The Mshatta Facade is the decorated part of the facade of the 8th-century

Umayyad The Umayyad Caliphate or Umayyad Empire (, ; ) was the second caliphate established after the death of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty. Uthman ibn Affan, the third of the Rashidun caliphs, was also a membe ...

residential palace of

Qasr Mshatta Qasr Mushatta () is the ruin of an Umayyad winter palace, probably commissioned by Caliph Al-Walid II during his brief reign (743-744). The ruins are located approximately 30 km south of Amman, Jordan, north of Queen Alia International Airp ...

, one of the Desert Castles of Jordan, which is now installed in the south wing of the

Pergamon Museum The Pergamon Museum (; ) is a Kulturdenkmal , listed building on the Museum Island in the Mitte (locality), historic centre of Berlin, Germany. It was built from 1910 to 1930 by order of Emperor Wilhelm II, German Emperor, Wilhelm II and accordi ...

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. It is part of the permanent exhibition of the Pergamon Museum of Islamic Art dedicated to

Islamic art Islamic art is a part of Islamic culture and encompasses the visual arts produced since the 7th century CE by people who lived within territories inhabited or ruled by Muslims, Muslim populations. Referring to characteristic traditions across ...

from the 8th to the 19th centuries. This was only a relatively small section of the full length of the facade, surrounding the main entrance; most of the wall was undecorated and remains ''in situ''.

History

The facade belonged to the Qasr Mshatta or Mshatta palace, which was excavated about 30 km south of the contemporary Jordanian capital of

Amman Amman ( , ; , ) is the capital and the largest city of Jordan, and the country's economic, political, and cultural center. With a population of four million as of 2021, Amman is Jordan's primate city and is the largest city in the Levant ...

. It is thought to have served as a winter residence and storage halls during the

period. The building of the palace probably dates to the era of the

caliph A caliphate ( ) is an institution or public office under the leadership of an Islamic steward with Khalifa, the title of caliph (; , ), a person considered a political–religious successor to the Islamic prophet Muhammad and a leader of ...

Al-Walid II Al-Walid ibn Yazid ibn Abd al-Malik (; 70917 April 744), commonly known as al-Walid II, was the eleventh Umayyad caliph, ruling from 743 until his assassination in 744. He succeeded his uncle, Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik. Birth and background Al-W ...

(743-744). After Al Walid was murdered, it was left incomplete and later ruined in an

earthquake An earthquakealso called a quake, tremor, or tembloris the shaking of the Earth's surface resulting from a sudden release of energy in the lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from those so weak they ...

. The sections of the outer wall remaining ''in situ'' are much plainer. Unusually for an Umayyad building, the main structures are built from burnt bricks resting on a foundation layer of finely dressed stone; the carved facade is also in stone. The name of the place, Mshatta, is a name used by the modern

Bedouin The Bedouin, Beduin, or Bedu ( ; , singular ) are pastorally nomadic Arab tribes who have historically inhabited the desert regions in the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, the Levant, and Mesopotamia (Iraq). The Bedouin originated in the Sy ...

s in the area, and the original name remains unknown. The remains of the palace were excavated in 1840. The facade was a gift from the Ottoman Sultan

Abdul Hamid II Abdulhamid II or Abdul Hamid II (; ; 21 September 184210 February 1918) was the 34th sultan of the Ottoman Empire, from 1876 to 1909, and the last sultan to exert effective control over the fracturing state. He oversaw a Decline and modernizati ...

to Emperor

Wilhelm II of Germany Wilhelm II (Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albert; 27 January 18594 June 1941) was the last German Emperor and King of Prussia from 1888 until his abdication in 1918, which marked the end of the German Empire as well as the Hohenzollern dynasty ...

. A large part of it was brought to the then

Kaiser-Friedrich-Museum The Bode Museum (), formerly called the Emperor Frederick Museum (), is a listed building on the Museum Island in the historic centre of Berlin. It was built from 1898 to 1904 by order of German Emperor William II according to plans by Ernst v ...

(now the

Bode Museum The Bode Museum (), formerly called the Emperor Frederick Museum (), is a listed building on the Museum Island in the historic centre of Berlin. It was built from 1898 to 1904 by order of German Emperor William II according to plans by Ernst ...

) in Berlin in 1903. It was reconstructed as a 33 metres long, 5 metres high facade, with two towers, and parts of a central gateway. In 1932 it was reconstructed in the Pergamon Museum. It was seriously damaged during the Second World War and the bombardment of Berlin. Today, it is one of the most important exhibits of the ''Museum für Islamische Kunst'' in the

, and a key monument of early

and architecture, demonstrating early forms of the

arabesque The arabesque is a form of artistic decoration consisting of "surface decorations based on rhythmic linear patterns of scrolling and interlacing foliage, tendrils" or plain lines, often combined with other elements. Another definition is "Foliate ...

millefleur Millefleur, millefleurs or mille-fleur (French language, French mille-fleurs, literally "thousand flowers") refers to a background style of many different small flowers and plants, usually shown on a green ground, as though growing in grass. It i ...

and also animals carved in

relief Relief is a sculpture, sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces remain attached to a solid background of the same material. The term ''wikt:relief, relief'' is from the Latin verb , to raise (). To create a sculpture in relief is to give ...

. There has been much discussion of the fact that the decoration on the left side of the facade contains many animals among the foliar forms, while on the right of the entranceway in the centre there are no animals. It has been suggested that this is because the right-hand side was the outside wall of the mosque.

Decoration

Description

The portion of the facade housed in the

consists of the two walls on either side of a central portal from the southern facade of the Mshatta Palace. The installation also includes animal and human sculptures that were found within the palace. The decoration of the facade is primarily made up of

relief carving In wood carving relief carving is a type in which figures or patterns are carved in a flat panel of wood; the same term is also used for carving in stone, ivory carving and various other materials. The figures project only slightly from the bac ...

s depicting swirling grape vine designs interspersed with vegetal motifs, birds, and other animals. The facade frieze is bisected by a zigzag line of

acanthus leaves The acanthus () is one of the most common plant forms to make foliage ornament and decoration in the architectural tradition emanating from Greece and Rome. Architecture In architecture, an ornament may be carved into stone or wood to resemble ...

that creates a series of alternating upright and inverted triangles. Each triangle contains a unique design scheme organized around a central

rosette Rosette is the French diminutive of ''rose''. It may refer to: Flower shaped designs * Rosette (award), a mark awarded by an organisation * Rosette (design), a small flower design *hence, various flower-shaped or rotational symmetric forms: ** R ...

rimmed with acanthus leaves. Some of the common images include vases and amphorae with grape vines sprouting from them, birds perched among the vines, and predatory animals drinking from ornate bowls. While each section on the left side of the portal is decorated with various animal and human figural designs, the right side is completely composed of vegetal and other non-figural motifs. The most widely accepted explanation for this inconsistency is the presence of a

mosque A mosque ( ), also called a masjid ( ), is a place of worship for Muslims. The term usually refers to a covered building, but can be any place where Salah, Islamic prayers are performed; such as an outdoor courtyard. Originally, mosques were si ...

behind the right side of the facade. Figural designs would have been omitted from the

qibla The qibla () is the direction towards the Kaaba in the Great Mosque of Mecca, Sacred Mosque in Mecca, which is used by Muslims in various religious contexts, particularly the direction of prayer for the salah. In Islam, the Kaaba is believed to ...

wall to conform to the Islamic tradition of using non-figurative imagery in religious spaces. Other scholars have suggested that the difference between the two sides of the facade might be part of a larger shift in the entire design layout.

Greco-Roman and Sasanian influence

The imagery used on the Mshatta facade, like much early Islamic art, draws inspiration from different historical referents. The grape vine, acanthus leaf, and amphora motifs provide a clear link to

Greco-Roman The Greco-Roman world , also Greco-Roman civilization, Greco-Roman culture or Greco-Latin culture (spelled Græco-Roman or Graeco-Roman in British English), as understood by modern scholars and writers, includes the geographical regions and co ...

and

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

visual culture. These motifs were consistently used in Byzantine churches, as well as early Umayyad monuments like the

Dome of the Rock The Dome of the Rock () is an Islamic shrine at the center of the Al-Aqsa mosque compound on the Temple Mount in the Old City (Jerusalem), Old City of Jerusalem. It is the world's oldest surviving work of Islamic architecture, the List_of_the_ol ...

in Jerusalem. Some of the mythical creatures depicted in the relief also come from Greco-Roman origins, like the

griffin The griffin, griffon, or gryphon (; Classical Latin: ''gryps'' or ''grypus''; Late and Medieval Latin: ''gryphes'', ''grypho'' etc.; Old French: ''griffon'') is a -4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk ...

and

centaur A centaur ( ; ; ), occasionally hippocentaur, also called Ixionidae (), is a creature from Greek mythology with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse that was said to live in the mountains of Thessaly. In one version o ...

. One section of the facade contains a central image on the bottom register of a griffin and another creature with the head of a dog and tail of a peacock. This creature has been identified as a

simurgh The simurgh (; ; also spelled ''senmurv, simorgh, simorg'', ''simurg'', ''simoorg, simorq'' or ''simourv'') is a benevolent bird in Persian mythology and Persian literature, literature. It bears some similarities with mythological birds from di ...

from

Zoroastrian Zoroastrianism ( ), also called Mazdayasnā () or Beh-dīn (), is an Iranian religion centred on the Avesta and the teachings of Zarathushtra Spitama, who is more commonly referred to by the Greek translation, Zoroaster ( ). Among the wo ...

mythology. The appearance of a Zoroastrian mythical creature suggests that visual culture from the

Sasanian Empire The Sasanian Empire (), officially Eranshahr ( , "Empire of the Iranian peoples, Iranians"), was an List of monarchs of Iran, Iranian empire that was founded and ruled by the House of Sasan from 224 to 651. Enduring for over four centuries, th ...

influenced the design of the Mshatta facade. This is further supported by the vegetal imagery on the right side of the facade. Among the grape vines are pine cone-like buds and winged palmettes that draw reference to the iconic

crown A crown is a traditional form of head adornment, or hat, worn by monarchs as a symbol of their power and dignity. A crown is often, by extension, a symbol of the monarch's government or items endorsed by it. The word itself is used, parti ...

of the Sasanian kings. Scholars have suggested many incentives for the Caliph's use of multicultural imagery. One theory suggests that

intentionally commissioned imagery from the former ruling empires of Syria to represent the cultural heterogeneity of his subjects. Combined with the use of military architecture employed throughout the palace complex, this multicultural imagery could have been used to convey the widespread power of the Umayyad Caliphate. Another theory considers the architects and artists who carved the relief to be the driving force behind the amalgamation of cultural motifs. The Umayyads were known to employ Coptic and Orthodox Christian architects who would have been familiar with the classical motifs we see on the Mshatta facade. Parallel to this theory, scholars have argued that the Sasanian motifs reproduced on the facade differ enough from their origins that they were likely influenced by Sasanian textiles, coins, or books, not created by artisans familiar with Sasanian culture.

Gallery

File:Musée de Pergame (Berlin) (6349361315).jpg, Drawing of the reconstruction by Bruno Schulz in 1903, presented in the Museum of Islamic Art in Berlin. File:Fachada Mshatta 03.JPG, Left Facade, Pergamon Museum, Berlin

References

*Grabar, Oleg ''The Date and Meaning of Mshatta'' Dumbarton Oaks Papers, Vol. 41, Studies on Art and Archeology in Honor of Ernst Kitzinger on His Seventy-Fifth Birthday (1987), pp. 243–247 *Enderlein, Volkmar ''Mshatta-A Caliphs Palace'' The Pergamon Museum Information leaflet No. ISL I, Berlin, 1996

External links

The Date and Meaning of Mshatta
{{Authority control Islamic architecture in Asia Umayyad architecture in Jordan Islamic art Arabic art Sculptures in the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin 8th-century establishments in the Umayyad Caliphate