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ОСНОВНОЙ РАЗДЕЛ
Abdullayeva G.A.
lecturer
department of miniature and book graphics National Institute of Art and Design named after Kamoliddin Behzod
THE ROLE OF ARABIC CALLIGRAPHY IN MINIATURE
Abstract: This article discusses the role and importance of Arabic calligraphy in Miniature and its special features. The history of Arabic calligraphy, its major representatives and the work they have done have been studied. The influence of the miniature genre on Arabic calligraphy has been studied.
Key words: Arabic calligraphy, laconicism, building inscription, style, architecture of Seljuk, independent element, wicker, blooming.
Construction activity of the Seljukids in the XII-XIII centuries. led to the emergence of various religious buildings and complexes in the cities of Anatolia. The stone portals of monumental mosques and madrasahs were decorated with rich carvings, in the decorative repertoire of which many artistic traditions were reflected.
The ceremonial portal of the cult building, in the laconicism of its architectural form, the stability of the decorative composition, the plastic elaboration and the richness of details, asserted political and aesthetic ideals that were new for the Anatolian society of that time. They are associated with the formation of a new Muslim state in Asia Minor after the Battle of Malazgirt (1071) and the subsequent Turkization and Islamization of the former Byzantine metropolis. Arabic calligraphy became an integral part of ornamental decoration in the architecture of Seljuk Anatolia already in the 12th century. The earliest known monument with an entrance, in the design of which one can see a portal composition, is the mosque in the Divrija fortress (1180) 2 in the eastern part of Central Anatolia. The building inscription in blooming kufi is placed directly under the tympanum of the portal arch; along with other decorative elements, she discovers in her style a connection with the brick architecture of Iran.
The study of monumental epigraphy allows us to conclude that the inscriptions pursued two goals. One of them is to give the most complete information about the building: its customer, builder, architect, date of construction, name and purpose. These so-called building inscriptions are an invaluable historical source that allows you to significantly supplement the picture of construction activities, and in the case of individual monuments, to reconstruct it if no other written evidence has survived. In addition, the inscriptions contain unique information about the organization of construction, the level and essence of labor differentiation that took place in medieval society.
The historical inscriptions of the monuments of Asia Minor turned out to be especially interesting in this sense. The study of these texts led to the conclusion that construction activity was unique for the Muslim world as a whole during the heyday of Anatolian architecture in the 13 th century3, an unprecedented number of "signed" works and a variety of construction specialties. Clarification of the content of some terms made it possible to represent the nature of the relationship between the customer, the official supervising the work, and builders - from an architect to a simple apprentice4. From these inscriptions, we learn that the construction of the building was supervised by a high-ranking official called a mimar (Turkish architect), and the builders could have had the title of mouth or benn. Despite the seemingly purely informative role of the building inscription, it was assigned a rather significant place in the overall system of facade decoration. Apparently, its main essence should be considered the mention of the name of the customer, the confirmation of his piety and the opportunity to perpetuate the memory of him.
The architect's signature as an independent element of decor is present on the portals of Anatolia three times.5 For example, in the Sahib Ata mosque these are two flat round medallions above the stalactite half-dome, on which the name of the master, Kaluk ibn Abdullah, is engraved in naskh script6. The same medallions are located on the portal of the Inje Minareli madrasah, in its upper part. It was the inscriptions on the portals that brought us information that the customer of these religious institutions was the Seljuk vizier Sahib Ata, and the builder was the said master. An example of an exceptional decoration is the building inscriptions belonging to the courtyard wall of the medieval cathedral mosque of Konya - the Alaaddin Mosque. One of them says that the completion of this beautiful mosque was carried out by order of Sultan Keykubad, the son of Kylycharslan7. The four-line relief inscription, carved in naskh script on gray marble, has a frame, befitting the name of the sultan, in the form of a white marble eight-pointed star protruding in a three-step profile and inscribed in a square. Another inscription with the name of the Sultan is placed in an even more interesting composition, testifying to the active search for artistic means in the era of rethinking different traditions. A shallow niche with an arched end frames a gray slab with a solemn inscription in five lines. The most unusual epigraphic impregnation of this composition is a hexagonal marble slab introduced into the masonry of local stone in the tympanum of the arch. This truly original work of calligraphy represents the writing of the statement of monotheism - Tavhid (Tur. Kelime-i Tavhid) 8. A flat strap surrounds a six-pointed star in the center of the slab and several slightly protruding triangles and hexagons; the latter contain cut-in fragments of the inscription made in thin lines. This example is perhaps the only one for building inscriptions, in which the Quranic formulas cited, firstly, were usually limited to Basmala, and secondly, they were never presented in the form of an independent decorative composition.
Other inscriptions, composed of quotes from the Qur'an and hadiths, were intended, from the point of view of a modern Muslim theologian, for training, education and edification.9 Indeed, the iconographic meaning of writing as one of the main themes of Muslim decor10 appeals to the ethical foundations of the art of Islam. However, even in the earliest and most widely known monuments of Muslim architecture, Arabic calligraphy acquired perhaps the most important importance in decoration, revealing a close connection with the development of the ornamental repertoire in general. As the handwriting of the Arabic script developed, it was enriched with "wicker", "blooming" varieties, which took precedence in the architectural inscriptions of kufi, from the 11th century it was gradually replaced by the elegant cursive suls. It should be noted that most of the Quranic texts on the monumental portals of Anatolia are written in the handwriting of suls, one of the six classic handwritings of Arabic calligraphy. Researchers have noted the high aesthetic position of suls in the art of the Ottoman Empire11. Nothing prevents us from asserting, however, that much earlier, in Seljuk Anatolia, monumental stone inscriptions sulsom acquired an extremely high status and had some artistic features. Suffice it to say that the suls on the stone portals never has a background of arabesque curls, which almost always accompanied the inscriptions in this handwriting, made in faience mosaics or knock carvings. Clear, obvious, or, in Arabic, jali suls (Turkish jeli suls) - this was the name of this handwriting of monumental Quranic quotations, which were easily read from a great distance. The particular beauty of the outline, the elegance and clarity of this handwriting in the architectural inscriptions of Anatolia of the 13th century. they gave him another name -"Seljuk suls". In fairness, we note that in the so-called. In the Seljuk era, when a variety of motifs and decor techniques received extraordinary development, not only the pulse, but also the earliest Arabic handwriting - kufi, acquired a special stylistic coloring12, which continued to be used in architecture^.
In the inscriptions on the portal of the Sahib Ata mosque in Konya, several styles of Arabic writing are used - suls, kufi, geometrized kufi. The epigraphic repertoire of the portal is unique in its richness and variety. Rectangular panels in the upper part of the pylons, lined with bricks with inserts of square faience tiles in turquoise and dark blue, contain the names of the righteous caliphs Ali and Abu Bakr. You should pay special attention to them. Geometrical kufi is quite rare in the architecture of Asia Minor13. There are several known inscriptions in this font made in the indicated technique14. Together with the formula "al mulku lillah" ("power belongs to the Lord") on an Iranian minaret of the early 12th century, they constitute the body of the earliest mosaic inscriptions of geometrical kufi in Muslim architecture. The many times repeated religious formula "Allah rabbi wa Muhammad an-nabi" ("God is our Lord and Muhammad is the prophet") fills the vault of the aivan of the Syrchaly madrasah in Konya. In all other cases, these are the inscriptions "Allah" and "Muhammad" and the names of the righteous caliphs Ali and Abu Bakr (as on
the facade of Sahib Ata). Geometric kufi was almost never used in interiors. The exception is the inscriptions in the dome decoration of the Karatay Madrasah (Konya), where the names of Muhammad, the righteous caliphs, are inscribed in the twenty "Turkish triangles" of the transition to the dome drum. - Abu Bakr, Omar, Osman, Ali, as well as the prophets Musa, Isa, Daud. These ornamental texts give the impression of dark blue-turquoise fabric inserts with intricate weaving, framed by openwork borders with a motif of turquoise shoots on a white background.
In addition, on the Sahib Ata portal, for the first time in Islamic monumental epigraphy, such a large number of Qur'anic fragments are cited. There are twelve15 of them, all of them are part of a single decorative program. The latter, in turn, is closely related to the purpose and location of the monument. The fact is that the mosque is one of the buildings of the complex located outside the city walls of Konya16, the remains of which disappeared by the end of the 19th century. Here, at the gate of Larende Kapysa, the roads to Karaman (in the old days - Larenda) and Meram17 crossed. The location of the mosque at the very entrance to the capital city was played up by the customer and the architect in a very original way, which, at the same time, has motivation in the context of Muslim culture. In the foundations of the paired minarets flanking the portal, charitable fountains were arranged, to which, in the conditions of the waterless and stony Kony plateau, water was supplied from the very foothills of Meram. The stalactite niches and frames of the sebels are made of marble, while the main volume of the portal is made of local stone; the ancient marble sarcophagi and carved frames of the sebiles did not suffer from long contact with water. Over time, he only acquired a yellowish patina, which gave the pattern of inscriptions and ornaments a sharp outline.
Sebili Mosque Sahib Ata is a unique phenomenon in the cult architecture of Islam, not only from the point of view of construction; their artistic solution is unusually expressive. Its characteristic and most striking part is the texts surrounding the sebili, which are selected fragments of several suras of the Qur'an. The wide and flat border of the sebil in the right wing contains several thematically related Qur'anic fragments, written one after the other, in one wide line. They talk about water as the source of life (21:31) 18: "We have made every living thing out of water, will they not believe"), about the purity and blessing of the drink of paradise (76:21): "And their Lord gave them drink a pure drink ", as well as (76: 5-6):" After all, the righteous drink from a vessel, a mixture in which with kafur, with a source from which the servants of God drink, making it flow "), about the life-giving power of water sent down by the Creator ( 25: 50-51): "He is the One who sends out the winds as heralds of his mercy. We bring down clean water from heaven to revive a dead country with it; with it We give drink to our numerous creatures - both cattle and men "), about water as a reward for following the right path (39:21):" But those who fear their Lord will be the palaces above; on top of them are still high palaces, and below
them rivers flow, as God promised, but God does not change his promise ", about the rain that feeds all life on Earth (78: 14-16):" We pour rain from the clouds, pouring abundantly to give them back bread and all vegetation, orchards with branchy trees. "
The principle applied here in the selection of verses of the Qur'an combines the Sahib Ata portal with very few Islamic monuments in which Quranic quotations are intended to emphasize a specific idea19. The fact that these inscriptions belong to the decor of a charity fountain make this monument exceptional. The border of the left fountain is decorated with an incised sulsom inscription. Here, after the obligatory Basmala ("In the name of God, merciful and merciful"), is written down extremely popular in architectural inscriptions and objects of decorative and applied art Ayat ul-Kursi - "Throne verse" of the Koran (2: 255). It should be noted that this favorite protective text is found only once in the architectural carving of Seljuk monuments, although it is not uncommon in monumental inscriptions in faience mosaics in the interiors of religious buildings in Anatolia20. The second wide border of the portal's rectangular frame contains a large fragment of Sura Pobeda (48: 1-13), a quote also included in the decor of the Dar ul-Hadith portal, the vertical composition of which is "held" by two wide double-interlaced ribbons of suls with a large fragment of the sura Ya sin (36: 1-31). The latter, it should be noted, is no longer found in the Asia Minor buildings of this period; quotations from this sura are characteristic of later mosques associated with burials. Thus, the full text of Surah Ya Sin is placed in the interior of the main building of the Taj Mahal complex in Agra (1632-54) 21. We talked about portals, where the inscriptions are presented in the form of rectangular ribbons, or play the role of a central compositional accent. But there are other original solutions as well. Let's return to the Alaaddin mosque, which was probably at the beginning of the 13th century. adorned with an elegant portal22. In its original form, it was a combination of Byzantine elements (a block with a corner column, doorway profiles) with motifs of the decor of Syrian architecture of the Zengid era (striped marble masonry of different colors; wicker knots). On the slightly concave surface of a rectangular border made of white marble blocks, in concave stalactite-like niches (there are 42 of them in total), there is the text of the first four verses of Sura Pobeda, preceded by Basmalla23. In the portal of the Karatay madrasah, which was built, apparently, several decades later, the same technique was used. However, in the carved "leaves" adorning the doorway, there is the text of hadiths - legends about the prophet's sayings.
In general, the repertoire of religious inscriptions and their artistic embodiment in the carving of the Konyan portals appears to be original and unique in the history of Islamic architectural epigraphy. The study of the Koranic texts on the portals, carried out in the context of the historical situation in Anatolia in the 13th century, is especially fruitful. The cities of the Konya Sultanate, which inherited the traditions of the Great Seljukids in the
organization of education and the organization of waqf educational institutions, became the focus of Muslim scholarship, centers for the study of the Koran and hadith studies. The presence of a noble customer - a vizier or a ruler -contributed to the appearance of appropriate semantic accents in the decorative program of socially significant buildings. They were sacred texts that symbolized the Muslim presence and domination in territories that were Christian a century and a half ago. It is difficult to find adherence to any canon in the location of such inscriptions on the portal or in the choice of writing style. Indeed, each monument in this sense is worthy of a separate study, in each individual case, according to the just statement of Professor O. Grabar, special problems were solved24. The individual character of the use of Arabic calligraphy is one of the characteristic features of the style of the Seljuk decor of Anatolia, which gives it its uniqueness and originality.
References:
1. The subject of research is religious buildings; therefore, the portals of numerous Anatolian caravanserais are not considered here.
2. Ogel S. Anadolu Sel?uklu Ta§ Tezyinati. (Stone decoration in Anatolia Seljuk time). Ankara, 1987. Res. 1.
3. Rogers M. Waqf and Patronage in Seljuk Anatolia: the Epigraphic Evidence. // AS, vol XXVI, 1976.
4. Bayburtluoglu Z. Anadolu'da Sel?uklu Donemi Yapi Sanat?ilari. (Master builders of the Seljuk time in Anatolia). Erzurum, 1993.
5. Sahib Ata Mosque (1258), Inje Minareli Madrasah (1264-65, both in Konya), Gok Madrasah (1271, Sivas).
6. Bayburtluoglu Z. Decree. Op. p. 132.
7. Oral, M. Zeki. Konya'da Ala ud-Din Camii ve Turbeleri. I. Yapilar, Kitabeler. (Alaaddin Mosque in Konya and mausoleums at it). Yillik Arast§rmalar Dergisi, I (1956). C.57.
8. Ibid, p. 57-58.
9. Ozonder H. Konya'da Sel?uklu Devri Abidelerinde Gorulen Epigrafik Ozellikler. (The nature of the epigraphy of the monuments of the Seljuk period in Konya) // Konya. Haz. F.Halici. Ankara, 1984, p. 16.
10. Hill, D., Grabar, O. Islamic Architecture and its Decoration. L., 1964, p. 85.
11. Al-Khallab A. Aesthetic foundations of Islamic ornament. M., 1999, S. 69.
12. See, for example: Sourdel-Thomine J. Sel?uklular devrinde Halep kufi yazisi. (Kufic letter in Alep - according to the Seljuk time). // Tarih Dergisi. No. 26. Mart: 1972.
13. Classic examples of the exclusive use of inscriptions in this font belong to the exteriors of Timurid buildings in Iran and Central Asia.
14. Meinecke M. Fayence decorationen seldschukischer Sakralbauten in Kleinasien. Tubingen, 1976. Teil I. C. 148-149.
15. Only two fragments (21 (31) and 76 (21)) are repeated in the decor of the right and left fountains. Reading most of the texts on the portal by: Ugur, M.
Ferit, Koman, M. Mesut. Sel?uk veziri Sahip Ata ile Ogullarmm hayat ve eserleri. (Description of the life and buildings of the Seljuk vizier Sahib Ata and his sons). Istanbul, 1934. Previously unattributed fragments were kindly read for this research by NF Ismagilov (N. Nakkash). Now in the southern part of the old city.
16. Meram is a village to the west of Konya, a place of recreation for the townspeople, famous for its gardens and villas located along the river descending from the mountains.
17. According to the edition: Koran. Translated from Arabic by G.S. Sablukov. Third edition. Kazan, 1907.
18. One of such rare examples is the solemn gate of Bulent Darwaza at Fatehpur Sikri (16th century, India). Wheeler M. Thackston. The Role of Calligraphy. // The Mosque. History, Architectural Development & Regional Diversity. Ed. by Marthin Frishman and Hasan-Uddin Khan. L. 1994. P.47.
19. In Anatolia, in the decor of nineteen monuments of religious architecture (facing of ayvans, mihrabs, sarcophagi, windows, dome bases). See: Meinecke M. Op. Cit., Vol. II, S. 189-190.
20. Wheeler M. Thackston. Op. Cit., P. 53.
21. The mosque underwent several reconstructions, as a result of which a portal and inscriptions, which were discussed above, were built into its courtyard wall.
22. Oral, M. Zeki. Decree op. P. 58.
23. Ettinghausen R., Grabar O. The Art and Architecture of Islam: 650-1250. Yale Univ. Press 1994. p. 325.
