Mosques as places of worship are the most significant form of architecture introduced after the advent of Islam. Sindh saw the emergence of this type of building after the arrival of the Arab general Mohammad bin Qasim in 712 AD, when he brought the geography under the banner of Islam. Shaikh Khurshid Hasan’s Evolution and Development of Mosque Architecture in Sindh relates, in essence, to that episode in history and narrates the story from there onwards, keeping the focus on the mosques in Sindh.

Places of worship are significant for every religion and archaeological remains are a testament to their importance. Revered, celebrated and often designed with posterity in mind, these sacred abodes were — and are — usually mostly grand in scale, durable in material, embellished with the utmost finesse and aesthetically pleasing. Nothing was spared — from manpower to material resources to innovation in design and technology — to build a ‘Divine abode’. Pagan temples from the Bronze Age, that have withstood the vagaries of time, attest to the phenomena that places of worship were. One look at the temple of Karnak in Egypt and the soaring columns of its Hypostyle Hall, inspiring awe and shrinking the spectator to an insignificant being, is telling of the very mentality that conceived these spaces.

Speaking strictly with reference to architecture, design evolves over time, starting from humble beginnings and reaching a perfect style over a period of years. Similar was the case with mosque architecture; it began with a basic, temporary shelter that was the Mosque of the Prophet — Masjid-i-Nabawi — and developed into a mature form of construction with permanent elements and iconography during the Umayyad and Abbasid periods. As one skims through Hasan’s book, it becomes evident that the evolutionary account of the mosques of Sindh is no different.

Collapsing time and geography into one volume with credible sources, this book is a treat for those interested in history and architecture

Published by the National Institute of Historical and Cultural Research’s Centre of Excellence at Quaid-i-Azam University, Evolution and Development of Mosque Architecture in Sindh is a valuable addition to the available source material on the architecture of this particular region under Muslim patronage. It takes us back to the earliest of prayer spaces— of which only traces remain today — to mosques from the later period, many of which continue to stand fully erect, albeit having been renovated.

The book’s chapters are divided into two streams: geographical and temporal. There are accounts of the major and minor mosques built in important cities and under prominent dynasties that established their rule over Sindh. A thematic chapter that grabs the attention of the reader instantly is ‘Mosque[s] Constructed in Remarkable Style of Architecture’.

In this chapter, Hasan discusses prayer spaces that have distinct decorative and architectural characteristics. Bodhesar Mosque in Tharparkar, for example, constructed somewhere around 1505 CE, displays four bracketed capitals (the topmost section of a column), a distinctively designed mihrab (semicircular niche that indicates the direction of the Holy Kaaba) and battlement-like parapets that express the plurality, and inclusion, of local design tendencies within the prescribed iconographic framework for mosque architecture. Tharparkar and the lower Sindh areas also have a long-established tradition of stone carving; this is apparent in the use of decorative elements.

The Bodhesar Mosque belongs to what Hasan categorises as ‘provincial’ style as it “combined both the Imperial and vernacular traditions.” According to him, there are three stylistic approaches when it comes to the design of mosques in Sindh. One is the Imperial style, centred mostly on Delhi. Then, the Imperial Mughal style that became visible later in the major Mughal cities of Lahore, Delhi, Fatehpur Sikri and Agra. Finally, there is the provincial style, which is an amalgamation of local taste and Imperial design. To grasp in totality what comes later in the chapters, this first part of the text is imperative as it provides an overall framework to the book.

This initial chapter elucidates upon styles, elements, patrons and builders and the broader historical context that informed the architecture of Sindh in general and mosque construction in particular. Here, the author deliberates upon exceptional features pertaining to Sindh, such as Jain temple architecture that subsequently informed mosque architecture, or the domestic feature of mangh [wind catcher] that found its way into Sindh’s mosques because of its climatic utility. Hasan writes: “One of the unique features of architecture in Sindh is of domestic nature. A normal feature of houses in lower Sindh is ‘mangh’ or wind catcher set in a flat roof of the house facing the wind direction, in the summer providing natural air conditioning of homes by filtering the air through this roof tunnel. This device has been provided in some of the mosques in Sindh. The Sindhi artists excel in the art of stone carvings. The skill of the stone masons, who have carved Buddhist stupas are among the finest in the subcontinent. The bas relief carvings in the Samma tombs are also quite attractive. The solitary example of carvings of Quranic verses in Shah Jahani Mosque at Thatta can indeed be compared to those in the Mosque of Cordova, Spain.” [sic]

Reflections of the Imperial style are observed in mosques that were constructed during the reign of the Mughals. The Mughals’ downfall, however, brought back local features that were not dictated by the centre — according to Hasan, the regional dynasties of the Talpurs and Kalhoras preferred glazed tiles with red brick over stone carvings, reminiscent of the Timurid school of architecture in Herat, Afghanistan. What is intriguing for a historian such as myself, is the plurality and inclusiveness when one observes the graphics of the mosques. Immense liberty was exercised in the execution of these constructions. The variety observed within the stylistic approaches of different regions and time periods is reflective of the plurality of a society where Jain temple architecture can find its way into mosque architecture without being frowned upon.

This is markedly different from contemporary times where we have witnessed the mushrooming of green domes, a style that adheres to a particular, single geography. This fixation is reflective of the fundamental mindset of today that attempts to purify everything, making most mosque architecture copies of the image of the Mosque of the Prophet. As it is, there is an inherent lack of investigation when it comes to religious matters and the case of religious architecture is no different. The dome on the Mosque of the Prophet is a Mamluk element added fairly later and only much later was it painted green. The book under review, therefore, has its greatest potential where it discusses multiple architectural styles adapted for mosques in Sindh in a reasonable manner based on valid published sources.

Hasan, being an archaeologist of immense repute, writes in a pragmatic tone that is methodical and follows a strict structure for description of the buildings. Architecture, decoration and calligraphies are discussed in detail and historic context is narrated wherever sources are available. It is only here that we encounter retellings of myths and legends associated with the patrons and builders, but overall the text avoids anecdotal references — the writing does not transcend the boundaries of fact to venture into folklore. This is a challenge in itself if one decides to write about Sindh, a land pregnant with stories, where the lines between fact and fiction are often blurred. The book is therefore a successful attempt as it keeps its focus limited and sources reasonable; it provides serious scholarship rather than filling pages with fictitious accounts.

Information about the mosques included in the book is supplemented with plans and images, both black-and-white and coloured. The only problem is that the images have numbers rather than titles. These numbers are concentrated at the end of the book, grouped with indices and bibliography, and must be matched to the corresponding titles that are provided at the beginning. This creates difficulties for the reader who must constantly switch from chapters to images, back and forth, to figure the titles out. This technical, or compositional, glitch prevents the book from being a logistically manageable read. Even so, the book must be celebrated for condensing a large time span and diverse geography in a single volume with credible source material, research and scholarship. For this reason, the book is a treat for architects, architectural historians, academics and history lovers.

The reviewer is an architectural historian and assistant professor at NED University of Engineering and Technology

Evolution and Development of Mosque
Architecture in Sindh
By Shaikh Khurshid Hasan
National Institute of Historical and
Cultural Research’s Centre of Excellence,
Quaid-i-Azam University
380pp.

Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, December 24th, 2017