Architecture in Sicily under Norman have before mentioned (p. 129) that the luxurious architectural monuments erected in Sicily under Arabian domination no longer exist; but all the peculiarities of Arabic architecture, as well as of Arabic culture, were continued under the Nor mans after the overthrow of the Arabian domination. As at an earlier period the Christians were indeed overpowered, but were not converted into Arabs, so under the Normans the Arabian population with its culture remained, and even partially developed itself in the service of the Nor man princes, who, recognizing the higher culture of the Mohammedan, were not slow to utilize it.
Influence (?f Saracenic ArI in we glance at the compara tively low grade of the art of the Christian kingdoms of the West in the eleventh century, it will appear that Saracenic art, though it had not then reached the fairy-like beauty of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, must have made a deep impression on susceptible minds. And the Nor mans were susceptible; otherwise the beauty of the land would not have induced them to reside there, otherwise with its stolen treasures they would certainly have returned in their ships to their native land.
Roger built near Palermo two country palaces, Mine nium and Favara, in the Saracenic style, both surrounded with parks and ponds. His successors William I. and William II. followed his example, and an Arabian traveller of the time of William II. celebrates the mag nificence of the mansions which surrounded Palermo, comparing them to a rich necklace adorning the throat of a maiden. From the reign of William I. (died 1166) dates the still extant Palace Zisa, and the Palace Kuba from that of William II. (died 1189). Both stand at a short distance from each other near Palermo.
The Palace Zisa is externally a severe and commanding structure of three storeys simply crowned with battlements, carefully constructed of squared stone, and adorned with pointed arches in which the windows are set. In the interior, behind a portico, is a magnificent square reception hall of considerable height, with niches on three of its sides; these niches are veiled with those many-celled vaults which we meet with in Spanish buildings. The walls are covered with varicolored tiles and marble. Above the groined vault of the central hall was an open court by which the halls of the middle and upper storeys were lighted. A flat roof now covers the entire building, and windows broken in the niches of the outer walls light these rooms from without.
Palace in every respect to the Zisa is the smaller but more elegant Kuba, the central hall of which was originally lighted by a cupola. There are some small chambers in this building, which was a place, not of residence, but of festivity, and was surrounded by many pavilions, one of which, a dome raised aloft on four pointed arches, is still extant.
The Palatine Christian churches followed the Arabian style in the Sicily of this period, yet were strongly influenced by the Byzantine, which had left its traces in the land, and to a less degree by the style of the West, of which the Normans themselves had brought the elements. The most famous of Sicilian churches erected in the Arabian style is the Palatine Chapel in the royal palace at Palermo, a three-aisled basilica erected 1129-114o. The aisles are divided by Corinthian columns. connected by high-pitched pointed arches. The side-aisles had open timbered roofs, but the ceiling of the nave was of stalactitic Morcsque work. Above the centre rises a cupola on high-pitched pointed arches. The walls are lined with marble tiles and bedecked with mosaics on a gold ground, in which the Byzantine and partly the Occidental styles predominate over the Arabic, which is evident only in the inscriptions and in individual details. An interior view of this church is given in Figure 3 (fl. 27).
More or less similar are the Cathedral of Cefalii (begun 1132), the Church La Magione at Palermo (1.13o), the cathedral itself (consecrated I 185), and the Cathedral of Monreale (r174-1189). The exterior of these churches is decorated with colored marbles. At the time of their erec tion they excited the admiration both of Arabian travellers and of Chris tians, and Pope Lucius III. says in a bull of 1182 that since the days of antiquity no work which could compare with the Cathedral of Monreale had been built by any king.
Jiohammedan of the development of architecture in Persia between the eleventh and fifteenth centuries are almost wanting. The dynasty of the Bnyids made Shiraz a brilliant capital in the tenth and eleventh centuries. At the same time the Chaznavids, upon the Indian confines, inaugurated an era of architec tural prosperity. In the thirteenth century the Mongols obtained the upper hand, and did not neglect architecture; some towers still exist that were erected by these either as tombs or as triumphal monuments. Here belongs the Tower of Vezid, near Teheran, ascribed to the four teenth century. Towers crowned with cupolas are found at Erivan and Selmas. The tomb of Mohammed Khodabenda, at Sultanieh, is a dome roofed building of the fourteenth century, octangular in form and richly decorated upon its exterior. The mosque at Tabriz, built in the fifteenth century, but now in ruins, is in its arrangement related to the Byzantine style.