Historical and Architectural Importance
[Picture source: © 1980 Jean-Claude David] [Picture source: © 1980 Jean-Claude David] The Sharaf Mosque lies in the middle of a part of Aleppo that was characterized by a largely majoritarian Christian population. Nevertheless, we find a number of Friday mosques that are particularly prosperous. They were patronized by some notable Muslim families living in the area. The Sharaf Mosque for example is controlled for a considerable time during the 18th and 19th centuries by the Hariri family. They act as administrators and continue to endow the mosque’s waqf, like Sayyid Muhammad Sharif Jalabi al-Hariri in 1201/1786-87.[1]
Members of the family were probably active in the textile sector, a major factor in the economy of that northern part of Aleppo.
The major bond nevertheless between the mosque and the Christian communities was the fact that the land on which the Christian graveyards were established – just outside the old Judayda neighborhood in today’s Aziziyya – was waqf for the mosque. The mosque received the ground rent (hikr) – although only small sums – for that land and was involved in court cases dealing with the administration of graveyards.[2]
One possible explanation for that dense relationship involves economic activities: the northern suburb was Aleppo’s second economic center in the early modern period, particularly since the 17th century due to the importance of the textile industry. The waqf-complex of Ibshir Mustafa Pasha, consisting of several khans and qasariyyat (workshops), in the direct vicinity of the mosque attests to that importance (cf. Ibshir Mustafa Pasha).
In an attempt of resuming, the Sharaf mosque is important and interesting to study – as an example of a small ‘neighborhood’ mosque – because it continued to flourish in the early modern period (particularly the 18th and 19th centuries) in a mostly non-Muslim environment, because it became – at least institutionally – a kind of meeting place of the different communities living in that part of Aleppo. Apart from that, it is a fine example of late local Mamluke architecture, particularly its prayer hall, minaret, and the attached qastal (Fig. 7).
Figure 7: Sharaf Mosque, qastal [Picture source: © 2007 Stefan Knost] 