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IG_159: Book illustration: Vue Intérieure de la mosquée el-Moyed
(MISC_IG_Coste_1937_IG_159)

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Title

‘Vue intérieure de la mosquée el-Moyed’

Type of Object
Dimensions
36.5 x 46 cm (platemark)
Artist / Producer
Dating
1837
Research Project
Author and Date of Entry
Sarah Keller 2025

Iconography

Description

Pl. XXX in Pascal Coste, Architecture arabe ou Monuments du Kaire, mesurés et dessinés, de 1818 à 1826, 1837. The plate shows an arcade of the courtyard of the Sultan al-Muʾayyad Shaykh Mosque in Cairo with four stucco and glass windows. The round-arch windows are composed of two large circles, one surmounting the other, each inscribed with an eight-pointed star.

Iconclass Code
12I61 · temple, shrine ~ Islam, Mohammedanism
48A9815 · ornament ~ starforms
Iconclass Keywords
minaret · mosque · shrine · star · temple

History

Research

Pascal Coste’s plates are based on the extensive documentation he made in Cairo between 1818 and 1827. The Sultan al-Muʾayyad Shaykh Mosque (818–24 AH / 1415–21 CE) was the first one to be documented by the French architect, and more than 30 drawings, made in 1822, of the complex are preserved (Volait, 1998, p. [3]). One drawing shows the stucco and glass windows of the qibla wall (IG_223) and one shows a detail of the here depicted windows of the courtyard (Marseille, Bibliothèque de l’Alcazar, MS1310_f12b).
While some of the 70 plates of Coste’s book were published as line drawings or shaded versions, the view of the courtyard of the Sultan al-Muʾayyad Shaykh Mosque was coloured. Although the main focus of the illustration is not on the windows, their design is detailed and seems to correspond to reality. A few decades later, around 1872, large parts of the mosque were in ruins, and at the end of the 19th century it was renovated by the Comité de Conservation des Monuments de l’Art Arabe. The stucco and glass windows installed today above the arcades of the prayer hall show the same design as in Coste’s plate. While some windows may have survived until today, some were certainly copied in the same style by the Comité (Barois/Grand/Sedak/Herz, 1890, p. 74). While in Coste’s time all the walls facing the courtyard had window openings, as seen on the plate, today, only the inner arcades of the prayer hall have windows.
While the star motif is not uncommon and often appears as a single motif (see the windows in the dome of the Sultan al-Muʾayyad Shaykh Mosque; IG_186; Victoria and Albert Museum, MES.LOST.30), other windows with two star motifs, one surmounting the other, are not known.

Dating
1837
Period
1818 – 1837
Related Locations

Bibliography and Sources

Literature

Barois, J., Grand, P., Sadek, M., & Herz, M. (1890). Examen de la mosquée el Mouayyed (plan Grand bey n° 190). In Comité de Conservation des Monuments de l'Art Arabe 7, 69–77.

Coste, Pascal-Xavier (1837). Architecture arabe ou Monuments du Kaire, mesurés et dessinés, de 1818 à 1826. Paris: Typographie de Firmin Didot Frères et Compagnie, Imprimeurs de l'Institut de France.

Volait, M. (1998). “Les monuments de l’architecture arabe” vus par Pascal Coste (pp. 97–131). Jacobi, D. (dir.), Pascal Coste, toutes les Egypte. Marseille: Parenthèses/Bibliothèque municipale de Marseille. https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00957011

Image Information

Name of Image
MISC_IG_Coste_1937_IG_159
Credits
Coste, 1937, pl. XXX. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/1721.3/65847
Copyright
Public Domain

Linked Objects and Images

Linked Objects
Architecture arabe ou Monuments du Kaire, mesurés et dessinés, de 1818 à 1826

Citation suggestion

Keller, S. (2025). ‘Vue intérieure de la mosquée el-Moyed’. In Vitrosearch. Retrieved December 5, 2025 from https://vitrosearch.ch/objects/2713003.

Record Information

Reference Number
IG_159