JOURNAL OF RESEARCHES IN ISLAMIC ARCHITECTURE
Year:2015 | Volume:3 | Issue:3 (8)|Papers Count:8

In recent decade, various types of reports, articles, and books have been published in relation with Islamic city, but the terminology of “Islamic city” is not yet defined clearly in these publications. Explanation of the subject and its definition that called as Islamic city is the first step of this research. The descriptive and analytical method has been used as the research methodology in this paper, through which all the existing published literature were surveyed and analytically reviewed. Literature survey shows that most of the recent studies are about existing cities that Muslims settled over there. The recent publication about Islamic city can be classified into two groups. First, those who defined Islamic city based on dominating elements of existing traditional Islamic cities.

Human beings have always been in an interaction with Nature in accordance with their own ideology and the interface between them has become a rich source of inspiration for most studies. The impact of human beings on Nature is anchored in the ideology or philosophy of life; The ideology has exerted so powerful influence that some people believe a typical Islamic city is grounded on and is physical manifestation of the Islamic philosophies and the merely way to be familiar with the ecology of Islamic cities is to comprehend its principles and laws. In that connection, the way the cities in human civilization formed and constructed have always embodied the ideology reigned over those societies; as a result, it is not surprising that in the geographical heterogeneous environments, cities with assorted roles, different levels of significance, and with uncoordinated and disparate development have been formed.

One of the symbols and symptoms that identify Islamic civilization is the Islamic Urbanization as a place for dwelling and activity. Urban areas and structures by manifestation of custom values should identify society’s civilization. And help them to achieve their purposes and ambitions. an Iranian Muslim architect ‘s belief has always been a priority for all of his works And to create his works all functional rules are under consideration of his belief principles. One of these belief principles is subjectivism and privacy life.

Despite many scholars in various domains including scientific, academic, professional and political fields talking about “Islamic city” and “Islamic ideal city” (Utopia), there is not a specific definition for “Islamic city” based on sacred Islamic texts. In other words, a variety of definitions and attributes of the “Islamic ideal city” are spread in texts based on different backgrounds and study domains of researchers. However, it seems that the appropriate definition for the “Islamic ideal city” as well as its essential and main attributes should be derived from the Islamic fundamental sacred texts, especially from the Holy Quran.

Tabriz has an old history that thanks to its proper geographical and climatical condition. This geographical situation has been made Tabriz to a permanent habitat center. This city in the early centuries of Islam has extended on the central mosque, bazaar, square and government palace. In the year 663 A.H, Abagha Khan has moved the capital from Maragheh to Tabriz. In the Ilkhanid era except for a short time at the time of the monarchy Oljaito (Mohammad Khodabandeh) since the 703-716 A.H that Tabriz and Soltaniyeh were the capital simultaneously, at other times, Tabriz has been capital and the seat of government. At the time of Ghazan Khan has have the most architectural and urban changes.

Mosque, as one of the most prominent buildings of Islamic architecture has been influenced by constant subsystems and temporal as well as spatial variables and has passed its trend of formation and evolution or decline. As the architecture of Shiraz’s mosques finds their way at the very preliminary sanctuary pattern, different from many Iranian mosques, the paper tries to investigate the order and organization of it in the interaction with different and influential subsystems by focusing on the main body of this architecture, i.e. the sanctuary. Accordingly, the major question is how the sanctuary in historical mosques of Shiraz is organized and ordered. For this purpose, through studying the number, location, and proportion of the sanctuaries. In every mosque, their order and organization can be analyzed.

In Islamic architecture, especially in mosque, the main consideration is to the prayer spirit. For this reason, Quran inscriptions cover the most parts of the decorations of architecture. Altars are always one of the elements with full of motifs decoration because of dignity and its position. The decorations are including Quranic verses and themes. Mosque decorations inscriptions are a main source to investigation the views and religious thoughts. Identifying the Quranic Inscriptions of stucco Ilkhanid alters and understanding their contents are the aims of this paper. Totally, decorative inscriptions of Altars are divided to four groups; date, signature (name of the architect and artist. Etc.), supplements and endowments, religious phrases (names of God, the Quran verses, Hadith, name of the prophet and Imams). The present study focuses on the themes of Quranic verses and the contents of them that used in Ilkhanid stucco altars.

After mosques, tombs are the most important buildings of the Islamic period. Octagonal domed Tombs in the Islamic middle ages are more abundant than the early centuries of Islam. The evolution of quadrilateral domed tombs to octagonal domed tombs occur with the advent of the Seljuk and architecture developments in this period. Kerman province that was regarded as one of the most important centers of the Seljuk rulers, converted to the place of numerous tombs of sufis and elders in this period. It could be noted several examples of octagonal domed tombs in the Seljuk period that has been prevalent design of the domed tomb in this period. The existence of these buildings is interpreted with reference to local elders and religious figures.