Sultan Hassan Mosque

Sultan Hassan Mosque-Madrasa in Cairo, completed in 1363 during the Bahri Mamluk period, is among the most architecturally significant Islamic buildings in the world and one of the largest medieval mosques ever constructed. Built by Sultan al-Nasir Hassan over an extraordinary seven-year period at colossal expense, the complex combines a congregational mosque with four madrasas — one for each of the four major Sunni schools of Islamic jurisprudence (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi'i and Hanbali) — arranged around a central courtyard with a magnificent ablution fountain at its centre. The four iwans (vaulted halls) opening onto the courtyard each served as the lecture space for one of the legal schools, while the main qibla iwan facing Mecca contains the mihrab and minbar for congregational prayer. The mausoleum at the rear of the complex was originally intended for the sultan but he was assassinated before completion and his body never recovered, so the chamber instead holds the tomb of two of his sons. The building's vast size — its main facade is over seventy-five metres long and the entrance portal nearly thirty-eight metres tall — and the refined geometric and calligraphic decoration of its stone surfaces make it a high point of Mamluk religious architecture. It stands directly opposite the Cairo Citadel.