A veritable variety of Vocabulary
Decoration using polygonal shapes with no gaps.
What is tessellation?
Hypostyle Hall Design Mosque from the Early Umayyad Period located in southern Spain.
What is the Great Mosque of Cordoba?
The Taj Mahal was built as a mausoleum for her by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan.
Who is Mumtaz Mahal?
Pre-Islamic monument located in Mecca that was rededicated by Muhammed as Islam's most sacred shrine.
What is the Kaaba?
The founder of India's Mughal Empire claimed descent on his father's side to this feared Turco-Mongol leader from central Asia.
Who is Timur (Tamerlane)?
A dense forest of columns.
What is hypostyle?
A delicate carved ivory container given to the son of a powerful member of the Umayyad caliph's family.
What is the Pyxis of al-Mughira?
Highly ornamental Islamic script used for religious art and texts.
What is Kufic calligraphy?
A four iwan design mosque located in a dense Iranian city center with large snaking rows of bazaars set up in the vicinity of the mosque.
What is the Great Mosque of lsfahan?
The term used in art history that signifies the absence of human figures.
What is aniconic?
Honeycomb-like decorations applied in Islamic buildings; surface resembles intricate stalactites
What are muqarnas?
The Abbasid Folio from a Qur'an was painted on this material made from a specially prepared untanned skin of an animal.
What is vellum (or parchment)?
This artist working in the Mamluk Dynasty made a brass basin inlaid with gold and silver zoomorphic and figurative designs.
Who is Muhammad ibn al-Zain?
A centrally planned mosque similar in design to the Hagia Sophia that is part of a larger complex including schools, hospital, and a library.
What is the Mosque of Selim ll?
The name of the court official who commissioned the Ardabil carpet and whose name is inscribed on the poem at the end of the carpet.
Who is Maqsud?
The pillar that states Muslims should donate 2.5% of their income to the poor (Arabic word).
What is Zakat?
The Islamic caliphate that came first chronologically?
What is the Umayyad Caliphate?
This motif found on the Baptistere of St. Louis was both a French royal heraldic device and a traditional Mamluk emblem.
What is the fleur-de-lis?
The renowned architect of the Ottoman Empire who built many centrally planned mosques.
Who is Sinan?
The epic story still told in Iranian schools today that instills pride in the Persian past.
What is the Shahnama?