairo on the orders of Muhammad Ali, an Ottoman governor who took control in Egypt, gained autonomy, and initiated an extensive program of reforms.
The new mosque was founded in 1830. In order to accommodate his mosque and new palaces in the Citadel, Muhammad Ali demolished the old and partially ruined Mamluk-era palaces that stood on this site. Some ten metres of rubble had to be filled in so as to create a platform for the new mosque.
The first plans for the mosque were drawn up by Pascal Coste, a French architect and the chief engineer for Muhammad Ali from 1818 to 1827. Coste's proposal, presented in 1827, was for a mosque in a neo-Mamluk style. He may have laid the building's initial foundations, but Muhammad Ali did not accept his design.
Instead, construction restarted in 1832 in a completely different, more Ottoman style. The architect of this design is unknown, but was probably a Greek or an Armenian. Due to the building's great size, construction lasted many years. Muhammad Ali insisted on the use of alabaster in the mosque, a material otherwise not well suited to buildings, in order to promote a local industry that was in decline. The extensive decoration of the mosque was not completed until 1857, during the reign of Sa'id Pasha.
Before completion of the mosque, the alabastered panels from the upper walls were taken away and used for the palaces of Abbas I. The stripped walls were clad with wood painted to look like marble.
Muhammad Ali Pasha was buried in a tomb carved from Carrara marble. His body was transferred here from Hosh al-Basha in 1857.
The most extensive care for the mosque occurred during the reign of King Fuad I, following the discovery of structural issues. Mahmoud Pasha Ahmed, Director of the Department for the Preservation of Arab Antiquities, identified severe deterioration in the mosque’s structure. The elements responsible for distributing the building’s weight had weakened, while the stones supporting the arches had disintegrated under the pressure of the large central dome. This caused the arches to push outward against the external walls, leading to their tilting. Additionally, cracks had appeared due to the oxidation of the iron ties used to bind the stones of the mosque’s construction.
On December 29, 1931, King Fuad ordered the formation of a committee of senior Egyptian and foreign engineers to inspect the mosque and propose a restoration plan. The committee’s examination concluded that the central dome, along with the surrounding semi-domes and smaller domes, needed to be dismantled and rebuilt. A framework of steel scaffolding, weighing 650 tons and costing £16,110 Egyptian pounds, was designed to support the restoration. The dismantling of the large dome and adjacent structures began on February 11, 1935.
During the restoration, meticulous care was taken to preserve the original architectural proportions and dimensions of the arches and other structural elements. Special reinforcements were added to strengthen the design. The domes were reconstructed with hollow interiors to replicate the original thickness of 0.80 meters while maintaining the old aesthetic. These new domes were decorated to match the original design. To ensure the highest fidelity, samples of the old decorations were retained, color models were created before demolition, and detailed drawings and photographs of the original ornamentation were taken.
The total cost of the demolition and reconstruction reached £60,000 Egyptian pounds, with an additional £40,000 spent on plastering, decorations, and gilding. These efforts restored the mosque to its architectural glory, making it one of Egypt's finest buildings. It was reopened for prayer during the reign of King Farouk I, who performed Friday prayers there on January 5, 1358 AH (February 24, 1939). Observing that the old pulpit was too far from the mihrab, King Farouk ordered a new alabaster pulpit in harmony with the mosque’s grandeur. The new pulpit was adorned with red marble and had a finely crafted brass door inscribed with the king’s name.
King Farouk also undertook the restoration of the mosque’s clock tower, repairing the long-defunct clock and commissioning plans to clad the remaining facades with alabaster. He declared the southern and northern courtyards as sanctuaries of the mosque and beautified its surroundings.
In 2012, the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities restored the mosque's historic carpets. Two years later, in 2014, the ministry initiated a project to restore the clock tower. By 2017, further efforts aimed at returning the mosque to its original splendor were underway. These included cleaning the marble cladding in the mosque's courtyard, removing accumulated dust from the fountain’s decorations to reveal their vibrant colors, studying the ornamentation, and scientifically addressing any alterations to align with modern restoration standards.
Muhammad Ali's mosque is entirely Ottoman in form and adopts the same layout as the Şehzade Mosque and Sultan Ahmed Mosque in Istanbul, referencing the classical architecture of the Ottoman Empire at its apogee. This choice of model likely expressed a pan-Islamic affiliation beyond Egypt. The mosque's decoration, however, eschews any Mamluk influences or any traditional Islamic ornamentation in favour of European influences instead, although Qur'anic inscriptions and references are still present.
Until this point, the architecture of Ottoman Cairo had largely been a blend of Ottoman and Mamluk styles. The new and deliberate design choices of Muhammad Ali's mosque were a radical break from this tradition and likely symbolized Muhammad Ali's own efforts to forge a new order in Egypt. Having been appointed Ottoman governor in 1805 and eliminated the remaining Mamluks in 1811, he undertook a program of modernization while increasing Egypt's independence from Istanbul. The new architectural vocabulary likely symbolized these changes, and the mosque's size and prominent position on Cairo's skyline reinforced this statement.
The main construction material is limestone but the lower walls and the courtyard are faced with alabaster. There are three entrances on each side of the prayer hall, including one from the courtyard on its northwestern side. The courtyard, in turn, has two lateral entrances. Visitors today usually enter through the northeastern gate.
The rectangular courtyard measures 55 by 57 metres (180 by 187 ft). It is surrounded by riwaqs (arched porticoes) supported by columns and covered by domes. In the center of the courtyard is an ablutions fountain made of carved marble and sheltered by a wooden roof held up by columns, all richly decorated in a baroque style. Two cylindrical minarets of the Ottoman type, with two balconies and conical caps, are situated at the southern and eastern corners of the courtyard, on either side of the prayer hall's façade. They are over 80 metres (260 ft) tall and their bases are 3 metres (9.8 ft) wide.
A monumental tower clock rises over the northwestern wall of the courtyard. This was presented to Muhammad Ali by King Louis Philippe of France around in 1846 in exchange for the obelisk of Luxor now standing in Place de la Concorde in Paris. Made of iron, it is designed in a mix of neo-Gothic and orientalist styles, with a tearoom incorporated into its top level.
The prayer hall is almost square in plan, measuring 45 by 46 metres (148 by 151 ft). It is roofed with a central dome surrounded by four semi-domes and four smaller corner domes. The structure of the main dome is supported by four massive pillars standing inside the hall. The central dome is 21 meters in diameter and its apex reaches to a height of 52 meters. The mihrab (niche symbolizing the direction of prayer) is set within an apse-like projection on the southeastern side of the hall covered by another semi-dome. Flanking this apse is a large wooden minbar (pulpit) with carved and gilt decoration, dating from the original construction period. A second, smaller minbar of alabaster, located closer to the mihrab niche, was a later gift from King Farouk in 1939.
Muhammad Ali himself is buried in a tomb inside the mosque, in the western corner of the prayer hall. The tomb is marked by a tall marble cenotaph, gifted by his grandson Abbas I, and hidden behind an elaborate screen of bronze openwork.
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