Rescuing the Mamluk minbars of Cairo In 2018, the Egyptian Heritage Rescue Foundation (EHRF) launched a two-year project to document the minbars of the Mamluk period that can be found in many religious monuments in Egypt and museum collections worldwide. Omniya Abdel Barr describes the efforts to restore, conserve and protect these pulpits. A minbar (pl. manabir) is a stepped pulpit located at the central point of a mosque to the right of the mihrab, the prayer niche directing to Makkah. It provides a raised structure for preachers to be better seen and heard at a distance during their sermons (khutba) before Friday and Eid prayers. However, pulpits were present in Egypt long before Islam. One example survives in the Coptic Museum and shows a raised seat with six steps – or seven if we count the seat – and two columns on both sides. This white limestone pulpit was made in the 6th century CE for the Monastery of Jeremiah. James E. Quibell, who excavated the pulpit in Saqqara in 1908, and K. A. C. Creswell both suggested that it could have served as a prototype for the Islamic minbar. After the Prophet Muhammad built his mosque in Medina, he used to preach next to the trunk of a palm tree, which supported the roof. Later, he ordered a raised wooden seat with two steps to be made. It is believed that the carpenter who made this structure was Coptic or Byzantine, and so it is thinkable that the first minbar in Islam was influenced by the Egyptian pulpit. The Prophet used the minbar to deliver his sermons and to answer queries. During the first decades of the caliphate period, this minbar became a permanent reminder of the Prophet’s presence. It was the symbol of state power and religious authority. With the early Muslim conquests, more minbars were built in the new provinces and installed in every mosque. The design and form developed under
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the Umayyad dynasty (661–750 CE), and more steps were added. The grand structure also served to designate a special area for sultans and caliphs to pray. Today, these minbars have impor tant spiritual and historic as well as artistic value. The Mamluk minbars Cairo was the capital of the Mamluk sultanate (1250–1517), a period representing the golden age of medieval Egyptian art and architecture. The countr y regained its position as an international economic centre and secured links between east and west. The Mamluks were important art patrons and generously financed their religious and funerary complexes. The minbars in these foundation were mainly made from imported and local wood, with finely carved panels and inlaid with ebony, ivory and mother of pearl. A few examples were made from polychrome marble and stone. The design of the Mamluk minbars shows advanced use of geometry in decoration and highlights its development in Egypt. The Mamluk minbars are appreciated for their fine craftsmanship. Almost every international collection on Islamic art acquired a piece: panels from the minbar of Sultan Lajin, made for the Mosque of Ibn Tulun in 1296, are today present in twelve museums and three private collections. An entire minbar made during the reign of Sultan Qaytbay (1468–1496) was purchased in 1867 by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and has been on display ever since. It can be found in the Museum’s Jameel Gallery.
