Claudine Piaton, Ezio Godoli and David Peyceré (dir.)
Building Beyond The Mediterranean
Studying The Archives of European Businesses (1860-1970)
Publications de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art
The restoration of the Muhammad Ali Mosque in
Cairo, 1931-1938
La « mise en état » de la mosquée Mohammad Ali au Caire (1931-1938)
Mercedes Volait
DOI: 10.4000/books.inha.12772
Publisher: Publications de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, Honoré Clair, InVisu (CNRS-INHA)
Place of publication: Arles
Year of publication: 2012
Published on OpenEdition Books: 2 March 2021
Serie: InVisu
Electronic ISBN: 9791097315016
http://books.openedition.org
Printed version
Date of publication: 1 January 2012
Electronic reference
VOLAIT, Mercedes. The restoration of the Muhammad Ali Mosque in Cairo, 1931-1938 In: Building Beyond
The Mediterranean: Studying The Archives of European Businesses (1860-1970) [online]. Arles:
Publications de l’Institut national d’histoire de l’art, 2012 (generated 05 mars 2021). Available on the
Internet: <http://books.openedition.org/inha/12772>. ISBN: 9791097315016. DOI: https://doi.org/
10.4000/books.inha.12772.
The restoration of the Muhammad Ali Mosque in Cairo, 1931-1938
Mercedes Volait
On the southern side of the Mediterranean, European
construction companies were not only called upon for
buildings, industrial constructions, public architecture, and
modern dwellings. They were also invited to take on restoration, even reconstruction work on historic monuments.
From the 1870s, steps were taken by local or colonial
authorities to protect the ancient centers of the region’s
cities, while also carrying out modernization works. In
Cairo, partial reconstructions, alignment setbacks, and even
relocating historic buildings, were done from the end of
the 19th century.365 The Hennebique archives have retained
a record in images of the reconstruction in reinforced
concrete of the sepulchral mosque of Qalawun (1284)
in 1904-1905, as well as the restitution of the barriers
on the cap of the Sultan Hasan Mosque (1356-1362) in
1909.366 We know that a competition for the construction
of the Amr Ibn al-Ass mosque (827, numerous subsequent
alterations) was launched in 1925.367
One major project is now well documented thanks to a
comparative analysis of the sources.368 The “restoration” of
the Muhammad Ali Mosque was carried out during the 1930s.
Built a century earlier on the orders of the reigning sovereign, the building constitutes Cairo’s principal monument in
the Turkish style. Its prayer room is covered by a large
central dome supported on four half-cupolas, themselves
resting on four arches and pillars; the two minarets follow
the slender template in use in Istanbul. The sovereign had
been ambitious: the minarets reach 82m, the dome has a
height at its summit of 52m, ten more than the Sultan Ahmet
Mosque (1616), its model in Istanbul, and the wall cladding
is made of alabaster. Oversized, the mosque showed signs of
weakness from the end of the 19th century; an attempt was
made then to reinforce the masonry of the pillars supporting
the dome by lining them; iron rings were placed at the
springing of the main arches.369
Law n° 8 of 1918 for the protection of monuments of Arab
art expanded the perimeter of protection to all buildings
earlier than the end of the reign of Muhammad Ali (1849).
The mosque was therefore included on the list of protected
II • BUILDING AND EMBELLISHING
structures (n° 503) and from then on entrusted to the Comité
de Conservation des Monuments de l’Art Arabe, the protection agency for historic monuments created in 1881, so that
its maintenance could be supervised.370 It was on this occasion that a detailed examination of the building took place,
and revealed worrying deterioration. The mosque had cracks
all over, some fissures appearing through the entire height
of the building; others, located at the bases of pillars, were
almost 10 cm wide. Urgent action was required.
On December 29, 1931 a technical commission was formed
under the leadership of the architect Sayyid Metoualli Bey,371
director of the technical service of the “Arab Monuments”
department at the ministry of the Waqf. Its other members
175
Muhammad Ali Mosque, Cairo:
Rehabilitation project (1933), vertical
section of the mosque
the construction materials was commissioned. Calculations
of strain were made374 and indicators were put in place.
Sixteen months later, in May 1933, examination cleared the
foundations of responsibility for the deterioration. A chemical analysis by Ismaïl Omar showed that the cracks were
caused not by the materials used for the domes (bricks
and mortar), but by their support structure: arches, drums,
pendentives, and pillars. A verticality check showed that the
building was sagging towards the exterior; on the walls, the
deformation equalled 10 cm for 11 m in height, while in
the minarets, some 20 cm of deflection were measured. The
calculation of average strain led to the conclusion that the
building’s structural mechanics suffered under the thrust
from horizontal forces. By elimination, the Commission came
to identify the structural reasons for the deformities and
tearing as insufficient anchorage of the straps placed at the
springing of the arches, as well as rust. The iron dowels,
sealed in lead, binding the stones together, like the metal
ring around the drum, revealed badly eroded areas. It also
appeared that the building had been weakened by a past
earthquake, the later explosion of a munitions store, and
Cairo temperatures.375
From May 1932 to February 1933, the Commission worked
on a reconstruction project. Two scenarios were studied:
either rebuilding the entire lower part of the structure (the
pillars) without touching the domes, or redoing the upper
were Charles Andreae (1874-1964), a Swiss civil engineer area (the domes) and the pillars. In both cases, the entire
who since 1928 had been director of the Cairo Polytechnic building would require interior scaffolding. The first soluSchool,372 three civil engineers from the Ministry for Public tion was rejected after studying the cost of scaffolding
Works: Serge Leliavsky (1891-1963),373 Ismaïl Omar Bey capable of supporting the upper structure whose weight
and Ahmed Fahmy Ibrahim Effendi, and an architect, Farag was estimated at 4,000 t (of which 1,750t for the central
Amin, Inspector of the Royal Buildings. The commission dome). For reconstructing the domes, the Commission
had to carry out a detailed examination of the mosque’s recommended using reinforced concrete framework. Origicondition, issue an opinion on the causes of the defects nally, they planned to fill in with bricks, like in the original
it identified, and present suggestions for its restoration, construction; in the end, prefabricated slabs flashed with
even though nothing was known about how the building lead sheeting were used to roof the structure.376 The decihad been constructed, because any building plans that had sion was based on the conclusions of the very recent
ever existed had been lost. Surveys and excavations were International Congress on the Conservation of Artistic and
carried out on the mosque’s foundations. An analysis of Historic Monuments which accepted “the principle of using
176
Rehabilitation
Muhammad Ali Mosque, Cairo:
Rehabilitation project leaders, c. 1935
modern materials for the reconstruction of ancient buildings.”377 There, the issue of raising the main monuments of
the Acropolis of Athens by the process of anastylosis had
also been discussed.
The half-cupolas and the small domes had to be constructed
on the ground and then raised; the large dome was to be reconstructed in situ. The work was estimated at 60,000 Egyptian
Pounds (EP), of which 50,000 EP was budgeted for the metal
scaffolding to support the building during the works. The
structure was delicate to install because it could not use
any bearing points likely to weaken the mosque even more.
The work was put to tender in September 1933. Eleven
contractors responded to the invitation.378 With the help of
its local agent, the Belgian Léon Rolin, Hennebique submitted
a bid.379 On December 27, 1933, the Commission endorsed
the offer from the Swiss company, Rothpletz & Lienhard.380
Andreae had already worked with both engineers, Ferdinand
Rothpletz (1872-1949)381 and Friedrich Lienhard (1873-1952);
all three were graduates of the Federal Polytechnic Institute
of Zurich. With 53,095 EP (including the installation of iron
scaffolding for the entire mosque in one go), it was the lowest
bid, ahead of the Italian company Garozzo (54,034 EP) and the
muallim (master mason) Siyam Muhammad (54,061 EP).382
The satisfaction of the Egyptian Ministry for Public Works
with Rothpletz & Lienhard, in association with the companies Almagià (Italian) and Ruegg (Swiss),383 on their first
Egyptian worksite, the digging of the al-Ahaywa Tunnel in
Middle Egypt, seems to have played a part.384 Hennebique
would subsequently admit to having incorrectly overestimated the cost of the metal scaffolding.385
The works were scheduled to be completed in 22 months,
from March 1, 1934 to December 31, 1935. They lasted two
months longer. The photographs of the worksite taken by the
company and the report on the works made by Charles
Andreae allow their progress to be followed.386 The first
stage was designing the scaffolding. It was completed and
installed by March 1, 1935. Weighing 650 t, it was made by
Goganian, a local locksmith company, from designs by two
professors at the Cairo Polytechnic School, H. Schwyzer and
II • BUILDING AND EMBELLISHING
I. El-Demerdash.387 The central tower of the scaffolding was
equipped with a lift for the workers (built by the Schindler
company at Schlieren near Zurich) and a paternoster (a
continuous caterpillar track supplied by the Swiss firm
Oehler based at Aarau) to carry the concrete and the mortar.
In parallel, the consolidation of the minarets with triangular
slabs was done in July 1934. The coffering in wood for the
large dome was prepared on the ground (September 6, 1934).
Outside scaffolding was erected simultaneously; the demolition
of the large dome in brick was begun in February 1935; the
demolition works, pillars included, was finished in July 1935.
The small domes were finished on December 24, 1935, the
central dome on February 6, 1935, the half-cupolas a week
later. The original covering in lead was returned to most of
these; the large dome received new sheets of lead 3 mm
thick. Some of the cut stone for the exterior casing was reused;
the missing elements were replaced with imitation stone.
The project was managed locally by the architect Farag
Amin Bey, Inspector of the Royal Buildings, Serge Leliavsky and Charles Andreae. They kept scrupulously to the
allocated budget; the scaffolding (16,110 EP) and the reinforced concrete (21,260 EP) were the biggest expenses. An
amount that was almost equivalent (40,000 EP) was spent
on renewing the decoration, which Andreae considered
177
Muhammad Ali Mosque, Cairo: Demolition
of the great dome, February 1935
178
Rehabilitation
Muhammad Ali Mosque, Cairo: General
view after dome demolition, July 1935
II • BUILDING AND EMBELLISHING
179
180
Rehabilitation
Muhammad Ali Mosque, Cairo: Installing
the timber casing for the large reinforced
concrete dome, autumn 1935
Installing the concrete tiles for the west
half dome, January 1936
II • BUILDING AND EMBELLISHING
181
Muhammad Ali Mosque, Cairo:
Reinforcement of the concrete slab at the
base of the northern minaret, August 1934
Plywood forms for a part of the great
dome, September 1934
to be of much less value than the quality of the structure.388 The Ministry of the Waqf had taken care to allocate 1,000 EP in 1934 to the Comité de Conservation des
Monuments de l’Art Arabe for the execution of drawings
in color, photographs and rubbings of the mosque’s décor;
plaster casts had also been taken.389 At least the décors
were recreated identically.
The mosque was renovated again in 1999, when the dome
covering was redone, and the minarets were refaced.390
The restoration of the Muhammad Ali Mosque earned the
company Rothpletz & Lienhard a similar project, the restoration of the Nilometer. The structure, serving to measure the
ebb and flood of the Nile, dated from 861 and was located
at the tip of Roda Island. The company made it permanently
impermeable with complete casing in reinforced concrete.
The sizing of the structure was calculated free of charge
by Serge Leliavsky. Carried out in 1937-1938, these works
were complemented in 1945 by the reconstruction of the
Nilometer’s cupola, a subject that had long been debated
within the Comité de Conservation des Monuments de l’Art
Arabe. Some advocated replicating the roofing the Nilometer
might have had when it was erected in the 9th century, under
Fatimid rule. Another wing of the committee was in favor
of restoring the curious Seljuk-influenced pyramidal dome,
probably built at the beginning of the Ottoman period. It
had been surveyed quite accurately in 1737 by the Danish
traveller Frederik Norden. The arguments of the latter group
prevailed.391
These two projects are only the tip of the iceberg. In a region
steeped in history, the sector involving the restoration of
ancient monuments was undoubtedly much more important
than we imagine today, but we lack of an overview on the
subject. Let us hope that in the future, architectural historians will engage in the study of these projects. Reconstructions and relocations of historic buildings required as much
ingenuity as than new construction. European engineers and
builders were active in the field, and transferred know-how
to local professionals.
182
Rehabilitation
Roda Island Nilometer, Cairo:
Restoration work in progress (1937-1938)
II • BUILDING AND EMBELLISHING
183