Among
the cities associated with the Islamic civilization, Cairo is perhaps
the most representative culturally and certainly the richest architecturally.
Founded in 634 at the strategic head
of the Nile Delta, the city evolved from a military outpost to the seat
of the ambitious and singular Fatimid caliphate between the 10th and
12th century. Its most spectacular age, however, was the Mamluk
period (1250-1517), which established it as the uncontested center of
a resurgent Sunni Islam and produced a wealth of religious, palatial,
and commemorative structures that synthesized the achievements of previous
periods and symbolized the image of the city for centuries to come.
After that, Cairo was reduced to an Ottoman provincial capital until
the end of the eighteenth century. Then, it witnessed a short
and capricious renascence under the independent minded Muhammad ‘Ali
Pasha (1805-48) followed by a period of vacillation between conservatism
and modernization that is still with us. The urban and architectural
chaos was exacerbated by the late-twentieth-century acute problems of
rapid expansion, population explosion, and underdevelopment.Yet, Cairo
still shines as a cultural, political, and economic center in its three
spheres of influence: the Arab world, Africa, and the Islamic world.
Moreover, many of its Islamic monuments (456 registered by the 1951
Survey of the Islamic Monuments of Cairo) still stand, although they
remain largely unknown to the worlds architectural community and their
numbers are dwindling at an exceedingly alarming pace.
In this course we will recount the
story of Cairo. We will review its urban and architectural developments
from the initial settlement on the site to the twentieth century and
interpret them in light of the cultural, political, and social history
of the country, the region, and the world. We will examine Cairene
architectural types and urban patterns to see how they reflect various
regional influences and relate to their counterparts in the wider Islamic
and Mediterranean contexts. The course is open to both graduate
and undergraduate students. A number of discussion sessions are
scheduled throughout the course to further address the critical and
paradigmatic architectural and urban issues. Students are encouraged
to contribute to the structure and topics of the discussion sessions
as part of their course requirements.