The mosque and the city
[Picture source: © 2008 Rami Alafandi ] [Picture source: © 2008 Rami Alafandi ] Historian Ghazzi in his description of Aleppo’s neighborhoods, and documents from the Sharia Court Records as well, distinguish the urban space between intra muros (dakhil Halab) and extra muros (zahir Halab). This distinction was obviously still important in Ottoman times, when the city’s ramparts that represent the border between these two spheres had already lost any strategic importance and were even no longer visible in some parts.
This question is important for the history of Banqusa, since its location determines the position within the city’s networks and the status of its mosque.
The Ottoman city is divided into smaller units – particularly in case of big cities – that help organize many aspects of everyday life (security, water supply, paying taxes, etc.). The usual solution is a parish-like social organization, where units – sometimes ethnically or religiously defined – take over some of these tasks. When observing cities in the Middle East, we notice that sometimes the administrative neighborhood – at least in Ottoman times – seems to be congruent with a parish community, organized around a neighborhood mosque.
A brief look back into history reveals that the shape and the size of the city of Aleppo changes significantly between the 12th and the 15th century AD. The second half of the 12th century AD is characterized by an urban renewal in most of Syria and Mesopotamia. This ‘urban renaissance’ involved in the case of Aleppo a growth of suburbs extending beyond the walls, as describes the historian Ibn Shaddad.[1] Destruction caused by the Mongol invasion (1260 AD) and Tamerlane’s siege of the city (1400 AD) principally concerned these suburbs and significantly reduced their size and changed their shape.
The integration of Aleppo into the Ottoman Empire in 1516 initiated once again a period of urban growth and the shape of the new suburbs was established. The prosperity of Aleppo in later centuries, mainly based on long-distance trade, led to a higher density of constructions mainly in the suburbs.
Mosques and the rituals performed therein have a very distinct relation to the city: Particularly the Friday prayer with its sermon (khutba) may only be performed in a city. The main mosque in a city – the ‘Friday Mosque’ – serves that purpose. Only one should exist in the city, to allow for the gathering of the whole community in that place during the Friday prayer (salat al-jumʿa). The ruler is supposed to construct the mosque and appoint its imam and preacher. Attending the Friday sermon is considered an individual duty (fard al-ʿayn) for the entire adult male Muslims population of the city. This task becoming more and more difficult to achieve, with growing cities - and the particularly the Muslim communities within – more than one Friday Mosque per city became accepted.
These additional Friday mosques might be established in distinct parts of town, distinct urban unities, separated by the other parts of the town by a river, a mountain, or being situated on a hill, etc.
In Aleppo, already in the 13th century AD several Friday Mosques did exist in distinct parts of town. There was a one on the citadel, occupying the place where there had been an altar of the prophet Abraham (Ibrahim), as a legend pretends. That mosque probably existed since Mirdasid times (5th / 11th century) and was reconstructed by al-Zahir Ghazi, the Ayyubid ruler of Aleppo (610 / 1213).[2] In addition to that Friday Mosque on the citadel, Ibn Shaddad mentions one in the suburb Hadir Sulaymani in the southwest of the city, of which no traces remain today (close to the modern extra muros neighborhood of al-Kallasa). Others were situated in the extra mural neighborhood of ar-Ramada in the north and in Banqusa,[3] adding up to five Friday Mosques in Aleppo, including the Umayyad Mosque. We observe that until the end of Ayyubid rule in Aleppo (1260 AD), the principle that there should only be one Friday Mosque in an urban entity, was generally applied. In intra muros Aleppo, the Umayyad Mosque remained the only one. After the end of Ayyubid rule, numerous new Friday Mosques were constructed in different neighborhoods and patronage to build and endow these mosques acquired a broader base.[4]
The Banqusa Mosque was thus one of the ancient Friday Mosques of Aleppo that existed in addition to the ‘Great Umayyad Mosque’ (Jamiʿ al-Umawi al-Kabir). The exact date of the foundation of the mosque in Banqusa remains unclear.[5] It is possible, but not entirely sure that the current Banqusa Mosque is a successor to this mosque mentioned in the 13th century. However, no constructions remain from this period, certainly due to the already mentioned destruction of Aleppo’s suburbs on several occasions.[6]
Historians highlight this mosque: Ibn al-Hanbali calls it the ‘great mosque in Banqusa’ (al-jamiʿ al-ʿazm bi-Banqusa). He mentions as well a certain Ahmad b. Ahmad al-Badami (d. 940/1533), who, after serving as a judge in Mardin, used to live in one of the rooms in the Banqusa mosque while he was teaching in Aleppo.[7] Ghazzi mentions that during his time (around 1900), there was no other mosque in Aleppo that would match the Banqusa Mosque’s importance in number of attendance and rituals performed therein.[8]
Aleppo’s Sharia Court Records from the Ottoman period confirm this assessment: a document concerning the appointment of a new teacher (mudarris) for example informs us that he should teach on four days a week in the mosque, two days hadith, Hanafite law (fiqh) on two other days. The same document refers to the mosque as ‘Jamiʿ Khass Bek known as great mosque’.[9] Another document, an endowment charter (waqfiyya), stipulates two Coran readings each day, one to be finished with the Surat Ya Sin, the other with the Surat al-Kahf each Friday.[10]
A small endowment established in the year 1222 / 1807 displays in a typical way the importance of the Banqusa Mosque: a certain Hajj Ibrahim endows a house (dar) in the Ibn Nusayr neighborhood close to the mosque for the benefit of his wife and, after her death, for the benefit of the mosque. A part of the waqf’s revenues should be spend for Coran readings.[11] These small endowments, of which there are several to be found in the records, probably established by people living close to the mosque and forming part of the mosque’s parish community show by this means affiliation to the mosque. The Banqusa Mosque was among the most frequently endowed mosques in the Ottoman period, particularly in the first half of the 19th century.[12]
