AL-AZHAR GATES

DR. Ashraf Mohamed Tawakol

Assignment 2

Omar Alaa Eldeen Soliman

1610480
 The Gates Through The Years
Al-Azhar Mosque has 8 doors, and Al-Azhar is divided into two galleries, and the old portico extends
from Bab Al-Shawam to the balconies of Al-Sharqawi along the courtyard. As for the new balcony built
by Abd al-Rahman Katkhuda, it appears behind the old portico and rises in the middle of it.
The mosque has 10 mihrabs, 6 of which are still present, and a minbar. The mosque has more than 380
beautiful marble columns, the column heads taken from ancient Egyptian temples, and some “beaks”
resting on white marble columns, shoulders and brackets.
The most famous doors of Al-Azhar Mosque are Bab Al-Muzayinin, Bab Al-Maghariba, Bab Al-Sa'idah,
Bab Al-Shawam, Bab Al-Jawhariya, and Bab Sagheer.
Al-Muzineen Gate: a double-arched alls portal built of stone with recessed arches surrounding the Two
doors and four panels of stone-cut, floriated ornaments with roundels in between. The Bab al-Muzayinin
opens into a rectangular, mar- ble-paved court flanked on the northeast by the main façade of the Madrasa
al-Aqbaghawiyya. It consists of two entrances, and it is the largest and most famous of Al-Azhar’s gates,
and the main entrance to the mosque. It was named like this because students would have their heads
shaved outside of the gate, which eventually became the main entrance to the mosque. The Muzaineen
Gate includes the Taybarsiyya school and the Aqbaghawyah school on which the date of its creation and
the name of its builder, Sultan Qaytbay, one of the sultans of the Mamluk state, were inscribed: “He
ordered the construction of this door and the honorable minaret, Maulana Al-Ashraf Qaytbay, on the 3rd
of Rajab.There was a verse of a poem was written by gold on the outside face of the gate which says:
."‫ كسماء ما طاولتها سماء‬.:.‫" إن للعلم أزهرا يتسامى‬
Bab Al-Saa’idah: It was built by Prince Abdul Rahman Katkhuda. It is located after Bab Al-Shawam in
the direction of Al-Batalia and Ketama lanes. Whoever passes this door enters the porch of Al-Sa`idah,
the house of the lanterns, the burial ground of Al-Katkhuda, and the mosque's new shrine. Khedive
Tawfiq was the one who demolished the gate and built it again under the supervision of Prince Adham
Pasha, who inscribed on its facade from the outside his poem of three verses, the first of which says:
‫ وسمت محاسنه بأعجب منظـر‬..... ‫" باليمن أقبل باب سعد األزهــــر‬
ً
‫ موصول مورده جميل المصدر‬...... ‫مجازا للحقيقة بالهـــــدى‬ ‫وغدا‬
‫ إنشاؤه نادى بخير األعصـــــر‬..... ‫باب شريف للنجاح مجــــرب‬
"‫ يمن يسر كمال باب األزهـــــر‬..... ‫في دولة إسماعيل داور عصرنا‬
Bab Al-Sa'ida" is considered one of the most famous and largest halls of Al-Azhar Al-Sharif, and it was
called Al-Sa'ida; Because the Sa’idah students used to live in the gallery - according to what was
mentioned in (The Journey of Al-Manna and Al-Manna) by the student Ahmed Al-Mustafa Al-Hajji, Ibn
Tawir Al-Jannah -, as students from Upper Egypt used to come to this gallery and study in it, and the
Sa’aidah hallway usually includes the neighbors from Giza until Aswan.
The Mughrabi Gate: It is believed that it is one of the original gates of Al-Azhar and was built under the
supervision of the agency established by Sultan Qaytbay, and its rail is connected to the maqsura in the
old mosque. Through this door, the visitor enters the courtyard of the mosque after passing between the
Moroccan barrier and the two porticoes of Al-Senariyeh and the Turks. And the reason of this name is
The large number of Moroccan families who have come to live in Egypt.It was believed that the many
and wealthy Moroccan families who left the countries of Morocco and lived in Egypt, or the families that
frequented them in search of trade, pilgrimage or knowledge, since the first centuries of Islam in North
Africa; These families have encouraged the allocation of a place (Riwaq) for Moroccan students and their
sheikhs who study jurisprudence according to the Maliki school of thought, and receive all other sciences
in Al-Azhar.
Bab Al-Sharba: It is located next to the dome of the new mosque, next to the house of Sayyid Omar
Makram, the captain of the supervision, and the one who built it was Prince Abdul Rahman Katkhuda. It
was called sharba, due to its proximity to the soup kitchen, in which rice and soup were cooked during the
Ottoman era, during the month of Ramadan and distributed to the poor of the mosque, as Dr. Souad
Maher in her book “The Mosques of Egypt and Their Righteous Guardians.”
So, the gates of al-azhar mosque was totally affected by the culture at the time when each gate was built,
starting by the mamluks passing by fatimids and Ottomans. Each era had its own effect on the mosque,
effect on the design, names and draws until we got the result of masterpiece which is El-azhar mosque. A
result of 1000 years efforts by different cultures.