The Umayyad Mosque in Aleppo has been badly damaged during the ongoing conflict in Syria. The mosque’s six-storey minaret, built in 1090, was completely destroyed in the spring of 2013. The 45-metre minaret is known to have had 174 steps. The minaret, designed by Aleppo master Hassan bin Muferrek, was one of the most popular historical monuments not only in Old Aleppo, a UNESCO cultural heritage site, but also in the Islamic world.
Power Umayyad Caliph Walid bin Abdulmalik decided to construct that mosque in Aleppo after building the huge Umayyad Mosque in Damascus. Caliph Walid passed away in 715, shortly after the construction began. His brother, Suleiman bin Abdulmalik, took responsibility for completing the construction and invited his cousin Omer bin Abdulaziz to oversee the project. Two years later, in 717, when the mosque was opened for worship, it was called the Umayyad Mosque, similar to the one in Damascus. Both temples became named after the city in which they were located: the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus and the Umayyad Mosque in Aleppo.
The Umayyad Mosque in Aleppo, which witnessed the rule of the Abbasids, Seljuks, Hamadani, Ayyubids, Mamluks and Ottomans, was seriously damaged during the Crusader and Mongol attacks. The Mongols destroyed the mosque almost to the ground. Mamluk Sultan Seyfuddin Kalavun restored the mosque to the form we saw until 2013. The mosque had a unique wooden minbar by master Muhammed bin Ali el-Mawlisi. The minbar is considered to be one of the most beautiful examples of Islamic art. Sadly, today almost all of Old Aleppo, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, has been destroyed.
The Umayyad Mosque in Aleppo is an important part of Islamic and Muslim history also because the tomb of the Prophet Zechariah, identified with St Zechariah, father of the Prophet Yahya (John the Baptist) and guardian of Mariam (the Virgin Mary), was discovered there. Some sources say that the relics of the prophet were found in the Baalbek area of Lebanon in 1043 and reburied in the city of Homs and then in Aleppo. It is claimed that the Prophet’s head was buried inside the mosque, when there was a danger of the Mongol invasion of the city. Thus, the Umayyad Mosque in Aleppo is a monument and special place not only for Muslims, but also for Christians around the world.
Of course, this is only one of the existing versions of the location of Zechariah’s relics. The Catholic tradition holds that the relics are in Venice; the Armenian Church says that they are kept in the monastery of Gandzasar in Nagorno-Karabakh. There is also a version that the relics were in the Great Church of Constantinople, where they were brought by the prefect Urbi Ursus on 4 September 415.
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: Guillaume Piolle/Creative Commons 3.0