Publication Date
530/ 1136
Type
Other
Language
Undetermined
Digital
Yes
Manuscript
No
Library
Museum With No Frontiers
Record ID
monument;ISL;sy;Mon01;37;ar
Library Location
Bosra, Syria
Date
530/ 1136
Notes
Historical sources indicate that schools were established in Damascus as early as 491/1098, but the Kamshtekin School is the oldest model of Syrian schools, and is located in the southern city of Busra in the Hauran region, an important site on the north-south pilgrimage and trade route. Tughtakin, the Atabek of Damascus, had the Seljuk Turkish officer Kmushtakin deprive the Hauran region in the early 6th century / 12th century, and the latter began to renovate it directly. The madrasa was one of the later facilities he established, and it is linked to an older mosque known as Mubarak al-Naqa. According to accounts, the first copy of the Holy Qur’an was sent to Syria on the back of a camel, and the place where the camel fell became a sacred place and a center of learning. Adding to the sanctity of the place is the adjacent basilica (church), where the Nestorian monk Bahira learned about the boy Muhammad (PBUH) and his prophecy when he was accompanying his uncle on a commercial trip. The Komshtakin School was built next to the eastern wall of the Mubarak al-Naqa Mosque, and the difference in the size of the stones between the two buildings can be directly identified. According to an inscription on the north side, the construction of the Madrasah at Kamshtakin began in 530 / AD 1135 to teach the Hanafi school of thought. Black basalt stone, a natural building material in the Hauran region, was used to construct the madrasa. The madrasa has a square sky court and four iwans covered with horizontal basalt slabs. This technique is not suitable for use with less hard stones such as limestone in Damascus and Aleppo, meaning it is a local technique. The main southern iwan is wider than the other iwans, so a second arch was added to support the roof. This iwan is separated from the heavenly space by a wall with three doors topped by arch-shaped windows, and this shape is repeated in the smaller northern iwan. The southern and northern iwans are surrounded by a pair of rooms on both sides, and traces of a second floor can be identified that most likely included student rooms. Only traces of stucco decorations remain, most of them around the mihrab in the southern iwan. The development of the madrasa plan, with its axial symmetrical shape, from its Persian origins to its local uses in Syria, is considered one of the characteristics of the urban renaissance that was initiated by the Seljuks and continued by the Atabegs and Ayyubids. The unprecedented speed in the emergence of the madrasa during the sixth / twelfth century in Syria indicates the development of madrasa architecture and its specialization beyond its origin derived from the Persian East.
Sample Text
Abd al-Razzaq Moaz, Zena Takieddine “The School of Complaints” in Discover Islamic Art. Museum Without Borders, 2026. 2026. https://islamicart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=monument;ISL;sy;Mon01;37;ar
