In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the Ayyubid dynasty brought unprecedented architectural development to Aleppo, the most important city in medieval Syria. While early Islamic empires usually expressed their grandeur by founding new cities with vast extra-urban palaces, the Ayyubids asserted their power by "modernizing" existing towns. With its large, well-preserved citadel and a wide variety of pious institutions, Aleppo is the ideal subject for Yasser Tabbaa's study of the pan-Islamic transformation in urban architecture. 
Tabbaa argues that the intense palatial and religious architectural activity of the period was intended to create a royal image of the Ayyubid state while also fostering links between it and the urban population. His study is based on an entirely new evaluation of the architectural and epigraphic aspects of the standing monuments of the period. It presents for the first time full photographic coverage of these monuments, as well as many new plans and other renderings, and pays close attention to monumental inscriptions, correcting and augmenting previous studies. 
The book utilizes the full panoply of the available literary sources, including topographies, chronicles, travel accounts, and poetry. The juxtaposition of thorough architectural analysis and keen evaluation of literary sources sheds new light on nearly all aspects of this architecture: its links with the city, its place within Ayubbid patronage, its role in the prevalent sectarian rivalry in the city, and, perhaps most important, its function as the propagator of royal power and integrator of this power within the urban population. At a time when Arabic poetry and court culture had lost much of their earlier resonance, Tabbaa finds that these architectural institutions contributed to the creation of a later medieval Islamic culture, one more closely tied to the grandeur of monuments than to the eloquence of ideas.

Constructions of Power and Piety in Medieval Aleppo

Arts & Photography

Tabbaa, Yasser

History & Criticism

Penn State University Press

The Transformation of Islamic Art during the Sunni Revival (Publications on the Near East)

University of Washington Press

The nature of Islamic art and its development is here analyzed within a carefully historical context that seeks to formulate connections between artistic, political, and religious developments in the 11th-and 12th- century Islamic world. Tabbaa (an author of other works on Islamic art and architecture) includes in his analysis Quranic manuscripts, public inscriptions, architectural ornament, muqarnas vaulting, and vegetal and geometric patterns. The concurrent development and influence of geometry is an underlying theme. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

The Transformation of Islamic Art During the Sunni Revival (PUBLICATIONS ON THE NEAR EAST, UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON)

Univ of Washington Pr

The transformation of Islamic architecture and ornament during the eleventh and twelfth centuries signaled profound cultural changes in the Islamic world. Yasser Tabbaa explores with exemplary lucidity the geometric techniques that facilitated this transformation, and investigates the cultural processes by which meaning was produced within the new forms. Iran, Iraq, and Syria saw the development of proportional calligraphy, vegetal and geometric arabesque, muqarnas (stalactite) vaulting, and other devices that became defining features of medieval Islamic architecture. Ultimately, the forms and themes described in this book shaped the development of Mamluk architecture in Egypt and Syria, and by extension, the entire course of North African and Andalusian architecture as well. These innovations developed and were disseminated in a highly charged atmosphere of confrontation between the Seljuk and post-Seljuk proponents of the traditionalist Sunni revival and their main opponents in Fatimid Egypt. These forms stood as visual signs of allegiance to the orthodox Abbasid caliphate and of difference from the heterodox Fatimids. Tabbaa proposes that their rapid spread throughout the Islamic world operated within a system of reciprocating, ceremonial gestures, which conveyed a new and formal language that helped negotiate the gap between the myth of a unified Sunni Islam and its actual political fragmentation. In subject matter and approach, The Transformation of Islamic Art during the Sunni Revival makes original contributions to the study of art, revealing that this relatively neglected sector of medieval art and architecture is of critical importance for reevaluating the entire field of Islamic studies. It challenges the essentialist and positivist approaches that still permeate the study of Islamic art, and offers a historical and semiotic alternative for exploring meaning within ruptures of change.

The transformation of Islamic architecture and ornament during the eleventh and twelfth centuries signaled profound cultural changes in the Islamic world. Yasser Tabbaa explores with exemplary lucidity the geometric techniques that facilitated this transformation, and investigates the cultural processes by which meaning was produced within the new forms. Iran, Iraq, and Syria saw the development of proportional calligraphy, vegetal and geometric arabesque, muqarnas (stalactite) vaulting, and other devices that became defining features of medieval Islamic architecture. Ultimately, the forms and themes described in this book shaped the development of Mamluk architecture in Egypt and Syria, and by extension, the entire course of North African and Andalusian architecture as well.These innovations developed and were disseminated in a highly charged atmosphere of confrontation between the Seljuk and post-Seljuk proponents of the traditionalist Sunni revival and their main opponents in Fatimid Egypt. These forms stood as visual signs of allegiance to the orthodox Abbasid caliphate and of difference from the heterodox Fatimids. Tabbaa proposes that their rapid spread throughout the Islamic world operated within a system of reciprocating, ceremonial gestures, which conveyed a new and formal language that helped negotiate the gap between the myth of a unified Sunni Islam and its actual political fragmentation.In subject matter and approach, The Transformation of Islamic Art during the Sunni Revival makes original contributions to the study of art, revealing that this relatively neglected sector of medieval art and architecture is of critical importance for reevaluating the entire field of Islamic studies. It challenges the essentialist and positivist approaches that still permeate the study of Islamic art, and offers a historical and semiotic alternative for exploring meaning within ruptures of change.

This volume collects Yasser Tabbaa's investigative and interpretive articles on medieval Islamic architecture, ornament and gardens in Syria and Iraq, with comparative expansions into Anatolia, Egypt, North Africa and Spain. He examines the monuments, many of which have vanished in recent years, within the context of the political divisions and theological ruptures that characterised the Islamic world between the 11th and 13th centuries. The writings cover significant forms such as muqarnas vaulting, proportioned Qur'anic scripts and cursive public inscriptions, and monument types such as the madrasa, the hospital, the tribunal (dar al-'adl) and the citadel palace. Collectively, they present medieval Islamic architecture as a transformative process that echoes Abbasid glory and signals future developments in later Islamic architecture.

The Production of Meaning in Islamic Architecture and Ornament (Collected Papers in Islamic Art)

Edinburgh University Press

The Transformation of Islamic Art during the Sunni Revival

I.B.Tauris

This new MWNF Travel Book was conceived not long before the war started. All texts refer to the pre-war situation and are our expression of hope that Syria, a land that witnessed the evolution of civilisation since the beginnings of human history, may soon become a place of peace and the driving force behind a new and peaceful beginning for the entire region. Bilad al-Sham testifies to a thorough and strategic programme of urban reconstruction and reunification during the 12th and 13th centuries. Amidst a period of fragmentation, visionary leadership came with the Atabeg Nur al-Din Zangi. He revived Syria's cities as safe havens to restore order. His most agile Kurdish general, Salah al-Din (Saladin), assumed power after he died and unified Egypt and Sham into one force capable of re-conquering Jerusalem from the Crusaders. The Ayyubid Empire flourished and continued the policy of patronage. Though short-lived, this era held long-lasting resonance for the region. Its recognisable architectural aesthetic - austere, yet robust and perfected ‒ survived until modern times. The Ayyubid Era: Art and Architecture in Medieval Syria describes eight thematic Itineraries including, among others, the cities of Damascus, Bosra, Homs, Hama, Aleppo and Raqqa. This title is part of the series "Islamic Art in the Mediterranean". Each title in this series starts with a general introduction to the series, followed by an introduction to the particular title. To see the table of contents of this title and a section of its introduction, please check the "Look Inside" link for the eBook/Kindle version. The "Look Inside" link for the paperback version takes you to the general series introduction. Please note that only the eBook includes a Location Index.

The Ayyubid Era: Art and Architecture in Medieval Syria (Islamic Art in the Mediterranean)

Moaz, Abd Al-Razzaq

Takieddine, Zena

Museum Ohne Grenzen (Museum with No Frontiers)

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Tabbaa, Yasser. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Tabbaa, Yasser

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Tabbaa, Yasser. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Constructions of Power and Piety in Medieval Aleppo

The Transformation of Islamic Art during the Sunni Revival (Publications on the Near East)

The Transformation of Islamic Art During the Sunni Revival (PUBLICATIONS ON THE NEAR EAST, UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON)

The Transformation of Islamic Art during the Sunni Revival (Publications on the Near East)

The Transformation of Islamic Art during the Sunni Revival (Publications on the Near East)

The Production of Meaning in Islamic Architecture and Ornament (Collected Papers in Islamic Art)

The Transformation of Islamic Art during the Sunni Revival

The Ayyubid Era: Art and Architecture in Medieval Syria (Islamic Art in the Mediterranean)