SARACEN1C ARCHITECTURE, is the term usually applied in this country to what would perhaps be better named Mohammedan archi tecture, since it embraces the architecture of all Mohammedan peoples, or Arabian architecture, from the race with whom it originated. But though the style may be traced back to them, the Arabians cannot be considered as themselves the inventors of it. They had in fact no (Instinctive style of their own, when the rapid spread of the religion of Mohammed and the conquests of his followers rendered necessary the erection of numerous religious edifices, and called into existence a new style of architecture. Mohammed is 'BMW to have built a mosque at others. Hence, as has been often pointed out and is now generally admitted, the Mohammedans wherever they secured a standing adopted the architecture of the subjugated race. Thus iu Persia we may clearly trace in Mohammedan buildings the older Persian typo; in India (as was observed under Lute, Aactirrzerraz of) that of the Hindus ; in Spain the debased Roman or early Romanesque; in Egypt, Syria, and Turkey, the Byzantine t but everywhere this native character was modified and adapted, overlaid with a certain exuberant oriental fancifulness, Imbued with Mohammedan feeling : in short combined with a new and foreign element, instead of being prosaically copied as it stood; and thus was rapidly evolved a distinct and well-charac terised style.
What may be regarded as the typical varieties of the earlier Saracenic architecture are those which appeared in Spain in the 8th century of the Christian cra, and in Egypt somewhat earlier : its later form appeared in Constantinople. In each of these a striking and distinctive feature is the horse-shoe arch. But this though a peculiar is by no means a constant feature of the style, or used to the exclusion of other forms of arches. On the contrary there are several varieties, and among them is the pointed arch, which is already a well-established form in the mosque of Ahmed Ibn Tooloon, erected at Cairo in the 9th century, and is of frequent occurrence in other Mohammedan structures erected in that city in the 10th century. The arch being so essential a characteristic of the style we give a few of its various forms in the annexed figures.
Fig. 1 is an example of the horse-shoe form, having the centre c on the diameter of the arch raised above the chord or spring of the curve (the dotted line), and consequently the curve itself is greater than a semicircle. The same figure further exemplifies some differences of
application, the side or half A showing the arch supported on columns, the other without columns; besides which it illustrates other varia tions; for on the side is the head of the arch is closed over a square headed aperture net wider than the span or chord ; whereas on the side A the opening between the columns is as wide as the diameter of the arch itself in its greatest width through the centre c.
Fig. 2 is an instance of a pointed horse-shoe arch, it being struck from two centres, which, as in the other case, are elevated above the line of the impost, or spring, from which the curve commences. This Medina, but it was a structure of the simplest kind, and he left no directions in the Koran for the guidance of his disciples in erecting figure also exhibits two varieties of decorations, both of them by scalloping ; one half being scalloped on the intrados, or edge of the arch itself; and in the other, the extrados, or outer circumference, being so cut, or more properly speaking, the edge of the face of the wall within which the arch recedes : of which kind is the gate in what is called the Casa del Carbon at Granada.
The next example is of what may be called the cusped or scalloped arch, strictly so termed, the outlino being produced by intersecting semicircles, similar to the trefoil-headed compartments in our Gothic windows; but beyond that general resemblance, which certainly goes some way to confirm the opinion that the Gothic style borrowed some thing from the Saracenic, the character is altogether different, not only because it is here the whole arch which is so shaped, instead of merely a snbdivision within a larger opening, but also both on account of the external moulding following the same form, and of quite a different mode of decoration. In gothic architecture the spandrels, or trian gular spaces between the foils, are panelled with splayed surfaces uniting in the centre. Arches of the kind here shown occur in the sanctuary of the great mosque at Cordova (Sth century), where they rest upon columns which both in their capitals and shafts bear con siderable similarity to Corinthian ones, except that they are shorter and without bases, and are therefore very different from the slender pillars peculiar to Arabian architecture.